Mahishasura Mardini

The last leaf said good bye as her eyes swelled with tears. Her time has come to fall become one with soil. She knew that some seasons later she would be reborn. With the same mother tree or as leaf, that no one could assure her. 

The tree has been there for many seasons and stood stoic as the leaf bid good bye. She has seen it all. She knew the entire life cycle. Only the roots were attached to her permanently one could say if at all. New leaves would come, followed by buds, fruits and flowers. It is a matter of time when the first rains would come. This was all part of a life cycle. No one is exempt. 

But Humans can't shed their caste, religion, violence that stems from their belief in spite of being bestowed with high intelligence. Can they? My eyes caught the news in the mobile. Yet another Dalit girl gang raped in India. Another Durga Puja went by. UNESCO has given the Durga Puja celebrations in Kolkatta the heritage tag. I wondered what this heritage they were extolling about?

Almost all over India a version of this festival gets celebrated. Some call it Navrathri. Down south in the city of Mysore the Dussera celebrations happened in a grand scale. In Gujarat men and women dance for the nine nights and they call it Garba or Dandiya Raas. Soon that dancing nights may get the heritage tag. When the Goddesses were worshipped with so much fervour why the rape of women especially Dalits?

Unlike the leaf Dalit remains a Dalit in this country. Her forefathers were Dalit and the generation that follows would remain a Dalit. No less than the PM extolled Nari Shakti in his august address to the nation from the Red Fort. The very same day some obnoxious rapists were given the pardon by his very home state. 

A consolation that this girl could now get rid of the foetus as the supreme court had ruled recently. But what of the scar she would carry in both physical and in her psyche? How would she be able to erase it?

It wasn't unusual in this country that law take its own course and that course could be for weeks, months or even years. The rapists were out on bail as they were from powerful upper caste community. The media had long forgotten the episode. People have got hardened by such news and move on with their respective life.

But not the girl. She was seething with rage. She knew where her rapist gang up together for rounds of drinks. It was at an adda a few kilometres away from her hamlet and she knew the way they would return cutting across the fields. 

She was after all an agriculture labourer and she knew how to wield the sickle deftly. She chose the night of Diwali. For she thought while in the northern parts Diwali is celebrated for the killing of Ravana by Lord Ram and his effigy got burnt. In the south the festival got celebrated for the death of Narakasura by Satyabhama with the aid of Krishna. But she was neither Satyabhama and there was no Krishna either. She was Durga herself embodied as Dalit.

The sky was lit up and the noise of the bursting crackers were heard loud and clear in the night. Her rapists were staggering back across the field in a single file loudly spluttering. There were three of them. She had marked the spot during the day where she would hunt the quarry. There was a dried- up stream which the men had to cross. She let the first two go and the third was staggering behind at a distance. She caught him from behind by the scruff of his neck and hacked him to death instantly. 

She ran up from behind and caught up with the next guy. He stopped hearing what he thought was some animal noise and also wondering why what happened to the fellow who was following him. He called out for him. That was when she sprung from behind the tree and it was instant death for him too, the jugular veins slashed. 

Only one was left. He had stopped for a pee and he called out in an abusive language for the other two. She walked towards him and said they were dead. He started running and staggered and fell. He was asking for forgiveness as he told her he had a family and children to take care. She silently held his head with her left hand and hacked him with her right. One swift motion as though she was hacking a straw of wheat during its harvest. 

What she further did got reported in papers that struck terror in the readers' mind. All their male organs were cut off and burnt at the site of the last murder. 

When the news spread the next day a posse of police landed up anticipating caste war. The needle of suspicion fell on the girl as there was no trace of her or the sickle that she usually carried for work.

Two days later a national TV had announced a hot live news. The girl had dressed up as Durga arrived at the studio and announced to the news broadcaster that she had some shocking news to share about the hacking of the three rapists. The lady broadcaster who was intuitive had the gut feeling that she was the girl who had been raped. 

To a gasping audience the girl who appeared as Durga announced she had vanquished the three asuras in a matter of few minutes and burnt their penises. She demonstrated how she wielded the sickle. The sickle had blood stains and she said the blood test could reveal the veracity of her claim. 

Within minutes the live telecast was being broadcasted all over the world and a tsunami had struck the social media ocean. 

Women all over the world dressed up as Mahishasura madini took up morcha in her favour and gave a clear message to the male kind.