Manipur Musings

My first glimpse of Manipur more than three decades ago did not instill much confidence. As the short flight from Calcutta taxied to a stop, all that I could see from the plane window were armed soldiers and barbed wire around the perimeter of the small airport. So much for the land of the graceful Manipuri dance, I muttered under my breath!

Last month I once again took a flight, this time to leave Imphal perhaps for the final time after completing a post-retirement assignment. The departing flight offered me a somewhat similar scene from my window seat—high brick walls had replaced the barbed wire but the soldiers were now present in greater numbers.

In the intervening years, I had lived in Manipur, married there and witnessed the birth of our children in Imphal. I had also dug out roots of my past and discovered relatives and traced some of the steps my late father took there as a young army officer.

My nephew Vijay came to see me in the guest house after learning about my arrival. I had never met him before but knew his father, my cousin Sashadhar—a boisterous man whose laugh was as loud as his heart was big. He had passed away a few years back while serving in Manipur and now his widow MK Tamphasana Devi, daughter of Maharaja Boddhachandra, the last ruler of Manipur, lived in a big cottage named Tripura House in the palace compound campus of the Manipuri royal family. Her brother Okenderjit was the reigning titular Maharaja.

Vijay being roughly of my age, we became good friends and I started spending most of my free time in Tripura House. The lure of authentic homemade food made by the old family retainer was one incentive. She had a knack of preparing some old recipes which reminded me of the dishes my mother used to cook for my father—thin potato fries called bhaja, dry fish snacks like gudok and shidol, and mostanga (boiled pork chopped into tiny pieces and tossed up with oil, onions, vegetables and chilly). And meals were always served in huge thalis surrounded by an array of bowls, just as in the old days.

My sister-in-law was a regal but demure lady befitting her pedigree. Life had not been a bed of roses for her as it so often happens behind the high walls of palaces. The quick and successive deaths of her husband and two young sons had introverted her and she spent most of the day inside, seldom venturing out except for unavoidable family functions. Within the house, her loyal maid served her well doing all chores while she spent time resting, preparing and chewing pan, meeting relatives who came to meet her and planning small changes in the house with her son and daughter. I would often go to her room which had a huge bed in the middle with an exquisite and many layered mosquito net over it. The tables and walls were adorned with black and white sepia photos of and with relatives from Cooch Behar, Jaipur and other such royalties, reminders of happier times. In the midst of all this, Tamphasana would sit on the floor with a couple of large pillows for support and slowly chew on pan and betel nut. I called her Bhauj and she treated me more like a son then the Bhai she addressed me as. Once I had driven my official jeep accidently into a pond just outside the house and the next morning it had to be towed out by a crane. She gently admonished me—“Bhai, what will people think if they come to know your official status leave alone your connections with the Palace?”

Maharaja Okenderjit was a pleasant man with a look of a person who could in a moment’s notice don a solar topi and jump on to a horse. He was an alumnus of Mayo, Ajmer but like many others of his ilk across the country, he had not been spared the vagaries of changing times. The kingdom and the perks that came with the throne were all long gone but he seemed not to bear any grudge against democracy or harbour a feeling of loss. I more often than not found him in a cheerful mood much like a Wodehouse character entering a room with a hearty, “what ho! what Ho!”. He spoke perfect English and would often drop in to meet his sister. He would saunter in with a big smile and after exchanging pleasantries with Bhauj, call for Vijay and me and update us on his latest acquisitions or adventures. But behind the cheery and sunny exterior, like his sister, he too perhaps nursed hidden pains because often he would act in a surreptitious manner as if he was searching for something or trying to hide from someone. We once visited the hostel of the Regional Medical College to meet some students from Tripura. Since my jeep was out of action we engaged an auto rickshaw. He got into an argument with the driver on the matter of the fare. One of the students told the driver “Don’t you know he is your king?” He replied ,”Ok maybe he is and but what has that to do with my fare?” But he was a real king who just smiled and carried whatever regret or pain he might have had to his last resting place when he passed away at a very young age of forty-four in 1996.

A few months before I left Manipur for my final deputation to the Government of India in 2016, Bhauj called me and requested a meeting with the Chief Minister. There had been rumours of a government takeover of the Palace compound which included perhaps the Tripura House. The plan was to renovate the dilapidated main palace and beautify its surroundings and restore them to their old glory. My sister-in-law was not enamored by this project as it appeared to encroach upon the house built by her husband. It held too many memories to be left to the mercy of a government make over. The meeting was arranged and she arrived at the CM’s office in her quiet, regal but simple manner. As she was ushered in, the CM got up from his seat and respectfully welcomed and addressed her. She explained her anguish at the Govt plan and made an appeal to keep Tripura House out of its ambit. She spoke slowly and quietly without any visible strain or trauma in her demeanor. He assured that her wishes would be considered.

The renovation plan was shelved but Vijay moved to Shillong with his family and my sister-in-law soon after. Tripura House still stands, albeit old, weary and locked up, a bitter sweet reminder that sometimes we become so attached to places that have been witness to so much pain and happiness in our lives in equal measure, that after a point letting go may be hard but living there is equally painful.

Views expressed are personal