A dying State

Shiva Naipaul

The dark green plain, sliced through by a broad, orange-coloured arc of the Ganges, was dissected into shining rec- tangles by fields of rice which stretched as far as the eye could see. Scattered across that sodden verdancy were the brown-tiled roofs of huddled villages. Here and there, casting graceful reflections and breaking the monotony, were palm trees. But they were few and far between. For, over the centuries, the plain had been relentlessly surrendered to one of the chief obsessions of its inhabitants — the cultivation of rice. From the air, it was a vision of order, fruit- fulness and peasant contentment. This was a deceptive first impression: I was looking down on Bihar, ancient but degenerate heartland of Hindu culture.

Bihar, home of at least sixty million In- dians (it is the second most populous state in the Indian Union), is nowadays notorious for its squalor, its backwardness, its gross corruptions. It has become a byword for all that is most hopeless and ter- rible about the Indian condition: the sub- continent's heart of darkness. The mere mention of the name in the intellectual circles of Delhi or Bombay or Calcutta (even Calcutta!) calls forth shrugs of despair. In the drama of progress many In- dians justifiably enjoy painting for visitors there is no place for Bihar. Bihar, it was often implied, had degenerated so far that it was now beyond the reach of the usual panaceas of social and economic reform. One of the seed-beds of the glorious past had decayed and the heirs of the men who had made that past had decayed with it and slipped beyong redemption. Best, perhaps, not to think about it. Let nature take its course. Bihar, it seemed, defied reason and alienated compassion.

It excelled in virtually all the negative in- dicators. It had the highest birth-rate, the highest level of illiteracy, the highest number of college dropouts. Its politics were the most caste-fettered. A model of political instability, Bihar, since 1947, had run through nearly two dozen Chief Ministers. With roughly thirty percent of its population landless, it had become a reser- voir of the semi-slavery known as bonded labour. Brigandage was rife: dacoity was a

and pastime ad e gorfthoeaLo man llege clyr° d f jobless 11. `students' by day and brigands bY n'Ople The educational system was disintegratito's For one whole year the University of Pa of had remained closed after rival gr°11Pshol students, organised on caste lines' begun to murder each other. From one year to the next, itar $ generated more tales of atrocity than had other region of India. Massacre :ore become almost a commonplace in its remote villages where caste warfare dol ticulated the struggle between the .51 and the landless — or, as the N4'1-0 ideologues like to put it, between .0 and `serf'. Typically, it was Bihar caused a furore in the New Delhi Paraso ment when news broke that the poll '0e matter of course, had been blinding s' p dY. of common criminals in their custo, had been estimated that probably fiftY P;y ple are killed every day by Politic is motivated acts of violence. The h°r1.°I. pt5 obscured because many of these inei,cle, tgioonuani rpepreosrst. pedienopble k

both the how

an° ...at long Piroty can carry on as it is without the sc'c'aot breaking down completely,' a civil Ser,voe who knew the state well said to Ille.iradY answer is that the society has ..'„d the broken down.' Acts of God cor1P000 Bihari tragedy. The people lurchbe"; of the threat of drought and the threa` flood: too little or too much water. or, Bihar, famine is always just around the e ner.

,rthing

`Vou want to know if there is anl-,„d. good atb that editor a t c n o f b esaid onae b oouf t The p pl3ai ilt rTsae 6;5 alliti English-language newspapers was by my question. 'The truthful rePlY is Pay: cannot think of a single good thing t° kept at His office, tidy and dark and cool, keyotic bay the over-heated glare and ellausp ugliness of the Patna morning thr: see which I had ventured to him. He had many problems trYing c°rne anto for; duce his paper. His staff, most of "Indio were equipped with degrees in EnglisItti to not really know the language and rensp accept that they did not know it. Eng v1,2sa dying language in Bihar. `To be frank ,, You, he said, 'this so-called paper of piell I'm editor is fit only for toilet paper. 21quite ashamed of it. But what can I do "Lth theseP eo le? What can anyone do *ith therrp, htAle lived the life of an exile in Patna. It N.' Proved almost impossible for him to t-eate a social life in that debilitated en- °11Ment If, for instance, he invited a to his home, it was more than likely Procated; the invitation would not be

