On the Day of Uttarayan

Festive road wears a pleasantly deserted look with people either sitting or walking languidly as if there is no tomorrow, a forever sort of feeling all around. Its uttarayan and I m strolling on the road of Gandhinagar. A small girl child grinning at me while I cautiously put my foot forward lest I get entangled with the multiple coloured yarns criss crossing the road. A guy in his forties wearing orange shirt and orange pant and orange shoes trying to fly his yellow kites and being assisted by a small boy, probably his son. Vegetable market is not its usual noisy self, vendors seems standing forcibly with their not so fresh wares. Perhaps fresh lot of vegetables has not come today due to festival. A beautiful newly wed lady passes by, all adorned- bangles full forearm, all ornament at its right place, waistband dangling clinking and making tune with anklet. She is a beauty and it makes me hum a song from Mallika Sarabhai movie. I express my praise for her to my Gujarati friend to which he responds by a cold sigh. “There was a time when all newly wed Gujarati girls used to dress up like this but gone are those days, dressing like this now comes only from so called low caste-poor family only, relatively richer people prefer to wear ethnic-western fusion and not traditional gujarati attire.i don’t know how to react back and just nod to show my approval. All of sudden, my phone rings. It is dadaji calling. I get anxious. Mother had informed that grandmother is not keeping well, she has not taken solid food for last 2-3 days. Tears well up in my eyes and I answer back with choked throat. It is my grandpa on the other side. I enquire about grandma. She is well. I take a sigh of relief and thank almighty. She is a pious old lady of loud mouth and honest heart and clean soul. No baggage to worry about and no future have a wistful thought about. Her only wish is to die before her husband. Mother was telling that now grandma is mainly talking about where her cemetery would be and how she wishes at a neat and clean place.