The 6th Candle

In Thalassery, the sea reminds constantly of the colonial past, because of the monuments that lay dormant on the shores, caressed ceaselessly by the wind and droplets from the Arabian Sea. One such monument was the old Anglican Church that was nestled between the sea and the British fort. 

Certain things could not be undone, thought Rupesh. The more he was frustrated the more he thought about the sea and the past about which it reminded. 

He walked past the restaurant called Paris, named after a European city, owned by a Muslim family. His roots were all mingled with others, he thought ruefully. There was no place in this city he could go and claim his cultural legacy, at least in a symbolic way. Even his house was somebody else’s. The owner would come this Sunday for rent. He hadn’t paid it for the past three months. The COVID crisis had left him begging for other’s mercies. 

He had resigned from a self-financing college near Kannur Airport, run by a Muslim committee. They were more interested in charity works and less in the business of running the institution. Mismanagement had corroded away the financial base of the institution. Since the coronavirus crisis began, the employees had not seen their salaries. Most of the colleagues were married women, who depended on their husbands, who were also breadwinners. Rupesh took care of his parents, his only brother who was chronically depressed and remained at home and his father who survived an accident at his workplace, a distillery. To save his father, the family had to spend lakhs of rupees in hospitals, sell their land and house and move to the rented apartment near Thalassery. What bothered him too much was that the only possible way of survival for his family was to depend on Rupesh. 

He visited his temple and prayed to the gods. The quietness of the response from his gods felt innocent and profound. 

With each day passing, Rupesh lost his sensibility to resentment, which rose within him like the waves of the Arabian Sea on a Monsoon evening. His gods were quiet because his land was desecrated by the Europeans, and the Arab traders. Again, he felt confused. How could he undo aeons of intermingling, the damage done through time, since prehistory?

He reached the old Anglican Church, recently renovated and shining radiantly in the evening sun. To the right side were tombs marked with the names of the streets of Thalassery. The thought made him smile, which was mean to think, but appealing to his resentment. The British officers who were buried in that cemetery were historical figures whose names clung to the streets of the city. 

Near the largest tomb was a white-clad man, a priest. A candle stand stood between the priest and the tomb. Upon the candlestand were five candles. Rupesh waited and watched the ceremony with disdain. 

After lighting the candles the priest said a quick prayer and turned to leave. 

“You pray for those Europeans? For these sinners who kept us slaves and became our masters?” frustration broke its bounds in Rupesh. There were no tourists due to the protocol. The priest looked at Rupesh, puzzled. The shock of being confronted by a stranger was apparent on his face. 

“I was… just…,” the priest mumbled. 

“Do you consider your prayers just, when they are made for those slave masters?” Rupesh wasn’t in a mood to stop. He had found the target to vent out his frustration. 

“I am sorry if I offended you. I am Father Michael from the Syro-Malabar Bishop’s House. I was posted there a year ago and ever since I have been coming here and lighting candles. It helped me. It’s a good thirty minutes’ walk from the Bishop's House, and it helped me greatly during the covid lockdown, you know….” the priest spoke with a visible friendliness as if he wanted to communicate that he meant no harm. He was bald with a small patch of hair on the sides that looked peppered with age. He had a broad smile that crushed his eyes into two inverted crescent slits that gleamed. His arms looked clean and well kept.

“Very well, but my question was straightforward, wasn’t it, father?”

Fr Michael sighed. “What’s your name, brother?” 

“It’s Rupesh. Tell me father, what motivates you to be such a hypocrite about the conquerors of our land? Do they deserve your prayer? How could you even call yourself an Indian?”

The sun was setting on the face of the priest. The white cassock slapped around in the strength of the wind from the sea. As his eyes reflected the dying light of the day. 

“I pray for any sinner. It’s not just for them. But my very existence makes sense when it is spent for the sinners, just like the existence of a physician makes sense only in service of his patients.”

Rupesh turned his face, disliking every word spoken by the priest. Seeing Rupesh walk away abruptly, the priest awkwardly turned and left the place. 

The powerful wind was cooling the land off, which the sun had scorched with its relentless fire. But the wind wasn’t cooling the agony of his mind. He felt unhappy about picking that petty fight with the priest. But the way he had questioned the priest was admirable. That was a question long overdue, “How could you even call yourself an Indian?”

To some people, religion is more than just a visit to a temple. For them, it’s a way of life. If they did not follow the way of life offered by this country, they had no right to remain here. Rupesh felt that he was wound up with these thoughts. He wanted to remain calm, but his mind was agitated. That night, he couldn’t sleep. 

As he had left the teaching job, and there were not many interesting opportunities in view, he was largely unoccupied the next day. Even though he had attended an interview at another institution, no door opened. He decided to take a walk in the city. Again, he wanted to visit the place where he had met the priest, the graveyard adjacent to the Anglican Church. 

At the same time as yesterday, Rupesh reached the place. The priest was there, lighting five candles for five tombs whose names were visible. The other tombs were minor and there were no writings on them. Most of them were in a state of dilapidation too. 

As the priest was leaving, Rupesh moved in front of him. There was shock on the face of Fr Michael, following a glimmer of recognition. 

“I couldn’t sleep the previous night, as I wanted to ask you this one more question,” Rupesh said. 

Fr Michael was silent and looked away. 

“Answer me!” Rupesh barked. The echo of his voice reverberated from the church walls. The wind played a hollow tune and the candle flames danced. 

