Mangalore: Sidney Pinto Authors Debut Novel at 85

By John B Monteiro

Mangalore, Sep 19: "When audiences come to see us authors lecture, it is largely in the hope that we’ll be funnier to look at than read" – Sinclair Lewis.

These days it is routine to take authors around major book markets for them to lecture, interact with prospective readers and sign books sold at the venues. But alas! In the case of the author under review here, Sidney Pinto, 85 years old, whose debut novel, "Louis Puchhekanna – The Servant Boy From Mangalore" (published by Fortytwo Book Galaxy, Santacruz (E), Mumbai 400055; P. 173; Rs 195), which was recently released in Mumbai, leave alone promotion tours, but a determined attempt by this writer to interview the author was frustrated. For, he is on oxygen, and talking about himself or his book is the last of the priorities for this self-effacing Mangalorean settled in Mumbai in the later years of his achievement-studded life. Being a debut author, it is only apt to start with a short introduction to him.

Sidney Pinto was born on September 2, 1926 in Mangalore, the seventh child of Albert and Helen Pinto. He studied in St. Aloysius School till 1938 in the Kannada medium of instruction, and could not speak English until he entered high school at the age of 13. He then started learning in English with Hindi as the second language. After passing the intermediate exam, he joined Loyola College, Madras and obtained an M. A. in Economics. He moved to Bombay (now Mumbai) in 1948 and did his L.L.B.

After a stint in the law profession, he shifted to industry in 1956. He joined an industrial company run by British owners, and in 1962, the Indian subsidiary of Imperial Chemical Industries Ltd. (ICI). In 1968, he was the only recruit to the proposed merchant banking unit of Grindlays Bank, and became head of the unit in 1973. He left Grindlays in 1976 and set up a consultancy of his own.

On a visit to a friend, he was introduced to a young businessman Uday Kotak (then 22 years), who had obviously studied his past career. Kotak insisted on his joining him to form a new business, which eventually became Kotak Mahindra Bank in 1985 when Kotak was 25 and Pinto 59. In 2003, Pinto was obliged to resign because of a new rule of the Reserve Bank that no director of a bank should be more than 70 years old. Pinto married Rosemary Albuquerque in 1957. She died in 2002.

Coming back to the novel, its central hero is Louis Puchhekanna (in Tulu, Puchhekanna means cat’s eyes), the youngest son of Pascal and Lethy Cardozu. He is a mulgenidar, farmer-tenant, who can be evicted only if he persistently defaulted on paying the annual rent to his landlord – in this case Walter Christo, a retired public official who lived in a bungalow, Forest Lodge, at Bijey, Mangalore, with his wife Veronica and two daughters, Jane and Rebecca. They had two in-house servants – old Sherpinami, the cook-woman, and Pauline, young, dark, house-help. For outdoor work, they had Kuttappan, a Kerala-origin bachelor, loyal to the family, and the local, Monappa, generally undependable. In this setting is transplanted Louis (hereafter Puchhe) who was viewed suspiciously rebellious by his ever-drinking father and his two elder siblings. He is offered to the landlord for work in Forest Lodge for a monthly salary of Rs. 6 – which was to be deposited in a post office account and beyond the reach of Pascal who would have spent it on his liquor.

The liquor story, partly extracted later, had already ended the life of Lethy, in her 30s, who was offered as dummy hostage in a liquor raid case and, there being no jail for women in Mangalore, was sent to Vellore where she was repeatedly gang-raped, ending with a delayed message that she had passed away. Young, ruddy and handsome Pucche is also viewed suspiciously at Forest Lodge because of the concern for protecting the virginity of the two daughters of the Christos and their dusky maid Pauline, for her virginity also the landlord couple feel responsible (see extract below). For this reason, Puchhe is barred from the run of the house and is made to work and sleep outdoors, on the varandah, and is allowed into the kitchen only for meals to be served by the household servant women.

