Fatal Mistakes Read online

  ‘No, no, it’s fine,’ Nalini waved her hand vaguely. ‘To answer your question, my original career choice was teaching. I actually worked as a professor for, oh, seven? Eight years? Give or take.’

  ‘What did you teach?’

  ‘Chemistry. At SIES College.’

  ‘Um-hmm,’ Avantika said, scribbling on her notepad, ‘and why did you quit teaching?’

  ‘Well, some men came and threw acid on my face.’

  Avantika stopped writing and looked up. There was a knock on the door behind her.

  ‘Oh, good,’ Nalini said, ‘the tea is here.’

  The same young woman Avantika and Dhruv had met earlier entered the room with a tray bearing three plain brown ceramic mugs and a plate of salted biscuits. She put the tray down on the desk and left as quietly as she’d come in, just as Nalini called out, ‘Heena, tell Anita I want to talk to her after she’s done with her chores.’

  They drank their tea in silence. Avantika was racking her brains for something to say. Clearly, she was going to have to ask about the acid attack. What did it have to do with her article? Heaven alone knew. But she supposed it was impolite not to ask about these things. It was like old people and illnesses. You asked about their hip pain and how their joints were doing, despite not knowing what to do with the information. It was the geriatric version of small talk. Oh well, the best way out is through. She picked up her pen.

  ‘Tell me about the acid attack,’ she said.

  ‘I was teaching at SIES College back then,’ Nalini said, taking a sip of her tea. ‘I’m actually from Delhi, but after my wedding I moved here with my husband. He had his own business and we lived in a small two-bedroom house1 in Kurla. Ravi would drop me to college and pick me up every day. See, coming from Delhi, I was a little wary of public transport.’

  ‘Sure. I mean, after what happened to Nirbhaya on that bus…’

  ‘Exactly. And even if that was an extreme case, pawing and groping is an everyday affair on those buses.’

  ‘It’s not like that here,’ Avantika said, ‘I mean, obviously, there are creeps in every city, but it’s not that bad here yet.’

  ‘That’s exactly what people told me,’ Nalini said, ‘But I didn’t want to take a chance. And Ravi was very sweet. He said he didn’t mind being my chauffeur every day.’ She smiled at the memory. ‘Then, one evening, Ravi said he couldn’t come to pick me up. He was held up at work or something. Anyway, I told him I’d manage and set off for the bus stop. We had been kept back after college hours to discuss something. Science exhibition? Annual day? Something like that. It was winter and the sky had begun to darken early. The bus stop was in front of a dark alley that didn’t have any street lights. There was nobody waiting at the stop except me. I must’ve been there some ten minutes when two men came up behind me. They must’ve come from the alley because I didn’t see them approach till they were just a few feet away from me. I heard footsteps and I turned around in time to see their faces. It was only for a second or so, and I was about to move away from them, when one of them brought out a glass bottle and jerked the liquid inside it towards me. For a split second I thought it was water. And then the burning began.’

  Nalini leaned back and took a sip of her tea. Avantika found herself doing the same. Her throat had gone dry as Nalini had reached the part about her attack.

  ‘It must’ve … hurt,’ she said, even as a part of her slow-clapped sarcastically in her mind. Nice, it said, what a compassionate, evocative choice of words, right there.

  ‘Yes, it did,’ Nalini replied, ‘But the pain was just beginning. When it sank in that I had to quit teaching … that hurt as well. Not that the college had a problem, but I couldn’t do it. My psychiatrist had diagnosed me with PTSD and I’d have these episodes … then there were days I couldn’t bring myself to get out of bed and that would’ve meant missing lectures and I couldn’t put the kids through that. Besides, you know how people are. They stare and they’re not very good at hiding those stares. After a point, all that pity, the revulsion in those looks …’ She made a scoffing sound. ‘It was just easier to quit.’

  Avantika nodded.

  ‘And after you quit your job, you opened the farm?’ she asked.

  Nalini sipped her tea thoughtfully.

  ‘Not immediately,’ she said. ‘It took a while for me to … heal. It took some months, but I got better.’

  Avantika nodded.

