Pedalling stardom

People Like Them

Aren't you coming to see the cycle show?" asked Raju, the cycle rickshaw man who ferries me around in Santiniketan. "It's absolutely fantastic. It goes on for seven days and the boy doesn't get off the cycle. He eats, drinks, sleeps on the cycle and even cooks his food."

Not being a great circus enthusiast I felt no great need to see this spectacle. But I got my daily cycle show update from the gardener, the rickshaw men and the under-privileged children I teach.

"You know he faints if he gets off the cycle," I was told one day. "Today he jumped off the cycle to land on a bed of florescent lights and broke them with his chest," was the high point of another day.

The kids never gave up trying to drag me to the show. "You don't want to come even today? He his going to fry an egg on his head," they said, almost in a tone of rebuke. I must admit that even though the city-bred me didn't allow me to join them, by the end of each day a small part of me would be waiting to hear the latest.

"So did he fry the egg?" I asked, quite intrigued. "Oh, yes he lit a small kerosene stove on his head and fried an omelette. But on the second last day he is going to cook meat and then auction it," said one of the boys in great excitement. Apparently, the auction went off well.

"I think the auction is egged on by somebody in their team," said one bright little boy. This emboldened other young sceptics. "I think his fainting if he gets off the cycle is also fake," said another.

"When their radio had a problem I saw this guy get off his cycle and run towards it. But of course he 'fainted' when he realised everyone was looking."

The peak excitement was to come on the penultimate day, when the cycle man would be buried in the sand for twenty four hours. There was no dearth of speculation. "How will he be buried? Will his limbs be straight or curled up inside?"

The only way the cycle show had really touched my life was that it was accompanied by the usual Hindi music, loud enough to take me to the local police station. "It's a private enterprise, not at all connected with any religious festival. So how does he get permission to play the mike?"

I asked the officer in charge. He replied that the local thana had the authority to grant this permission and the local thana said it was the SDO office, which said no such permission was actually given. But what put the cycle show in context for me was what the inspector said to me.

"I know the mike is loud, but isn't tomorrow the day he gets buried?" he asked, completely bewildered at my lack of sympathy. I realised I was barking up the wrong tree. To the inmates of this small town, the cycle man was what film stars were to cities. Truly above the law.

The seventh and final day, I must admit, diluted my scepticism. I secretly admitted to myself that I was tempted to join the crowd next year! By four in the evening all the cycle rickshaw pullers had called it a day, all the house-helps had wrangled a few hours from their mistresses and all the kids were back from school without stopping to steal from the gardens on their way back.

As the cycle man was taken out from under the sand, I heard, the kids ran to garland him while mothers wept and fathers clapped. The hero was assured of a full house for his show next season.