Read Hope in Chains :: Child

But there was another thing that the engineers did not know. Yes, they knew that less cement than required went in the side railings and other non-structural components, and that was one of the places where his profits had gained a lot of weight. But unknown to them, Ratanavadivel and his team had been siphoning off quite a bit of cement. Consequently, even the pillars were not as strong as they should have been. But it would stand for a few decades at least; by the time, all of them would have retired, unless—unless something unusual challenged the structure. Time passed; Ratanavadivel was almost 51 now. Meena, his daughter—still the special person in his heart—had gotten married more than a year ago. She was now back home for her confinement; the date was almost a month away. She had regularly had her antenatal check-up with a gynaecologist in the plains, who assured them all was well. It was decided that the experienced midwife in Pachalur could follow her up and conduct the delivery. There was nothing to suggest any problem. As for the bridge, it looked none the worse for use, although the shoulders had broken down in many places. The expansion joints had chipped into a large fissure, which somebody had patched up with tar.

At one point, you could see that some vehicle had climbed the sidewalk and rammed the railing; the repair work was shoddy and did little to conceal the damage. Overall, it was well preserved and did its job. But if you had cared to climb down to the water line and remove the moss and reeds that grew around the base of the pillars, you would have seen damage that might have been the cause for some concern. The plaster was broken and undermined. In many places, the bricks were showing through and some of them were missing. Water was presumably seeping in through these large gaps and it was anyone’s guess how the concrete beneath was faring. It was the rainy season, and one of those beguiling sunny October mornings that gave no hint of the nasty thundershowers that could follow in the later part of the day. Meena woke bright and cheerful. Her mother and the maid waited on her as usual. When breakfast was ready, she carefully waddled her way out of the bedroom. She felt that her protuberant abdomen was hanging down lower this morning and so she cradled it firmly with both her hands as she moved ponderously towards the dining table. She sensed her baby move within her and smiled a little to herself. After breakfast, her abdomen would not quite settle down; she felt a vague discomfort that did not amount to pain. She did not tell anyone.

Must be that jackfruit I ate yesterday, she thought to herself and besides, there was another week before the date. By 10 am, mild cyclical pain was upon her and she told her mother about it. Meanwhile, the midwife had arrived and people were moving about here and there, making preparations. By lunchtime, the midwife said she was definitely in labour and everything was going according to plan. Outside, the sky was turning darker by steady increments. A strong breeze from the east stirred up the trees, making their limbs shiver and flail about nervously. Heavy sullen clouds moved in above, packing themselves in from one end of the horizon to the other. In a short time, the first ominous peals of thunder rolled across the hills. But by 7:30 pm, Meena had taken a turn for the worse. An anxious expression had taken over the midwife’s face. She soon announced that there was no progress and Meena would have to be shifted down to the plains. Outside, the storm had already started half an hour ago and shown no signs of letting up. Ratanavadivel soon arranged a jeep and by 8 pm, they started down the ghat road. The wind was coming at them from all directions and the wipers were hard-pressed to keep up with the lashing rain. The headlights could not pick out the road more than five to six metres ahead of them. So they crawled along.

“If it goes on like this, it is going to take us at least three hours,” said Siva the driver. “I have not seen a storm like this in years,” he added. Above the squall, they could hear Meena in the backseat as she moaned each time the pains came on her. “Keep going,” encouraged Ratanavadivel as he looked at the driver anxiously. In places, the road was submerged under a flowing mass of water but the jeep could wade through. They saw a few goodsized trees fallen beside the road but fortunately, none of them across their path. They finally came to the bridge across Neeri and they could not believe what they saw. The Neeri had overflown its banks. The central pillar of the bridge had snapped at its base and leaned over, carrying the bridge down with it. The span had broken in two in the middle, and now lay sloping at a crazy angle. Most of the central part of the carriageway was submerged under a swirling, seething mass of water that flowed over it. Ratanavadivel got out of the jeep and walked up to the water’s edge with the headlights of the jeep fully behind him. His shadow sharpened and fell across the bridge. He stood there, immobile for a few seconds. Then he heard it, what started as a low moan crescendo-ed into a desperate scream that rose above the clatter of the rain. Meena was in severe unremitting pain. Ratanavadivel did not know what he was doing. He ran to the side of the road, down the embankment and into the surging stream. When the waters reached above his knees, he was swept off his feet. He turned and lunged for the shore, his fingers grasped and held on to some wild shrub and there he was suspended for a few moments, before the driver came to his rescue and hauled him onto the shore.