  ‘Then, one night, there was a gas explosion in our house and my husband died.’

  Avantika stared wordlessly. Hearing about this woman’s life was like walking through a House of Horrors. Every turn, something scary happened. She shook her head.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she muttered. ‘That’s horrible.’ Yay, her inner voice cheered, more pithy, inadequate sentiments. You go, girl!

  Nalini gave her a small, tight smile.

  ‘Yes, well,’ she said, ‘I was away when that happened, so I survived. And luckily, we had insurance on the house, so I got some money. But it wasn’t a good time. I used to go to the seashore, sit on the beach and think about … everything. One day I went there during the rains and I saw it. Tons and tons of garbage, just washed up on the shore. The whole beach was practically covered with it. And I thought, is anyone doing anything about this?’

  She’d spoken to a few people, did some research and discovered that Mumbai generated 9,400 tons of waste every single day, only 3,000 tons of which was processed. The rest usually ended up as untreated garbage and sewage in the Mithi river and the other water bodies in the city.

  ‘Well, that explains 26/7,’2 Avantika said, jotting down the numbers.

  ‘Exactly,’ Nalini continued. ‘In fact, according to the Central Pollution Control Board, about 62 million tons of solid waste is produced in the country every year. And by 2050, it’s going to be about 436 million tons.’

  Dhruv whistled.

  ‘Are you serious?’ he asked.

  ‘I am,’ Nalini said. ‘I basically saw what MBAs call a need gap. And they tell me the waste-management market is expected to be worth about 13 billion dollars by 2025, with an annual growth rate of over 7 per cent, so …’

  ‘Wow,’ Avantika said, scribbling furiously, ‘but tell me, were your funds enough to start this place? Because I don’t know a lot about what you need to start a waste-management plant, but I know the real estate prices in Mumbai are pretty steep.’

  ‘Oh, they definitely are,’ Nalini said, taking another sip of her tea. ‘I had to get a few investors on board. But they liked the numbers I just told you so it wasn’t as difficult as finding funding for, say, an app for gardeners on call.’

  Avantika grinned as she wrote that down. She had another question all lined up.

  ‘Managing a waste farm can’t be easy. I mean, it’s a proper business, right? And no offense, but you’re a chemistry professor. Don’t you need an MBA or something? My question is, where and how did you learn how to manage a business?’

  Nalini gave her a long look and Avantika got the feeling she hadn’t expected the question.

  ‘I had help from some of the investors,’ she said. ‘Menaka Gujaral, for one.’

  ‘From WSpot?’ Dhruv asked. ‘She’s their COO,’ he explained to Avantika.

  Avantika nodded in recognition. WSpot.com was an online fashion portal for women. Their clothes were wildly popular among working women for their chic cuts, breathable fabrics and complete wearability. Not to mention they were priced in a way that made them within the reach of women who weren’t insanely successful supermodels.

  ‘WSpot has sort of adopted the farm as a CSR project. We handle the waste from their Mumbai branch. Which is not to say we don’t have other customers—such as some of our neighbours, who run the slaughterhouses. We’re also on contract with around fifty corporates, some private colleges and some of the newer townships. Sustainability is a big trend right now, so a lot of people are asking for green homes. We’re getting a lot of enquiries from builde
rs, especially for gated communities.’

  Avantika asked if she could get the names and numbers of some of the farm’s customers, to get quotes for the article.

  ‘Sure. We’re also in talks with the BMC,3 for trash-disposal services, though I’d prefer it if you didn’t put that in before we sign anything.’

  Avantika promised that she wouldn’t and asked if it was possible to get a tour of the premises.

  ‘Of course,’ Nalini said. ‘If you’re done with your tea, I’ll take you around myself.’

  The farm stretched out behind the main house and was neatly divided into sections. As Nalini took them around, Avantika was struck by how many women she saw about the place. Women were sweeping floors, collecting dung in baskets and feeding the livestock that, Nalini explained, was used to dispose of organic waste.

  ‘We keep goats, pigs and ducks mostly. They eat almost all kinds of organic matter when it is mixed with feed, and we have a biogas plant, into which we feed their dung to manufacture cooking gas and fertilizer.’

