CHENNAI: The PreciousGems Panchayat was descending into chaos. We’d gathered to discuss our rights to set up a fence around our farm, and here was our closest neighbour not only admitting that he’d moved the marker-boulders — but declaring that we could not erect a fence, ever! We simply stood there, gaping. My father finally gathered his rapidly fraying composure. “Why do you say this?” he demanded in a voice that shook only very slightly. “Can’t I erect fences for my protection?”
Hill: But why do you need protection? Aren’t we all honest men, here? Isn’t this village the very symbol of truth, integrity and justice? Isn’t this the very soil where Mannukatti walked? (Much of PreciousGems was addicted to quoting Hindu epics with considerable creative licence, leading to hilarious results. Hill Mudaliar meant King Manuneedhi Chozhan who sacrificed his own son to assuage a cow’s sorrow — in reality, he was speaking of a lump of mud. We may have been puzzled but everyone else apparently got it, judging by the wisely nodding heads.)
Father: I’m not denying the truth and justice, but surely I have the right to do with my land as I wish?
Silence. More wise nodding, for this was just as well.
Hill: If you block your land like this, how will we get to our fields?
Now although PreciousGems, like most Thamizh villages, consisted of farmland stretching to infinity, everyone always kept an eye out for trespassers: farm implements and livestock were scattered everywhere so unless you had a very good reason to cut across someone’s land, it was not encouraged. Hill himself had a morbid fear of interlopers and often stood like a scarecrow in the middle of his fields, fearing wholesale theft of his crops. Which made his claims even more hypocritical.
It turned out, though, that there had been a secret meeting between our neighbours, for practically everyone laid the same objection.
Father: But this village is well-connected by roads and paths — none of which go through my land. Why do you need a new right-of-way now?
Others: Our tractors and other big machinery may not be able to negotiate roads.
Father: But you want to drive them through my fields, where there’s no path? Also, I’ve planted rice in every inch of land, now. Do you plan on trampling them through?
Silence again. Then the objections flew thick and fast, each more outrageous than the other: What if they needed to use our water? What if they needed to use our electricity/motor/well? What if putting up a fence causes discontent among others?
“Fine,” my father said finally, heavily. “No fence. But I’m making no promises.”
(The writer is a journalist, artist, translator, historian and editor but not necessarily in that order)