Riot (2 page)

 

from Randy Diggs's notebook

October 10, 1989

Delhi airport. Crowded as usual, even at 4 bloody a.m. Curse of this New Delhi job is that everyone lands and takes off in the middle of the effing night. Engines droning, lights flashing, cars roaring, all at 2-3-4 o'clock. It's only in the 3d World that residents near the airport would take this crap. But then they don't have a choice, do they?

Harts emerge from Customs, escorted by clean-cut consular type from the embassy. Good PR, that. What every traveler needs in India is an escort through Customs and Immigration. Bad enough to lose your daughter without having to lose your patience as well in those interminable queues.

Hart's a striking-looking fellow. Tall, with smooth good looks now going to seed. Sort of Robert Redford plus thirty pounds, some of it on his face. Eyes blue, gaze steady, firm handshake. But there's a weariness there that goes beyond the exhaustion of the journey.

Mrs. Hart: maternal/intellectual type. Short, heavy-set, with wiry brown hair and skin too dry and lined for her age. Glasses on a chain around her neck. Sensible, drab clothes that'll be far too warm in this heat. (And she's lived in India before: doesn't she remember the climate?)

She's distinctly unfriendly. Hart seems happy to see me, utters the predictable thoughts (need to see where it happened — meet the people who knew and worked with Priscilla — trying to understand — etc) and welcomes the idea of my traveling to Zalilgarh with them. Mrs. Hart objects: “This is a private visit, Mr. Diggs. I don't think …” But he brushes her aside, as if from habit. They're divorced, of course.

“Priscilla lived for a cause,” Hart tells his wife. “If we don't talk to the press, how are people going to know about her life and her work?”

A couple of agency photographers click at them desultorily. One hack asks all the obvious questions. Not much press interest here. If they're lucky, they'll get an inch or two in one of the Delhi papers. Zalilgarh is too far, the riots yesterday's story.

Hart looks disappointed, as if he'd expected more. A TV crew, perhaps, backing away from him as he strides to the consulate car. He'll learn soon enough that one more death doesn't make that much of a difference in a land of so many deaths. Poor bastard.

 

transcript of remarks by Shankar Das, Project Director, HELP-US, Zalilgarh, at meeting with Mr. and Mrs. Hart

October 12, 1989

(Owing to a malfunctioning tape recorder, voices of other participants in the meeting were inaudible and could not be properly transcribed.)

 

Mr. Hart, Mrs. Hart, please come in, please come in. It is my honor to velcome you both to Zalilgarh. Though in such wery sad circumstances. Wery sad circumstances.

Here is chart showing our project. It is population-control awareness project, as you are no doubt knowing. Objective is to inform poor rural women of family planning techniques. Family planning techniques. You are knowing? More importantly, educate them about facts of life. Facts of life. Why have so many children they cannot feed? If they are having fewer children, they are looking after them better.

Miss Priscilla was having so much knowledge. So hard-working. Took so much trouble to get to know local people. Everywhere she went, everywhere, on her cycle. On her cycle. Cycle also destroyed in terrible events. Really terrible.

Please have some tea. No sugar?
Bhaiyya, bagair chini ka cha lé aana!
Sorry, here habit is to serve tea with milk, sugar, all mixed already. Wery sorry. Wery sorry. New tea coming in just a minute.
Bhaiyya, jaldi kar do!

Meanwhile if you vill just look at this wall. Here, you see dimensions of our project. Two thousand, three hundred and forty-three families served. Outreach program to one thousand, one hundred and seventy-five households. Households. Supply of baby powder, you can see figures for yourself. Supply of contraceptive devices. Clinic visits. We are best Indian project. Best.

Normally we are not having Americans working in Zalilgarh project. Policy of HELP is to help people to help themselves, you see. But since Miss Priscilla had been much involved in designing this project when she was in America, it seemed quite natural. Quite natural. She was here for her field research, the project was here, it all fitted in. Fitted in.

