Ramayna : The epic Retold...

For the past week, our letterbox has been clinging feebly to the building, its walls blown outward, the flap dan¬gling, the interiors visible. It could make a competent entry into an abstract-art ex¬hibition under the title "Yawning Steel Maw Contemplates the Futility of Life”, but it's no longer equipped to do what it was built for. And all because late one night, some ruffian stuck a little bomb into its interior and then watched as the thing exploded noisily. This happens every year around the same time, and since the explosion is always loud enough for us to spring up horizon¬tally from our beds at 3am we have come to see it as our annual introduction to the Happy Diwali routine. Hal¬loween has nothing on our Festival of Frights.
Given that Diwali marks Lord Rama's return to Ayodhya after his victory over Ravana, I often spend my nights dream¬ing about missing letterboxes and postal misadventures that could have played a key role in the epic.
FLASHBACK
The mighty Lankan king Ravana trembles to learn that an army of monkeys, bears and squirrels is marching towards his palace, growling and chirruping with great ferocity. Even worse, Ramanand Sagar is outside with a video-camera.
Ravana: Vibheeshana, what's all this? Didn't Rama get my note?

Vibheeshana: What note was that, bhaiya?

Ravana: The one where I told him Sita was being ill-tempered and could he please send someone to collect her at the earliest.

Vibheeshana: Bhaiya, my spies tell me that some of the monkeys were playing around with firecrackers. They blew up Rama's letterbox with
the note still inside.

Ravana: What! Why wasn't I told about this earlier?

Vibheeshana: I sent u a telegram as soon as I heard.Didn’t you get it?

(In the back¬ ground, unseen by Ravana and his
brother, two courtiers exchange glances and giggle.)






Letterboxes aren’t the only things at risk in our colony. Last year, I found an unmonitored child carefully placing an "anaar" just be¬neath my car. "Par uncle," this bud¬ding terrorist explained, uiss se aapki carhelicopter ke jaise ban jayegi." I clipped him on the ear and sent him off, but it was difficult to get much sleep for the rest of the night. Troubled dreams came again.
FLASHBACK 2

In the final battle, as Rama draws closer Ravana tries to make a getaway in his fly¬ing chariot. Valmiki's draft of the epic originally included the following ex¬change between Ravana and his chari¬oteer:
Ravana (in des¬peration): Why isn't this chariot taking off, saarthi?

Charioteer: Maharaj, the en¬gineer forgot to bring an anaar to light under it.

Ravana (as the first of Rama's arrows finds its mark): Aarggh!

Monkeys: Yay! Now we get to go back home and invent a new festival. Back to the bridge, quick, before someone decides to use it as an alternate trading route. And don't forget the firecrackers — Ayodhya is full of nice letterboxes.