The Woman on the Tracks

On this day of greatest tragedy in the Sindh can`t help reflecting on how true to life this story is. So many trying to hide the dark problems that often lead to big big disaster - such as happens daily to our women in train carriage as well as on the streets - and distractions of those in charge with what they feel is more important. Sad sad story and sad sad day. Unfortunate this scenario really does happen - that everyone seems only thinking of themself and time it would take from them if they helped or did the right thing?

Only thing I don`t believe is last paragraph - NO normal man would give up sexing his wife forever being plagued by gory thought and sight of another - man`s conscience fades too quickly and especially when urges come day in and day out.

May we each pray to be affected by the tragedy today whether it affected us directly or not. This story is clear reminder of us all that life is too short to think only of ourself.

Well...Beejay...ummm...thanks :-).

Dear Jawahara:

Since nobody is coming up with any more remarks on this, I guess it’s for me to collect the shards and try to construct some kind of meaningful closure to this tragic story that you wrote. (I don’t expect a reply to this, of course.)

Anyway, grabbing a few moments here and there from my janitorial duties, and thinking about the lady who got cut on the train track, here is a little poem I came up with. I hope you won’t mind if I put it here in its entirety. Thanks.

The Hollow

End of line – ends the life
Well-in-vested – or wise
Well spent, till call
Aren’t dots we all
To each – track own
As the flesh meets track
What’s laid – was Said
And the soul goes back
Each own – whence came
Was it train – ran it down?
Or the furor – of crowd
Crowded one, crowded all
But to save one – none
Save the self – we must all
Save thy self – lady sweet
These are crowds – just crowds
And that train – so near
Pull away – my dear!
In shine – in rain
To each – own train!

And the soul leaves body
What then leave us behind?
Even birthing all new
And sweet and kind
It’s free from THE soul
As the paths go on
In by-lanes, and by-worlds
And to dot – it’s not
Cin-dumb-ella or Cruella
It’s one – and the same
That very, very own
That blessing o’ delight
Your soul – my soul
Their soul – all soul
Sole soul
It’s happy and sad
Both good and bad!

Write ode to a lady
Never knew one self
Yet the pain hangs on
Deeper ever, not gone
Permeating more, more
Deep as vast oceans
As body we sever
And the whole – it took
Every part, every nook
Every bone, all skin
In breathing, in sense
Sweetest pain on roll
Sans pain, no gain
No gain, like soul!

Write ode to a lady
Never knew never met
Man’s words, just words
And they sure even fade
And the words that we are
Magic all through and through
And they land wherever
Magic blessings of soul
Some like rain – rain-bows
Some just dark – dark clouds
All the colors of the soul
Know not what – was the price
Even if – was a choice?
And the sorrow – not tomorrow
Over time yet will heal
Over time surely mend
And vanish, not kill
As the burning – comes to end
There’s always tomorrow
Leaving more – or not
Only core – bit hollow!

And go on – as you do
Hope happy – and gay
From afar – tips his “hat”
Sincerely “BeeJay”!

#22 MiriamK (further add-on)

I forgot the all-important question –

What’s the appropriate punishment for the people who committed this slicing outrage?

Hanging? Shooting? Jibah?

Or even public ridicule?

Or does it even matter, since they may already be brain-dead?

#22 Miriamk (add-on)

Since you are here, I was wondering if you can enlighten the ignorant me regarding the following questions regarding this “story”-

Do you think that the language was staccato clinical?
Do you think that this author has almost sliced the words beneath the wheels of thought, and in their spareness both life and death are shorn of any embellishment?
Although the anonymous `body` has not been given a name, do you think that it comes across as a sutradhar, holding forth on the mundanity of people`s lives around it, besides its own?
Do you think it is like a dying woman`s testimony?
Do you think that in those few minutes of near-death that character was ageing and regressing at the same time?

And last but certainly NOT the least-

Do you think that the body without the soul amounts to just a piece of crap, or not?

Sincerely,
BeeJay.

#22 MiriamK
It’s nice to see you too here!

#17 Jawahara
I do not wish to belabor the point (and be too morbid about it), but when somebody gets split in the way you described in your story, only one part will include the head and be considered alive – the other would be a dead appendage! The longer the two parts stay connected, the longer the life expectation for what used to be the combined entity – which would have been of some value! Once the split is physically complete (so each part could be moved around independent of other) the expectations of life would be considered minimal! (Just some foolish thoughts of mine! I’m not a medical doctor. You don’t need to answer this one.)

jawahara:

this was just lovely. keep `em coming.

rgds
miriam

The beauty of prose helps one gloss over the lapses in logic. Great stuff!

very very nice !

good story. could be better - somehow. don`t know how. in any case, chowk needs more of this stuff on the front page.

Jawahara,

A few summers ago I had to take the crushed remains of a victim only to be declared `brought dead`. There were many onlookers but there were helpers too. And that autowalah who wouldnt take money. With billion people, life`s cheap here yes, but not THAT cheap.

The dying woman thoughts were poignant read.

``Jism jab khatm ho aur rooh ka saans aaye..
mujhse ek kavita ka vada hai milegi mujhko`` ( Really haunting in ABs voice)

Cheers

Thanks for the comments everyone. I had taken a break from writing short stories for a while and this one came about while experimenting with different styles.

FV, thanks for your comments. I am flattered. Truly, I am.

Temporal, thanks. You`re too kind. I don`t know if I`ve arrived somewhere. I think I am somewhere enroute to some destination. Who knows, huh?

Veeresh, thanks. Perhaps some Bombayite (Mumbaikar?) can answer that question. I got so caught up in writing the story I forgot to doublecheck the names of trains.