  ‘Do you employ only women?’ Avantika asked, looking around.

  ‘It wasn’t a conscious decision at first,’ Nalini replied, ‘but one of my first few workers was a woman whose husband had … well, he used to beat her up, so she’d run away from him. After I gave her a job, word spread, and more and more women with … problems … started showing up. So now, almost my entire workforce is basically female.’

  ‘Then this is a women’s shelter too, apart from being a waste farm?’ Avantika asked, eyebrows raised. ‘Wow.’

  ‘Oh, I’m not sheltering anyone. The girls all find jobs to do, here or outside. If I can give them a place to sleep, some food to eat, till they can get back on their feet, it’s hardly a big thing.’

  Avantika wrote on, smiling to herself. This was turning out to be so much better than she had expected.

  ‘Women want to work, see,’ Nalini continued. ‘I think we’ve been conditioned for so long to believe that we’re a burden on our families, especially in the poorer sections of society, that we do anything we can to ease that burden.’

  ‘It’s not even true that women are a burden,’ Avantika said, making a note on her pad. ‘I mean, forget cities, even if you see women in villages, so many of them work as farm labourers. Others take on tailoring jobs at home to make extra money …’

  ‘Exactly,’ Nalini beamed. ‘A lot of the women here used to work as cooks and maids—seven–eight jobs a day, while managing the house. The husband used to typically sleep all day and drink all night. And yet, they never left these no-good specimens, despite essentially running the house single-handedly. It takes a monumental event to get a typical Indian woman to leave her husband.’

  Dhruv had followed them silently all this time. Now and then, Avantika could hear the discreet click of his camera. ‘Will they mind if I take their pictures?’ Dhruv asked now, gesturing at a group of women busy separating wet garbage from dry, their hands sheathed in rubber gloves. One of them stood out in the crowd, a young woman who was carrying a wicker basket full of dung, without seeming at all concerned about the smell. There was an easy grace to her as she balanced the basket against her hip, her printed polyester sari fluttering in the light breeze.

  ‘Ask them yourself,’ Nalini replied, ‘but I don’t think it should be a problem.’

  Avantika watched as Dhruv wandered towards the woman. He said a few words to her, at which she smiled coyly and nodded. He walked a little way off and held up his camera, framing the shot.

  ‘Your colleague is very convincing,’ Nalini said, watching him. ‘Janaki is generally shy.’

  ‘He has his moments,’ Avantika said wryly. ‘What happened to the husband of the woman who beat her? Did she report him to the police?’

  ‘No,’ Nalini replied, ‘these women don’t want to involve the police. And there have been cases where … let’s just say, they’re better off not going to the authorities.’

  Avantika recalled what her mother had said about Radha not wanting to go to the police if she could help it. She frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Take Janaki, for instance,’ Nalini said, nodding towards the young woman, who was self-consciously adjusting her sari to a demurer position in the gaze of Dhruv’s camera. ‘Her husband was a drunk. No job, didn’t want to get one. She’d work at a construction site and what little money she made, he’d take. He’d drink, then come home and beat her and the children. When she protested, he stripped her, tied her to the window bars. Then he threw chilli powder over her private parts and locked her in the room. She was screaming there all night. He didn’t open the door till she promised she’d never question him again.’

  Avantika’s eyes widened in horror.

  ‘And she told the police all that?’ She couldn’t imagine what it took to tell a bunch of men in uniforms about this kind of violation.

  Nalini’s gaze was as impassive as her voice.

  ‘When she complained to the police, they told her it was a domestic quarrel, she had no proof he had done it, so they couldn’t file a complaint. She had to go back and live under the same roof with him, till she saved enough money to run away.’

  ‘What happened to the kids?’ Avantika asked, her mouth dry. No child should have to live with a father like that, she thought.

  ‘Oh, the husband died. Run over by a car on the way back from the bar one night. After that, we worked with a lawyer and she got the kids.’

  ‘Serves him right, the asshole,’ Avantika muttered.

  Nalini looked at her thoughtfully.

  ‘Janaki didn’t think so,’ she said. ‘She said he was a good man as long as he didn’t drink.’

