Life, Death and Non Violence – A story of my father.

Life, Death and Non Violence – A story of my father.

One afternoon, there was a buzz of messages on the social media of our apartment residents group. The apartment is built on seven acres of land with quite a bit of vegetation. One snake had been seen by a resident in car park area in the basement. I was smiling as I read the messages. From the photographs it was clear it was non venomous one and a small one. But the kind of messages being sent made me feel that the city dwellers don’t want any animals, except Dogs perhaps, in their life. Some of the messages read something like this;

“Dear RWA, Heard from few residents that Security team was trying to locate snakes near open Gym area in morning. Can you please confirm if it's true.

Please advise if it's the earlier one which was roaming in Basement area. Kindly confirm so that we can avoid venturing into such places for few days

Request RWA to kindly call any of the Snake catcher and get rid of snakes in VG, even if we need to spend some amount in the interest of residents please.

 The concern being.. If they can venture into basement areas. They will surely venture into duct areas very sooner through which they may get into any of the houses. Kindly look into this on urgent basis please.”

( RWA means Residents Welfare Association- that manages the apartments ) 

 “RWA, immediately snake repellents should be sprayed everywhere”

 “Dangerous snake roaming in our apartment. Keep all the doors closed. Don’t go to the basement”

“Snakes are roaming and RWA is sleeping. Get up before they bite you and get rid of the crawlers.” 

While I was reading these messages, my memory took me to an incident in the life of my father. 

Some incidences in someone’s life are sometimes unbelievable. On few occasions it becomes difficult to accept or believe what one tells you. You may not be able to understand or realise what the other person has gone through and may brush aside it as imaginary. This is what happened to me the first time I heard it from my Foster mother about an incident that happened in my father’s life. She was his elder sister. A few months later when I met my father I asked him about the incident. He smiled and brushed aside and started talking something else. I was in my teens and could not pursue him to tell. 

About a year later I had gone home to my village and my mother was not keeping well. In the evening, my father opened up and told me the incident that happened to him before I was born. It was a few years after he had lost his elder brother. I was named after him. Because of which I was pampered by all. He had died due to snake bite while coming from home after finishing days’ work in the field. Seems he was passing through a field of Ketaki ( Screw pine), it is believed snakes are attracted to this plant. He was bitten by a poisonous small snake not found these days. Though he was taken to nearby Town, he succumbed to the venoms power. Those days the antivenins were not very easily available. People used to make the patient drink Neem Juice with the hope that the bitterness of Neem will bite the venom.

Before I start narrating what he told me I would like to brief about his background. As I write this he is no more with me. He was a small farmer. Had few acres of land which was dry land and the crops were predominantly dependent on rain. We have this particular farm land which is the bigger of the few lands we own. This is about three kilometers away from the home. This is nestled between two small hillocks on shorter sides with the other two longer sides land bordered with our relative’s lands. Almost in the mid of this farm land there is a stream that flows cutting across the land, in the rainy season. On the banks of this stream land many trees and bushes were there. There is one deep well on the banks of this stream, which is the source for drinking water to us and other farmers around. 

At the hillock ends of the field, the ground is slanted with lots of grass and trees and no crop is grown. There were few Indian Jujube ( Ber in Hindi and Bore Hannu in Kannada) shrubs also. As a child I had enjoyed the fresh fruits a lot. The grass will grow very tall. May be around three to four feet tall. As a child I remember when I went there, as my father was cutting grass and I wandered around, I could see nothing but grass. It gave me scary feeling as I felt lost and shouted for father. 

This grass is harvested only when it matured and looks absolutely dry and golden. It’s wonderful to see this dry grass. This will be cut and then stacked as hay. After harvesting the grass and the crops Jowar or Maize, depending on which crop is grown, they will make bundles from chopped Jowar or Maize Stems and the cut grass. These bundles will be stacked nicely. This in local language is known as Banave. The stack will be covered with mud and or a mixture of dung and mud to protect from rain and also from birds making their nest. This hay stack will be used as fodder to the cattle stock, especially during the rainy season. Even today my younger brother harvests this all by himself with sickle and no machine cutting. 

I remember, father will be sitting, barefoot, holding the grass base as much as he can in left hand and cutting with sickle in the right hand and pooling the cut grass. They will start cutting the grass after the morning dew has settled and end well before the sun starts floating above the shoulders and the heat becomes stronger. He will have his lunch and rest for a while in a hutment or beneath the tree. He will resume the cutting after the sun has gone down the shoulders and heat has reduced. He will end it much before the dusk. On many occasions the neighbour's would help in cutting the grass, as my father would help them either before or after his field grass is cut. Those days they were more cooperative and many jobs used to be shared. With the entry of machines, man has become more nuclear, independent and or lonely.

