“As flies to the wanton boys are we to the Gods, they kill us for their sport” – William Shakespeare
I read about this most tragic incident more than two decades ago, through a five line news item that appeared in a Telugu newspaper in my home city of Hyderabad in India. It still keeps haunting me even today and for the rest of my life as well.
Later, using my creativity as an award winning Creative Director, I visualized the whole incident and penned it down in my own way. You may find this whole story and also my narrative completely new but at the end you will be spellbound. That’s my promise.
However, three things are certain to happen while you read this story. One, you will forget breathing; two, you may notice a little heaviness in your heart; and three, you may end up in tears upon completion. Please continue reading this one of the most extraordinary stories you would ever be reading in your life.
This Most Tragic Incident..
Occurred in the month of August, 1999 in a small hill town of Kerala state in India that has a population of about thirty thousand.
It was raining cats and dogs there for a few days before that..
Life, to say the least, was paralyzed..
The communication link with the outside world was completely cut off long..
On that eventful day..
It was around 5 AM in the morning..
Almost all the people of the town woke up shocked as they found pools of flood water flowing with a terrifying noise all around them.
Before they could even realize what was happening, the levels of water started rising and there was no escape route for them as the heavily gushing water began restricting their movements.
Still they managed to get out of their houses but have pathetically found themselves stranded in more and more flood water outside..
The water at that time was up to their waist level and was gradually rising.. The shocked villagers tried to reach the top of a few handful of high rise buildings in the town only to find them overflowing with people.
While a few lucky ones could still barge in, those unlucky were shunted out. It was still very heavily raining that time. With the passing of time, the rains didn’t stop, the rising of water levels didn’t stop, and the plight of the people too didn’t stop..
All the streets were full with people and were full of water. Some of them were trying their best to come out but the water level was constantly rising and was making life miserable for them.
After some point of time and after some more struggle, almost all of them have silently realized that they were slowly heading towards a country from whose Bourne no traveler has ever returned..
While some people among them were shouting for help; a few among them were weeping out of fear. While some were down low spirited; some were going hysterical.
Children and the old aged were the worst affected as one after another started dying a silent death…A helpless death..
Unfortunately so.. All the remaining there want to live. Just live. Do something. But live..Helplessness…Daaammmnnn helplessness was bogging them down.. Questions and questions were frustrating them..
Do..?? What to do..??? How to do..???? How..how…..?????????????? All that they wanted at that moment from God was.. Life. Just life. Nothing..Nothing else.
No riches, no money…No egos, no jealousy… No holier than thou attitude.. No one-upmanship.. No false shows of prestige… No clashes, no rivalry, no religion, no exploitation in the name of God. No superiority and no inferiority.
Nothing.. Nothing..And nothing else.. Life and only life.. But less do they know at that moment that in the court of Nature there’s no room for appeal.. But still they were doing their best to survive.. They were praying for life.. Praying for those helping hands..
Praying loudly, praying silently.
Praying and weeping..
Weeping and praying..
Praying for their survival and weeping for their loved ones..
Just praying and praying and praying..
Thuddddddddddddd..
Thuddddddddddddd..
Before they could even realize with what force death strikes when it strikes, It was all over. All their dreams, all their plans, and all their aspirations were washed out with just one blow of death. With one deadly blow of D…E…A..T…H…H…H…H
A sudden rush of water flowing from a broken nearby dam struck them silently, wiping them off their feet. The water that was so essential for the survival of humanity on this planet has silently eliminated them.
And after that…
There was absolute silence there..
Fearful silence..
With only the sound of water echoing all around the space and creating terror…
That’s all.
And..
And..
And..
From those dangerously flowing deadly waters, from among those dead bodies, rose a woman, a poor young woman in her late twenties; and she rose like a phoenix out of the ashes..
During all that painful time,
She was fighting..
Was waging a lone battle..
She just did not remain silent and immobile by offering prayers to the Invisible..
She was trying to move..
Come what may..
Move..
And finally she moved..
She was a Telugu speaking lady from the Srikakulam district of Andhra Pradesh..
