Short Story - The Silver Stories

Fiction, Family, family, Love, Mother, Relationships, Short Story

Dhaam Ke Meethe Bhath

February 23, 2023 2 Comments

In the foothills of the Himalayas, laid a small yet gorgeous town, Mandi. The town was straight out of a Ruskin Bond novel, with lush green trees, blooming bright flowers, a flowing cold river with chirping birds and grazing cows around. There wasn’t any clamour of heavily treading vehicles nor any smoke from industries. The place was resided in by simple people, leading even simpler lives. There wasn’t luxury but there was peace, there wasn’t the comfort of cushions but the people of Mandi woke and slept in the arms of nature.

The population of Mandi was either engaged in small businesses or in service for shops/farms in their own or nearby villages. Both ways, the people of Mandi had limited resources at their disposal, contributing towards a life that was slow and all wrapped in humility. Amongst all the people that were a part of the village, there was a beautiful family living by the stream.

Rampal Tehran was a 30-year-old man who was born and brought up in Mandi. His ancestors too, belonged to Himachal Pradesh and worked in the fruit farms of wealthy land owners for years. Continuing the tradition, Rampal began working in the vast farmland of the Mehrotra’s, after finishing high school from the village. He was soon married to his aunt’s neighbour’s daughter, Roop. Matching up the standards of Rampal’s fair complexion and 6-feet tall height, Roop herself, was a lovely girl with small, green eyes and long, traight brown hair. After marrying Rampal, Roop too began working at the Mehrotra farmland to help her husband with some extra income. A year after their wedding, Roop gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. The couple knew no boundaries of joy at the birth of their daughter, Roohi. Both Rampal and Roop, spent all their time with their daughter, playing with her by the river, taking her to the village mela, teaching her native rhymes and songs and putting her to bed. Their lives were devoted to their young girl and each-other. Theirs was a family that everyone only had blessings for.

With Rampal’s unimaginable affection and Roop’s obsessive care, Roohi grew up into the most endearing, chubby little girl. At around 5:30 in the morning, Rampal used to wake up and walk down to the riverside to fill up 2 buckets of water for the day. On his way back home, he bought half a litre of milk from the dairy for Roohi from the previous day’s savings. After reaching home at around 6, he would place his hand on Roop’s forehead, signalling that it was time to wake up. Then, both Roop and Rampal would together clean their warm, one-room house, keep the pots of daliya and tea on the stove and finish their everyday chores. They would do all of this in hushes and murmurs so as to not wake Roohi. Exactly at 7:30, Rampal woke Roohi up while Roop readied three plates and cups for the family. In utmost agony, Roohi opened her eyes as her deep sleep broke. With sleep-laden eyes and a grumpy face, she sat on the floor with her parents and gulped down the sweet porridge and tea. “When will I cook for you and baba?”, Roohi asked Roop eveyrtime the three sat together for breakfast. Whenever Roop sat down by the stove to make simple yet delectable meals, Roohi always stood by a distance and admired her mother dearly. Although Rampal and Roop dreamt of educating Roohi into a police officer, little did they know that their girl dreamt only of jumping into her bed for a long, deep sleep and of cooking hot Pahadi Mutton for her parents. After dropping Roohi off to the village school, Rampal and Roop rushed to the farms and worked extremely hard the entire day to make ends meet. Sama Begum, their 60-year old neighbour lived alone and had the leisure time to pick Roohi from school. In the hills, the sun set sooner than other places, leaving the small town of Mandi in the blanket of darkness, unprotected from chilly winds. Roop and Rampal came back home from the farms just before the sun set.

Surrounded with endless forests from each side, it wasn’t safe to be out in the streets at the time of dusk in Mandi. Sama begum, the only source of town gossip for Roop, usually sat with her over tea and narrated tales of robberies, rapes, murders, accidents and other mishaps in the town. Which is why, all the residents finished their work of the outside world well before the sunset and spent the cold evenings locked up in their warm, cosy huts with kehwas and chicken stews.