474 and if by some chance it was,

I iski2st's womenfolk would be carefully fe'eer.,T1 away from his gaze. The Bihari suf- tb..'" from an eerie lethargy. Such energy as ere Was came from imported individuals

e self. The locals who were desperate

emniiu and ambitious enough often

j;gtated to other states: Bihar was a ma-

' exPorter of raw labour power. 'What pr'nkare faced with,' he said, 'is a human a personality problem. How do nii'll.solve the personality problems of sixty Cl°t1 People?' And he too had shrugged esPairingly, 5,,Tilike businessman who had come from e.7'ul to Ilset up a factory making pump dispac,inerY for tube wells was equally He reckoned that roughly triee„11,'"ve percent of his original invest- been eaten up by bribes to politi- Darbils1 and bureaucrats. 'You have to grease

ties, s at Piece

every stage. To push even the lit- of paper up the ladder costs you li:hrieJ.' He had not yet come across an Politician or bureaucrat. Yet he was suc'healist. He was not against bribery as bribe 10 do business anywhere in India, him s usually had to be paid. What upset pa.;,.' what he found 'unfair', was that after Iiing Your bribe nothing much happened. 1 sta;1, is the astonishing thing. That is what ill" can't get over. Nothing happens. hatiedYjur,st wake up enough to hold out their baeLs tOr the envelope and then go straight sle„p., 8.1111.1ke Th., the editor, he was perplexed by the he Zellaracter. They signally lacked what. apb;ed a work ethic. Mostly, they were

O tw'o-ehtlY quite content to take home the r three hundred rupees a month they

ear for doing next to nothing. The idea aliDe°,tking harder or earning more did not have any appeal. Without notice, tirn`InPloyees would disappear for days at a sot: to attend the wedding or funeral of sortie distant relation; or to take part in ehle..,ngthY and obscure religious ritual. alrii -a" concluded that the Bihari was timost -evoid of ambition in the conven- asusoal sense. At any rate, ambition was not laboeiated with productive, disciplined gteedur. !Its Place was taken by a fatuous 1E his factory managed to produce his 'Ling at all that was only because half of Uw°.rk-force had been recruited from -Eitharis. disaAfter autumnal Delhi, the Patna air was u,..greeably vaporous and clammy. MY tr7al-drive1 was an unshaven, sullen-faced incin,i Mouth bloodily discoloured by over- ulence in pan. We proceeded slowly,

carefully dodging the cows which reclined by preference in the middle of the road, showing not the slightest tremor of anxiety at our approach, serenely contemplating their ramshackle world. 'That tranquil, far- off gaze [of the Indian cow],' wrote a businesslike American observer in the 1920s, 'is, indeed, often remarked and ac- claimed by the passing traveller as an out- ward sign of an inner sense of surrounding love ... after examining the facts, one is driven to conclude that the expression in the eyes ... is due partly to low vitality.' We crawled along dusty, pot-holed lanes crowded with pedestrians and cycle rickshaws and lined with the stalls of petty merchants. Ceaselessly, the driver honked his horn. I stared at the meagre limbs of the rickshaw wallahs, haunches angled off their saddles, effortfully. pumping the pedals of their cumbrous vehicles as they toiled their human cargoes homeward. India, even to- day, offers a still more elemental mode of public transport: in Calcutta I saw people being carried about in hand-pulled rickshaws.

We were halted by a religious procession. Gaudily coloured idols, bedecked with tinsel and garlands of marigolds, were riding on the open tray of a lorry. A shabbi- ly uniformed band walked behind the lorry, their trumpets and drums filling the steamy air with strident discordancy. Patna, as I was to discover, was a pious town, much given to exhibitions of Hinduism's polytheistic zeal. Hardly a day passed without my seeing processions similar to this one. Dusk was falling when I got to the hotel.

The hotel, owned by a state-controlled corporation devoted to the develop- ment of tourism, was a gloomy place, so dimly lit that it was painful to the eyes: the electricity was running at about half-power. After filling in many forms, I looked for the bar.

'Bar is closed,' said the receptionist. 'What time does it open?'

'Bar is closed permanently.' He spoke, I felt, with some satisfaction.

The bar had been shut up during the

'Energy crises just pass me by.'

Janata era, a victim of Morarji Desai's pro- hibitionist fervour. Despite Janata's demise and Indira Gandhi's more tolerant attitude towards the consumption of alcohol, no steps had yet been taken to reopen it. If I wanted anything to drink, anything either hard or soft in a bottle, I would, the recep- tionist explained with intensifying satisfac- tion, have to send 'outside' for it. Indeed, he pointed out, if I wanted cigarettes I would have to send 'outside': if I wanted matches I would have to send 'outside'.