  ‘But he did drink. And he beat her up when he was drunk. Didn’t he beat the kids, too?’

  ‘Yes,’ Nalini shrugged. ‘Ultimately that was the argument that convinced her that they were all better off without him. Till then she kept saying, he wasn’t as bad as some other husbands.’

  ‘I don’t know why women do that!’ Avantika exclaimed. ‘It’s OK that he beats me, at least he’s not cheating on me. It’s OK that he’s cheating on me, at least he’s not living off me. It’s OK that he’s living off me, at least he’s not beating and cheating on me at the same time!’ She gave a short mocking laugh. ‘I don’t know why the bar is set so low for guys.’

  ‘Me neither,’ Nalini said. ‘And you have to ask yourself, do men make these allowances for their wives and girlfriends? Somehow, I don’t think so.’

  ‘Yeah, me neither. Can you imagine a guy saying, hey, it’s OK that she’s not sleeping with me, as long as she’s not cheating on me with my best friend?’

  They laughed. A few feet away Dhruv had just finished taking his last shot of Janaki.

  ‘Did you know there’s a superstition that you shouldn’t name your daughter Janaki?’ Nalini asked, watching the woman walk away with her basket, ‘or any other name of Sita. They say a woman with those names is trouble for the family she is married into.’

  ‘Yeah, because it wasn’t Dashrath or Kaikeyi or Ram himself who was responsible for Ram having to live in a bloody forest for years,’ Avantika said.

  ‘I think they were referring to the whole Raavan episode.’

  ‘Yeah, I get it. Totally her fault. Going out of the house and giving food to hungry sadhus? What a slut.’

  ‘Who?’ Dhruv asked.

  He had just walked back to them and looked totally confused at the current topic of conversation. Avantika cleared her throat but Nalini smoothly continued talking, saving her from having to reply.

  ‘That’s why I decided to call this place Dharini Farm, in fact. Dharini means the earth and Sita was a daughter of the Earth, to whom she returned when Ram questioned her chastity, when he refused to believe her. I wanted Dharini Farm to be a place where any daughter could turn to, in her time of need. Where she’d never be turned away.’

  That Ram, Avantika thought to herself, what a swell guy. Aloud she asked, ‘You m
entioned a biogas plant?’

  As it turned out, the plant was at the other end of the farm. Nalini took them around, mentioning facts and figures, which Avantika wrote down. They wouldn’t all find a place in the story, though. She was beginning to suspect that the article was going to be more about Dharini Farm’s role as a women’s support centre, rather than how wet garbage is processed in a biogas plant. Surely, even in Nathan’s sadistic book, human interest trumped human waste?

  As Nalini began explaining the waste-sorting procedure to her, Avantika noticed Dhruv taking pictures. Every few seconds, he’d turn in a different direction and grab a shot: of the plant, a couple of Nalini, of the workers at their jobs. He seemed to be taking quite a few pictures of the women, in fact. They didn’t seem to mind, but Avantika wondered what he was going to do with these shots.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she whispered to him once, when Nalini’s attention was elsewhere.

  ‘Making you jealous, apparently,’ he replied, clicking.

  She considered punching him, but decided against it.

  ‘Can you focus on what you’re here for?’ she hissed.

  He looked at her and smiled impishly.

  ‘I could. But then how would I get any work done?’

  She made an exasperated sound as his meaning sank in, and turned away just in time to see Sapna carrying a wicker basket identical to Janaki’s into the yard. For a moment, their eyes met and she saw Sapna’s face freeze into a look of sudden terror. She stood rooted to the spot for a moment, her eyes moving swiftly from Avantika to Nalini and back. Then, without a second glance their way, she turned on her heel and hurried away in the direction from which she had come. Misinterpreting Avantika’s expression as curiosity, Nalini spoke up.

  ‘That’s Sapna. She came to us just a few days ago. Bright girl, finished her SSC.4 Mother remarried, stepfather tried to molest her and when she refused to let him, you know what he did? He told her she couldn’t have money to do a beautician’s course unless she agreed to let him have his way. She decided to come here instead.’