Chapter 8 Badri, the Bhangi boy at Jodhpur
Baya, the sweeper girl at Chelana, had a cousin living in Jodhpur. Her name was Indira and she was Badri's best friend.
Sheraji was the ancestor of all the thirteen Bhangi families who lived at Chelana in 1981. He lived in the early 20th century, but had died before Tan Dan was born in 1943. Sheraji had two sons, Labuji and Bhikaji. The latter was the grandfather of Ganga Ram who died young in the early 1970s, leaving his wife and five small children behind. Ganga Ram's widow moved to Jodhpur in search of jobs for herself and her children. She settled in a small Bhangi colony in the eastern part of the town. Her daughter Indira contributed to the household income by cleaning the houses of well-off urban families living in bungalows of the area, although she was only a child. So did also other children of the mohalla. Badri, for example, a small boy and one of Indira's best friends.
Tan Dan got to know Badri in the late 1970s. Badri lived in an old building which earlier had been a stable. It was a part of a housing complex which in the feudal age had belonged to a Jodhpur nobleman, possibly of the royal dynasty. He had kept many horses in the stable, as he was an important warlord. That was long ago, though, during the age when this part of Rajasthan was ruled as a princely state. The previously luxurious palace building was in poor condition. To make some money on the building, it had been divided into separate apartments which were occupied by ordinary Rajput families. The building was in the centre of a large compound which once had been a park. In the 1970s it had been neglected for a long time. The fifteen hectares of wasteland was full of weedy bush and rubbish. It was surrounded by a long wall which had fallen down at several places. The stable was at some distance from the big house in the middle. It had been built in one corner of the compound. There emerged a Bhangi mohalla, where families lived both in the old stable buildings and in huts they had built themselves. In another corner of the compound another lowcaste group of the Ganvaria Banjara caste had established themselves in a similar way.
Badri's uncle
In 1981 Badri was twelve years about. He lived in a room of the stable building together with his uncle and Indira lived with her mother in a small hut in front of it. Badri had lived there since he was five. His mother died and his father married another woman. He left both Jodhpur and Badri. A distant cousin of his father took care of the abandoned child. Badri felt obliged to his uncle, although he had to work a lot for him. He had to make opium drinks for his uncle almost every day. He soaked the dry poppy capsules in water, and then pressed them through a sieve. It was a painful sight for Tan Dan to see Badri busy pressing with his palms the poppy capsules. Badri's uncle had become completely addicted by that narcotic drink. Badri never complained, but Indira and her mother told Tan Dan that he got a bad treatment in many ways.
Indira's mother, Ganga Ram's widow, observed pardah towards Tan Dan. She covered her face with her odhni. With five children to support she had a difficult time. Indira herself was bold, lively and outspoken, as girls of her age used to be also in the patriarchalic region of Marvar. She was at the age when women had most freedom and liveliness, in the parda world of western Rajasthan.
Badri as a sweeper
The slum-like Bhangi colony of huts and old stables were out of sight of those who lived in the newly built bungalows in the neighbourhood. The bungalows of the professional class. There lived judges, retired officers of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), high court advocates, businessmen, factory owners etc. The locality was a part of Jodhpur, a big town with almost half a million people around 1980, and all the time expanding.
As the bungalows were spacious with plenty of rooms to be swept, there was much work for Badri and his friends. Especially, as it was beneath the dignity of high class families to clean their houses themselves. Besides, why to clean your own house, when there were plenty of children around, who wanted work at a very moderate wage?
Two of these children were Indira and Badri. Every morning they went to the well-off people of the professional class to sweep their bungalows. In 1981, when he was twelve about, he had swept bungalows of rich people for five years. Thus he started his professional career at the age of seven. Several other small Bhangi boys also worked in the same way, but they had the support of their families, at least. The whole family was exploited together. It was at least a better emotional support than that of Badri. He had practically nobody, and was forced to work and live as an adult bachelor, although just a child.
He had a number of houses to sweep every day, but there was no permanent bonds between the sweepers and their clients in this part of Jodhpur in contrast to villages such as Chelana, where the jajman relationship lasted for generations. So there was no economic security for the Bhangis working in these new bungalows. In towns, sweepers of streets and other public places were better off in that respect, as they were permanently employed by the municipality.
Badri worked from sunrise up to noon. Then he used to roam around on his own and play as other children. In 1980 he had started to look for job opportunities at the Jodhpur vegetable market in the afternoon. Occasionally a customer let him carry bags and baskets to some vehicle, often a riksha. That way Badri could add some extra cash to his meagre income.
Badri and his employers
Badri lived as a stray individual in a big city, and he learnt from early childhood the importance of being meek and obedient to those who gave money to him, i.e. the owners of the bungalows he used to sweep in the mornings. If not, he might be dismissed faster than he had been engaged.
