The Tale of a Wedding Less Ordinary

by Mrinalini Rautela Pahwa

I was born and brought up in tea and then married a planter, so I have a tea trolley laden with tales -- poignant, funny, ludicrous,  and to the uninitiated, possibly a figment of an overwrought imagination! And while I am waiting for the others to emerge from the cobwebby corners that life in a fast paced metropolis has thrust them into, here I am, testing the waters with my first offering-- the story of my wedding to the hapless Atul Pahwa, Esq!

Post him nearly getting sacked within days of his transfer to Dejoo, where my father was the Manager, not for any mess up on his part but because his dog took it upon himself to rid the garden of a wild cat that my mother had adopted (a tale that shall be aired in due course )  I arrived back home on my summer break from college and hit him - the master and not the dog - on the head with a squash racquet! In my defence, we were playing a friendly game of squash. However, I had a wild left handed swing which often confused my right handed opponents and I connected with the husband to be’s head rather than the squash ball! 

                                             

A solitary one of Atul and self dancing

AP insists that it was suddenly all very hazy and when the haze cleared, he found the saat pheras to be over and a delighted newly minted father in law/manager shaking his hand vigorously and thanking him for taking his older daughter off his hands! This is Atul’s story. The one I stick to is that Cupid quite literally struck him!

To backtrack a bit, when Atul and I decided that we would like to get married, I told him that he needed to ask for my hand formally in marriage. This entailed speaking to his trigger happy boss -- not something any young Factory assistant with the instinct for survival would be eager to do, unless he was feeling particularly suicidal! 

With Atul being a non- starter, I attempted to broach the subject with my father while he read the papers in the evening. The only question I was asked was whether the young man I had in mind was a good sportsman! No name asked. None given! It turned out that my wily father had been kept updated on the blossoming romance by the chowkidars who would carry Atul and my notes to each other.

Then came the matter of informing Atul’s parents and fixing the date. In true tea garden style, the date was fixed for 10^th March as it was a Saturday. According to my father, the guests could get ‘wasted’, have Sunday to recover and get back to work on Monday! The venue was the Burra Bungalow of Dejoo Tea Estate.

And this is when things began to get exciting.

Atul pushed off to Delhi to fetch his parents and relatives. He reached Delhi all right but the wedding party missed the return train to Gauhati. I might mention here that his father was a Railways man and had retired as Advisor Railway Board! Gauhati to Dejoo was a nine hour bumpy drive and my parents had sent band, bajaa and malaas to the Gauhati station to welcome the baraatis, who were still trying to find their way to a remote corner of Assam in the days where the garden did not even have a landline through which they could inform my now palpitating parents of their progress- or lack of it.

Meanwhile, my mother, in her enthusiasm, had got the floors and steps of the bungalow polished to such gleaming perfection that while leaning over to admire her reflection on the floorboards, she tumbled down the staircase and fractured her right hand. All the wedding photographs have her looking rather dramatic in a resplendent lehenga and sparkling tassels wrapped decoratively around her plaster encased hand!

Mum with her hand in a plaster

The year was 1990. It was the height of the ULFA agitation and many had told dad that it was foolhardy of him to get his daughter married in an increasingly unsafe environment. But Assam, to my parents, was home and their daughter was going to be married from home. QED.

Turns out it wasn’t quite so simple. On the night prior to the wedding, members of the organisation swept in and very politely took away a revolver that was licensed in my mother’s name. They then proceeded to take a Gypsy from another planter and use my mother’s revolver to shoot a third person in that vehicle! The next day, the cops turned up to arrest my mother and dad had to send off for anticipatory bail. This is right when the bedraggled wedding party arrived, all shaken and stirred. Looking at the scene that met them, instead of the traditional aarti, I wouldn’t blame them for wondering about the antecedents of the family their prospective daughter in law belonged to! But they were there and fleeing was next to impossible so they took a deep breath, sent up a silent prayer, squared their shoulders and got down to the business of getting us married.

The band

The pundit was from the army and addressed one and all, regardless of gender as Sir. The army band struck up a rousing tune and after the pheras, the festivities were uncorked along with the champagne. There is not a single photograph of Atul and me together but there are several of me with many planters- all in an increasing state of inebriation (the planters, that is!) and of Atul with lipstick marks covering his face, surrounded by the ladies! By the time my mother got around to trying to find the official photographer to take photographs of us, he had got sloshed and fallen into the cattle trap, from where he spent the rest of the evening contentedly photographing the legs of guests who passed by. The bar was the summer hut next to which the Ranga Nadi flowed and several planters who were deep in their cups, found themselves taking the wrong turn and having to be fished out by the gleeful maalis whom my father, with long years of experience, had positioned just for this eventuality.

In the wee hours of the morning, people reluctantly started wending their way home, promising to return for my Bidaai, the next day. I still remember that just as the car brought me from the Burra Bungalow to Atul’s bungalow and parked in the porch, the heavens opened up to a massive downpour. My mother in law was delighted- it was auspicious, she said. It certainly wasn’t auspicious for all the guests, who in their finery had got into a boat to cross over to the neighbouring Koilamari Tea Estate and got the drenching of their lives midstream!

The Bidaai, of course, was a thinly disguised excuse for the beer and bridge party that was going to take place while the DC signed off on our marriage certificate. Incidentally, I have no photographs of the bidaai either as the drunk as a skunk photographer was too busy nursing a hangover to show up. However, all these aforementioned sodden guests ensured they turned up, sniffles notwithstanding!

And thus, in the midst of friends, family, love and laughter, set against the backdrop of a political agitation that would change the face of the state I knew as home and draw the curtains on a way of life that is in the blood of anyone who has been a part of the plantations, and cannot be understood by anyone who has not, I got married.

The fact that we had to face a 73 hour Bodo bandh, drive through Bodo territory with all my jewellery in the dead of the night to board a train back to Delhi from Bongaigaon, only to have it derail with us on board, is a story for another time.

    The bungalow, 15 years later, when we took our daughter back to visit from Delhi

Editor’s Note:

saat pheras – the most important ritual in a Hindu marriage ceremony

baraatis – the bridegroom’s party

band, bajaa and malaas – a fitting reception committee for the groom’s party

bidaai –  when the bride leaves her parents' home after the wedding

Meet the writer: 

Mrinalini Rautela Pahwa

Mrinalini Rautela Pahwa lives in Gurugram, Haryana with her husband, a dog and a daughter ...not necessarily in that order. She would like to believe that she is a teacher- a stolidly respectable pillar of society. However, there are many, who shall not be named, for fear of arousing homicidal tendencies in her-- who have been known to whisper otherwise. For now, let this suffice. The rest is silence.

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