'What about food? Do I have to send outside for that as well?'

He laughed. 'Food you can have inside,' he said. 'Restaurant is in operation. But if you want anything else... ' He spread his hands resignedly. 'If you wish, I'll send a boy right away. Of course he'll require a lit- tle extra...it is not, properly speaking, his job, you understand.'

I was beginning to understand. It was not in the staff's interest to provide too many facilities within the hotel. Sending 'outside' was a much more rewarding exercise. Desai's attempt at moral revolution had coincided neatly with self-interest.

As I stood there meditating on these mat- ters, the lights went out altogether. A peon was summoned. He arrived, bearing a lighted candle, and escorted me to my room. After about an hour, the lights came on again, spreading their painful glimmer. I went down to the restaurant. Young men in red trousers and black jackets lounged listlessly. The only diners apart from myself were a taciturn Bihari family and a Japanese woman of middle age — come to Bihar, I assumed, to see Buddhism's sacred places. During dinner the lights went out again. Candles flamed into life.

'Does the electricity go on and off like this all the time?' I asked my red-coated at- tendant.

'Every day, sahib.'

'Why?'

'Power shortage, sahib.'

'Why is there a power shortage?'

He simpered inanely and shrugged.

The shortage of power in a state that ac- counts for more than half of India's coal production had ceased to be strange. It had become one more unalterable fact of life to be endured. Later, I discovered one cause of the shortfall: the private contractors licensed to transport coal from the na- tionalised mines had fallen into the habit of siphoning off substantial quantities into the black market. Bihar was as powerless before the doings of men as it was before the doings of nature.

I watched the wavering reflections of the candles in the panes of the windows and doors; I listened to the murmur of voices penetrating from the lightless road. The Bihari family departed. So did the Japanese woman. I called for my bill. My waiter bent over me, whispering the amount into my ear.

'But where's the actual bill?'

He looked embarrassed; he signalled over one of his colleagues.

'You have a problem, sahib?' asked the newcomer politely. He was dressed in a less flunkeyish style than the others and seemed to be in a position of some authority.

'I would like my bill.'

My original attendant skulked away, vanishing into the candle-lit gloom.

'Naturally, sahib, we'll provide a bill if you want one...' He hesitated, his soft eyes exploring my face. 'May I be frank with you, sahib?'

'By all means.'

He explained succinctly the system of petty embezzlement engaged in by himself and the rest of the staff. The loot, he ex- plained was shared out equally among them. It was all very democratic, all very cooperative. 'Sahib,' he murmured, assum- ing a piteous expression, 'we cannot live on what they pay us. If we tried to do that, we would all starve.'

He paused. I watched the reflections.

'Do you really require the bill, sahib?'

'Forget it.' I felt weary, infected by a sudden apathy.

He smiled. 'I can see you're a good man, sahib. I'll invite you to my house. You will

see how I — a chef de rang, sahib ... ache! de rang! — you will see how I live, in what conditions I must raise my children. Would you like to visit my humble home, sahib?'

I said I would. The chef de rang led me through the candle-lit gloom to my room. 'Take care to lock your door, sahib. Patna has many bad, anti-social characters.'

I promised I would take every care. Bow- ing solicitously, he retreated. Sleep did not come easily in the overheated darkness.

One sultry evening I am led by the chef de rang down a meandering, muddy lane. He goes before me, lighting my way with a torch whose beam traces the outlines of fetid pools. We leap across a gutter. He says, 'We're here. Welcome to my house.' A young woman appears in the doorway. She draws the edge of her sari forward so that it veils the lower half of her face. Twit- tering, she scuttles off into the darkness. 'That is my wife,' says the chef de rang. 'She is shy. You must excuse her. It is not our custom for women to talk to strange men.' He takes me into a white-washed room about ten foot square, roofed with corrugated iron. The lingering warmth of the day continues to soak through the metal. 'Sometimes,' he says, 'in the hot weather season the heat is so great that the skin of the children is blistered by it.' Most of the space is taken up by a bed. On it his three children, two girls and a boy, lie sleeping. He switches on the ceiling fan, the only noticeable item of luxury I can see in the room. Gaudy icons decorate the walls: gods and goddesses with face tinted mauve, pink and blue; multi-armed, elephant-nosed, monkey-faced divinities. On a shelf there is a shaving mirror, some tattered Hindi paperbacks and a collection of medicines. A folding table is set out before me. He covers it with a white cloth, arranges a knife, fork and spoon and offers me a napkin. All of these refinements are stamped with the monogram of the hotel. His wife, head lowered, brings in a bowl of curried chicken and scuttles out. The chef de rang squats on the bed, using his fingers, swallowing with noisy relish.