Life kept passing by, with Roohi’s giggles and snuggles. With the simplest of needs and modest of dreams, Rampal and his family barely complained of having less money. They were content with the little they had and that was enough to keep the wheels of their lives moving. Roohi was now 7 years old, who no longer had to be woken up by Rampal nor had to cared for excessively. She was now a big girl who loved helping around the house, accompanying her father to fetch milk and water, cleaning the mud pavement outside, chatting with Sama Begum and also learning to make tea for her parents. Roohi was now truly a big girl.

It was one of the coldest nights of the year on December 18^th. The sun had set sooner than it usually did. Sama begum and Roohi were sipping tea, occasionally peeping on the other side of the road to see if they could already spot Rampal and Roop returning from work. “Don’t worry, you finish your Maths homework, there’ll be here anytime soon. You know it is the time when berries are flushed into jam jars. The farm is bustling with activity. I am sure they must be tied up with work.”, said Sama begum. “Sama Begum, amma has been unusually tired these days. I am certain that the work has taken a toll on her. Baba also talks lesser than usual. How about I surprise them with Kehwa and Meethe Bhaath today? You could help me and we could all eat tonight’s dinner together.”, suggested an excited Roohi. With immeasurable love and caution, Roohi made her first ever pot of Meethe Bhath, a dish that the entire family ate on days of celebration or on the days when Roohi was sad. The entire room filled up with the aroma of jaggery and rice while on the other side Sama Begum readied the kehwa. Racing around the hut, Roohi firstly laid a mat on the floor and then slowly placed pots on it. “Everything is ready. They are still not here. I am starving. They never have been so late.” “How about you eat now and once your parents are back from the farms, you can share some more with them?” No, Sama dadu. I’ll eat with Baba and amma only.”

Rampal and Roop hurried from work, knowing that they were quite late and Roohi was alone at home. Just as they were rushing down the hillside towards the town, they heard howls of wolves. “Wolves! These are wolves, Rampal. We will be killed.” “There is no need to panic, we can easily manipulate them in the dark and find our way home safely. And you never know, these can be wild dogs too.” Both their hearts sank in fear, their skins turned cold and pale as the stark darkness only grew and the howls intensified. But only to protect the other from the claws of fear and hopelessness, none of them worded the real situation that struck them. “My Roohi! Will I ever be able to wrap her in my arms? I don’t think so. No! I didn’t know today morning was the last time I sat with my innocent daughter for our last tea together. Rampal, what will she do without us? Where will she go?” Rampal could not process anything. All he knew was that they had to run and run as fast as they could. In moments of horror, they misjudged the end of the slope. In less than a second, they both slipped down the hills, their hands entangled.

There was an eerie silence around the hills after that. No cries, no howls, no thud from the falling. The place was enveloped in a mournful quiet.

Back in the hut, Roohi covered her cold face with Roop’s shawl. She could smell her mother’s fragrance and that itself was comforting enough for her to continue waiting for them to return. The night became endless as a scared Roohi, with teary eyes and shivering hands, sat by the door with Sama Begum, waiting for her parents to come back. The hot pot of Meethe Bhaath went cold and odourless. “We’ll eat when they come back. Don’t worry Sama Begum, we can heat the pot up and they’ll be hot and nice again. My first Dhaam ke Meethe Bhaath. Mummy and Baba must be so hungry.”, murmured the little Roohi.

Fiction, Short Story

The Qureshi Palace

June 8, 2021 2 Comments

Everything had changed in Shehzadpur. When Qureshi had left the village, it was merely an extended agricultural farm with a handful of huts inhabiting the place, without even a sign of development. Today, almost 15 years later, the serene village had transformed into a hustling town, engulfing all the neighboring villages. Sardaar Bishan Singh’s only ayurvedic clinic was taken over by acquisitive private doctors, who mostly worked with fake medical degrees. The roadside fritters’ carts now were shops that sold spicy burgers and noodles. There now stood a cinema hall built by the village contractor. Everything had changed in Shehzadpur, thought Qureshi.

