Real life story of a Rotary Volunteer who ventured against threats to his life to argue and convince aggressive mobs trapped by misinformation and fanaticism propagated by vested interests, political clouts and self styled medicos, that Oral Polio V...
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Somu Bhaiyya was squatting under a neem tree flanked by his wife Booma and daughter Prema. He squatted encircling his folded legs at the knees, with both hands, as if to reinforce his posture lest he should fall on his back. He was shivering awfully with some fearful emotions, swinging forward and backward, unsuccessfully trying to utter something. His eyes pushed out as if he were being strangulated – strangulated he was with strong feelings of guilt.
Guilty, he felt, for it was his herd of buffaloes that caused the havoc in the village. Had he not stood back for a moment to ease himself, letting the 29 heads of half tonne heavy buffaloes go forward into the narrow lane, it would not have happened. Water buffalos, generally, are calm and harmless animals. Being quite familiar with the humans around, they would not hurt them at any rate. They walk away avoiding the people on the roads and in the lanes. People also stay aside to let the animals pass peacefully, at times they even squeeze themselves against the sidewalls of the lanes to make room for the passing animals. At least, he should not have hied the buffaloes from behind when he returned after attending to the nature's call and that made them hustle and squeeze themselves into the corridor, where those children who could not go to school or to the open places at the outskirts of the neighbourhood, played or squatted. Nadira was already 13, signed on to puberty only a couple of weeks ago. But she was all along found in the company of tiny tots, of four years of age and perhaps younger, playing with them in the corridor. He should have, for a moment, thought of these little ducklings moving around. Some of them once or twice happened to run between the feet of the on-coming fleet of buffaloes. He should have remembered how he once darted to save a two year old from being hit by an angry buffalo that was denied space to overtake by its forerunner. He should have thought of the babies getting entangled with the animals if let loose.
Though they are generally harmless when alone or walking leisurely, the animals may behave differently when irritated or pressurized. As an experienced herdsman he should know that animal behaviour is most unpredictable when they are driven from behind, under pressure or hied. When driven from behind they must charge forward and would not, and cannot, stop for any blocks to be removed. They will jump over the blocks if that were possible. If driven against a familiar blockade they would stop and turn around and may even charge backwards. Space constraints would make it impossible to make a turn about in narrow lanes like this. With vulnerable obstructions like humans and other animals they have no option but to smash the objects in front, trample over them and dash forward as if it were to escape from a chasing enemy. He was the enemy.
He did behave in an irresponsible manner. He should have remembered that Nadira used to be in the lane from dawn to dusk and even late in the evenings, until her mother would pull her in at nightfall, dragging her paralyzed legs and the weakened hip on the strength of her palms, from one side of the lane to the other, from one end of it to the other. He should not have forgotten that there was the additional constraint of two drains close to the walls carrying the dirty water from the sewerages.
Nadira was the weakest child in the lane. Polio had made her body below the waist a sagging bundle of flesh good only to be dragged when the two extra slim hands helped her crawl not faster than a mud snail. Both legs had become shapelessly bent making the body more crooked, both feet loose at the ankles.
Seeing the buffaloes swarming in, the other children would jump into the open doors or hold their bodies close to the walls even if that meant dipping their feet in the drains, and give way to their dumb compatriots. Nadira had the least possibility of avoiding a confrontation with the rushing animals, the innocent buffaloes that were being chased from behind left with the only choice of moving forward. There was no chance of escaping from a multitude of hooves repeatedly kicking her down and trampling over her defenceless body. She might have tried to protect herself with her hands. One hundred and sixteen extra-strong legs marching forward in a rage were more than what two weak hands could protect by.
He would be guilty of murder if Nadira succumbed to her injuries. He was responsible for every drop of blood she shed. The thought of her death by the hoofy strokes of his buffalos sent a violent flow of electricity through his nerves right from the hollow of his feet upto the cranium escaping through the eyes and the ears.
Would she not have screamed at the top of her voice, freightened, calling for help? Did that voice not have dissolved in the louder than ever bawing of the buffalos? Twenty nine buffalos bawing one after the other, at times all together, never waiting for anyone to finish!. Did he not panic them for the sheer fun of it, that nobody even heard her yelling for life. Nobody saw her being rolled and stampeded over and over again, until he himself emerged from behind the last calf, when she lay like an old pillow rolled in the batter of mud and blood.
He screamed like mad and that brought people out from behind the closed doors and from mid-day naps. He screamed and screamed and ran away from the scene until he stood gasping at the other end of the village trembling like a palm leaf in heavy wind as if possessed by evil spirits. His body temperature shot up like an oven.! His face like devil.
Suddenly he became stiff and silent. Lowered himself holding the neem tree. He couldn't sit, only squat. Put his arms around his legs as if to balance his body from falling. Shivering, crushing his rattling teeth he gazed on the people around – his wife, daughter and the village folk. None he recognized in his agony. Fear was tense in his eyes. He was afraid to look at them. Firmly closed his eyes. Unexpectedly and as a flash he rose with a loud scream and darted like an arrow – to where neither he knew nor the onlookers could guess.
