"When a Trumpeter Dies" | A tribute post to Fr. Stan Swamy
Sibusiso Hlatshwayo
“I will probably die here, very shortly if things go on as it is”
- Fr. Stan Swamy in his last appearance, via video-conference, before Bombay High Court on May 21.
“A dead man right now
has a lot more to say than anyone living
The blood oozing from his body
makes more noise than the blood in his body
A stiff wind is blowing
and ideas dreams memories
are being chased along like scraps of paper
a darkish blackish thing
a night is gathering filling with dangerous beasts…
… A plan has already been made to drive a tribal from his jungle
a crowd of displaced persons
bundles up whatever remains of their household effects
blueprints drawn to them into an unknown future…
… Reality is too much of a reality these days
its blood more visible than its body”
- Excerpted from Mangalesh Dabral’s Reality These Days, ‘This Number Does Not Exist, Poetrywala, translated by Christi Merrill. (Italics Mine)
Do you remember the beginning from Maqbool? Vishal Bharadwaj’s descent into the sinister dungeon that is Shakespeare’s Macbeth, starts with blood - “Saari Mumbai khoon se bhar di”, says one of the comical policemen (the auteur’s magnificent reimagination of the witches) after blowing out his prisoner’s brains on a car window. I do not know why, but that soul-stirring frame of a kundali traced on wet glass, smeared with blood, came before me. As I heard of the death of Father Stan Swamy, I imagined, with disturbing clarity, a torn map of a destitute country, drenched in a red so deep, that we quiver and cringe in the face of its nakedness.
This red is anger, and curdled blood. It is fear. It is the skeletal face of shock that smarts at the attempted rewriting of an 84 year old man’s life in selfless service of the downtrodden, as ‘terrorist’ or ‘enemy of the state’ and its people. This red is disbelief and frustration. The colour of helplessness and the preparation for battle. It slips behind our ears as we trundle through the city, our elbows tucked in, looking cautiously over our shoulders.
The machinery of the democratic circus has been reduced to a guillotine in the hands of trigger happy ‘patriots’ whose quest for lost glory is nothing but desperate attempts to hold on to power, to rein in the moderates and the feeble minded. It is a known thing that fascists have an affinity for large monuments, they like to see the materiality of their phallic ambitions before them. They strive to set their conquests in terrifying stone and limestone (Central Vista cough cough). They like lists too; carefully maintained rosters of the dissenters, and those who have the gumption to question their motives, to call out their hypocrisy, to be disgusted with their bloodsport.
The institutional murder of Father Stan Swamy, who gave his life to the tribals of India and their struggle for rights, identity and life, is a cruel mockery of everything we hold to be sacred under the constitution. It is a chilling thing, this apathy, this astounding ruthlessness of a broken justice system, and a disoriented administration.
The courts initially denied him a sipper and straw in jail, when his Parkinson’s disease had made it nearly impossible to sip water from a glass. They made him wait for weeks. They denied his four bail pleas, including his request to be released from prison on the grounds that an overcrowded prison would make him more vulnerable to the virus. Add to this the derelict conditions of the prisons in this country.
Still, in the face of utmost adversity, Fr. Stan Swamy found courage and hope.
His letters embodied a humanity that is beyond the ken of the saffron army. Even when he was in prison unable to find the physical strength to continue doing simple acts required for survival, he wrote of the countless innocent undertrials whose fate lay in the hands of cowardly men.
"Many such poor undertrials don't know what charges have been put on them, have not seen their charge sheet and just remain in prison for years without any legal or other assistance…. A majority of them come from economically and socially weaker communities… Overall, almost all undertrials are compelled to live to a bare minimum, whether rich or poor. This brings in the sense of brotherhood and communitarianism where reaching out to each other is possible even in this adversity…. On the other hand, we 16 co-accused have not been able to meet each other as we are lodged in different jails or different 'circles' within the same jail. But we will still sing in chorus. A caged bird can still sing."
The saga of the “Bhima Koregaon 16” is a synecdoche of the state’s conspiracy to frame dissenters, activists and humanitarian visionaries as traitors and criminals. It is also a reminder of the continued tireless efforts of these people, and their defiance.
Every time I write of another victim of Modi’s thuggery, I try to muster up courage, or inflate my diminishing confidence by remembering the small victories. It is increasingly becoming more and more difficult. But the archivist’s job is important. These betrayals should not go unnoticed. They must haunt future generations with the hoarseness of their reportage.
And so, Good Father, Rest in Power.
Note: Sibusiso Hlatshwayo (stage name ‘blessedm’) is a South African poet who hails from the far east of Ekurhuleni in Brakpan (Tsakane). A pianist, he studied music production with Soul Candi Institute of Music. He is the co founder of a writer’s organisation called Imbuyezi and the African Revolution Community Development. This poem has been published in “Singing in the Dark: A Global Anthology of Poetry Under Lockdown”, Ed. K. Satchitanandan & Nishi Chawla, Vintage.