It was 15 years ago that Qureshi had scammed a city dweller to buy a passport and a forged visa. He desperately wanted to escape the clutches of poverty. He was exhausted of watching his wife, Reshma Begum and five children sleep hungry every night. His four sons, Abdul, Karim, Javed and Raza along with his only daughter Hayaat, were shrinking of starvation every single day. There was no means of earning a livelihood. Farming for the landowner didn’t even provide for a week’s food, let alone one whole month. On somedays, like the birthdays of his children, Qureshi resorted to repairing buses of Punjab Roadways in order to purchase anything that would make for a celebration at his home. In the scorching heat of Punjab, he laid down under the buses, bruising and blackening his skin only to buy some chicken or Halwa for his family. Under these circumstances, survival seemed to be a difficult feat to achieve. Therefore, failing to find a dignified way of life in Shehzadpur, Qureshi escaped to the Middle East. His friend Rehmaan, who had been settled there for decades now, had assured him the job of a security guard at one of the mansions in Saudi Arabia.

Leaving behind his family for an unsettling span of time was not easy, especially considering that all of them meant more than his own life to him. It was indeed for them that he was leaving. With his heart soaring with pain, Qureshi left to play cards with his destiny, to see who wins between his fate and him. A man as well built and tall as him, was best suited to take care of Khwaab, the mansion where an old couple, the Sayyeds lived. Jamaal Sayyed was over 80 years of age and his wife was nearly 75. They both were partially paralyzed due to an accident where they had lost their only daughter. It was a lonely house. The husband and wife, barely spoke to each other and it was only Qureshi who broke the deafening silence of the house by narrating the intriguing stories of India to the couple. They began enjoying his company. But moreover, they began trusting him. For they had seen, in spite of being aware of their weak and incapable bodies, Qureshi never misused his freedom. He was mighty, yet loyal. He devoted his time in taking care of the mansion as if it were his own house. He went beyond his assigned duties of a guard and ended up making chicken stew for the couple on many winter nights. In return, he was able to send a hefty amount to his family, at the end of every month. Years went by. After the death of his wife, Mr. Sayyed became bed stricken. He lost all his strength and now completely depended on Qureshi for something even as small as holding a spoon. Without an heir for his manganous wealth, Mr. Sayyed gave everything away to Qureshi before finally passing away to a fatal case of pneumonia. Qureshi was now the possessor of 10 crore rupees besides the mansion, Khwaab and The Sayyed Chemicals in Saudi. He now wasn’t just a man who had fled from Punjab in search of some money, he was now Dawood Qureshi. The Dawood Qureshi.

After he arrived back in Shehzadpur, he was a new man. His aura had transformed into a magnet that could attract anybody who met him. People were in awe of him , looking for the reason behind his unbelievable success. There were all sorts of conjectures. Some said he had murdered a wealthy couple in Saudi to steal their money while some said he had married a lonely rich woman back in the Middle East. But Dawood shut every blabber with the vigor of his money. He indulged in limitless charities, sent his boys away to Saudi for them to take care of the Sayyed Chemicals and Khwaab, got his daughter married in Dubai and began building his own palace in Shehzadpur. In no time, the barren lane of his house was bought by his men. The lane was then covered with four magnificently royal bungalows that Dawood built, all adjacent to one another. By the side of these gigantic red palaces, was a bank branch that Qureshi bought, bribing some officials. Right opposite the central bungalow, Qureshi built a mosque. A mosque so beautiful that it could make your eyes gape endlessly at it, it could make you standstill in sheer amazement and it could bring you unimaginable placidity. With expensive glasswork and a colorful fountain in the center, the mosque had a gorgeous verandah where small children attended their everyday madrassa classes. Exactly behind his bungalows, were vast fields of mustard, where tiny yellow flowers bloomed and where life also lived.