'You think,' he says when we have finish- ed eating, 'that I am a wicked man to cheat my employers.'

'I haven't said that.'

'Will you please tell me how a man can live on 450 rupees [about twenty-five pounds] a month?' His rent alone consum- ed one hundred rui5ees. How could he sur- vive on what was left? How could he feed his family? It was not possible for him to live honestly on what he earned.

Yet the chef de rang could consider himself a fortunate man. By the standards of Bihar his salary was almost princely. If the most humble post in the hotel where he worked fell vacant there would be literally thousands of applicants for the job.

'If I did not cheat a little, sahib, my children might not be alive today. The Ganga would have taken their bodies a long time ago. When big men cheat, sahib, they take lakhs, they take crores. What do I take? Ten rupees here, five rupees there — so I can put food in the mouths of my children. It makes me sick at heart to do it, sahib.' He pauses, massaging the region of his heart. 'There are some who do worse things. Some sell the bodies of their daughters, their wives. Our mentality is no good, sahib. No good at all. I do not care for my own country or countrymen.'

His confession is becoming oppressive. What prompts it? The hope of a handout? Sympathy? It is likely that he himself does not know. He has probably lost touch with his own motives. The chef de rang is obscurely ready for any eventuality — com- passion, money ... anything.

'We have thought of sterilisation. Even 'She says she'll have it if we can change the spots.' (To be concluded).

that we have thought of.' He falls 50 staring at his sleeping children.

'What stopped you?'

'I have only one boy - child. -- d sicken and die tomorrow. Who call thei Girl children do not really belong t.° oor father. Boy children look after you old age. They alone can perform 070c rites. What would happen to me if th,iseo son of mine should die? I have bad urgol about that, sahib. It worries Me a deal.' I sit in the hot cell, looking at the g.05 and goddesses, listening to his earlPialtiotil and the chorus of the frogs; I sit there Ty the power fails and I begin to sweat. beam of his torch guides me back thr° the malodorous darkness to my rn°1r1. 'peaceful Exam At Hajipur,' anri°L1.11,crehat theheadlienxeaminintahte examinations a a.i

D ewsipapevr,.51 Intermediate District,' ,00

, said the accompanYing tzt■ were being conducted peacefully at College and Jamunilal College centres ;de. Strict police arrangements have beer111130. to maintain law and order on the CO?. pus... ' Elsewhere was reported the travo end of 1) a 'notorious criminal' who had 63 mysteriously drowned in a riVers plain.misadventure A s i f ttoheepoomlipceenwsaertee aftoar lothsasInheipe body of a murdered policeman had Tc found lying beside the railway trae,ff to Forbesganj. I read on, confining IrlYs.rfot the same page. Saharsa District bat!: ods many days past, been cut off bY 11° est from all other parts of the state and Otero, of the country. The District had n° hPerre spect of immediate relief. In Nawada f,t-hers had taken place a protest march by tea-the who wished to voice their opposition t° triaomn poafnftt eceo r Ar u 'sugarti on o ffatmh et nDei swt rasi c t r' as geidi;:ii the town of Khagani. In the Kolhan regitles, noted one of the more cryptic dispatch vias the people were 'in distress' — no cause. „5 specified. A small item repeated allcboc about the mass torture and killirt up Achvasis — the tribal folk who make In about ten percent of Bihar's PoPulati°Ari.the Aram a gang of bandits had attackeuclec, house of a local high school teacher,' away flowed in the district of East s meant ,foarmonly g one or tthwt noghs ours a ta ge of drinking water. Moairleoavcetirte,' tinued the item, 'the Public Health 9ePaot ment and the local municipality have yet installed any power-generating It specifically for water supply in the tow, has become nobody's concern here: P'er. ween Bagaha and Narkatiaganj traT,sass vices had been 'paralysed' because 01. 'had casual leave. The residents of Khagarl,a not received promised flood relief all", the people of Kolhan, were in distress. was. soal,:,

But in Bihar that morning there

gn000ndneendewitss ttnotoe. agntBiohntoalepsutr verabUlisnhi a den

course in Gandhian Thought. s!ty oina