MEMOIRES OF ANOTHER DAY - by A. Roy Mukherjee

V : At Kharagpur there was a lame man who would occasionally come but not for begging alms. He would appear on the left of the vast open field lying in front of our house and then cross over to the right in great speed almost running on one leg. I was very afraid of him. Not me alone but all the children of the locality were very afraid. My father purchased me a motor car that did not run on fuel but had a paddle and a steering to maneuver it. Naturally all the children of the locality came to make friends with me. One day when we were playing on our compound and I was driving the car, suddenly the lame man appeared. All the children, myself included, ran into our house. The car was abandoned on the compound.


VI : We had a brick-built well at the back of our house. Inside the well a few frogs and snakes coexisted, peacefully or nor is not known. But they coexisted. The water of the well was used for cleaning of the floors and for toilet and other purposes. Sometimes a frog and a snake would come out in the pail when water was drawn. The frogs were comparatively much bigger in size.

VII : While we were there, a rumour spread that a number of human beings are required to be sacrificed at the site where a railway bridge was then being constructed on the river Padma (now in Bangladesh). For this purpose some people have been engaged to catch some people, bring them to the construction site for sacrifice. The rumour was so strong that all the people at Kharagpur started coming home before sundown and stopped going out of doors thereafter. My father’s office was on the ground floor of our house building and a few office bearers and other office staff used to stay in a part of the ground floor. So, for a few days, every evening my parents would sit on the open portico and the office staff would sit on the ground floor underneath and the discussion would obviously hover around the human sacrifice. I would, however, not sit with my parents on the portico, but would sit inside the room beside a window and would intently listen to all the stories.