Qureshi was 65 years old by this time. His limbs began growing weaker, his shoulders stooped and his heart turned older, inviting multiple chronic diseases. But Qureshi wouldn’t stop. There was still so much to do. Only now he finally had the authority where people bowed at his glimpse, his orders were followed swiftly and he ruled. He ruled Shehzadpur. It was then that he made his mind to enter politics to become Dawood, the leader. He won elections one after the other and multiplied his wealth beyond limits. The entire Punjab shook with wonder when Qureshi got his youngest son married. The bride was landed from a chopper at Shehzadpur’s school ground. The magic didn’t cease there, thousands of villagers gathers to catch a glimpse of the diamond laden young bride from Dubai, whose lehenga was furnished with jewels from across the globe. This was Dawood Qureshi’s supremacy.

The next few years for the family were blissful when Sana, the youngest and the only daughter in law who was living with them, gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Qureshi knew no boundaries of happiness and began spending more time at home, watching his granddaughter, Firdaus grow. He refused to send her to the local school, blaming the wild boys of the town and insisted that her learning must curtail to her 4’o clock madrassa classes. When his power began slipping from his hands and his party was about to lose the elections, now, 70 years old, Qureshi bought victory for 5 crore rupees in cash. Everybody went quiet knowing that the tiger was still not old and knew how to still hold his power. But in truth, the tiger had gone weak, so much so, that now he couldn’t be out of his house for very long. Besides his heart, now his lungs too were losing their strength. Firdaus, the tiny chubby girl with her pink cheeks had stopped complaining of not being able to go to school. She felt sorry for her old grandfather’s inability to even retaliate now.

One night before going to sleep, Qureshi informed his wife Reshma about a journalist’s visit, scheduled for the next day. He was ecstatic and with childlike enthusiasm told her that he was being interviewed by this young journalist from Chandigarh’s magazine. “She will do a lifetime feature on me.” He told Reshma Begum. Gulping a handful of pills for keeping his body alive, Qureshi went to sleep. Next morning rose with a different glow. The sun was shining brighter but it wasn’t hot. The breeze was cold and Reshma had already instructed the servants to prepare for the Dawaat. It was her husband’s big day and she was spot on as his supporter, as his wife. Firdaus ran to her grandfather’s room with a cup of tea like she did every day. But Qureshi won’t even move in spite of her joyous shrieks. He laid still as a stone. “Dadijaan, dadajaan won’t wake up!” And Qureshi just won’t move. He was in the lap of eternal sleep.

The town stopped that day, all shops shut and everybody gathered outside the Qureshi lane that began with a huge hoarding that read ‘You are welcome to The Qureshi Palace’. The journalist’s car arrived, brushing the crowd away. The young lady from the city, cluelessly, walked in the house and realized what had happened. Firdaus and Sana were inconsolable over Qureshi’s death. But Reshma didn’t bat an eyelid. Just when the journalist was preparing to leave, Reshma signaled her to wait and said, “Welcome to the Qureshi Palace. Please have a seat and enjoy your sherbet. You have come to write about my husband, Mr. Qureshi. He conquered everything he set his eye at and this feature was something, his heart beamed for. His final desire will not go unfulfilled. You have come to feature the tiger; his tigress will narrate his tale to you. Sana, call the party workers and tell them the 5-crore deal to win the elections won’t go in vain. Reshma Begum is ready to hold her husband’s chair. And Sana, send our men to the town school and register my Firdaus’s name. She will go to school from tomorrow. Nobody can dare to even set an eye on a girl from The Qureshi Palace. Let that be known.”

Dreams, Fiction, Love, Mother, Relationships, Short Story

Little Dreams

March 3, 2021 3 Comments

In the barren lands of Rajasthan, in the midst of mighty deserts, there was a barely known and teeny sized village, Bhaleri. Even if you were to be an explorer, there exists an extremely thin chance of you to come across this name, let alone visit it. In this incomprehensible world, billions exist and with them, billions of stories and billions of fates. Some we know about and many we are unaware of. One among these life stories is the story of a beautiful child, Jaanu. That’s what they called her, perhaps she had a formal name too, but that was only limited to a mere registration identity for her village school.