You are saying? No, not at all. She was wery popular. Wery modest, wery simple. Not like some big shot person from foreign. Here also, it was always Mr. Das this, Mr. Das that. She was knowing lot about this project, yet she was always asking, not telling. Not telling. You see, Mr. Das, how about if we tried this that way? Or tried that this way? And sometimes I am saying to her, this is wery good idea, Miss Priscilla Hart, but Zalilgarh is not America. Not America. In America you are doing such and such and so and so, but here it is different. And she is always listening. Always listening.

Your tea is all right now? Good, good. She was such a good girl. Such a sweet person. Sweet person. She made friends very easily. Sometimes I am saying to her, you should not be so friendly with all these people. Some of these people not your type. Not your type. And she is laughing and saying, Mr. Das, what is my type, please? Everyone is my type. And I am saying to her, no, you should be choosing more carefully you know, awoid some of these low-class riff-raff. And she is laughing again and saying, oh Mr. Das, are we all high-class riff-raff here, then? Laughing and saying. Laughing and saying.

Excuse me. You see how upset we all are about Miss Priscilla. Wery upset. The day before we had held big farewell party for her. So many people came. We could not have imagined what sort of farewell it would turn out to be. What sort of farewell. Wery sad.

This is Miss Kadambari. She is extension worker with us. She is working a lot with Miss Priscilla. Miss Kadambari will be taking you to where your daughter was staying. I believe you are wishing to see? Wery simple accommodation. Wery simple. But Zalilgarh is not Delhi, isn't it?

We are fixing up appointment for you to meet district magistrate, Mr. Lakshman. He was in charge during riot, you know. He can tell you more details about tragic events of last veek. Wery important man. Wery good friend of Miss Priscilla also. Wery good friend.

Some more tea? No? Thank you very much for honoring us with your visit. I am wishing your goodselves a very comfortable stay in Zalilgarh. Please do not hesitate to call me if you are needing anything. I am always here. Always here.

 

from Priscilla Hart's scrapbook

December 25, 1988

 

Christmas in Zalilgarh

 

Mists of dust on crumbling roadsides,

Cowdung sidewalks, rusting tin roofs.

Bright-painted signboards above dimly lit shops.

The tinkle of bicycle bells, the loud cries

Of hawkers selling vegetables, or peanuts, or scrap.

Red betel-stains on every wall

Compete with angry black slogans

Scrawled by men with a cause.

The dirty white dhotis of dirty brown men

Weaving in and out of traffic, in and out,

In and out of their sad-eyed women

Clad in gaily colored saris, clutching

Babies, baskets, burdens too heavy

For their undernourished bodies.

Here I have come to do good. It's true:

So simple a task in so complex a land.

I wheel my bicycle into their habits,

Tell them what's right, what can be done,

And how to do it. They listen to me,

So ignorant, so knowing, and when they have heard,

They go back to their little huts,

Roll out the chapatis for dinner,

Pour the children drinks of sewer water,

Serve their men first, eat what's left,

If they're lucky, and then submit unprotected

To the heaving thrusts of their protectors,

Abusers, masters. One more baby comes,

To wallow in misery with the rest.

 

It is Gods will. But not my God's.

To their will I oppose my won't.

Give me strength, oh Lord, to make things change.

Give me the time to make a difference.

 

from Randy Diggs's notebook

October 11, 1989

God, what a dump.

The heat. The dust. The flies. The shit. The crowds. You name it, Zalilgarh has it. Every horrific Western cliché about India turns out to be true here.

 

letter from Priscilla Hart to Cindy Valeriani

February 2, 1989

…

The first time I saw him I didn't really like him. He stepped down from an official car, one of those clunky Ambassadors that look like a steel box on wheels, and he was wearing that awful outfit Indian officials seem to like so much, the safari suit. The shirt was cut too short, its wings stuck absurdly out over his behind, the pants flared too much at the bottom — Indian tailors seem to be stuck with patterns from the '70s, know what I mean? And I thought, Gawd, one more pompous self-important bureaucrat, completely unaware of the impression he makes, coming to throw his weight around our project. I could just imagine Mr. Das bowing and scraping and yes-sirring and no-sirring him to Kingdom Come, all to make sure the government remained happy with us, and I wanted no part of it. But it was too late to slip away, and when you're the only paleface blonde in sight you can't really make yourself inconspicuous. So he walked into the project office, and I was stuck.

