Koral Dasgupta - Rasia: The Dance of Desire

Rasia

Koral Dasguptas stories appear randomly through her books, academic lectures, speeches, columns and paintings. A literary movement founded by her, www.tellmeyourstory.in, hosts short stories and poems written by people across age, professions and geographies.

As a professor of Marketing, Communications and Creative Writing, she conducts workshops and talks at educational and corporate floors. She also consults with the corporate in marketing communications and content space. She is an advisory member with CBFC Mumbai.

Rasia: The Dance of Desire is her third book.

Readers can reach her via Twitter or

Instagram @Rasia_thebook

Please feel free to tag her in your reviews, comments, thoughts on the book or photographs with the book.

Published by

Rupa Publications India Pvt. Ltd 2017

7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj

New Delhi 110002

Sales centres:

Allahabad Bengaluru Chennai

Hyderabad Jaipur Kathmandu

Kolkata Mumbai

Copyright Koral Dasgupta, 2017

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any actual person, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-81-291-XXXX-X

First impression 2017

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

To my son,
Neev Tanish

Contents

Prelude

One year later

BRIAN HERRETT

Manhattan, 2016

Excuse me, may I? I utter repeatedly, holding up my camera in one hand and my press card in the other. The unhappy faces that move aside are the standard response we journalists usually receive. But a press card has its advantages. Art patrons and enthusiastic audience flooding the auditorium and green rooms, frown. Ali, Sid and Arjun receive me warmly, leaving those around to wonder why I am so important. I hug them back like a proud brother, wink suggestively at the faces that stare, and march ahead.

Kala Mandirs inaugural performance in the heart of Manhattan was meant to declare that the dance academy is active and functional now. New admissions have started rolling in. The troupe is scattered all over the campus, answering questions and picking up well-deserved accolades.

Congratulatory messages had flooded in similarly months ago, when they learnt that Shekhars Mumbai-based dance academy, Kala Mandir, was setting up a branch in Manhattan. For days, the Indian media covered little else but stories on Shekhars inspiring lifehis rags to riches story, his grit as a practising Bharatanatyam artiste, forming a troupe that stands by him like a rock, and his far-sightedness as an entrepreneur who never rested on past laurels. Shekhar did not have time to contribute to those stories, or to even read them. The correspondents gathered their content from sources best known to them.

But where is Shekhar?

At one corner Manasi is busy talking to some delegates from the United Nations. I reach out to her. She smiles.

Where have you hidden Shekhar? I whisper in her ears.

Leave him alone, Herrett. Manasi whispers back ignoring my joke.

Did the lady just advise a journalist to stay away from news? If Shekhar needs to be away from this chaos at such an important moment, then there is a story brewing somewhere!

The OOH TV planted above runs some channels from India and the USA, lavishly praising the event and the one who made it all possible.

Ideals. Ambition. Pace. Discipline. And a ruthless drive to dismiss whatever is not to be. These are a few words that describe Raj Shekhar Subramanian, declares the excited young lady on the screen. She calls him a huge inspiration in the Indian cultural space.

I double back, my eyes scanning the crowd for the inspiration, ignoring the wifes injunction to leave him alone. I invite disapproving glances as I push through the crowd again, my body further encumbered by a huge bag and a camera on the side.

The show has ended about an hour ago. This is when Shekhar openly interacts with all the delegates and audience, carefully observing every minute detail of their reactions and responses. His absence at this hour cant be a silly exception.

I touch the bag loosely hanging from my shoulders and hold it closer to myself. Then I briskly walk out of the hall.

There he stands, at an isolated corner of the corridor in the rear end of the auditorium. He has just washed his face to remove all makeup. The trident painted elaborately on his back is now covered with a shawl. Having been a friend to Shekhar for eight years now, I know when not to make my presence felt. More so because he has been trying to avoid me of late. But this situation has left me confused. Maybe I should risk it.

Whats the fun soaking in the accolades alone, Shekhar? Lets do it together over wine, I say, interrupting his reverie. Shekhar turns around and smiles pleasantly.

I look behind, wondering whether the stern lips have curved for me or its directed at someone else. Sceptically, I look back at him. After being neglected for a while with condescending cynicism, the unpredictable warmth feels rattling. This strange man had maintained a distance ever since I pronounced my plans. He had interpreted my proposal as an obscene uninvited encroachment into his private space.

Am I hallucinating or are you really in a mood to say yes? I ask in disbelief.

I am prepared, Brian. He says. You can go ahead.

Still stunned over his capitulation, I pull out some papers from my bag in haste and hand them to him.

I am carrying the contract. I have already told you what it holds. Read well before!

Shekhar has signed on the dotted line even before I can finish my sentence. He holds out the papers at me. It takes a few minutes to overcome the deafening silence and find my voice.

Has the earth been hit by a comet? India defeated Pakistan in cricket? Has the US president called you to spend a night at the White House? I ramble along. Whats wrong with you, Shekhar? I had been chasing you for days to write your biography, and you had steadfastly denied to have anything to do with it until yesterday. What changed this evening?

Shekhar looks away. I need to unburden some secrets of my life, Brian. Maybe I will, when I reveal myself, he says.

I know where this pensiveness comes from.

Here he stands, all alone, hiding himself from the adulation due to him at the end of what seems to be the most life-altering show of his career. But neither the media, nor his friends and well-wishers, nor Shekhar himself could have predicted an evening which will make him stand at a crossroads, questioning everything that he has ever believed! Two women wait for him at two different ends of the crossroads. He knows which path is his, but he cant walk that path till he has attended to the other. I wait, watching him introspect silently over a long journey; eventful and interesting, successful yet self-defeating.

Finally, he turns to face me. Those ever-energetic eyes look tired.

We can start tomorrow, if you are ready, he affirms.

In the next moment he is gone, leaving me bewildered. I repeatedly check whether Shekhar has really signed the contract without reading it. That is so not like him.