She’s not deterred by the fury of water..
Not moved by the countless dead bodies around her..
Not fazed by the calamity that just served a deadly blow..
Because..
She has complete faith in herself that she can move and move and also clearly knows that she must at any cost move out of that gory place…
Because..
She has a goal…
She has a strong purpose to live..
So..
She moved and moved briskly from there..
Mustering all the courage. Gathering all the strength..
Leaving all the dead bodies behind..
Leaving all the people and the town..
And swam and swam and swam..
And swam across the flow of that fearfully flowing water..
Swam across every hurdle..
Swam across every street and corner..
Pushing away the dead bodies of all Humans, Cattle and Sheep…
Forcing her march ahead..
She swam..
Braving the storm..
Braving the floods…
Braving the fury of Nature and of God..
And moved ahead…
Till she reached a lonely standing Palm tree..
It was a tall and lonely tree eagerly waiting to receive that brave lady..
After reaching the tree, she paused..
Looked at it once..
After making sure that the tree can give her enough protection..
She moved towards it and then slowly and confidently reached to the top of the tree and lay settled there..
Then..
And…
Then..
She..
Very fondly..
Very gently..
And very carefully..
Kissed her beloved four year old son..
Her goal..
Her Life..
The sole purpose of her existence..
For whom she braved all that ferocious storm and its fury..
For whom she braved Nature and God.
For whom she braved everything and did everything..
The boy was weeping all the way..
Weeping with hunger, weeping with fear, weeping with pain..
But she held him tightly in her protective arms and resorted to that courageous act only to save him. She lost her husband in a tragic accident a year ago. Now, she’s all alone in this world with only that four year old son on her side.
She wants him to live forever. And she wants to live for him forever. That’s all.. No tall claims.. No tall order of wish list..
After settling down on the Palm tree, that lady closed her eyes for a moment. Relaxed.
Then, opened them and wiped her son’s face with her sari and then wiped her face too which was filled not with water but with sweat. She felt relaxed for a moment as she reached her first goal of safety..
Then what…???
She looked around.
She looked at her son’s face..
Though not weeping, the boy was silent but was looking weak with hunger..
She kissed him again..
And again she looked around.
This time with the hope of finding something for her son to eat..
But, to her utter disappointment she couldn’t find anything around her except water and water with not a drop to drink. Left with nothing else to do, she decided to relax for a moment and then think about the further course of action..
While she did so, there were questions and questions clashing in her mind. She knows pretty well that her problems are far from over and she still has a long way to go. But her son was keeping her steady. Of course she can weather any storm for him..
But how long…?????
Another question..
Didn’t know..
Only God can answer..
She looked down…
Though it was not raining, the water was steadily growing in level there..
She knows that the Palm tree is too tall and she can be sure about the protection from the water level..
So, that way no worry..
She looked at her boy..
He is slowly closing his eyes and falling asleep.
She carefully pulled him closer to her and held him tightly..
What a plight. God sometimes is so unkind. HE turns HIS face away from us when we need HIM the most. Even the most sinful and the most cruel personalities in this world do not deserve such a punishment of utmost severity..
Then, what was her mistake…?? Her whole body was shivering with chill and every bone was aching with pain. She knows that she has to bear with everything until the water recedes fully..
No way. She lost all the strength to swim and knows pretty well that it will be a sheer act of stupidity to swim any further without any sight of land or a tree nearby.
So she chose that tree.
She was waiting..
Waiting silently.
Waiting with hope and waiting with despair…
But she was waiting..
Waiting for that help from those invisible Hands.
Those Invisible Hands that created this World. This Universe. This Nature.. And us humans. Our birth..And our death..
She was waiting..
That’s all she could do at that moment..
She may not know the theory of Predeterminism..
May not have heard about dualism in Nature..
May not have read about the Advaita and the Visishtadvaita schools of thought and philosophy..
But for sure she knows one thing..
Her son, his well being and her duties for him. Everything else is unnecessary.. That’s all. Thus far she has done all that she can to save him and it is for God now to interfere and save him further..
Will HE or Won’t HE..???
