Banjh (No Offences, I am Against the Word)

I had grown it- with the help of my mom, in our balcony, collecting all soil, making it fertile, continously adding manure and nurturing it. And then one day mother buried the tomato seed and within a few days, out came the sapling, small, then increased in size, bits by bits, leaves all gre more and more.
I used to look at it everyday, how it would finally grow up into a full-fledged plant, bear flowers and then finally tomatoes, just like it did last year- sweet and tiny, full of juices, and so many in number- we literally had to distribute it to our neighbours and then keep them refrigerated while visiting a wedding at Kolkata, and returned to find them all actually as fresh as ever. Tomatoes in Delhi don't taste so good, but this was the natural taste- and unique to me!

I would spend a lot of time dreaming about all these. Days passed, weeks passed and soon it began to flower, yellow leaves, pentamerous, papery with bulbs, all bent down, perhaps to support the weight of the heavy tomatoes. But to our grief, none fertilized!

"What to do with them? Banjh !" My friend muttered.

"No. You won't do what you are thinking of. No throwing away the already established till it dies naturally. It's like murder."

"Why have this when it won't give tomatoes?"

"Why kill it just because of it?"

Mom won't listen. And that was what hurt me. It was like a typical mindset of those people- murdering the daughter-in-law for not bearing children and getting the son married off to someone else- just because of a silly reason?
To others, it was just a small tomato plant- but to me, it meant much more. A life, which had been made to born for service, but when it's incapable, what makes us eliminate it from our life? Doesn't it have the right to live just because it can't produce more life?

"Agree to me, Mother." I said, eyes all moist. Mother understands how stubborn I can be at times, and at instances like these, she supports me as well. She understands what I want- Right. Rights which are right. No matter the rights of whatever- right of a human being, or of something else, which has a right as well...

"Alright!" She smiled, kissing my cheeks, and going away to the sound of whistle in the pressure cooker in the kitchen.
I smiled gently, looking at the poor abused little one, and patted the flowers lovingly, gently.


*** (Few days later) ***


One bulb.. two...
Tiny tomatoes hanging in the plant.
My patting had helped them to pollinate.
No, I was wrong, there were more- three, four, five, six, seven.
All so petite, unable to reach eyes. Just a day ago were they born perhaps.

Mother stood besides me.
"I told you ma." I said, smiling happily, clapping like a tiny kid who found a new toy to play with.

"I wasn't going to cut it though, 'cz you love it." Mother said.
I looked at the plant, successful finally to give what she wanted, and in that, I could find the plant so happy with itself, proud that finally she had proved my mother wrong. Finally, she wasn't a "Banjh".

I hated that word. Why human beings unable to bear children are named so derogatorily. Was it their mistake? Not at all.

The plant looked gleefully towards me, perhaps asking me to kiss her again, accept her now, she had bore children.
"Even if you couln't, I would still love you." I said to it.