Memories of a Family Helper and Some Unanswered Questions

On a quiet Sunday afternoon, when I awoke from a nap, at my home in Kochi, a thought came to my mind: where could be Mohammed Sabir now? For many years I would see him nearly every day. He worked as a helper at my dad’s office in Kolkata. He would come every day to our house to collect the keys. The office was just a kilometre away, on Shakespeare Sarani. He would open it, clean and sweep the floor. Sabir was a person you could turn to, when you had a problem.

In September 1978, when flood waters gushed into our ground-floor flat, because of non-stop torrential rain, he arrived holding an umbrella. Then he helped us by getting bricks from a nearby park. The sofa, tables, beds and the refrigerator were placed on these bricks. As a result, they were not damaged. The waters had climbed almost six inches in all the rooms. We watched with surprise as a neighbour’s dog nonchalantly passed urine in our living room. Sabir was from the Munger district of Bihar. He spoke little about his early life. Apparently, one day, as a teenager, he boarded a train and landed up in Kolkata. After working in several menial jobs, he began working for my father.

Sabir liked a regular routine. He was always dressed neatly, with his hair combed backwards, plastered to his head, thanks to the use of oil.

It was not that he was perfect. He liked to have a drink in the evenings. I had no idea how much he drank, but, on some mornings, as a child, I could see that his eyes were red.

Sabir remained unmarried for many years. But one day, he told us he was going home. When he returned, he showed up at our home, with a woman in tow. Zaheeba was two inches taller than Sabir. We have got married, he said. She is from my village.

The couple got along well, and had three sons. They lived in a two-room house in a slum, a few kilometres away. When I look back, I feel astonished that I never visited his home, although he invited me many times.

And the years went past. Soon, there came a moment when it was time to leave Kolkata. My father had retired and was returning to Kerala. I was also moving to south India. Since Sabir had worked for us for twenty years, my father gave him a sizeable sum of money. That was when he realised that he needed to open a bank account. So my dad helped him fill the forms and he put his signature, in a lopsided manner, and the money was deposited. And then he said a surprising thing, I have to make sure that my children do not know about this.

His sons had grown up. Sadly, like their father, they did not study much. One worked as a mechanic, another as a driver, and the third as a factory hand. They might want the money, he told my father. So, he hid the cheque book and passbooks, buried under several clothes, at the bottom of a tin suitcase, which was then pushed under a bed. You will be surprised to know that there comes a day when parents become afraid of their children, he told me with a sad smile.

We left Kolkata on a wintry December night. I shook Sabir’s hand and said goodbye. He had tears in his eyes. And since then I have lost touch with him. It was a time when mobile phones did not exist. Sabir had no land phone in his house. And today, years later, I have no idea whether he is alive or dead. Whether he is healthy or sick. Whether he is still working. He should be about 80 now. All these unanswered questions filled my mind on that recent Sunday afternoon.

Indeed, life is a journey. With some people, mostly family members, you remain in touch till the end. With the others, you go along, for a while, then part ways, never to meet again.

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