The Death in a Mohalla

The mohalla had gone quiet. Once an epicentre of uninhibited activity, it had come to a shuddering halt sometime back. From the days of brightly lit shops being thronged by people for all their marriage needs to today where the shops are desolate and shopkeepers are out as hawkers standing infront of their illustrious past waiting perpetually for customers. The river of customers had dried up. As the shopkeepers wondered for the umpteenth time today as to what has gone wrong, if you were to zoom out into the space, you would see the same vista being present all across the country except the metro cities.

The beautiful face of our country marred by the freckles. Someone’s bad eye has caused all this mayhem.

A flutter somewhere. All eyes turn towards the gigantic steel frame of a door in shape of a palki. A dried leaf swirls in the air for sometime and then takes a downward trajectory to deposit itself right at the exact middle point of the mohalla. The eyes have followed the entire trajectory. There is nothing else to do.

The sweltering sun has started to beat down. Eyes are still hooked onto the leaf. The dried leaf is reverberating now. Reverberating itself into a frenzy, the leaf lights itself up which swirls into a huge ball of fire. The shopkeepers, already dulled into a sense of defeat, gasp initially but then see it is a dignified end for themselves. Bracing themselves for freedom finally, the spreading fire, inexplicably, starts retreating into a concentrated glow of light which momentarily blinds the shopkeepers. By the time the normalcy returns, the vista has drastically changed. The street is lined with customers again. The bright clothes, the glittering jewellery, the insidious chatter, all of it is back. Unbeknownst to the shopkeepers, they are drooling over a mirage.

…

“Why did people stop marrying?”

“Who knows why they do what they do. It’s the stupidity and free will to exercise it, I guess.”

*Mohalla = Community; Palki = Palanquin