Free In the Shadow of Crows by David Charles Manners Page B

provisions, however poor. Bindra asked Jyothi to offer a piece of churpi to their camp mates. Both men declined. They had never been able to develop a taste for the pungency of fermented yak’s cheese, so prized amongst these hill people in their jungle-clad mountains. One of the men returned the hospitality by unlocking his metal trunk and handing Jyothi three pastry shingara stuffed with spicy vegetables.
    Bindra smiled in gratitude as her boys tucked hungrily into the crisp crusts. The roti-wallah offered a bloody grin in return, his mouth and teeth scarlet with well-chewed betel nut, but Bindra quickly turned away.
    She had never felt comfortable with Plains-men.
    ***
    Dawn had barely dissipated the bug-drummed darkness, yet the village was already wide awake and working. I breathed in the sweetness of warm cow dung steaming in the yard, the comfort of spices tempering brightly in the kitchen. I stretched my toes and rolled onto my back to listen to the harmony of voices, tools and animals, the concord of a whole new world beyond the windows.
    Suddenly, an anxious cry. Mr Mehta.
    I leapt from the bed, wrapped around my waist a lungi cloth, and ran out onto the verandah.
    Priya’s grandfather was bending over the buckled body of a perspiring stranger. The man’s head was bleeding badly.
    â€œWhat’s happened?” I asked, as Mrs Mehta hurried to join us. Her hands were already heavy with clean cotton and a bowl of steaming water.
    â€œThis fellow is a Dalit , from the edge of our village,” Mr Mehta said, gently laying a hot, wet compress across the man’s wounds. “You understand the term Dalit ?” he asked.
    I shook my head.
    â€œ Dalit means ‘broken’, ‘shattered’, ‘oppressed’,” he explained. “This fellow is an Achut , an Untouchable - even though Untouchability has officially been illegal in India since the days of the Mahatma!” he added with manifest frustration.
    I crouched down to meet the eyes of the ostracised man, whose sort my Grandmother had told me to embrace.
    â€œHis name is Pankaj - ‘mud-born’,” Mr Mehta said in introduction, quickly adding in response to my look of surprise, “like a lotus, not a worm! He and his wife are permitted no land. Instead, they must deal only with dead livestock and the removal of the other villagers’ faeces from the fields with their bare hands. Can you imagine such a scavenging bhangi life?”
    I could not.
    â€œGandhi- ji referred to such people as Harijans ,” he continued, “Children of God, just to make his point. But you think casteminded people really understood then, or begin to understand today? Do you think they would ever allow this man to enter their homes, or even to take water from the same well?”
    Pankaj looked up at me and smiled shyly, even as he winced at another application of scalding cotton. I laid my hands on his shoulders in an attempt at comfort. He looked too hurt to hug. In response, Pankaj placed his pale palms together and drew them to his heart, even as tears trickled down his bruised cheeks to darken the dust.
    â€œHas he had an accident?” I pressed, as Mrs Mehta returned with more clean cotton and a honey-pot. She removed the wooden lid and handed the small clay container to me.
    â€œSon, this is no accident,” Mr Mehta replied, shaking his head and tutting in despair. He dipped in the proffered spoon, then let the viscous, antiseptic syrup drip onto torn flesh. “Neither is this uncommon, nor infrequent. I am sorry to say there are some, even in our own community, who have not yet learned the inherent value of all life. Some who do not yet see that all is one . . .”
    A sudden shout interrupted his explanation. Its vehemence caused Pankaj to flinch and retract his undernourished, scab-dappled legs. I had not noticed the gathering of agitated villagers that kept its well-judged distance.
    A gaunt, tense