Stories from the field: Bilasipara, circa April 2024

                                                    

 

In the sound of the gushing waves, and the sun burning over our heads, my first visit to my election constituency, at the first instance, was scenically pleasant. Only scenically. Only at the first instance. As our DDMA speedboat cut through the waters of the mighty river, the faces of the inhabitants of the Chars struck like thunderbolts. Their eyes were questioning us as to how Sarkaari Babus had finally reached this place. Multiple shifts in the islands, sometimes due to the changing course of the river and sometimes for the sake of accommodating ‘development’, had left the inhabitants rather scared of speedboats. Their questioning eyes only made the islands grim.

In a span of kilometers, the islands showed no trace of ‘development’ in the form of roads, electricity poles, or bustling civilizations. A few solar electricity panels were found sparsely placed in the dusty landscape of the riverine creations. From our boat, all of this only appeared like a mound of sand placed over the river. As the mobile towers and the local info-nomics of the members present on the boat grew sparse, we were now lost in nowhere but water. “Water, water everywhere, not a drop to drink,” came as reminiscence from 10th standard textbooks. Every now and then, one of the boat crew members—who comprised government officials claiming expertise in these obscure islands—would take us in a new direction in the deep waters, and for two hours we were left spiraling in nowhere.

In this mayhem, we saw two speedboats with the Indian flag painted on their masts rushing to catch our pace. We soon identified these boats as BSF patrol boats, but the relief turned short-lived in our heads. The driver of this boat was not convinced by my claim of being a government official and insisted on a written order. Once I stressfully established that I was an IAS officer (while showing my ID card hurriedly), his aversion to help us slowly subsided. In his defense, no pop reference showcases a public servant on a speedboat in a T-shirt and mismatched sports shoes. What followed was a quick low-key bashing, which he had to do keeping in mind he was dealing with a superior, but miserably failing to hide his angst. In his words, we were meters away from the zero line, the border between India and Bangladesh. “But it is just water... it looks the same, there should be a marking,” I chided. “Madam, how can you mark such a wide stretch of flowing river?” he responded.

At my request, Malli, the BSF boat driver (we had done our introductions by now), agreed to drop us at Nilokhia, the island being looked at by the vagabonds of our DDMA boat. It took us another 30 minutes and two more spirals along similar islands to figure out an old man named Azharuddin, in his blue dhoti and torn vest, waving vehemently at the island coast. As Azhar pulled us out of the sailing ferry, one by one, the reality of the sand mounds became apparent. Sand splayed all over I could see, but this sand was not arid like Thar. Even in the nomadic landscape, lush crops grew on unmarked fields at varying distances. It felt like a scene cut from a sci-fi movie, and walking on the sinking sands made me admire the local boys swiftly running around. The girls were safely tucked inside the sand mounds they called home, with flimsy colored tins supporting the ceilings—red, green, and blue.

We walked through their village, about a kilometer on foot, dipping into sand. The wind felt warm, sticky, and dusty, the stickiness from the river making it all the more unbearable. While I was trying to make sense of all I could see and not patronize the inhabitants, impoverishing adjectives screamed in my head at the sight of everything. People, though, had their own means of enjoyment here too. Where government assistance could not reach, two teams were competing in a match of cricket, at the fringes of two great cricket-playing nations. Women, at the sight of someone who was one of them and still didn’t look her part, huddled to decipher the puzzle of my identity. Hushed questions were raised, and hushed answers were given. Someone said, "Baideu aase, townor pora aahise", she is a madam, and she has come from town. And thus, curiosity peaked in the sticky heat.

We were taken to a room with tin sheds having porous corners and mud walls with no windows. In the absence of light, what was left was the little sunlight coming through the porous corners. Aqua Life water bottles were placed on a crooked table, which was supported by a broken brick on its two legs. Gawking at the newly arrived aliens, the villagers checked us out piece by piece. Now came the moment of truth: I had to address them for the purpose of awareness over voting for the upcoming elections. Azhar came to my rescue, singing praises of my name (my authority and designation in majority) to spike the interest of my disinterested listeners. I tried to do my best, following Azhar in all the languages I knew—English, Hindi, and Assamese—but little could be conveyed. Azhar hesitantly smiled, translating the declamation into the local language. Some called it Bhatia; I couldn’t understand a word, but the sudden rise in the affirmation of the eyes of my listeners gave me some hope.

My initial unceremonial speech was continued by my accompanying officers, doing better, though just by a margin. Villagers were definitely more interested in the drones flying over their village (which we carried to take a few aerial shots of the island) than in the aliens speaking parseltongue. We soon drifted to the ground, where we, along with the villagers, took an oath for voting in the upcoming elections. The crowd slowly dispersed, but a few villagers insisted on us having lunch with them. There was hardly any insistence needed; all of us were famished from the long ride on the merry-ferry. It was a feast on a wooden takht, with neatly cut onions and tomatoes, along with riverine shrimps and freshly chopped mutton gravy laid neatly around paper plates. Girls cooked on firewood, mothers carried it to the takht. Men stood politely around the takht. Boys peeped from the window behind the takht. The work distribution was established.

After the sumptuous meal, bidding farewell to the villagers, we began walking to our boat, which had no fuel left to take us back home. At my request, Assistant Commandant Hanuman, hailing from Rajasthan and insisting I marry one of my batchmates there, gave us a few gallons of oil in exchange for a false promise of prospective matrimony. Hanuman insisted on keeping in touch, and to this day, he never misses wishing me on any festival over WhatsApp. We boarded our boat, and this time, despite the unnamed islands remaining unchanged, we reached home in one go.

One month later, we conducted Lok Sabha elections in Nilokhia.