As she was waiting, seconds turned into minutes; and minutes into hours with no sign of any relief coming from anywhere.
The croaking of the frogs, the unsteady flow of water, the unbearable sound of heavily blowing wind were terrorizing the whole atmosphere there..
She was slowly losing her hope..
It was around 4 pm..
She was already sitting on that Palm tree for more than five hours and that too in the same position..
She was losing her strength. Was draining and sinking both mentally and physically.. Slowly closed her eyes..
Then..
Thennn..
Thennnnn…..
She heard that sound..
“What’s thattttt…???”
Her hopes returned…
She became highly attentive and alert..
Concentrated fully on that sound..
Tried to analyze..
No doubt..
It was definitely the sound of some motor engine..
She hurriedly looked in that direction..
She couldn’t believe her eyes as she found a helicopter coming in her direction..
She didn’t want to take any chances..
With eyes wide open, she looked into the direction of the helicopter..
The helicopter was appearing closer..
She did not want to waste a second..
Lifting her son in one hand and holding the branch of the tree with the other, she carefully got up and turned herself towards the helicopter.
It was an Indian Navy’s Coast Guard helicopter pressed into service by the Indian government for flood relief operations.
There were around six guards on board the helicopter with life jackets…
She waved at them. They didn’t notice her. Mobilizing all the bodily strength into her voice, she screamed. The guards still didn’t notice her and to her utter shock the helicopter slowly moved away.
She knows and knows pretty well it was her last chance to have any chances of survival. She screamed again and again and louder and still louder.
And that time, the guard sitting near the rear window of the helicopter, with binoculars in his hand, heard the scream and noticed her..
He waved at her as a signal that he noticed her..
With all her hopes suddenly coming alive, she too waved at him..
The guard then instructed the pilot to take a U turn and turn back the helicopter and go down as nearly as possible to the Palm tree..
She was noticing everything with a subtle smile on her lips that’s combined with a great relief..
First, the helicopter hovered around the area of the Palm tree, for a few moments to assess the altitude, and then slowly descended down to the maximum permissible level.
Later, it remained stagnant there at one point as one of the guards slowly dropped down a rope ladder onto the tree, instructing the lady to hold it properly.
She tried to grab it but due to heavy winds the ladder moved around and went beyond her reach for a few minutes..
She tried again and again and after a few more misses could grab it and hold it with a single hand..
The guard in the helicopter, who was holding the other end of the rope ladder, smiled in appreciation of her smartness..
Quickly, the other guards too joined him in holding the ladder firmly.
As they all looked eagerly, the lady made sure that she was holding her son tightly with one hand and then tried to hold the ladder firmly with the other..
After making sure that everything was perfect, she carefully got up from the place she was thus far sitting and moved.
All the coast guards were watching her keenly..
Cautiously holding the boy in one hand, the lady did not forget to kiss the tree as a thanks giving gesture..
And then slowly.. Very slowly.. Left the Palm tree..
Seeing her moving from the tree, the helicopter too started slowly moving forward..
After parting away from the tree, the lady was now on her own, hanging in the air and standing on the last step of the rope ladder..
It was altogether a new ordeal for her now. The wind was so heavy, and so was its speed..
She was finding it extremely difficult to hold the rope firmly, but still managed to stand firmly on the ladder and looked down..
Down there, the water was still ferociously flowing and the winds were still heavily blowing with a roaring sound..
It was all very frightening out there..
The poor lady was very weak to sustain that fright…
Still fighting against all odds and all the whims and fancies of mother Nature, she was trying hard to stay composed to overcome that fright..
She closed her eyes for a moment..
Cautiously monitoring every movement of the lady, the helicopter was slowly moving ahead exactly in synchronization with the position of the lady. Instructing her to hold the rope tightly, the guards slowly started pulling up the ladder..
The distance between the helicopter and the lady, at that moment, was approximately thirty feet and she was standing on the first step of that thirty feet ladder. Due to heavily blowing winds, the guards were finding it extremely difficult to hold the ladder firmly..
