Karad Diaries-2

The day I ran away from home was the day of Ranga-panchami, a day in which people throw colours on everyone they come across. People all over India celebrate this on the second day of Holi, but in western Maharashtra it used to be done on the 5^th day after Holi.  Though hailed as a celebration of colours, it doesn’t stop at colours; people throw muddy water at each other, smear each others faces with grease paint and hit unsuspecting bystanders with balloons filled with water and sometimes even push visitors in water tanks and so on. All in all it is a rowdy celebration and I hated it immensely, but that was not the reason I ran away from home.

We were three brothers then, and Vijay being youngest, was the spoiled child of the house. I and Sanju (the second brother) resented this, sibling rivalry being what it is; there were always some or the other kind of petty quarrels. Vijay, of course, would colour every incidence and report to father earnestly, resulting in him scolding us which was something we took for granted. We even had a nickname for Vijay, an abbreviation of ‘a puppet of the ruling power’. All this was normal, but the day before Ranga-panchami a complaint by Vijay made my father so mad that he beat me mercilessly with his shoes, which was more than I could take and decided to run away from home.

So in the morning of Ranga-panchami, I just took my bicycle and rode away, but had no clue as to where I would be going. So instinctively I thought of Grandma who was at Kolhapur as she adored me and would be consoling me and may even scold father for beating me. The distance was about 70 kms., and I managed to reach there by evening. The only incident during all this journey that I remember is that the rear tyre of the bicycle got punctured and I had to seek help of a puncture repair shop on the roadside who knew next to nothing about bicycles, there being no bicycle riders on the highway, but managed the job sufficiently for me to carry on riding. I do not remember paying him, but I used to have no money at the time and it never struck me that I would need any. So much for the planning to leave home and start a new life.

As it turned out there was no new life for me, only a change of place for a few days. Of course, as I learnt later, there was a great deal of search operation at Karad, when everyone realised my absence and Sanju bore the brunt as he was sent to search for me and became an easy target for all the rowdy activity of the day. This is something I had not anticipated and felt sad when I learnt about it. As all search at Karad failed, my father made a phone call to my mother’s ancestral home in Kolhapur, one of the very few places that had a telephone connection those days, and someone came to inquire about me at Grandma’s place, where I had reached by then.

So a great rebellion turned out to be a tame affair, the only outcome that I can now record is that I proved that I could ride a bicycle all day and travel 70-75 kilometres when young. I have a bicycle now and ride it occasionally for minor errands, and the maximum distance I can manage these days is about 5 kilometres. But then I am 65 now so that is also worth celebrating.