He was hired for the market price, which was settled through the strong but invisible forces of supply and demand. The bonds of the feudal age had been replaced by the equally crushing commercial forces of the money economy. However, after a few years the market price for sweeping a bungalow became like a fixed fee established by custom and precedent.
In 1980 the price for the work of the sweepers was six Rupees per month and bungalow. Badri swept eight houses every day. Thus he earned 48 rupees per month. Whether the low wage was justified from a social aspect, the educated people living in the bungalows hardly considered at all.
Badri told Tan Dan about the following incidence: A new bungalow family had moved into the locality and Badri offered his services as a sweeper. The lady of the house decided to engage him, but she was not sure about the wage. In reply to her question Badri told he got six Rupees per month from each of the other houses, where he worked. How much the other paid was the only important consideration for her, when deciding his pay. She did not want to pay more than the customary fee for sweepers, feeling to be cheated otherwise.
She did not feel quite sure that Badri had told her the truth. Small boys like him might tell lies out of greed and dishonesty. Therefore, she walked over to her neighbour and asked her how much she used to pay. They discussed this matter in loud voices, which could be heard all over the place, completely unconcerned about Badri's feelings.
When Tan Dan met Badri at Jodhpur in June 1980, the boy was in a happy mood holding money in both his fists. He was on his way home from his morning duties as a sweeper. Seeing Tan Dan he immediately shouted that he wanted to give him a glass of sugarcane juice, something which Tan Dan used to offer Badri, when they met in Jodhpur. A small glass of sugarcane juice cost 30 payse and Badri felt it was within his reach, as he had twenty Rupees in his hands. He was well aware, though, that his money was not to be wasted. He had to give it to his uncle who had allowed Badri to take shelter in his house.
Badri told Tan Dan that the money was his wage for four months. They had not paid him anything for that period up to then out negligence, as they had had more important things to care about. They owed him 24 Rupees but they gave him only 20 Rupees.
Why was not clear to Tan Dan. The family might have cut Badri's pay in a kind of barter, or because they thought he could not count. Perhaps they felt that the full pay would be more money than such a small boy could handle properly.
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br /> When Tan Dan heard that Badri had got cheated, he suggested: "Come on, let us go and ask them to pay the rest of the money." That idea did not appeal to Badri, though. He explained to Tan Dan very gently, that it was no good to do like that because: "Then I would be disliked".
The bungalow people of the locality would tell each other:
"He is a wicked boy." (Badmash hai, muh torta hai.)
They would tell him:
"You are not fit to come to our compound." (Hamare yaha ane ke layak nahi hai.)
"You do not have to come to us in future." (Hamare yaha ane ki jarurat nahi hai.)
Badri felt he would succeed better, if he remained meek. By getting other people's appreciation he might get better chances later on.
On another occasion in 1978 Tan Dan met Badri together with his friends, three girls and one boy. They were all going to their various bungalows. It was early in the morning and they hand brooms in their hands. They were ready for work.
Badri and his clan
Although Badri was twelve years in 1980, he had not married unlike most other Bhangi children of his age in western Rajasthan. Child marriage was the rule, not only in the Bhangi caste, but in many castes belonging to the masses. According to tradition, it was the duty of parents to get their children married early, and many parents started negotiations with other families just a few years after the birth of the child. In the case of Badri, though, there were no parents around to take care of that responsibility, just a distant uncle who did not bother.
In spite of that Badri was a part of a bhaipa, a Bhangi clan who hailed from Nilkhedi ten kilometres to the south of Chelana. No families of his clan lived in the village any longer. They had all dispersed. Some lived far away.
In March 1979 all the Bhangis of the local khera met at the Bhangi mohalla of Nilkhedi village. They had been invited to a big feast by some men of Badri's bhaipa, who had gone to Hardvar and carried out the customary death ceremonies for deceased relatives. They had also brought Ganges water to their village, as high caste families used to do. Badri had got a special invitation to the fest. He was one of the most important persons of that function, as he alone represented his family. There was no other left than him. His father did not keep any contact with his caste brethren, after he had remarriage and left Jodhpur. Badri had neither brothers nor sisters. His grandfather was dead, and so was his father's brothers. As Badri was one of the few male persons living within his line of the bhaipa, he was treated with respect in spite of his young age. His caste people thought, it was important for the welfare of the souls of his deceased relatives, that he participated in the rituals of the feast.
The old house of Badri's deceased grandfather was still there at Nilkhedi village, and in that house adults of the clan still kept the pind of Badri's dead relatives. Pind means body, and here it means some small pieces of the dead body which are kept in a cloth bag and brought to Hardvar for submergence in the Ganges river. A necessary rite for helping the soul, atma, of the deacesed relative to go to heaven and then further to a new life. These pind remnants are also called asthi phul, which refers to the ash of the cremated body, but the Bhangi did not get any ash, as they buried their dead instead. So the pind brought to Hardvar in the customary cloth bag by Bhangis did not contain ash but small parts of the body. Such as nails and some tooth.