Without a word, Fr Michael started walking around Rupesh, towards the gate of the property. 

“Why do you even think yourself worthy of praying for these dead people?” Rupesh spat the question. The words hung in the air for some time, as Fr Michael turned and looked at him. Then he walked away. 

“Oh, you don’t want to talk to me? Have I committed a sin by shouting at you? That would be sad,” Rupesh scoffed the priest, shouting. 

A stray dog watched him from a distance. While Fr Michael walked away without stopping, it felt better, having asked someone else the question he always wanted to ask himself. 

Voicing suppressed thoughts was cathartic, he remembered some of his classroom lectures on Freud and Aristotle. He felt elated and weightless and decided to visit again tomorrow. 

The next day, Rupesh came back to the same place but a little late. He had lost interest in confronting the priest now. After all, he had asked the question that he wanted to ask. There was no point in listening to the priest’s response. He contemplated reciting the Hanuman Chalisa. He had sensed in himself a vague sense of pride in thinking about his culture being able to create such magnificent and epic works. But the fact remained that he couldn't recollect a single word of Hanuman Chalisa. Why? The prerequisite of any act of recollection is the act of experiencing it, by reading, listening or by simply being part of an experience. He had never had the chance to experience Hanuman Chalisa either in reading or in listening. In the Northern part of India, he had a well-formed picture of Hanuman Chalisa being a daily reality to the masses.

Rupesh wandered around the church, merely observing the colonial architecture of the small church. Even in its smallness, it represented a microcosm of European art and construction in the colonial era. 

He arrived at the graveyard, lastly. 

Instead of five candles, today, he found six. All of them struggling to keep their dancing flames steady in the wicked breath of the Arabian Sea. 

The area was deserted, and any hope of seeing Fr Michael in the premises was reluctantly dying out like the candles. 

During the hours of the sleepless night, later, while tossing and turning in his bed, Rupesh gritted his teeth in anger. How dare he! 

“My very existence makes sense when it is spent for the sinners,” Fr Michael had said. 

“The sixth candle was for me,” Rupesh sat up. “How dare you, priest! You judge me!” He voiced his thoughts as if he was calling his dragons. He felt like someone had intruded into his world, and questioned his identity. 

Should he go to the Bishop’s House to meet him and teach him a lesson? That did not sound like a good idea. He didn’t know the premises and it would be dangerous to enter unknown territory. Waiting till the next evening was the best idea at hand. 

Reaching the spot early, he went closer to the sea. The church was situated on a rise and below the sea was a dancing dune of waves.

In the distance, as he turned at the sensing of the right time, he noticed the priest in his white cassock. He was walking slowly towards the churchyard. When he reached the graves, he paused to light the candles. The priest didn’t notice the presence of Rupesh, who waited for the sixth candle to be lit. Would he light it today?

Yes, he did. 

Rupesh rushed out from the shade of the church and stopped only when he reached behind the priest. Rupesh touched his shoulder and it made the priest jump. 

“So you dared to light a candle for me? You think I am a sinner too, like them?” Rupesh gritted his teeth. 

Fr Michael was now calm, silence emanating from his being. 

“Answer me, father,” Rupesh refused to stop. 

“I am sorry if the sixth candle made you think it was for you. No, I have to disappoint you, brother. The sixth candle was for me. You were right the other day. You asked me, what made me think that I am worthy of lighting candles for these dead people lost in history.”

Rupesh took a step back in confusion. The words of Fr Michael were strange and he didn’t want to confront anything he couldn’t understand. He was having difficulty understanding those words. 

“I realized that I had forgotten my own worthlessness, my being a sinner. So I decided to light a candle for myself too, here, every evening,” Fr Michael said. 

Rupesh stared at Fr Michael. 

“When we start thinking in terms of our responsibility towards others and ourselves, we must also think if we truly deserve what we hope to achieve.” The words of Fr Michael were clear now. The sea was calmer now. The Arabian traders came to Thalassery crossing the Arabian Sea, and they left behind their culture. Then there was the Dutch, the Portuguese, and the British, colonial powers who came by this shore and conquered this land. From the influences they left behind, it was impossible to free the land and make it pristine prehistoric once again. Even then, no one was certain how the land of Thalassery was. The sea was still there, the bay and the long sandy beaches and the spices. There must have been travellers who came here and settled down. 

The next day, Rupesh went up to the old British fort and waited for Fr Michael to leave. From the parapet of the old British fort, he saw the cassock of Fr Michael disappearing in the streets. The candles appeared very small from this distance, like fireflies. Rupesh came down from the fort and in a slow walk crossed the date and entered the cemetery. There were six candles, with their flames dancing in the evening wind. For some time, he prevented the candles from being blown out by the wind. 

He took a letter from his pocket and read it aloud as if he wanted the souls of the dead to hear him. “You are hereby appointed as an English Language trainer at Jubilee Training Centre Thalassery at a salary of 35,000 rupees per month... Ha... Ha...!” A broad smile spread over his lips. After a few minutes, Rupesh started walking back to his house, thinking about the sea. It brought many people to Thalassery, many cultures. It was a doorway to the world, once upon a time. Now, it was a reminder of the things we needed to be grateful for. 

When he reached the Paris Hotel, he bought four biryanis for his family. 

But as Rupesh left the cemetery, there was, with flames dancing in the tune of the Arabin Sea, another candle, a seventh one. 

__The End__