The two Thieves

 It had been only a week since I arrived in Bhaindar. This is one of the suburban areas of the city, Mumbai. As if my fate, to play something different now, was to be sealed for some particular period of time in that dense forest of concrete. For a boy growing up in the thorough lap of greeneries, this atmosphere was such that there was nothing common in that city to identify his childhood with. A feeling of depression was overpowering my soul, leaving me deeply nostalgic over my rural life leaving just a few days back. I was convinced that life would be so colorful as soon as I would arrive in Mumbai and that too without the nearness of my parents. How idiotic that was! Yes, there were colors and black & white were those. Neither did there be any way to guess when a new day starts with a New Sun with its sunshine nor was there any greetings for a new Moon with its moonlight accompanying the stars in the evening. When I would talk to my MaaBaba over the phone I never let my voice slip and did not want to yield to crying and tears. You know what, there was a trick I just always wanted to play when it comes to the matter of hiding my emotions while talking over the phone to my faraway parents and dear ones as well. While talking to my parents I always tried to talk louder than the required tone so that, my voice, if gets shuttered by chance, my emotions are not likely to get exposed to them and I was habituated to it well by time. Yes, I couldn't help disclosing my weaknesses and it happened once when I was talking to my grandfather who was scolding me over the phone and I was just torn down to the core of my heart. At times, it just came to my mind that I should leave all these boring stuff and go home right now! At the weekend, usually on Sundays, I used to dial a number of a STD Booth in our locality where my parents would wait eagerly at a shop at the given time to get my voice. I, while hearing their voice, felt the same smell of wet mud I used to walk on while returning back home from school in my village. I kept trying to imagine as if at the end of our play when the setting sun was about to leave, I would be returning back along the narrow path of my village towards my house. I saw other boys who were older than me but facing the same situation I had been doing there. I found a lad in a shop next to ours. He, as being more experienced, knew all the roads and their directions in the area and gave me good guidance whenever it was required. We soon became friends with each other. It was on a Sunday that we visited a nearby khadi, a narrow channel happened to get distracted from the sea and make its way towards the outskirts of the suburb. This was only after visiting that place that I just felt a bit relaxed after one week of my arrival there. This place later on became one of my cherished sites in Mumbai. Each Sunday morning I used to go to play cricket and for the rest of my business days I liked to go running to keep myself physically fit. By the way, we both spent a while sitting there. A soothing breeze was continuing and we saw small foamy waves breaking upon the shore, children playing with balloons, some of them making castles, people from various communities having their good times. The charming sea sight with the sun dipping into the sea I will never forget. Every ripple of the sea, as if, was making itself known with the last ray of the setting sun. The khadi was partially surrounded by some visible hills and some islands. Across the khadi there was a bridge stretching the Railway tracks towards the last station, Nalasupara. We just did not want to leave the place we sat on but were compelled to start walking for the workshops. It was too late and both of us got afraid of scolding in the workshops of our respective Maliks. We took a shortcut and this was a lonely ,straight, narrow lane coming to its end where it gets the access to the main road towards Our workshops .It seemed that now this lonely path got overlooked by all the passerbys who used to take this for granted when to save time and distance necessarily. We were soul goers at that moment and I noticed my mate looking backwards frequently and making me aware of walking as fast as possible. I was totally ignorant of what was going on as the path was too dark to see ahead. Suddenly I felt my hand grab and a whispering coming in my ears..." samne keu aachhe sabdhan!". I asked, " Who?" We stopped and he replied, " Mone hoy dujon police". It was only after hearing these words I felt my heart beating because if we were asked about our doings and present living we would be exposed as child labours. We were not allowed to roam freely as if it was a sort of 'Chor police khela'. I saw two men were busy urinating beside the path ahead and we had to go forward past them behind. We could not turn backwards because we had already been visible to them. We couldn't but go forward as if we were trapped by them. We were just about to leave them behind and a hiss came from there. " Yea chore rouk rouk," One of them asked us. We stopped and stood stand still. Meanwhile one of them came close to us and started checking us one by one in a rubbish way. Having found nothing in both of my pockets the constable got angry and then holding both of my arms shouted at me and asked me with a shudder " kaha gaya tha re motherc**d?" I felt as if my throat got locked and I couldn't say anything but I tried to answer them with a sigh, "khadi pe ghum ne gayatha Sahab." My tears was about to roll down my cheeks when he gave me a rough push at my chest. I just in a way managed to stay on my feet. "Chal nikal yeaha se, nikal.. bahenc**d!" As of now I did not notice where my friend was and what actually was also going on with him. He also had to face the same rubbish inhumane interrogation as I went through. But at last we were left free to go when they found it meaningless to find money in our pockets as we didn't have money either. After we both walked a while I looked at my friend smiling. He looked at me and said, " you acted well, otherwise they were not supposed to leave us soon." I said, "Acted?" " Yes, you cried as I did " he replied. I kept thinking whether my friend was really acting... "