Jaanu was only six years old. She was just as fair as milk with big eyes, carrot nose and apple cheeks. Jaanu was the walking teddy bear for the entire house for she was plump and stout. Whoever visited their house, in a matter of just a few minutes, was found playing with her excitedly. She was one of those magical children who could win hearts with just the charm of their innocence. Everyone was fascinated with the yellow flower clip that she wore in her hair, with her chubby arms laden with yellow and green bangles, with her limitless appetite for Kheer and her go-to orange dress that she saved for every special occasion.

Jaanu lived in an outright traditional environment with her family. Her grandfather, a farmer had two sons. The elder, Jaanu’s uncle was an engineer in the city. His wife, tempted with her husband’s independence and progress, demanded to study further and was then allowed to leave behind her son and a strikingly beautiful daughter to go settle in a hostel and prepare for government examinations. The younger son, Jaanu’s father, was in no mood to abandon the leisure of village life. He was content with the income that came from their agricultural produce. However, due to societal pressure and taunts for being unemployed, Mukesh decided to open a small internet shop, five miles from their house. He was proud of the fact that his was the first and the only shop in the village that could draw youngsters and officials for all their work for which initially, people had to travel to the city. Jaanu’s mother, jealous of her sister-in-law’s life, was always found with a frown on her face. She had neither the ambition nor the prerequisites to indulge in further studies. So, she spent her time in the kitchen along with the other ladies of the family.

Right next to their house lived Jaanu’s bestfriend, Garima. Jaanu met her every day and if there were days when her angry mother wouldn’t allow her to or if there were guests at home, she would throw a pebble on Garima’s terrace. Garima then, would come running to the top of the house and the two girls would communicate with gestures for hours. They couldn’t go to same schools due to the disparity between their house incomes. Moreover, Jaanu was adamant to go to a school that had uniforms and classes, unlike Garima’s, which was only an Aanganwadi with just one teacher and an open ground in the name of a school.

Bhaleri was a secluded place in all terms. There was barely any means for people to know about the world or get any exposure. If at all they wanted anything beyond the necessities, they could either travel to the nearby city or visit Mukesh’s shop to watch videos on the computer system. Life was slow and self-sufficient. Nobody bothered to get more than what they already had; cows for the milk to feed the family, farms to fill stomachs, a cart where t-shirts could be bought, an annual fest where stalls for exciting city things were set up, one school and a hospital. That’s all they could ever need. Maybe on somedays the men needed to smoke beedis or hookahs and now they had Lakshman’s moving cycle for that too. After the smoke and gossips of who loves whom, they bought packets of chips and chocolates for their children and walked back home.

It was an unusual day at Jaanu’s house, on one summer morning. As she was hurrying to ask Mukesh to drop her school on his motorcycle, her mother asked her to go back to sleep. Later, it was found that they were being visited by their relatives from the city. The entire house was running around, preparing to welcome their influential guests. Jaanu peeped from the pillow as she rolled in the bed. She could see her mother was constantly mumbling, walking in and out of the kitchen. Her elder sister, was sweating while she mopped and cleaned the entire house. Jaanu’s grandmother sat on the mat and monitored every bit of the preparation. After all, it was her elder sister visiting them. Jaanu was only getting excited because she knew it’ll be a day all about delicacies, bowls of kheer, no homework and lots of attention.

She quietly slid out of her bed, took a bath with boiling tap water, dressed into her orange frock and put on her yellow flower clip. Then she realized, it was not an ordinary village guests visit so she tip-toed to her mother’s almirah and slyly poured talcum powder all over her neck and a patch on her face. She just couldn’t stop giggling. With her little feet she ran to the verandah and threw a stone on Garima’s terrace, hoping that her bestfriend hadn’t left for her school yet. Garima came running. Jaanu with her little hands, signaled, asking Garima on how was she looking also then noticing that she had forgotten to wear her bangles. After her little chat, she went back to her room, finished up her final dress up regime and sat on the netted bed with her grandmother, waiting for the car to arrive.

