Banerjee - Scandalous Housewives: Mumbai

Madhuri Banerjee is a bestselling author, a blogger with CNN-IBN, a screenplay writer for Bollywood films, an Ad film director, a columnist with Asian Age and a mother. She has her own production house, Gray Matter Solution, that makes ad films and TV shows. She has also won a National Award for her documentary on womens issues called Between Dualities. Currently, she is the face of Revlon as their Relationship Expert.

She tweets with the handle @Madhuribanerjee and has over 12,000 followers who love her relationship advice. Her personal blog www.madhuribanerjee.blogspot.in has over three lakh views already. She is a traveller, an avid reader, a coffee addict, an amateur photographer and a chocoholic.

ALSO BY THE SAME AUTHOR

Advantage Love

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Copyright Madhuri Banerjee 2014

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 persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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BalaFor your incredible ideas, amazing sense of humour, and continuous support. Im so lucky to have you in my life. This book would not have been possible without you.

MiluFor being a terrific housewife, a great friend, and an incredible photographer.

AriaanaFor working quietly on endless activity sheets while I wrote a few chapters every day. Im super proud to be your Mama.

A Facebook page called Indian Married Unsatisfied Housewives has 150,000 likes. And this is just the people who have access to the Internet.

As per a 2011 consensus, 23 per cent of Indian women are employed. In a country of 58,64,69,174 women, there would be about 392 million women who could be housewives.

This is a story of four of them that you might recognize.

Sapphire Towers is a housing complex in Mumbai that is fictional. It is based on the observations I made about several housing complexes across Mumbai. The new complexes in Mumbai all have a similar design. There are two or more buildings in a complex called a society. The society has a swimming pool, a gymnasium, a walking track or park with swings and slides for children, and a clubhouse where parties or society meetings are held. A few might even have a lake behind them with a swampland or a tennis court along the premises. Some towers are connected through a refuge floor if the buildings are very close to each other. This is a fire safety norm for the buildings. Each society has an office that looks into the maintenance of the society, and is run by members chosen by the owners of the flat at a General Body Meeting.

In Mumbai, apartments are known by BHKs, which means Bedroom Hall and Kitchen. A 3 BHK would be an apartment with three bedrooms, a large drawing- and dining-room, and a kitchen.

The members can avail the complex facilities whenever theyre free. Most times, the members of the society really have no time to partake in any of these, but sit in the playground near the swings where the children play.

s usual, Gitas husband was late. She looked at her birthday cake and sighed. She had thought that, for once, Shailesh would make an effort. That maybe today, just today, he would keep his promise and come home early. But now she knew; he really didnt care. It wasnt about work as he always had work.

Mummy, Gitas four-year-old daughter, Anu, came running out of their bedroom, one of the two in her in-laws flat. She gave her mother a tight hug. When are we going to cut the cake? Its almost time to go to sleep.

Gita pondered. Either she could wait for Shailesh to come, or she could cut the cake now with her two girls and then pack them off to bed. She looked at the clock. It was 9:30 p.m., way past their bedtime. She decided she might as well have a little fun with her girls instead of waiting for a man who might not even be back before midnight.

Come, lets cut the cake. Should we light some candles? Where are the matches? Gita smiled as she asked Anu.

Lets call Dadi and Dada too. Anu ran into the other bedroom to call her grandparents, and Gita wondered why she even bothered. After all, it was because of Anu that her relationship with her husband and in-laws had turned sour. They had wished for Gita to have a boy for a second child; Renu, their firstborn, was then six. But she had another girl, and when the doctor had told her, she was overjoyed: A sister bonding was exactly what she wanted for Renu. But her in-laws had refused to even hold Anu, much less distribute sweets to the neighbourhood, as they had done when Renu was born.

Now Gita refused to try for another child. She had secretly gone on the pill to avoid another pregnancy. The idea had come from her close friends in the Sapphire Towers society, who had brought her the packet and told her to start taking it forty days from Anus birth. Thank God for those women, she thought. Otherwise, she would have gone completely mad in this building complex that sometimes felt like a prison.

Anu dragged her grandparents out of their bedroom for the cake-cutting. Gita shouted for her elder child Renuka to come as well. She came, playing a game on her mothers mobile phone.

Mama, how old are you? asked Anu.

Silly, said Renuka. You never ask a woman her age! She had the smirk of a Didi (elder sister) that said she knew better. Renu was tall for her age, her athletic body outgrew clothes faster than Gita could afford to buy new ones. She had long wavy hair and was a stunner for her age. All the boys in the building loved to play with Renu since she could beat anyone at football or cricket and still be the prettiest one around.

Gita smiled for the first time on her birthday. Where did you learn that, Renu?

Renu put down the phone for a brief second to look up at her mother. Sahil chacha, she said.

Sahil chacha was Gitas unmarried brother-in-law; he lived a few floors below. She suddenly remembered she had promised to call him for the cake-cutting. She went to the landline and dialed the intercom to Sahils flat. He picked up and said he would come.

Sahil had moved out of his parents apartment as soon as Gita and Shailesh had their second child. He said it was too crowded for the entire family. For a while Gitas parents-in-law had insisted that he stay; they said he could sleep with his brother in one room, and the two girls and Gita in the drawing-room. But Sahil felt that it was wrong: How could one separate a husband and wife? Besides, Gita needed some rest as well, and his parents woke up early to have tea. They would wake Gita up to make it for them. After a full night of looking after her newborn, she was in no position to cook for so many people. So he chose to not be a burden on anyone and look after himself by moving out.