Jai 'Sita-Sene'..!!

(Finally back to my normal ways!!)

Reading the newspaper as a first thing in the morning isn’t a great idea, trust me. It was a lovely morning that day, the 14th of February, a day of profits for the ‘Archies’. The previous night, I was enlightened by a business plan. In pursuit of anything red and resembling a heart, my eyes almost popped out like popcorn onto my ex-pillow. On a mission- “Steal the knife from the kitchen”, I crawled into the kitchen, but was late to realize that mom was as sharp as the knife. My business ambitions were pounded into the gutter. Anyway, that’s a long tragic useless story. Back to the present, I picked up the newspaper and read on- “ Sanjay Dutt enters politics.” In India, you can commit a crime and have grandchildren before you’ll be punished. My ever-vigilant mind began picturing a silly court scene inside my head- “ In a courtroom, the lawyer asks- “What were you upto on that fateful day on the 23rd of March 1960, Mr.X?” Mr.X replies- “ I was playing ‘ball’ with my grandfather, Sir.” The judge intervenes- “ What were you up to last week when the notice was sent, Mr.X?” Mr X coughs and replies- “ I was playing ‘ball’ with my grandson, your honour.””

Anyway, I moved onto the next headline- “ We will marry off any couples found together in public today- Mr.Muthalik, Rama-Sene chief.” I began to think about concepts like ‘Time saving’, ‘Money saving’, ‘energy saving’ and so on, but then I kicked myself, passed the paper to mom and breezed into the bathroom to get ready for college. Came out, found a T-shirt on which some nice words were intelligently written- “fcuk.” If I was as brave as I appeared to be, I would have changed it to- “fcuk muthakil.” Anyway, as I finished breakfast and was jumping onto my bike, my mom came and told me- “ Why not skip college today? We can go out somewhere.”

“What?” which appeared more like a joint question of- ‘Why? Whats the reason? Whats wrong? It’s not April 1st today….’

“Just simply. Getting bored.”

“No thanks mom. Go out with your lovely daughter. Cya” I sped away.

I reached Roshan’s place. That damn fellow was like the ‘kanjoos of the millennium’ types. I had to take him to college though he had a bike, but because his bike drank a lot more petrol. Anyway, I entered his home, his mom smiled at me though I wasn’t sure if that was artificial or genuine, I found a seat and the same newspaper. “What’s the weather forecast for today dude?” Roshan screamed from his room as if he was preparing for some ‘Mission Impossible’. I checked it to find- ‘Clear skies. Avg- 32degrees’. I screamed back- “Carry your Rain-Coat, dude.”
After his ‘dressing-up’, he came by and sat next to me to finish his coffee. As always I wondered if he had taken bath with water or perfume.

His mom passed me another cup of coffee and said to Roshan and me- “ Why don’t you guys skip college today and stay back at home. I’m preparing carrot halwa today.”

Roshan replied with the same- “What” exactly the way I did to my mom. When did parents in India start saying things like– ‘Bunk College my boy’, I thought.

“No ma. We have an important presentation to make today. Can’t skip.” He replied like Mr. Scholar.

“What presentation, Roshan?” I asked with a tone.

He came close and whispered- “Fuck you. Just shut up.”

Meanwhile, his mom was getting vexed and said- “ you both are staying back, that’s all.”

“No ma” our scholar replied again. Roshan walked out of the house like how a disappointed boss walks out of a staff meeting. As I too began to walk out, his mom came and enquired softly- “Does he have a girl-friend? He’s acting weird nowadays.”

“No aunty, don’t worry.” I said and walked out perplexed to the bike and we left. Only as we rode along that I could paint the actual picture. I could now come to terms with the weird behaviour of both our moms. The moms didn’t want their sons to come back home with wives. Just then, I got a call from my mom.

“Hello. You reached college? Just called to find out.” She enquired innocently.

“No ma. Someone from ‘Rama-Sene’ it seems. They’ve caught me and a girl who was with me. Now they are taking us somewhere ma.”

“What? Where are you? What the hell? Whats happening? Dint you go to college? I told you to stay back…..” and another billion questions pounced on me at a time.

“Relax mom. Just kidding. I don’t have a girl friend.”
She got the point, laughed and then we disconnected. I explained all this Roshan but he could understand it only after three repetitions. He called up his mom (of course with my phone) and tried to play the same prank I tried to play with my mom, it became a perfect flop show as his mom exhibited her verbal skills and it finally took my intervention to claim calm and peace.

At that very moment, Roshan announced- “Dude this is unfair. We all have to do something. Something soon. We shall organize dharnas, strikes…..” he went on. And finally he said- “ We shall start an organization contradicting Muthalik’s ‘Rama-Sene’. We shall call ours ‘Sita-Sene’.” So ‘Sita-Sene’ was formed and inaugurated by yours truly and as expected it lasted for less than half a day.

One hour later, a ‘spark-plug’ resembling Roshan had lost all his spark as he feared to even talk to girls that day making them wonder if his head was alright. By the end of the day, he resembled a punctured tube as his mom sighed relief that she was lucky enough to not meet her daughter-in-law yet. I, in the meanwhile, like Mr.India spent my evening in a temple with my paranoia struck mom.