northwestern part of Rudrakshapalem, cosseted by Prabhakarayya’s general store on the left and Ibrahim Bhai’s flour mill on the right, stood a serene, white, single-storeyed square building. The black stone plaque that stood by the front gate bore in gold letters the name of Sudeshnamma, Saraswatamma’s paternal grandmother.
She had been a woman of extraordinary character, going by the stories of men who had known her. Even though she could not read or write a single letter of the Telugu alphabet, she had an intuitive understanding of numbers and accounting, which made her incredibly hard to deceive in matters of money. Her husband, Janardhan Reddy, Saraswatamma’s grandfather, was the only child of his parents, and though he had had a town-bred English education (or maybe because of it), he tended to be loose-handed. The sharks in his family had been circling around him ever since he was born, and when he came of age and inherited all of his father’s lands, they prepared to close in.
It was then that Sudeshnamma entered the picture and closed her fist around the keys to the money locker. At all times, she knew exactly what the family’s balance sheet looked like. She knew which of their lands was leased to whom, for what period and for how much. She knew all about the crops growing on each of their farms and when they were due for a harvest. She knew which of their wells were full and which were on the verge of drying up. She was aware of all those who owed them money as well as the respective rates of interest. Equally, and more importantly, she knew at all times how much money the family owed others as a result of her husband’s generosity (she always called it generosity, never loose-handedness).
In matters of the house, she was equally adept. Sudeshnamma’s mother-in-law, Prameelamma, was known in the village to be a tough-headed woman, but in all the years Sudeshnamma ran the house, not a murmur of dissent or disagreement had been heard between the two women. The servants who slept at the house heard no quarrels. Visitors saw no evidence of tension. Even when Sudeshnamma cajoled and coached her husband in money matters, her mother-in-law would not speak up in defence of her son.
Whether the hold Sudeshnamma had on her mother-in-law was one born out of love or authority and fear, no one knew.
She always went to great lengths to play down her importance in the household. Whenever the priest came to the house and asked for alms, she would direct him to Prameelamma. (‘She is the head of the household, Shastri gaaru.’) When their leases ran out and came up for extension, she would pass the papers on to Janardhan Reddy to read them before signing. (‘Please read them out loud so that I can understand.’) When she visited the temple, the archanawas always in the name of her mother-in-law and her husband. (‘Please ask Him to look after my family, Shastri gaaru. Attayyais not keeping well these days.’)
Sudeshnamma always maintained that education was not important to a man. What was more important was common sense. She never explicitly pointed out her husband as an example of one who had the former and lacked the latter, but she proudly cited herself as an example of how someone who lacked the former could make up for it by displaying the latter.
It was that confidence—some, with the benefit of hindsight, would later call it bravado—that would turn out to be the cause of the misfortune that followed.
Prameelamma had been suffering for years. It was Sudeshnamma’s daily habit to make sure her mother-in-law took her medicines on time. There were tablets for hypertension, pain-killers for arthritis, tonic for cough and cold, and a dose of sleeping tablets. To differentiate one from the other, Sudeshnamma kept them in separate containers with the dosages committed to memory.
But once when the sleeping tablets had run out, the doctor had doubled the size of Prameelamma’s sleeping tablets and
She had been a woman of extraordinary character, going by the stories of men who had known her. Even though she could not read or write a single letter of the Telugu alphabet, she had an intuitive understanding of numbers and accounting, which made her incredibly hard to deceive in matters of money. Her husband, Janardhan Reddy, Saraswatamma’s grandfather, was the only child of his parents, and though he had had a town-bred English education (or maybe because of it), he tended to be loose-handed. The sharks in his family had been circling around him ever since he was born, and when he came of age and inherited all of his father’s lands, they prepared to close in.
It was then that Sudeshnamma entered the picture and closed her fist around the keys to the money locker. At all times, she knew exactly what the family’s balance sheet looked like. She knew which of their lands was leased to whom, for what period and for how much. She knew all about the crops growing on each of their farms and when they were due for a harvest. She knew which of their wells were full and which were on the verge of drying up. She was aware of all those who owed them money as well as the respective rates of interest. Equally, and more importantly, she knew at all times how much money the family owed others as a result of her husband’s generosity (she always called it generosity, never loose-handedness).
In matters of the house, she was equally adept. Sudeshnamma’s mother-in-law, Prameelamma, was known in the village to be a tough-headed woman, but in all the years Sudeshnamma ran the house, not a murmur of dissent or disagreement had been heard between the two women. The servants who slept at the house heard no quarrels. Visitors saw no evidence of tension. Even when Sudeshnamma cajoled and coached her husband in money matters, her mother-in-law would not speak up in defence of her son.
Whether the hold Sudeshnamma had on her mother-in-law was one born out of love or authority and fear, no one knew.
She always went to great lengths to play down her importance in the household. Whenever the priest came to the house and asked for alms, she would direct him to Prameelamma. (‘She is the head of the household, Shastri gaaru.’) When their leases ran out and came up for extension, she would pass the papers on to Janardhan Reddy to read them before signing. (‘Please read them out loud so that I can understand.’) When she visited the temple, the archanawas always in the name of her mother-in-law and her husband. (‘Please ask Him to look after my family, Shastri gaaru. Attayyais not keeping well these days.’)
Sudeshnamma always maintained that education was not important to a man. What was more important was common sense. She never explicitly pointed out her husband as an example of one who had the former and lacked the latter, but she proudly cited herself as an example of how someone who lacked the former could make up for it by displaying the latter.
It was that confidence—some, with the benefit of hindsight, would later call it bravado—that would turn out to be the cause of the misfortune that followed.
Prameelamma had been suffering for years. It was Sudeshnamma’s daily habit to make sure her mother-in-law took her medicines on time. There were tablets for hypertension, pain-killers for arthritis, tonic for cough and cold, and a dose of sleeping tablets. To differentiate one from the other, Sudeshnamma kept them in separate containers with the dosages committed to memory.
But once when the sleeping tablets had run out, the doctor had doubled the size of Prameelamma’s sleeping tablets and
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