Meanwhile, like water finds its own level, love blossoms furtively between Puchhe and Pauline, leading to her becoming pregnant – a great disgrace and scandal in the then conservative Mangalorean setting. The deed is done, what to do with the dagger? Puchhe the simpleton is prepared to marry Pauline and save her from disgrace – even if it involves eloping. But, Pauline carries a great secret which she is not willing to share with Puchhe nor does she want to cheat him. As it turns out later, her father was a leper confined to the leprosy asylum of Fr. Muller’s Hospital at Kankanady and she did not want Puchhe to suffer for her temporary relief.

Meanwhile, the landlord’s daughter, Rebecca, is infatuated with Puchhe and when he expressed desire to learn English to the landlady, Rebecca jumps into the ring and it leads to a touchy situation – literally. But, now Pauline’s illegitimate pregnancy gives a new twist to their story. Enters Lucy Sanctis, a neighbouring resident and head post master, who also doubles up as agony aunt and, beyond giving advice, also gets into finding solutions. Lucy, with the help of parish priests, gets Pauline married to a widower in a neighbouring parish, Felix Balthazer, a tailor by trade but also a helper in parish work.

Everything looks okay till Pauline is found ready to deliver before the conventional nine months after marriage. An upset Felix, heavily reinforced by liquor, uses his trade scissors to pierce the stomach of Pauline to get at the unborn child. The heavily bleeding Pauline is rushed to Fr Mullers Hospital where an emergency operation delivers a healthy, fair baby – with light blue eyes. But, Pauline dies of the deep wound and loss of blood. In due course the child is given to St Antony’s asylum at Jeppu.

At Forest Lodge, Pauline’s secret disappearance is known to the landlords; but not to Puchhe who agonises over her sudden absence. Now he is given Pauline’s duties and access to the house. One day, however, Walter finds his valuable Parker pen missing and Puchhe is the first suspect and is taken to the police station and is set for third degree treatment to extract a confession. At another level, Rebecca, sure of Puchhe’s innocence, gets a visiting young relative to admit to the theft and all would have been normal. But, Puchhe, fearing the impending torture by police, after borrowing money from his mentor, Kuttappan, secretly leaves the house, heading for Bombay, via bus up to Kadur and train thereafter.

As serendipity would have it, while waiting for the train to arrive, Puchhe is spied by Wendy D’Souza, setting out to go to England to be a nurse in the Royal Navy. She takes Puchhe under her wing, takes him to her untenanted flat in Mahim and then to stay at Majestic Hotel in downtown Bombay. She puts him touch with the vague contacts which Puchhe had come up with -- mainly a garage owner at Sassoon Docks. He also finds accommodation in a local Mangalorean club, studies in night school and soon opens an automobile parts shop, in partnership and ends up buying a flat in Colaba.

One of his better-placed friends and mentors, Stan, has taken a flat in suburban Vile Parle and Puchhe visits and spends week-ends with him. On one such train journey, he spies a familiar face exiting at Bandra Station. Stalking her, he traces her to a flat in Bandra West and gets low-down on how she has adopted Puchhe’s and Pauline’s son from the asylum and how she now works in Bombay with her school-going son, named Edward. To bring up the adopted son, she had given up the idea of marriage and written off her rights to the family property so that she can buy a flat and live in Bombay with Edward. During the story narration, Edward arrives from his boarding school to spend the weekend at home. His initial reaction to meeting Puchhe is detailed in the extract given later.

One thing leads to another and ends up in the low-key marriage of Puchhe and Rebecca, with the Christo couple and Jane and her husband attending. Puchhe moves out of his Colaba flat and moves into Rebecca’s Bandra flat. “And it was agreed by all concerned that each one would retain the name under which each had lived: Rebecca Christo. Edward Christo and Louis Puchhekanna.”

Aravind Adiga had used Mangalorean background in his novel, "Between The Assassinations" with little attempt to conceal the real names of places. Pinto is more specific and evokes nostalgia for Mangalore. His style is crisp and racy. He does not waste time on elaborate foreplay and repetitive sweet nothings – partly because all the amorous encounters are furtive. It is a page–turner, leading to the speculation” if only Pinto had got into his literary outpourings earlier. Of course, it is a matter of time, inclination and inspiration. We should be thankful for what we have. Amen.