The weather too was inclement and was also unfavorable for smooth sailing..
The strong winds were mercilessly throwing the ladder in every direction and it was making life miserable not for the guards, not for the lady but for the boy..
The boy was literally going breathless; with the sound of the heavy winds, the sound of the helicopter combined with a typical lashing sound of the helicopter propellers that were all creating eerie sounds that are normally experienced in any of Alfred Hitchcock films..
The lady was trying her best to hold the boy firmly but since both of them were very wet, her hands were slowly losing their grip over the boy. Observing her plight, a guard then decided to help her.
He slowly stepped on to the ladder to come down.
And exactly at that point of time,
It started raining very heavily again slowing down all sorts of rescue operations making the lady extremely anxious and restless.
The hapless boy in her hand was becoming very slippery though she was doing all that she could to hold him tightly. Unfortunately, she was feeling the looseness in her grip over the boy which was making her more restless, more unsteady and more panic..
The boy was not weeping but was looking pathetically into his mother’s eyes expressing great fear.
There was so much pain and agony in his eyes, that moment, which only a mother can read and understand..
Though unusual for his age, the boy was still trying to support his mother.
The lady too was looking at her son and was trying to cajole him.
The boy was still looking deeply into his mother’s eyes..
The lady may not understand but that time around she found something unusual in the boy’s eyes..
Something..
Definitely something..
Really really unusual..
What is that..??
Did the boy see something..??
Was he trying to convey something..??
If so..
What..???
What….??????
Whatttttt…..?????
Are any coming events casting their shadows..?????
Did he receive any hint from the Cosmic Forces.. ??????
A sort of a chill ran through her spine shattering her whole mind and body..
She was anxiously observing her son..
Observing his face..
Observing the movements in the expressions of his face..
Observing the gradual change that was taking place in his face and also in his eyes..
And..
Was observing that his eyes were seeing something beyond the reach of human vision and comprehension..
Was he seeing something about the future..??
His future..??
Their future..??
Was seeing something about his salvation from this sinful world..??
Something about his separation from his beloved mother..??
Something inexplicable..??
Something metaphysical..??
The poor boy wanted to convey all that he was seeing to his mother..
He was trying to tell her about what he was seeing.
But, again there was something inexplicable holding him back..
Still the boy was trying.
Trying to tell his mother about the signals he is receiving from the Cosmic Forces..
About the indication he is getting from the Gods in the Heavens..
From the angels of His service..
He was trying..
Unable to understand what’s going on in him, the poor mother was still trying to cajole him..
The guard on the ladder was still trying to come down..
The helicopter was still trying to take them out to a safe destination..
Then it happened..
And..
Happened so suddenly..
And..
Happened in a whisker..
Suddenly, the speed with which the wind was blowing till that time doubled..
As a result, thick drops of rain hit her face forcefully..
For a split second, she closed her eyes..
And..
In that split second..
In an effort to hold the boy more firmly, the lady lost her grip on the child for a moment..
Just for a moment….
And in that just one moment..
It happened..
What should not have happened..
Had..
Happened..
With his eyes filled with faith that his mother is there for him, the boy was still looking deep into her eyes..
The mother too was looking at him..
So also the guard and his colleagues..
And then..
With a terrible shock..
The mother finally understood the language of her son’s silence and tried to prevent the inevitable..
But that was too late..
The boy..
For whom she weathered all the storm..
For whom she fought all that battle against the Nature..
For whom she did everything beyond her capacity..
Slowly..
Slowly slipped off her hands..
And got separated from her..
The poor lady juggled with him for a few seconds..
Just like a fielder in a cricket match juggling with the ball before dropping a catch…
But failed miserably…
And..
As she was so helplessly watching..
As all the coast guards too were so helplessly watching..
The boy first got separated from her..
Lost his balance..
And then did a somersault in the air with all the plight, agony and trauma in the world…
Still looking at his mother.. Still looking deep into her eyes..
And..
S..l..o..w..l..y
Bid her goodbye.
A soulfully sad goodbye..
And went down falling..
Falling..
And..
Falling..
And..
Falling..
