Real Gold

Today morning I dug out an old favorite book to read on my way to work. A collection of Bangla short stories by Satyajit Ray. While flipping through the familiar pages, I chanced upon what had served as the bookmark the last time I had read this book. A Rajdhani train ticket from New Delhi to Calcutta made out in the name of Sayantani Dasgupta, age 19. Dated October 1998, when I was on my way to attend the 50th wedding anniversary of my grandparents.

Although I was the only one from our family in Delhi who went to attend the party, since the others -— meaning Mum, Dad and brother -— were all caught up in various activities, procuring that one ticket was an uphill task. Dad’s regular travel agent had said no, the Pujas were either just over or were round the corner so tickets to Calcutta were as un-gettable as tickets to the moon, I was falling short of attendance in College (there were two teachers whose classes I just couldn’t bring myself to attend therefore bunked their lectures religiously), so ideally couldn’t afford a week-long vacation...but what the hell! Grandparents are special, and this was their special day, so come what may, even if I had to walk it I was going! I was that determined.

Like manna from heaven, a classmate told me about this travel agent in Kamla Nagar who could get you tickets to anywhere anyday. So off we trooped, she leading the way, I following her with my fingers tightly crossed, and with us, my friends -— Andy, Sakthy (you might remember her, she taught “What If”), and Sachin. One look at his shady office and my heart sank further, but wonder of wonders, he promised me a ticket, for the very day I wanted to leave for Calcutta. Next morning, we (yes, all of us loved bunking) went and picked up the to and fro tickets.

The party was immensely enjoyable. There were about 75 invitees but that wasn’t my real reason for wanting to attend it. Nor was it just because we were celebrating fifty years of togetherness. It was because I had to salute my grandparents’ indomitable spirit and romance, I had to celebrate their incredible love story. My grandparents had fallen in love with each other when they were students in the same school. Once news of their romance leaked out, they faced tremendous opposition because of social and economic differences between the two families. So they eloped (we are talking pre-Independence days here) from their village in Bangladesh to Calcutta, got married, my grandfather broke his right arm in the process so his “signature” on the marriage certificate is his thumbprint. With tremendous kick-ass attitude they returned to the village, caused a huge scandal in the whole district of Chittagong, continued facing terrible setbacks including the Partition, yet all turned out for the better. They came to Calcutta, settled down, my grandmother went on to do her Master’s, and my grandfather joined the civil services. Bit by bit, they made a family and built a home.

I’m pleased that I wrote this today. In a world where relationships are fragile, where people are cynical and judgmental, where neither of the partners has either the time or the patience to make a relationship work, where in spite of tremendous chemistry between two people commitment is still a phobia...here is the most priceless love story I have ever come across.

To my grandparents’ delicious madness! (Hoping that some of it has rubbed on to their first grandchild as well.)