It was on one such morning hours of the Day. My father had started cutting the grass all by himself. He was alone. He had cut some grass and got up to pool the cut grass. The grass bundles were laid here and there as he had progressed. He lifted one bundle and went to lift another bundle as he put his foot near the other bundle he felt something beneath his foot and suddenly felt something wrapped around his legs, he was holding the grass bundle with both hands with sickle still in his right hand. Sickle was used for lifting the bundle. He dropped the bundle and saw what has happened. He said first he almost fainted as he saw the snake had wrapped around his left leg up to almost knee. The hood was beneath the arch of the foot. He gained confidence and tried to loosen the snake from his leg. It was very firm and he was not able to remove it. He realised the snake was one of the most venomous category ( Cobra ). He also realised it cannot bite him as its hood is beneath the foot. The snake was increasing its binding force on the leg to weaken its pray. My father tried to press the foot down. He was sweating profusely in fear. Sun was getting hotter as the day progressed and it was unbearable for him. His leg was numbing due to snake pressure. 

As he was standing, he glanced across the other fields but could not sight anybody. He shouted for some help, nobody responded. He kept on shouting and whistling in the hope that someone will come and help him. He realised, my mother would be bringing him his lunch but that would be at least an hour and a half later. He kept his calm in not moving his foot and continued applying downward pressure. The soil beneath was not very firm it was loose soil. So, snake was somehow managing to breathe and hold pressure on his legs. Both were testing others strength and patience. My father was continuously trying to unwind the snake around his leg with little success. He said this must have gone for at least fifteen twenty minutes. He started feeling week in his leg. But kept applying the pressure. 

At some point he put the right leg on the left foot and forced down. After some time, he started feeling the loosening of the snake around his leg. He further applied pressure with his right leg. At some point, he felt the snake loosen the grip and tail dropped, probably it was being suffocated. Once that happened, with his hands he loosened and unwound the snake body from leg with his foot still firmly held on the hood, held the snake in his hand and in one go slightly loosened the foot, pulled the snake with force and threw it away and sat exhausted. He cried for a while and sat there just blinking and thanking God till my mother came there bringing his lunch. 

He told me, during those fifteen twenty minutes he had felt horrible, thinking of his two very young daughters, his wife and mother and his younger brother. Loss of his elder brother to snake and his situation alike made him shiver. He was praying all along and seeking in God to take care of his family. He had seen the death from a very close quarters. He told, he could not muster the courage to tell my mother what had happened when she brought him his lunch. He hid his feelings and the fright and managed the lunch session and my mother left for home. 

In the evening, he could not walk properly because the snake winding around the leg had caused the weakness. Mother asked him what happened, then it seems he cried as he explained what had happened. Mother then had massaged the leg for next week or so till he felt better. He also told he felt small as he cried in front of his wife. She was also dumbstruck and my grandmother seems was very upset for a longer period. She had lost her one son to a snake bite and this instance made her weak. 

I listened very patiently with awe. I asked him very innocently why he did not think of using the sickle to cut the snake. He smiled and said, yes he did think of it and was in confusion of the right and wrongs. On the one hand it could make it easier and free him in the situation on the other hand he would be killing the snake, which he found difficult to accept. After all the snakes help the farmer by way of eating the rats that damage the crop and moreover, they don’t attack on their own. They only defend. Also his daily morning visits to the Jina Temple and the discourses (Pravachanas) on the preaching’s of Mahavir Theerthankar he had listened to in the temple have taught him that non-violence is principle of life. Live and let live is the motto of our religion, so he did not think it as appropriate to kill the snake, rather he thought of enduring whatever he had to face. 

I asked him, did he stop cutting grass after that. He laughed and said, no, in the afternoon though he had pain in his left leg, still he continued his work. Life continues. One must not stop doing things in fear of something bad happening. He said, if it was destined it would have bit him in the first place without leaving him the chance to live, but that did not happen. 

I asked him, did he go in search of the snake to see what had happened. He said no. He said animals have strong endurances and survival capabilities. It would have lied for a while to recover and then would have gone hunting for food. All that mattered to him was it was alive and he was alive. 

It took some time for me to understand his harmony with nature and the environment, his resilience and deep connection to the land and its challenges.