Time flew faster than one could imagine. Everybody came in their classy city attires, walked out of their big white SUV, carrying hampers and gifts in their hands. The kids got busy playing around with calves, goats and thatched huts. The adults sat in the room which had a cooler and drank glasses of cold lassi. It was a good day, everyone fought for chances to have Jaanu sit on their laps. They had their usual Rajasthani thalis for lunch with onion fritters as the side dish. Just as the time for Kheer came, Jaanu quietly excused herself from the gathering, filled a big bowl of Kheer for herself and licked till the empty bowl shone as though it were clean. After that whenever anybody asked her if she had Kheer, she would innocently shake her head and say ‘No!’ and share their bowl of the dessert too. After filling her stomach with bowls and bowls of it, she ran to the kitchen, making a twisted face and said, “Ma, it was too sweet! I think you added sugar twice.”

Just as the guests were preapring to leave, Jaanu’s distant aunt, who was in awe of the little girl said, “Jaanu, you go to school everyday, study so much..What do you want to be when you grow up?” The lady knew that either Jaanu wouldn’t understand the question or she would just giggle and to the most, would say she wanted to be a teacher just like her elder Aunt was aspiring to be. But to her surprise, Jaanu did not even wait for the question to end! She flung her little hands up in the air, and screamed “Faauji”! Her eyes lit up when she said that. Everybody burst out in laughter but her aunt was extremely intrigued with the response. It was so unusual for a six year old girl, being brought up in a traditional household in a village to have an ambition as strong and as clear as being a soldier. So she further inquired, “How did you know you want to be an Indian soldier?” “Every morning when we gather in our school ground for prayers and the Indian national anthem, I see army trucks passing by. I get so excited looking at them, that I also wave at the soldiers. On many days they end up looking at me, they smile and wave back. Grandpa tells me that they are heading to the border to kill our enemies and protect all of us. I want to go to the border and fight too!”

Nobody could ever imagine that a child like Jaanu would be garnering a passion so deep. That little girl could think more profoundly than probably anybody else in their entire village. Her aunt, mesmerized, then quickly looked at Jaanu’s mother. With a veil on her head, she was just laughing on what Jaanu had said earlier. It broke the lady’s heart to realize that had Jaanu’s parents listened to her dream more sensibly or patiently, they could actually mold her into an Indian soldier in the coming future. But they not only passed the talk as a mere farce but did not even pay the slightest attention to it. Nobody believed in the dream that glistened through her eyes. But Jaanu kept looking at her aunt, hoping that she would validate her tiny, blooming desire. The aunt gave the girl a tight hug, asked her to never forget about her dream, promised her to gift her movies on soldiers and then blessed her.

When the guests had departed in their car, Jaanu ran towards Garima’s house and got busy showing her the gifts that the city people had brought. The two girls played in the mud till dusk when Jaanu’s mother ordered her to quickly gulp down her night milk glass and go back to sleep. With kilos of kheer already in her stomach, Jaanu slept, with the yellow clip clutched in her hands. That night, she dreamt of the same army truck, this time with her aunt too inside. As she with the Indian Army soldiers halted outside Jaanu’s school to pick her up, Jaanu leapt in the bus with laddoos in her hand and drove off to the border to also fight back the country’s enemies.

Just as I said, in a world of so many stories and so many destinies, this was Jaanu’s little story and her not so little dream…

Fiction, Love, Mother, Relationships, Short Story

A Promise of Eternity

September 7, 2020 1 Comment

The auditorium was brought to life that day. Glowing yellow bulbs, thrilled voices, diverse perfumes fused into pleasant fragrance and sparkling outfits of the seated, infused breath into our enormous woody hall. The batch of 2019 was graduating and how! I had always dreamt of this evening, of draping that golden saree and of holding my degree. But never had I imagined this evening to be so distant from my dreams. Amidst the hustle, all of us lined up to go onto the stage but not everybody was awarded the opportunity of delivering a short speech in front of the entire University and all the esteemed guests and parents. Having been the head of the Literature committee and the author of various published works, the counsel approved of me as a worthy candidate. Unquestionably, standing in the queue to walk up to the stage, was making my heart race like Bolt and my limbs freeze like the Antarctica. It was the most important evening of my life and without a doubt, I knew what I had to speak about.