And I was soon happy I was stuck. As Mr. Das did the usual spiel — “two thousand, three hundred and forty-three families served. Outreach program to one thousand, one hundred and seventy-five households” — repeating phrases in that odd way he has, I found myself studying our visitor, the new district magistrate. He is dark, my Mr. Lakshman, sort of a Jesse Jackson shade. Fine features, an especially perfect nose, a silken moustache. I was reminded of Omar Sharif in “Lawrence of Arabia” on video. Only Lakshman has a fuller mouth, a really sensuous mouth. I don't believe I just wrote that. (Tear this up when you've read it, Cindy, OK?)

Anyway, all this was nothing more than idle curiosity, until he opened that mouth of his. It was just to ask a question — an unusually perceptive question, in fact, which showed that he'd been listening and actually understood a thing or two about population-control programs — but the words came right out and strummed me deep inside. Not the words themselves, but the sound of the words. Lakshman has a rich, soft voice, not smooth like a radio announcer's but slightly husky, like raw-edged velvet. There was something about his voice that reached out and drew me in, something that was both inviting and yet reassuring. It was a voice like a warm embrace, a voice that was seductive but not a seducer's. Do I make sense? Because if I don't, I can't describe it any better, Cindy. I heard his voice, and the only thing I could care about was hearing that voice again.

And I did, because Mr. Das went on and on, and Lakshman asked him all these gentle, probing questions, and I sat and listened to him, and I saw his sad, gentle eyes, and I knew I had found a kindred spirit.

I know you're going to say, there you go again, Priscilla, you're an incurable romantic, and I suppose I am and I'm not ashamed of it. Because you know what, Cindy, every time I think I've found a kindred spirit I've usually been right, whether it's with you or Professor Nichols or even with Winston, even if
that
ended badly. And there's no danger of that kind of complication arising here. We've spent loads of time together since that first meeting at the office and he's very correct, very gentle, very proper. Oh, and he's married. OK? So get any wicked thoughts out of your devious little mind, Ms Cindy Valeriani. He's had an arranged marriage, I'll have you know, with all the trimmings, and he has a little daughter he's very proud of, six years old and with dimpled cheeks you can hardly resist wanting to pinch. I know, not just because I've seen her picture in his office, but because she was presented to me when he invited me home to dinner. Little Rekha with the deep dark eyes and the dimples. So there.

The wife's a bit strange, actually, very different from him, reserved and not very communicative. She didn't make much effort to engage me in conversation. In fact, no sooner had the servants served us dinner than she disappeared to attend to Rekha and left me alone with Lakshman. Which was fine with me, of course, but it felt a bit odd, especially when she emerged only when I asked to say goodnight and goodbye.

But in that time we talked and talked, Cindy. I know he only invited me because he wanted to be courteous to the only foreigner in Zalilgarh, and maybe — just maybe — because he liked me when we met at the project and later talked in his office, but we soon connected at a much more, what can I call it,
elemental
level. As the evening wore on I realized I'm the only person in this back-of-beyond town he can actually
talk
to — the only person with a comparable frame of reference, who's read the same sorts of books, seen the same movies, heard some of the same music (thank God for elder brothers). These Indian officials lead terribly lonely lives in the districts. He's 33, and he's God as far as the local bureaucracy is concerned. But it also means that he's the only man in Zalilgarh from his sort of background; he's surrounded by people who haven't had his education, haven't thought the same thoughts, can't discuss the same ideas in the same English language. When he's posted in Delhi or even the state capital, Lucknow, it's completely different, of course, but here in Zalilgarh he's It, and he's pretty much alone. Oh, he's constantly being invited to the homes of the local bigwigs, the landlords and caste leaders and contractors and community chiefs with whom he has to be on intimate terms, but he has nothing in common intellectually with any of them. He mentioned one friend, the district superintendent of police, who'd been to the same college, but they're a couple of years apart and hadn't been close then, and in any case I'm not sure their normal work gives them all that much time together. At least that's the impression I had. So when Priscilla Hart comes along, full of stories of life in the Big Apple and knowledgeable as hell about Indian women and their reproductive rights, he sits up and listens. And why not, huh?