Words from the Heartland

A letter can contain many things: an expression of warmth, consolation for a loved one’s absence, or perhaps a reminder of provinciality

- Sumana Roy

My father, a student in Calcutta in the late 1960s, once went to a post office in the city. He was surviving on a meagre scholarship without the support of his parents, a father who had disowned him—temporarily—for leaving his village on the Indo-Bangladesh border in the hope of an education that would give him a life different from the one his refugee parents had had. He had something important to communicate to them in faraway Hili, and, unsure about how long it would take a postcard or inland letter to reach them, he decided to send them a telegram. It was the third week of the month, and, having spent his savings on buying a ticket for an East Bengal–Mohun Bagan football match, he had only a few rupees for the rest of the month. When he found out the cost of sending the telegram, he apologized to the man at the counter about his inability to send the telegram, saying that he would write a letter to his parents instead. This is how my father remembers this conversation from five decades ago, the hurt and humiliation still fresh.

“Why did you waste my time when you can’t send the telegram?”

“Sir, I don’t have the money, I didn’t realize that it costs this amount of money . . . ”

“This amount? It’s very little.” “It’s not little for a student like me, sir. I’ll send them a letter . . . ” “A letter? Why do poor people have to write letters? And why do poor and illiterate people in the provinces have to receive letters from their children?”

And later—“Why do the poor have to write, why do they have to waste their money on pen and paper and writing?”