There he knelt with his palms cupped to his face. Then he broke out into great big heaving sobs that swept over him again and again. In time, he regained his equilibrium, got up on his feet and called to Siva, “Shall we take the other road that descends on the east side towards Sempati?” “That is a very small road, Sar, and there are many streams running across it. Anyway, we have to go back up twenty-five kilometres to reach that road. Why don’t we go another twenty and reach the main road to Kodaikanal?” So they turned the jeep carefully. This was no four-wheel drive and they had a few anxious moments when the rear wheels churned in the mud before they regained enough traction to lift the jeep onto the road. They turned back up the road they had come. Just before they reached the junction, Ratanavadivel said, “Let us try that road to Sempati, Siva; it will gain us an hour.” “Okay, sir,” said Siva as he shrugged his shoulders. They turned left at the junction and took the narrow winding road towards Sempati. They had hardly done ten kilometres when they came up against a line of jeeps and small trucks. Ratanavadivel felt desperation rise inside him as Siva stepped out to enquire what was going on. He came back shortly and announced, “Sir, the road has been washed out and nothing can get across.” “I should have listened to you, Siva,” declared Ratanavadivel ruefully. There was not enough place to safely turn around. So Ratanavadivel walked back, picking out the way with the light of a torch while the jeep followed in reverse gear. They crawled along painfully for another five hundred metres before they found a broad, firm side path that led into an estate. Here, they turned and were soon on their way again. By the time they reached the main road to Kodaikanal, it was 3 am. There was no sound to be heard from the backseat of the jeep. “Is she alright?” enquired Ratanavadivel. “She is not bad,” replied the midwife and Meena’s mother. It was another hour before the jeep turned into the hospital at Batlagundu. As they transferred the patient to the stretcher, Ratanavadivel could see that Meena was far from all right. All the colour seemed to have gone out of her. Her breathing was laboured and drops of sweat stood out on her forehead. She hardly opened her glazed eyes as he held and squeezed her cold hand. In ten minutes, she was wheeled into the theatre. Ratanavadivel and Siva were frantically searching for blood donors, as Meena’s mother waited outside the theatre. It was three hours before a doctor came to tell them the news. The baby (a boy) was gone. The uterus was so badly torn up and the bleeding so profuse that they could not save it, they had to take it out. After six pints of blood, Meena was barely hanging on to life. Meena survived the ordeal but she would never have a child again.

Ratanavadivel was a broken man. There was an inquiry set up to probe the circumstance behind the broken bridge and in the years that followed, he spent a good part of his fortune fighting the case. His reputation had taken a beating and now he landed only a few contracts. Meena lived a childless woman in her husband’s home. The taunts of her in-laws were becoming unbearable and she knew that it would be only a matter of time before they persuaded her husband to marry again. After a year and a half, she returned home to Ratanavadivel’s house where she got the comfort that she yearned for. All the changes that Ratanavadivel underwent were not for the worse. In many ways, he had become a better man and his workers could vouch for this. “Ratanavadivel-Sar is so kind, he has become such a different person,” they said. It was about a year after this time that Dr Ravikumar first came to Pachalur. As his work became known, Ratanavadivel befriended him. One evening, a few months into their friendship, Ratanavadivel told the doctor, “Sir, I have a piece of land that I will give you, for a very small price. Why don’t you build a proper hospital on it? A place where children and pregnant women can get good care.” “This is how the property was acquired,” said Dr Ravikumar after he had narrated this long story. By now, all the lights in the house, except the one on the porch, had gone off and the house was quiet. To their left, a Rangoon creeper reached up from the ground and wrapped its branches around one of the pillars of the porch, the faint scent of its night flowers wafting in around them. The mosquito coil in the shape of a watch spring had slowly burned itself out, leaving behind concentric rings of ash on the floor beside them.

“You had better get some sleep,” said Dr Ravikumar as he got up. They carried the chairs indoors and bade each other goodnight. As Suresh picked out his way slowly towards the hospital, he thought to himself, Maybe there are finally no winners in a corrupt society.