My Sis: Through My Eyes (27)
Chapter- 27 (A Saga of Unending Heroism)
Nothing could be a worse phase in my life than what I have been going through lately. If one thing has kept me going till date, it has to be my Sis. My Sis has ‘qualities uncountable’ (I’m quoting the words of a brother here.) But she is also the most unfortunate woman. Almost everyone I know, other than a few close relatives, has one thing or the other against her.
It pains me no ends when I find most of my own people abhorring her so much. She cannot be perfect, goes without saying. Once she takes something to be right, she will fight for it till the end. She goes beyond the limits, almost berserk at times as well. But that’s all about (should I say, the only?) the ‘human frailties’ of my Sis. (I can’t help quoting the Bard of Avon here. “Frailty, thy name is woman.” Remember?)
Now let me tell you about her plus points. Ask any brother, who is god-fearing, and he will tell you that Sis is the most ungreedy lady he has ever known. There was a time, when my Barda, on her arrival in Kolkata, would ask Sis to empty the contents of his huge suitcases, and Sis would take out the coffee-maker, the dresses and the drinks, the gilt-edged model of the gondola and what not. She never asked for a thing for herself. I think my estranged Jamaibabu (Bro-in-law) would be the first to vouch for her ungreedy nature. It shows the faith my Barda had in my Sis. Even my late Ma wouldn’t go anywhere without Sis. Both my parents loved her a great deal. No one else in the family could take liberties with my Baba like the way my Sis did.
Anyway, to come back to the Qualities of my Sis, and I have no intention of exaggerating things here. I have often heard many criticising, complaining of my partiality towards my Sis. my biasedness, as they would term me. Now let me ask you, dear reader, if it is a sin to be biased to a sibling? One remains biased to a person – be it a sibling, relative, friend or rank outsider – one admires, adores and idolizes. The moment one loses the trust and respect, the relationship ends. I have seen the utter distrust, disregard of many a sibling for another. Our age-old values and beliefs are fast evaporating due to sibling rivalry. Personally, I am someone with a sugar-coated mouth. I have never quarrelled with anyone other than my siblings. But that is because they are the ones forming the cornerstone of my idea of living a contented, fulfilled life. So, if I find anyone of them deviating from what I consider to be right or truth, (Oh! Yes. I know Truth is many-sided) I forget myself. For I know it for sure that if one is distanced for one reason or the other, from one’s near and dear ones, the loss is irreplaceable. I realized this simple truth early on in life and tried to stick to my Sis, come rain or sunshine.For a very large family like my late Baba’s to survive, one member has to stick to the next, the next to another member, and the chain of sibling love stays strengthened, thereby ensuring some sort of family bonding till the end.
The next great quality of my Sis is her courage. The tales of heroism being enacted by Sis at BPK on a daily basis, are enough materials for her to win a nomination to My Woman Hero. Even this morning when I called her, she told me over the phone, how she had to deal with the four errant boys who bunked from the hostel without any intimation to the authorities, just to have some fun with their counterparts in the Girls’ Hostel. No dinner awaited them at my Sis’s order, after the scheduled time. When the boys returned drunk at 10.15 at night and raised a hue and cry outside the locked gates of BPK, Sis needed to call someone in the headquarters. The Security Guard from the Girls’ Hostel was made to come over. The miscreants, cursing and threatening, were allowed to get inside. Her dealings with the inmates of BPK not only show her Courage but also her Intelligence and Kindness as well. As Sis was narrating to me the reaction of the other inmates, who had come down during the uproar, not willing to let Sis handle the culprits alone, I winced and was reminded time and again of a story I heard about my Mejda (Please refer to: http://masb6.blogspot.com/2013/12/dhiresh-bhattacharyya-teacher.html?m=1). During the Naxalite Movement in the 70s in Bengal, when some local goons, brayed for my Mejda’s blood from outside the gates of Tiljala Brojo Nath Bidyapith in the Picnic Gardens area, the seniormost students of the school came running down and cowered the thugs asking them to lay a finger on Dhiresh Bhattacharyya, if they dared. The cherry on this pudding of a story is how Sis later bandaged the bleeding finger of one of the miscreants, who broke one of the windows from outside, while the fun-lovers were on the rampage!
I could have told you stories about her Honesty, Sacrifice, Encouraging and Enthusiastic nature and Never-Say-Die Attitude but some
stories are better left unsaid ( or should I say for posterity to ponder over?).
I told you earlier that my Sis is unfortunate. She is one of those rare individuals, who do not crave for name or fame. I have not the slightest doubt in my mind that Sis is being desperate by the day as she has started believing that she has neither any earthly attachments nor any obligations. And I fear for my Sis’s safety for this reason alone. What if someone becomes wild in the heat of the moment and lays a hand on Sis? When I asked her not to lose her cool in such uncontrollable situations, she could be heard smiling at the other end and pat came the reply:”These inmates love and respect me like their mother, Bappa. They won’t let anything untoward happen to me ever.”
Most of her close ones discarded her, left her at the mercy of God when all she needed was the love, support and trust of her own people. If there is such a God after all, I’ll only request Him to bless me with such a Sis, if there be a thing called rebirth.
