Bestial encounters II

In another incident concerning animal attacks once when I was about 10 we used to live in a decrepit locality in Lajpat Nagar, New Delhi. There were square blocks containing four contiguous rows. These rows further contained 16 houses each, 8 on the ground floor and 8 on the first floor. The houses (they mostly consisted of one room, one store, and a rectangular construction of kitchen and bath-place combined together) on the first floor were conjoined by a common gallery. Bitumen roads divided one block from another. Most living in Delhi must have seen these localities called “double-stories”.

Back then I used to use a rollator to walk about. A rollator is a walking apparatus with wheels at the bottom. It looks like this, but mine was a local one made by a neighborhood carpenter. I was quite active amongst my friends and used to gallivant here and there with the group.

One day we were playing on the road when we saw an elephant coming at a distance. In India sadhus visit backward or old localities riding their elephants and people give them alms and donate money in obeisance. They are mostly conmen who cheat the unsuspecting public and maltreat the majestic animals.

All the children ran towards the elephant. I couldn’t run but in no time I too joined my friends and stood in the middle of the road to catch a clear glimpse of the giant beast gradually moving towards us while getting gifts from the religious minded with his trunk and turning them over to the sadhu straddled at the top. Another small crowd of kids was following the elephant from behind and they were making all sorts of noises to get the attention of the elephant. Some were even throwing small pebbles and the sadhu was casting angry glances at them repeatedly.

Suddenly I noticed a vehement agitation in the elephant’s body. It raised its trunk high up in the air and threw out a shrill trumpet that caused an unanticipated stampede amidst the crowd. It veered to both the sides again and again, almost flinging down his sadhu. I could see its big dilated eyes and the froth coming out of its pout. Nobody had an idea what had agitated the elephant. Before I could make sense of what was happening, I saw the crowd around me had dispersed and the elephant was coming in my direction with great speed despite the sadhu desperately trying to stop it or at least change its direction.

The whole world disappeared in front of my eyes. It was just the elephant, with its trunk raised high up in the air, its head moving up and down with great frequency, and its body rapidly growing in its size as it approached nearer. I could also hear screams such as yeh ladke ko marega! (it is going to kill the boy), arre hatao usse koi waha se! (move him from there quickly), etc. Most of the vociferations, wrapped in panic, were incoherent, or may be I couldn’t understand them. Not knowing what to do, I did the only thing that came to my mind — I tried to run, which, of course, I couldn’t.

After a few hurried steps I lost control and I fell on the road. Amidst the din, the pain caused by the fall, and the approaching death, I lay there looking at the sky. All of this must have happened in a span of ten seconds, a few seconds more or less. Although I was a kid, I had a fair idea of distance and time. The elephant by now should have done with me whatever it had in its mind, but I was still lying there, injured by the fall. Overcoming the pain in my head where I had hit the road, I turned over and looked in the direction from where the elephant was coming. The elephant had stopped just a few meters away. In fact it was standing there as if nothing had happened.

Someone came running and picked me up, and soon I was sitting in a room surrounded by concerned neighbors. A few were yelling at me for taking unnecessary risks like this, and some were awed at the way the elephant had stopped short of trampling me and were profusely praising God for it. Ice was quickly applied on the bump on my head. After a short fussing around they all went outside to see the elephant again and I was left there alone, totally shaken, still trying to figure out what had happened. A friend had brought inside the rollator and had placed it beside me. I tried to stand up but couldn’t, my legs were shaking. I could hear the bells of the elephant gradually ebbing away.