Ayodhya: The tale of a mind.

“If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month.”-Theodore Roosevelt

His grand-father was kicked out from Punjab (Pakistan) in India at the age of 10. The orphan than learned to earn his wages in India and finally started his family in the greatest democracy of all time. The happy family had some issues, had to leave their complete property behind and no proper education, getting a permanent wager was difficult. But he did manage to get a job as a waiter in a restaurant and on that salary, managed a family of four.

His father was the eldest son and was a businessman. He had opened a small shop of catering in the town. The shop used to cater to all the local functions of all the religions. The Special Biryani made in the shop was the talk of the town for years.

All was well, until, until the fated day when the country burned and with it, burned his childhood. He was one year old, but he knew exactly why his grandmother was crying hysterically. He understood why he never saw his mother again and he knew, life would never be same again.

He had some vague memory of the night. That night, Mother and Father had not returned from the shop. His grandfather was seeing the Doordarshan news. Suddenly there was an uproar in the market. No one knew what had happened and grandfather tuned in the television news. There were pictures of train burning all over the news. He would later learn that someone had burned a train full of Hindu activist.

His grandfather quickly lowered the volume of the television and switched off all the light. They all sat in the darkness. No one moved, it was the dreaded time.

After an hour or was it after six hours, no one can tell. There was banging on the door,

"Anna," his father yelled, "Anna, open the door." he shouted frantically.

His grandmother was agile, she quickly opened the door and let his father inside. Oh, the scene was horrible. His father was all poured in blood, his white shirt was smeared in blood. In his arms rested his mother, dead and covered in blood.

He spoke to no one as he came inside and finally after the funeral he became mute forever. Every morning his father used to hold hands and pray.

His whole life changed after that. People cursed him as he walked, becoming a Hindu had become a crime in India. His father loved him very much and everyday his father used to kiss on his forehead and look at him with tears in the eyes.

But the venom was injected, the temple of Lord Rama was destroyed to build a Mosque and when they decided to correct it, it was a problem. The venom injected in his childhood was to erupt someday, so what he assisted some people burn some Muslims, they had to pay for what they did to his community, his mother.

Today was his final mission, the lathi in his hand was for the enemy. The devil had launched jihad on his Punyabhoomi, he had to destroy it, revenge his mother.

One final blessings of his father and he would set off on the final mission. His father was old now, burdened with time.

“You see the devil everyday,” he replied, “Today, I am going to defeat the evil,”

His father simply gazed at him, he shed one drop of tear and lifted his backpack to leave.

Suddenly he heard the words that were lost seventeen years ago suddenly came to life.

“That evening, when I was in the market closing our shop. A mob of hooligans entered the market with swords and started slicing the members of our community. We all got scared and started running hither and tether. They called us traitors, impure. That day was the day of the evil…,”

He turned back, his father was staring blankly at the floor, “Your mother was killed in the crowd and I could not save her, but I was determined to give her a proper funeral and not let her body for the dogs. I was bringing her back to the house, when he attacked. He carried a sword in his hand.

His eyes met mine and I knew his intention. I knew, he would attack me and I had 30 secs to choose. I picked up a trishul fallen on the ground and sliced him before he could attack. He fell down in front of me.

As I was running away from the place, carrying your mother, I looked at the fallen man’s hand and he held a picture. It was the picture of his wife and a child. The child was just a year old and was smiling. So horrified I was of what I did, I collapsed besides the man, my legs shaking.

I was unable to move. The burden of my deed was on me but then I heard them, a mob coming towards me. I froze stiff, pretended to be dead. They came over us,

“Are they one of us?” one of them ask.

“One looks like us… yes, he is with us,” another replied, “Seems he took two of them with him.”

“Is he…” another exclaimed, “Oh dear, his wife was killed yesterday, they just have a child of a year old.”

“Don’t worry Allah will look after the child, lets go,”

So horrified I was with the consequences of the deeds, I searched his wallet and thinking about nothing, I went to the dead mans house, carrying your mother’s body with me.

The house was dark and I knocked on the door, carrying your dead Mother. An old Muslim woman opened the door and she shrieked, looking at me. The horror was behind me, a mob was walking towards us. She immediately took me inside and asked me to hide in the bathroom. The kind woman had sheltered a enemy with her, but she had mistook, the mob was not one of them, they were people from our community.

When I emerged from the bathroom, I saw only blood in the house. There was your mother lying in blood and there was the old kind woman, who had sheltered a stranger and amidst the blood, a small child crawled towards me. I did not know what to do, I had come to see to it that the child was fine and here it was in my arms.”

He looked at his father,

“In an instant I made a decision, funeral for your mother was less important than saving the childs life. I left your mother with the old woman and brought that child home. I promised, nothing would happen to him and also, the child will remind me of the devil I saw that day in me. The devil who made me kill the man that day, the devil who prompted the man to lift the sword that day. It was the devil who drank the blood of the two ladies who lay in that room, but, the devil did not discriminate between the religion. He killed everyone.”

“But where is the child?” he asked, thinking the father has turned delusional, there was no child in the house.

His father looked up at his son and smiled, “The child is you. I am your criminal, for I killed your father. If you need any revenge, I am your culprit.”

It all came back to him. The crawl in the blood, the man with the corpse, everything. The whole world stood still and he revolved unable to bear it.

The backpack in his hand collapsed and his legs gave away.

अस्तो मा सद् गमय तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय मृत्योन् मा अमृतं गमय्

Facts and Note:

Repressed memory is a theoretical concept used to describe a significant memory, usually of a traumatic nature, that has become unavailable for recall; also called motivated forgetting in which a subject blocks out painful or traumatic times in one's life. Usually when we see something traumatic in the childhood, our mind represses the memory with an alternate version of the whole event this is called Repressed Memory.

The story is entirely fictional and has no relation with living or the dead. I was analyzing a physiological profile of a child trapped into the mess in 1992 riots and weaved a fictional story around it.

Images are from Ramayana 3392 A.D. a Futuristic tale of Ramayana.