A Family Affair

A Family Affair(Sudeshna Majumdar) Once upon a time, not long ago, there was a governor in a certain state of India. He had three children from his first wife and another three from the woman he had married after the first one had died or deserted him. The new woman in the governor’s life also had three children from her previous husband who had committed suicide.
The governor had a bright young IAS officer called Talwar, as his private secretary. One of his principle duties was to see that the children from the governor’s first wife and those from his second wife and her first husband were kept away from the children that they had jointly produced. Talwar put the children from the governor’s first wife and the governor’s second wife’s first husband in six different educational institutions having hostels of their own. The children jointly produced by the governor and his second wife lived with them in the Raj Bhawan.
One day, the governor received a message from the principal of the school in which one of the boys from his first wife was studying, saying that the boy was going astray. Almost simultaneously, he received another message from the principal of another school in which a boy from his second wife’s first husband was studying, saying that the bloke had been seen roaming about in the city’s red light area. The governor requested Talwar to go to both the institutions to see what was what and to set matters right at his own level. Talwar was also instructed to make sure that the fact of the governor’s children from his first wife and his second wife’s children from her first husband not behaving correctly was kept a closely guarded secret.
Hardly had Talwar left for the two places when the governor received a message from another school in which his eldest daughter from his first wife was studying saying that the girl had tried to commit suicide. Talwar was asked to proceed to the girl’s school post haste. But as soon as he reached that school, he found another message awaiting him. It was also from the governor and it said that the governor’s second wife’s eldest daughter studying in a different school at a different place had been caught red handed while stealing a gold bangle from a jewellery shop. Talwar was asked to leave the one who tried to commit suicide and to rush to the one who had been caught stealing.
He discharged all his assignments competently and returning home, suggested to the governor that in the interest of family harmony, it would be better if all the nine children lived together in the Raj Bhawan. That was accepted by the governor and his second wife. But then one day the latter came to him and said, “Trouble again. Your children and my children are fighting furiously with our children.”
I can’t say what happened thereafter. But looking at the political maze, the making and unmaking of gods and goddesses, their offspring running amock, any wonder why that great gubernatorial escapade has suddenly come to mind?