Here's my contribution to the Blank Noise Project........
Ethiraj College, Chennai, June 1998. It was my first week of college. After years of co-ed school, it was the first time in a girls only institution. It felt unfamiliar and strange.......
While I was making new friends and exploring my surroundings, Sarika Shah, a senior from my Department went out with friends. She was walking with them, to a juice shop near college, to sip some cold fruit juice on a hot Chennai summer day, perhaps to gossip about someone, perhaps to talk about a crush, perhaps to talk about the latest fashions or movies or perhaps just to to talk about everything and nothing as girls often do......
As Sarika walked, a rickshaw with a bunch of guys came wobbling by. Hands reached out of the rickshaw to grab her and to touch her. Sarika tried to swerve out of the way, lost her balance and fell, hitting her head hard on the ground. The rickshaw went wobbling away, wolf whistles fading into the blazing Chennai sun, while Sarika lay motionless.
Sarika was rushed to Apollo Hospital, where she remained for a week, fighting for her life. Sarika died a week later, on her birthday. The college remained closed for a day to mourn her. When it reopened, women police were active around the premises for a while and then that too was just a memory.
I got used to being in a girls college. In 1999, a good friend came to possess one of Sarika's textbooks. Her name Sarika Shah was scribbled on the cover. I often thought of Sarika, when I saw the book, or when I passed the juice shop. I thought of her when unknown hands gropped my friend in a bus and an old woman sitting in the bus attributed it to her (my friend) having worn a sleeveless salwar and tempting poor men.
I thought of her, and of her cruel and sudden death, her last conscious memory being that of groping hands reaching out........
With a prayer on my lips for Sarika, I turned to join my friends in the comforting folds of the girls only crowd at Ethiraj College.
- Action Hero Rambler