Some of Badri's relatives had been dead for many years, as it was difficult and expensive to go to Hardvar. Meanwhile the souls of the dead might have roamed around in the village as restless ghosts called bhut. Such was the belief.
Untouchables such as Bhangis were not supposed to go as pilgrims to Hardvar, Brahmins thought, but those of Chelana and other villages of western Rajasthan did go there sometimes, as shown in this narration.
The group of men of Badri's bhaipa went to Hardvar in March 1979 and submerged the pind of their relative in the Ganges river. The pind seravna. (The merging of the mortal remains into the Ganges river at Hardvar was called pind seravna.)
They could arrange the pind seravna ritual at Hardvar, although they were low caste untouchables, with whom the ordinary Brahmin pandas did not want to deal. How that was done Tan Dan did not know for sure. He has been told by a Bhangi at Merta and some other Bhangis that their caste had their own pandas at Hardvar. It cannot have been any panda accepted as such by savarn Hindus, Tan Dan thought. Whether their officiating priests at Hardvar were Bhangis or of some other caste, Tan Dan did not know.
As Nilkhedi was the common link of the Badri's bhaipa, it was natural that the feast for the whole caste was held there. Hundreds of Bhangis got together for the Ganga jal bhoj feast at Nilkhedi for celebrating that the souls of many dead Bhangis of this bhaipa had been liberated by the immersion of the last fraction of their mortal bodies into the Ganges river.
The feast at Nilkhedi in March 1979 with Bhangis of all the 24 villages of the khera was both a death feast and a wedding feast. These functions were carried out on different days. Formally, it was all combined in a big Ganges water feast, Ganga jal bhoj. That water the Bhangi pilgrims to Hardvar and brought to Nilkhedi in special pots.
It was controversial and even illegal to have big death feasts, but there was no rule which prevented people from feasting in a big way for having brought Ganges water to the village. They sprinkled Ganges water from Hardvar both on the death meal food and the guests to purify and make sacred in the same spirit as savarn Hindus did, although the whole party belonged to the Bhangi caste.
In the old feudal days, when Rajput warlords ruled the villages with great strictness, or, rather, brutality, the Bhangis would not even have been allowed to touch the Ganges water. There were many ways to punish those who did not obey.
Men of the whole Khera had come together at Nilkhedi. Khera was the local caste organization of the Bhangis comprising 24 villages, including both Chelana and Nilkhedi. Most castes in western Rajasthan are organized in khera units, and all kheras have 24 villages. That is the basic caste organization right from Brahmins to Bhangis, Tan Dan told. However, it is not the same 24 villages for all castes. For example, the Khera of the Bhangis of Chelana comprise villages, which to some extent are different from the villages of the Bhambi khera of the area.
The tasty Bhangi caste feast meal at Nilkhedi. Panch pakvan sweets etc.
Many dishes of tasty food were served at the feast, which lasted for three days. It was an expensive feast and prestigious feast, beyond the means of most Bhangis. Most of it had been paid by one of the men, who had gone to Hardvar as a pilgrim for the pind seravni ceremony, at which small bones of the dead persons were submerged in the Ganges water. He had a good standing within the caste and he owned money, as he had migrated to Punjab with his family, where he worked as a skilled labourer for a good wage, at least compared to labourers living in Marvari villages. It was this man, who had taken the initiative of the feast. He had also invited Badri personally, as he thought it was important to have at least one male representative of Badri's line in the death meal celebrations.
Their feast went on for three days. Some families of the khera took the opportunity to carry out some weddings, as was often the case at large gatherings of this kind, not only among Bhangis but among other common village castes as well.
Combining the death celebrations with weddings was partly a way of going around the prohibition of expensive death feasts, just like the ritual celebrations of Ganges water at the feast.
During these days Badri had a very nice time at Nilkhedi. He was a jolly boy, who liked to have plenty of people around, boys to play with and relatives to talk to, especially as the grown-ups of his bhaipa treated him almost like a grown-up person, although he wore short pants and simple open shirt. The adults of Badri's clan looked upon him as a link to the past and perhaps also as a hope for the future, although he did not get much support in his everyday life, except from his opium-intoxicated uncle, who might have been at the feast, too, but Tan Dan did not meet him.
At the feast Tan
Dan saw the Bhangis eat and cook some sweets called panch pakvan and also mitho. The five (panch) sweets were nukti, chakki, jalebi , thaur , and ladu . They were popular throughout western Rajasthan and other parts of India, too. Other items served at the feast were charko, a spiced dish, pharko, a fried dish, and phikko, a plain mild dish of finely sieved flour, the meda. The after death meal was performed to the benefit of Badri's forefathers. By eating the tasty food, Badri felt he served both the living and the dead and had a good time himself.
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