Beejay, I did struggle with the length of time she could have remained alive but I have heard of instances of people with injuries like hers who have survived for up to an hour. But really the story for me, apart from her death was of moral dilemmas, human apathy, choices, the crushing weight of life and death and guilt.

Rahul, I did try to write this in a third person narrative initially while I was playing around with the form, but I felt a distance from `her` in that. Maybe it might work if someone else was writing this same story.

drlokraj, yes, years ago, when I was a child, I had heard of cops in one Indian metro who waited around for a woman (victim of some accident) to die because it would be much less hassle for them. For some reason, these cops appeared in this story for me.

Godot, self torture? :-) Sometimes I think it`s more self indulgence than self torture for me at least.

I seem to take longish breaks from writing but when I start up again it`s always great to know I can almost instant feedback from chowk.

Take care all.

Brilliant, Jawahara, but why so much self-torture?

Very touching, profound and poignant. Well crafted.

tha kaun meray qatl ki Deita jo gawahi
logoN ne tau kholay nahiN derwaazay bhi ghar ke

So there`s a thin red line between the conscious and the sub. While the former may resort to selfishness, the latter can`t but harbor the basic human instinct...hence the endless guilt.

Re: # 8 It dies everytime she does.

This is a disturbing story in many ways.Has the author witnessed such incidence/accident or is it all imagination? In any case it is difficult to accept the callousness attributed to the onlookers.There must be hundreds of people present at that time on the platform...were they all just tamaasbeen,just witnessing the policemen waiting for her to die? This is highly improbable......still, people are the first ones to do the rescue/relief work and use their own means to save the accident victim.

Secondly if Mohan was displaying this behavior on the accident scene,he can not be having that haunting obsessive imagery later that night.These behaviors dont co-exist in the same person.

Jawahara, so you did a Thanda Gosht on us :-).What do i know, but I will butt in with a some points- The story is written in a first person imposed upon a third person,as in we are always told wht ``she`` is feeling or thinking. Was this unavoidable for this story,I dont know. But I thin it cud have been more effective if it could have been done away with in favour of a pure third person. Secondly, the last sentence shud have been omitted or shudnt have been so definitive. Good story, nonetheless.

i missed your haunting writings jawahara, welcome back

Only in `Jis desh mein ganga bhaitee hai`
sang RajKapoor.
Reality check
Shashi Bansal

Dear Jawahara:

You leave me very stumped!

I’m trying very hard to visualize what the main character could have done to avoid the fate described here. For once, I’m having a lot of difficulties:

(1) Perhaps she could have shouted out?
(2) Perhaps she could let go of those vegetables?
(3) Perhaps simply put up with the outrage till it was safer to move away?
(4) Perhaps missed the train?
(5) Perhaps ….

Too many perhaps, but when it’s time to go, we just have to go.

I do know what the others SHOULD have done after the mishap. Too many things that were not done the way they were supposed to be. Too many to mention here!

If I were a regular commuter of the type described here (over ten year experience, as you say), I would have probably developed a working approach for riding safely and to deal with such situations. Life is precious, after all.

---

About the story itself, there is an element of improbability. People “cut in half” will lose so much blood in no time that they would loose consciousness immediately, and the suffering would be (mercifully) very short. (That’s just a guess.) I think that some research on the medical/forensic part of it may have been in order. The indifference of individuals is well-captured.

The tricks that the imagination plays on those who are about to die is also very sensitively described here. In some ways, I’m reminded of the Hemingway story “Snows of Kilimanjaro”.

This guy “Mohan” could benefit from some counseling, too! Perhaps this story could form part of the therapy. I would have wished him good luck with it!

Jawahara:

Brilliantly morbid, or morbidly brilliant.

It was almost like reading Rohinton`s Mistry`s ``A Fine Balance``.

Is humanity, too, really dying in India?

Hi Jawahara:

This was simply wonderful -- the staccato clinical language. It is almost as though you have sliced the words beneath the wheels of thought, and in their spareness both life and death are shorn of any embellishment.

With sharp insight on your part, the anonymous `body` has not been given a name. Yet, to my mind, she comes across as a sutradhar, holding forth on the mundanity of people`s lives around her, besides her own. It is like a dying woman`s testimony.

Even those reminscences about her family -- those little worries...the dosas for Rajesh, and her imagining her children when they were kids. For a moment, the senile reference did not seem to fit in when one thought about a 10-year-old and an adolescent as her children. But I suppose that in those few minutes of near-death she was ageing and regressing at the same time.

The last para...Revathy as mute witness to her own `death`? Mohan`s conscience, guilt, denial? The `severence` of body and (from?) soul...

sifar:

:)

yaar humaiN sh`er yaad nahin rehtay...aik aap haiN aur allah bhala karay banjara sahib ka...bar waq`t madud ko aa pohanchtay haiN

Re: # 4
Umr-i-Daraaz maang ke laaey thhay chaar Din
dau aarzoo meiN katt gaey Dau intezaar meiN

unkil T, y do I always have to correct you when it comes to Urdu poetry? hehe, feels like I have been granted an upper hand in one thing for the least....keep em coming ;)
regards

jawahara:

..first some clichés?...gripping, morbid, j-darkish

what irony…difference between life and death is only four pages!...what was it bahadur-shah wrote?...maang la’aye thay chaar din?

lve

t

ps: sam: :)…read some of her earlier stories…she arrived way back!

The last paragraph is Weird.

VT-Dadar local train? A bit of a flaw there, especially since VT is a terminal, but yes, she could be boarding en route, however I don`t know if there are any VT-Dadar locals.

But morbidly interesting.

Read something like this in the vernacular once, though.

Brilliant.

Jawahara, you have arrived!