ANCIENT PROMISES

                                    - Jaishree Misra

   

Jaishree Mishra was born in 1961 and grow up in India, moving to England in 1993. She has worked in the field of special needs in India and in the Department of social services in Buckinghamshire, England. She worked as a Broadcast journalist with the BBC. Ancient Promises is her first novel. It is a semi autobiographical book, which is very interesting to read.

 The novel begins with a sorrowful note, saying

                   "My marriage ended today without the lighting

                   of oil lamps and the beating of temple drums,

                   but in a cramped little divorce court.

 In the next chapter, the novelist has given the past of the heroine. Janaki, her school life and wedding.

 Janaki, shortly called Janu, was a Malayali girl,
brought up in Delhi. When she was seventeen years old in school, she meets Arjun son of colonel Mehta. They become friends and then lovers. Janu’s family was a middle class family. Her parents had lived straight forward, honest lives and wanted the same from her, their only child. They had strong deep foundations in the age-old traditions of their ancestral soil and stuffed no mixed up priorities. Often Janu’s mother reminds he of their tradition. She used to tell her, “we aren’t the kind of family that can encourage its girls to have boy friends”. Every year they go to Kerala to visit grand parents.

Janu’s school studies were over. Arjun, Janu’s boy friend planned to go to England to do his degree. Janu’s parents were not interested to send her to college. Before Arjun’s departure, Janu met him and they made promise to get married one day. Then Janu along with her parents came to Kerala for the vacation.

A great shock awaited ajanu during that visit. Maraar, a highly respected family in Kerala , wanted to get the hands of Janu for their younger son Suresh. Janu wanted to put aside her marriage with the excuse of studies. But as all the members of her family were very much interested in her marriage, she consented for the marriage. She wrote to Arjun,

                     “Because I’m tired of fighting off my family, they’ve

                      proven their love for me in the eighteen years its

                      taken to bring me up…

                      And may be ill find some comfort in making my

                      folks happy, for once!... And how I’ve never seen

                      them happier”…

 The marriage preparations went on quickly Janu’s parents and relatives were very much elated at the Maraar’s proposal:

                  “You’re a lucky girl. The Maraars are an old and

                   gracious family, half the families in Kerala would

                   have died for an alliance like this”.

The wedding took place at Guruvayur temple on her 18^th birthday. After all the functions were over, Janu was taken to the bridegroom’s house in Valapadu. She tried her best to be a right daughter-in-law to the Maraar family. She changed herself a lot. She wore sari and tried to speak mostly in Malayalam. Later, she pathetically feels “…. And yet Kerala had failed to take me, one of its loyal daughters to her bosom. Despite all the futile attempts of Sari wearing and Malayalam speaking, I had failed so abysmally to fit in”. she settled into her new life happily but soon she realized that she was not liked by the people in the family. Her in-laws were uncaring and scheming people. Their behavior was indifferent and cold.

Janu’s husband, Suresh was a good man. He never abused or beaten his wife. He provided for all her needs monetarily. But he was different. He rarely talked and laughed with her. He never shared anything to her. He was mentally remote, which was unbearable for Janu. Moreover, her mother-in-law, often taunted and teased her.

 In the last bid to win the affection, Janu deliberately became pregnant. She hoped that she could get their love and respect, if she produced a much earned for first grandson. But that too failed because she gave birth to a girl baby, who turned out to be mentally challenged. Life in the Maraars household turned from bad to worse to unbearable.

Janu worked on her college degree with vengeance and earned a bachelor’s degree first. She sent Riya, her mentally challenged daughter to a special school. She had also worked there for the sake of her daughter, Riya. The tought of doing special education came in her mind. For that she needed the master’s degree. So with a great aim she joined her M.A. in the meantime, her father died and her mother came to Allepy to settle and live with her grandmother.

Gauri, Suresh’s younger sister’s marriage was fixed. Janu didn’t reveal her plans to anybody before. She did her best in helping the family members in marriage preparation. Later she informed the family members about her plan to do special education in Arizona in America. Though the family members were not interested in such study programmes, they granted permission.

Janu had an interview in Delhi. She went to Delhi and stayed in Raghu uncle’s house. She attended the interview the next day. The interviewers told that they would announce the results in the evening. In the meantime, to while away the time, she went to Leena’s (her school friend) house to see her new born baby.

Surprisingly, in Leena’s house, Janu met her former lover Arjun. She remembered the promise she made to him before years. She decided to live with him. In the evening Janu and Arjun went to hear the results of the interview. Janu was selected for getting scholarship. She also heard another good news that if she wishes she can do her special education in London . Janu felt extremely happy at the news. She returned home with the aim to separate from the Maraar forever.

Janu’s mother and grandma were startled when she told them of her plan of getting divorce. Then the news reached her in-laws. They thought that she was affected mentally and admitted her in a hospital and given her treatment. janu’s mother , with difficulty, brought her to her home in Allepy. Again and anain Suresh came and disturbed her not to get divorce. But Janu was very firm in her decision.

Situations became worse, that one day Suresh took Riya to his home. So Janu and her mother needed the help of a lawyer. Suresh was not ready to give his daughter to Janu. On 27^th September, Janu left for England but Riya couldn’t accompany her as she was with Suresh. She went to England for her studies. She there, used to meet Arjun on weekends. Janu faced some problems there also because of Suresh.

Things changed slowly. Janu’s mother informed over phone that Suresh left Riya with them as she needed her mother. He had also agreed for divorce. Janu came from England to get the divorce case settled.

Riya was handed over to Janu. Janu tells, “She (Riya) is the most important thing in my life. Nothing alse matters really”. Janu’s problems didn’t end there. Misra ensures a happy ending and she says Arjun, “Riya’s disability had been the blessing to free me from the circle of forced happiness”.

Janu knew well that people around her will call her ‘a divorcee with a child’. But she felt that it was a small price to pay for her happiness and her daughter’s future a small price indeed to keep an ancient promise’.

Women, especially Indian women are deeply bound by the age old customs of a society that is notoriously male dominated. A lot of brides in India are facing the same problem as Janu. Only a few marriages genuinely turn out to be good, the rest continue with adjustment and compromises tied together by fear of social stigma. The novel exposes the atrocities faced by women because of tradition, culture and society. Like a modern women, Janu, comes out of her marriage, to lead a happy life with her lover, breaking the sacred bonds of marriage and tradition.