Extracts from the book which reflect its style and substance

Consumption of liquor in the district was no more common than elsewhere in the world. The villagers generally distilled their own liquor either from the multi-coloured, juicy, cashew apple or the palmyra or coconut, all of which were plentiful. When prohibition was introduced, the police and the excise officers would raid villages, often after prior warning, and confiscate stocks of liquor once they had symbolically destroyed the illegal distilleries.

They also arrested the owners, usually young boys or women, who were offered as hostages by the men.

When their village had been raided three years ago and his mother been taken away sobbing and desolate, Puchhe had watched with dismay, restrained by his father and older brothers from protesting violently. The mother, Lethi (short for Laethicia), was still in her thirties, tall with a delicate build and, while not as fair as Pascal and Puchhe, had light eyes.

Puchhe was her favourite not only because he happened to be the youngest, but also because he helped her with her domestic chores and excelled in his studies in the parish school. His brothers, Leo and John, were jealous because their mother favoured Puchhe in various little ways. School dropouts, they were also conscious that she disapproved of their drinking with their father whereas Puchhe did not drink. When Puchhe went to the fields to join in the work of sowing or harvesting, they taunted him and harassed him. Although Puchhed worked as hard in the field as in school, Leo and John did their best to undermine his work. The animosity became worse when the police took Lethi away.

Mangalore has only one sub-jail with no provision for women prisoner, so when Lethi was sentenced to imprisonment she was sent to the dreaded Vellore Central Jail in the heart of Tamil country. She soon attracted the attention of the male staff who managed to get hold of her from the obliging women wardens. She was gang-raped frequently and, soon after imprisonment, died. None of these details were known to any of the family, indeed anybody other than the culprits and their accomplices, until some years later. All that the family was told at that time was that Lethi has “expired.”

**************************************************************************

After they had gone, Walter said to Veronica, “What a risk you are taking. The boy is so good-looking.”

“Look, our girls are completely safe. I can’t believe they will flirt with a servant boy who hardly knows how to read and write.”

“But you forget Pauline. We are equally responsible for her.”

“Look, you know how it is? He is so good-looking and fair. He will never look at Pauline who is black.”

“What has colour got to do with at that age? Moreover, Pauline may be black, as you say, but she is probably more attractive than our own daughters.”

“Rubbish,” said Veronica, “and as for our daughters, have you heard of any daughter of the house falling for a servant boy? The other way round, yes. One often hears of boys of the house having affairs with the servant girls.”

**************************************************************************

“Ma. This is not fair. You never told me that they were servants. I thought they worked in Grandpa’s office. So, then.... Where did they get married?”

“They did not get married. But you are the child of Puchhe and Pauline. Except Pauline is dead. And Puchhe is here now.”

“Why should I now recognise Puchhe as my father?”

“Because he happens to be so. Anyhow, meet Puchhekanna now that he is here. I have myself met him for the first time since he left our house several years ago.”

Edward looked unconvinced. She tried to smile and change his mood, “What is there that we have to be hoity-toity about? One of my grandfathers was a butcher, one ran a country liquor shop and an uncle was a grave digger. But I must add that all of them were smart. In those days of the 19th century, they asked not for your matriculation or graduation certificate – neither of them was there – but a certificate of proficiency in English which was tested in actual practice. Come, let me tell you a story. The British Revenue Officer who, during an inspection wanted to know the area of a rice field for calculating the revenue to be paid to the government turned to his British subordinate and asked what the area measured. The British deputy answered truthfully that he did not know, whereupon my grandfather is supposed to have intervened to say, ‘give me 15 minutes and I will have it measured and tell you’. The very next day he was promoted and continued his progress until, at retirement, he had risen to the highest position he was entitled to attain. So, how does it matter where your parents start their life?”