Fiction, Short Story

Lilly in the bed of Red Roses

June 24, 2020 4 Comments

Pari will take the test and by the weekend, we will have the results”, said Priyanjali, glowing in the bliss of morning sunshine. It was February and the Sharmas had just moved to Dehradun from Shimla. As she said this, her face lit up just like her eyes did whenever she dreamt of her child studying in the best convent school. “Oh, that’s wonderful, Mrs. Sharma. But mind you, Crestmore Convent is the best school of our city. Even kids of the millionaires cannot step in, if they lack the intellect to be a part of this glorious institution. So, don’t lose hope if Pari fails to qualify.” Said, Mrs. Karol, with a tone of superiority. Priyanjali was unharmed by the arrogant opinion of Mrs. Karol. She knew that her daughter was supremely smart and could easily ace the entrance exam of Crestmore.

Fiction, Love, Romance, Short Story

Ghaat Banarasiya

April 1, 2020 21 Comments

Enveloped in spirituality, Banaras was home to the tranquility that could wipe away every trace of restlessness. The city woke up to skies painted in shades of saffron and slept in the shimmering lights reflecting from the ghaats.Pillars of temples rose high up and birds opened their wings to soar in bliss. Even before the sun came up, Banaras was already immersed in mesmerizing voices of the devotees who sang to their Gods and the Ganga. This was a primary reason, besides the rejuvenating early morning sunrays sliding in through the crimson curtains of the room, that Piya never really needed an alarm.

Fiction, Short Story

Sapna’s Dreams

February 9, 2020 1 Comment

If someone ever mentions Fatehbad to you, do not bother looking for it on the map of India. Somewhere in Haryana, among soaring green trees, between one or two dried up canals and connected with broken puddled roads, you would find Sapna’s very own Fatehbad. Like children love slurping fruit jellies in the summer, like old men love snoring in the middle of reading a newspaper and like the young men love teasing those Chaudhary girls, Sapna loves her Fatehbad. It was 19 years ago that her father, Jaat Dharma Ram Singh had moved to this village. After the death of Sapna’s mother, Singh found it difficult to survive in the city of Ambala with Sapna and her two elder sisters.

Fiction, Short Story

Girl with a Pearl Earring

November 27, 2018 8 Comments

After a week of unusually heavy snowing, it was a warm and comforting Sunday morning in Los Angeles. The sun shone graciously in the Hollywood Hills and the house was enveloped in yellow haze of warmth.
Weather was never a direct influence on Anne’s mood, rather nothing at all had any immediate impact on her every day temperament. Anybody who looked at her, would in no time get fond her and this was accredited to Anne’s eternally graceful smile which never parted ways with her.

Fiction, Love, Romance, Short Story

A Letter that could never be Delivered…

January 1, 2018 No Comments

On my wedding night, my father placed his hand on my head, without looking into my eyes and said, “I will pray for your happiness always. Remember that your smile is my strength and every drop of tear in your eyes burns my heart.” I just smiled, looked up at him and said, “All my smiles bid me a goodbye the day I saw him walking away from our house, without even looking back to see me for the last time, walking away from my life forever.”

Fiction, Love, Romance, Short Story

That Incomplete yet Complete Lovestory!

December 24, 2017 No Comments

Amidst the monotonous normalities rushing through my life, never did I expect a surprise as vibrant as you. Lost was I in the world of logics and practicalities when you stepped in bringing in the beauty of some senseless, illogical and utterly magical companionship. The vacuum that had vividly become a part of me was effortlessly being filled by the laughter and love you came with. The setting was so perfectly weaved. Astonishingly, a person as private as me, took no time to turn into an open book in front of you.It was as if the universe had conspired us to be what the world called ‘soulmates’.

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