THE PRICE OF MANGO
Is there hope then when the local fruit seller invites one to buy some mangoes pointing at the terribly out of season fruits?
“Mangoes now? How is it even possible?” goes the conversation with myself inside my head.
This is not the season for mangoes that much even I knew, I who am blissfully unaware of the passing of vegetable seasons or the impact, or lack of it, of GST on fruit prices. I who limit my interactions at the local fruit and vegetable seller to pointing at the stuff and saying give me two or a bunch or some — as the case may seem appropriate to my inexact practice of social skills — that particular day.
The fruit seller brings one down from its perch, at the top of the pile, a huge yellow coloured mango with the faintest streaks of green.
“ sweetest of the lot…Guaranteed” he says and then without a pause adds “ from Pakistan”
My outstretched hand slowly retreats as does my drooling tongue. Mango is my Achilles heel of fruit shopping . The formula is usually simple -I see mango I buy mango, but this seemed to be fraught with danger. In the lengthening darkness of a Delhi evening here was crawled something sinister; an element of random danger that has the ability to throw the gear from normal to abnormal with the suddenness of an implosion of deep seated scare.
Pakistani mangoes — is it not unpatriotic to contemplate their purchase let alone their eventual eating? Can one buy them? Or more importantly in these troubled times of wearing patriotic fervour on ones kurta sleeves should one knowingly buy mangoes bred and raised in Pakistan? On Pakistani trees and plucked by Pakistani hands and packed in Pakistani boxes? And all these when mangoes are not even in season? Is it safe for an Indian? So many questions to surmount all for the sake of a mango.
“Why not?” asked the mango man on being queried about being allowed to trade in mangoes from Pakistan. “ They are so sweet” was his impeccable logic to counter all charges of it being an anti-national act.
I looked around surreptitiously — there were only I and the fruit seller in earshot.
“How much?” I asked in a hoarse whisper that reeked of illicit desire.
“200” said the brave man who openly stocked exorbitantly priced Pakistani mangoes by the kilos.
“That’s a bit much” said I, forgetting to whisper.
“They are the sweetest of all mangoes available now and brought in specially from Pakistan — so no - the price is not much” said the man justifying the existence of the Pak mangoes in the same time space conundrum as the two of us — both Indians haggling over their worth.
The novelty of the enterprise; the sheer audacity of the business exchange; the perceived forbidden-ness of the fruit exchange that was about to happen made me stiffen my ever floppy middle class, middle aged backbone. I tentatively held one of the beastly yellow fruits in my own two hands and looking across the battery powered LED lit fruit stall, ensconced in the gathering gloom of an approaching Delhi winter, I drew a deep breath. This was my moment of bravery when I would not fear consequences, casting one quick furtive glance to ward off strangers and patriotic evil, in a firm voice yet not too loud a voice, I addressed the man who owned the fruit stall.
I said “ I will take this one”
I was like a teenager breaking social laws; I was the communist standing up for the rights of the downtrodden; I was the Captain standing on the deck of a sinking ship.
The single mango was weighed.
“ 170” said the Mango man declaring the amount that I had to pay for my courage.
One mango; out of season; from across the border of a naturally accepted enemy state which also enjoyed MFN status as far as trade with India is concerned…well bloody costly I would say -the price of this mango.
“If I go to jail for this, you are coming too”
I told the fruit seller “ I will tell them YOU sold me the Pakistani mango”
“No problem ji, tell everyone, there are truck loads of the fruit waiting for customers…the more the sweeter…ha…ha” replied that brave Indian not worried about keeping his voice down.
Now all I had to do was sneak the mango in to our housing society and pray that I did not meet Sharmaji in the lift. He is the one who keeps saying Bharat Mata Ki Jai and I don’t know how he would react to a Pakistani mango…
