"Fortune and love favour the brave": Ovid
The river is searched for the body of Avdesh Singh Thakur. When it was not found, RV pronounced that the Gunahon ka Devta is still alive. No other possibility to explain the lack of body.
"If you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day so I never have to live without you":A. A. Milne
At the Haveli, Arpita and Bhauji are startled to see three of the gang come running in, exhausted and bloodstained. In halting voice, they explained that Avedesh got shot and fell in the river. Arpita fell as her world came crashing down, all her fears coming true. Grief ripped through her and tears flowed like a waterfall down her cheeks. Helpless, she leaned against a pillar crying her heart out.
Vedesiya came running police have come to the haveli. Bahuji, still stunned by Avdesh's shooting, manages to take charge, ordering the Pandit to hide the gang and weapons. She turns and her eyes fall on the weeping girl, desolate and all alone. For just a moment pain danced across her face and empathy shows in her eyes.
"'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all": Alfred Lord Tennyson
She roughly wipes the tears away...stop your crying, the police are coming and your tears will be the only proof they need...Arpita manages to slow down still bowed under her grief, with a small cry she turned and fled to the sanctuary of her room. Bhauji for just a moment gives into the grief in her and sags against a pillar as her eyes sparkle with unshed tears, the next moment she straightens her shoulder up and assumes the role she had undertaken from the day she stepped into the Haveli. Being the Guardian.
She steps outside and coolly watches as the cars unloaded with police officers. Her eyes meet the equally cool eyes of Inspector RV....he informs her they have a search warrant...she responds search away....
RV orders his men to search, leaving no stone unturned, neither the bathroom nor the puja room...Avdesh Singh Thakur must be found.... Arpita sitting desolately in her room is startled when the door is burst open and hordes of policemen come and start rifling through the room. Unable to bear the intrusion and the lack of privacy for her grief, she slowly walks out...like a sleepwalker, she drifts through the house and outside.
She sought comfort from the place most associated with her husband...the place where he relaxes, prays, exercises...the place where they spent one night getting closer to each other's heart while dreaming of the future. She walks in, her face washed out and tear stained...her eyes fall on the deity of Hanuman and she prays for her husband, for his safety and well being.
"Love conquers all": Virgil
Suddenly, she hears a suppressed moan of pain. Arpita turns around her eyes wild and filled with hope...searching she rushes ahead and stops. There lies her husband, hidden behind some drying hay....his beloved face strained with pain and clammy as he lay unconscious....Avdeshji!.. the scream rips out from Arpita and she rushes to him, her horrified eyes noticing the blood staining his right side, the dangling of his arms and body...In the Haveli, RV turns his head sharply at the scream, scenting his prey..... Terrified that RV and his men might come any moment, Arpita tries to waken Avdesh but to no avail... her anxious eyes darting to the gate of the compound...eventually she was rewarded with Avdesh touching her with one arm while he pointed to somewhere. Arpita comprehending immediately searched for the hiding place he had pointed out, and then slowly dragged him to it. Just in time, even as she pulled her sari free from the trapdoor, RV and his men came running in at full speed, Bhauji and Panditji behind.
"Love is all we have, the only way that each can help the other": Euripides
Why did you scream?.. RV harshly demands of Arpita, his eyes searching all around even as he orders his men to search. Arpita slowly turns to face him, hiding her blood stained hands in her pallu, Bhauji steps closer to her to offer comfort or strength...Arpita stammers out that she had come to pray, seen a snake and had screamed out in fright her husband's name. RV looks grim as the search was concluded and no one found. He looks at Arpita...it is good that you are praying, pray with your heart and mind...for he has a police bullet in him and not long for this world, if he loves you then he is thinking of you...for as long as your husband goes around as the Gunahon Ka Devta, I will be going around with his death warrant in hand....
Arpita watched him go, his word echoing dizzily around in her ears....her eyes dark as the night as all colour leached out from her face.
My thoughts:
Grief united Arpita and Bhauji. The former lost and broken while Bhauji did what she does best, hiding her grief and going about protecting the Haveli. These scenes gave a small glimpse of how Bhauji must have been in those early days after she was made a widow. For a moment, it flashed across my mind that they are both virgin widows, just one more thing in common, and that yet again Bhauji has someone to take care of which will help them both go through this raw phase.
Arpita for her part was inconsolable the very thing she had feared had come true. She walked around lost and aimless...just as she had always known she would be if Avdesh died. So her shock and absolute joy could be heard in that one scream the moment she saw her husband. Her need to make sure he was safe and beyond the reaches of the law, had her hiding him without a second thought.
I felt tremendously sad for both Avdesh and Arpita. Something had changed right then and there. She is no longer innocent and untouched by her husband's life. She went against her own inclination to be on the side of the law. She hid her husband, no question about it for he comes first with her, always. She took courage in her hand and lied through her teeth to RV.. anything to protect Avdesh..... And my sadness for Avdesh was that in essence he is a criminal, this is his life and this could be how he is ended. He is more likely to die by a gun than in his sleep...he is wanted and due to being shot had relied on his wife...it would chafe at any men's pride but it would eat him up...for her to see him like this, hiding and cowering like some vermin.... This is the life Arpita so desperately wanted him out of, because he deserves better....I hope he thinks about all these in when he recovers. It is romantic, his situation, but the reality is anything but.
For Avdesh may be the Gunahon Ka Devta,... but in the eyes of the world he is a criminal, no better than a petty thief. He will be hunted till he pays either with his life or with his reformation and word to never pick up arms again. That is the reality of his life and last night's episode was a stark reminder that even someone pure like Arpita cannot remain untouched for long when the person you love lives amongst darkness.... That you can help someone but only when they help themselves will change come about.
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