ASURA SADHANE

Recently one very senior retired Army officer who happened to read 'SALE OF SOULS' said, 'YOUR BOOK IS A GREAT ASURA SADHANE'.
I really could not understand what he meant and wanted to call Mr Anand Neelkantan, who is the author of 'Asura' but the grand old man went on asking questions about how I wrote such a serious subject. Now I did not have any answer to that.

After that few friends asked me why did  I risk writing such a serious subject  instead of some love or some mythological story.

Now pondering that question, I was taken back few decades to the village of Alige in a Coastal District of Karnataka. There was a dynamic, handsome and intelligent young man who almost reminded the villagers of filmy heroes of those days like Raj kumar or MGR. He was the only son of a middle class farmer with considerable size of land around the village. Because of his father’s advancing age he joined his father in business discontinuing his studies after ninth standard. He helped villagers when they needed him. He was the blue eyed boy of the village.

Then one day after many years (three decades), when I had visited the town, I stopped my car near the Siddivinayak temple which is situated on the highway to seek the blessings. When I was entering the temple, I passed a middle aged man sitting on the highway signboard structure just in front of the temple. I saw him stretching his hands and saying something. In a split second without my fully being aware I turned towards him.

‘What?’

‘Something, for food’ he said

‘Why don’t you go for work?’ I asked. He brushed his tears from his eyes and said something which I could not understand. There was something familiar about him.

‘Do you belong to Aligadda?’ I asked. He stared at me and slowly got up to go,without saying anything.

‘Hey, wait.I  know you are from Alige.My name is Vidyadhara, do you remember me?’ I asked.

‘No, who are you? I don’t know you’ he said and started moving away. I stopped him holding his hand and thrust a note in his torn shirt pocket. He looked at it and gave me a smile.

‘I am Vidyadhara from Alige’ I said.

‘I heard you were in Navy’

‘ Yes’ I said, without wanting to explain the details.

‘I hate Navy’ he said.

‘Why?’

‘They took my land, my life, my dreams and destroyed me,’ he said and started crying. It was difficult for me to see a middle aged man crying like that. I could not but hold my eyes becoming wet seeing that rich smart man in a destitute state.

 It was this and few other stories of the land acquisition which made me to write ‘SALE OF SOULS. It was not for money but to highlight the issues of these helpless people to the world. But in the process if I receive some monetary benefit it is always welcome .