And so falling..
Had crashed into the furiously flowing flood waters and disappeared in a flash…
The lady was just haplessly watching..
So were all the guards from the helicopter..
Over..
All over..
All the battle and the fury..
All the courage and bravery..
Were all over in one by a millionth of a second.
The lady went into a deep state of shock..
Her head became numb..
Her ears became heavy..
Million thoughts were striking her mind at once..
And one thought, “he’s gone”, was striking her mind a million times..
Billion times..
Trillion times and zillion times..
“ఒరేయ్ నాన్నా, నేను చూసే ప్రపంచంలో నువ్వే నా సూరీడువి రా” (Oh my beloved son, in the world am seeing today you are the only Sun).
The helicopter was moving slowly..
With tears flowing down her cheeks..
The lady slowly closed her eyes..
She found darkness..
Opened them….
She found darkness again..
Talking to herself and going into a state of delirium..
She slowly lifted her head and looked up..
And questioned the invisible Gods.
”Why and why and why…?? What is the sin I committed to deserve all this pain.. ??”
She then looked around in desperation, and in utter helplessness..
But..
She found only silence all around her..
Unbearable silence..
Unusual silence..
As though all was not yet over..
As though something more painful was to follow…
With their eyes filled with tears and minds filled with doubts, all the coast guards were anxiously watching her..
She too looked up at them helplessly..
Palely..
Blankly..
Poignantly..
And finally..
Thankfully..
Later..
She looked around once again..
Looked at the heavens..
And lastly..
Looked down at the cruel waters that consumed her beloved son..
Suspecting something tragic and deadly, the coast guard on the ladder suddenly started throat fully shouting at her and briskly tried to move down, tried to come down quickly..
The other guards on the helicopter too were signaling at her with all the physical signs that humanity can understand..
But..
But….
The lady had already gone into a shell of her own..
Into a world of her own..
Wherein she could neither see anything nor hear anything nor understand anything….
She started gradually going into a fit of rage as that one thought, “he’s gone” was knocking her constantly..
Shaking her constantly..
Rattling her constantly..
Then..
She slowly closed her eyes..
Composed herself..
Chanted prayers..
Coming down swiftly and shouting at her, the guard was using all his expertise to reach her..
She opened her eyes..
Took a deep breath..
Her mind was clear and calm..
And with all that clarity and calmness, she took the decision..
The most unmentionable and the most indescribable decision..
The coast guards were watching her..
And also the pilot..
And also the Palm tree..
And also the five elements of Nature..
Everyone, everything there was watching her with bated breath..
But..
They just remained watching..
As the right hand of the great lady that was holding the rope ladder till that point of time..
Left it..
Left it with unmentionable pain..
Left it..
With unbearable trauma..
Left it..
With inexplicable agony..
The coast guard on the ladder tried his best to reach her…
But he could only remain watching her gliding down..
And..
Gliding so..
She..
Slowly,,
Very slowly..
Went down..
And..
Down..
And..
Down..
And..
Further down…
And with a huge..
Thudddddd..
Touched the flood waters..
In a flash..
Her body too disappeared in the waters just the way her son’s body had disappeared a few minutes ago thus ending the extraordinarily brave saga of that extraordinarily extraordinary lady..
The coast guards couldn’t believe what they had seen..
One whole life may not be sufficient for them to believe what they have seen..
After that..
The flood water flowed quietly as though nothing had ever happened..
The guard on the ladder too moved up with a heavy heart..
And..
Slowly..
The helicopter moved on..
We moved on..
Our lives moved on..
Our world moved on…
The End
“కదులుతున్న కాలంలో, చెదురుతున్న కలల మధ్య, ముసురుతున్న చీకట్లలో బాంధవ్యాలు ఏ పాటివి అని ఆలోచిస్తున్నావా.. ?? అవి పటంలో గోచరించే బొమ్మలు, గడ్డి బొమ్మలు, గుడ్డ బొమ్మలు, దృష్టిని కలత పెట్టే దిష్టి బొమ్మలు”
Much Love
Narrenaditya Komaragiri