Posokkel to Matru
Chaya
I remember my childhood living under a grass thatched roof
and during rainy season we are going to one of the relative’s house to save
ourselves from the water droppings during the night time. It was Beeyu Dodda
who was taking our care to sleep in tiled house instead of grass thatched roof
in the rainy days.
One such rainy day me and my elder brother were sitting in
the house and my mother and another elder brother went to rice mill. Rice mills
were removing the husk from the paddy and making the rice. If we boil the paddy
and it has to be dried for 3 days before we can take it to mill to remove the
husk then the boiled rice or brown rice is made. If one has to make white rice
it is without boiling the paddy but dried completely for a day or two it will
be taken to mill to remove the husk.
Coming back to that day when we were at home it was raining
cats and dogs, we are frightened as well thinking that the wall may collapse
due to heavy rain. It being daytime we did not go to granny’s house. I think
same day a wall of the house collapsed at the side of the kitchen. On the same
day we had decided to have a house which has proper roof and will give us
shelter during rain and shade during summer.
We studied our primary education at Kapu then moved to
Shirva for further education. The dream of living under safe roof was fulfilled
when we moved to Shirva. Name of our house in Shirva is Posokkel meaning new
tenant. May be when our forefathers took the land cultivation right for payment
of remuneration to land owners they assigned this name. Origin of the name I
could not trace not beyond my maternal grandfather.
I think our dream of having house remained as a burning
charcoal covered with ash for long time. Once again the dream came to the
forefront when marriage of elder brothers was slated. However our financial
resources did not permit us to go ahead, and everyone got married and blessed
with children and settled at different places other than staying at the
Posokkel.
Once Lava and family settled back in Shirva in the year
2010, we touched the idea of having a new house built. Each year we had to spend quite a good amount
on repairing and upkeep of the house. It went on for another ten years to
ignite back the dream to build house.
In between our aunt and cousins built a house near to
Posokkel and it has further fueled our dream to move to a new house. As the
land rights were not with us we were following up with uncle to give the
permission to proceed on building a house. But we were not able to get his nod
to go ahead on building a house.
Thinking that we may get uncle’s permission for building a
house I made initial deposit during 2015 with mother for a reasonable amount.
After one more year I gave another reasonable amount to Lava to proceed on the
plan. However nothing moved till year 2018. Our uncle left us heavenly abode
leaving every plan unfinished and untouched. May be it was the wish of God to
renovate the existing house instead of building a new house.
Even then we were spending on the upkeep of the house quite
a sizable amount on each year. I remember I had given more than half a lakh
rupees during 2019 to proceed on the repairs to the tiled roof. I am not sure
how much is spent for the purpose.
During the year 2021 – we took a contractor to start the
construction of the house at the same place. Instead of doing the basic work of
levelling the land, and proceeding on the house construction, contractor
touched on the things like removing of mango tree, rock behind house and so on.
It helped to some extent but looked more like wastage of time and resources
than doing the main job. We asked him to stop the work and settled his account,
though he had shown his unhappiness of not making reasonable profit J J
In between I have to mention a venture where I had burnt my fingers.
It is a blocks factory at Pangala, where one of my classmate told me it is very
profitable business and it may take approx. 3 to 4 lakh investment and can
recover it in a years’ time. Calculations looked fantastic, but I did not
checked the genuineness of the person who brought the idea. He never had
entrepreneurship but was good in talking and fooling the people around. Top of
that his morals were way down was alcoholic to the core. I came to know after
month of making the investment as he kept on demanding money for making payment
to the labors. I discontinued the business but lost the investment.
Initially I thought Lava can carry on the business but he
was also another face of my classmate. So not to worry on the lost investment.
Lava collected a little amount that’s all I can get back from the investment,
and the collected amount was spent on the repair of the house.
At the end of year 2021 we contacted another contractor Rajesh
to take up the job. He was well connected with most of the political people in
and around Shirva. As we don’t had documents to pursue the house construction
work new contractor was more capable of taking the job further.
He had shown initial reluctance to take the contract but
once Bablu (Kusha’s brother in law) spoke he had come and also we took the help
of Ratan panchayat member from our ward. Ratan also assured his support for not
to get disturbance from the panchayat and also he recommended Rajesh to proceed
on the work.
It is on 31st December we initially gave the work
in the presence of Vishwanath (Lava’s brother in law) to Rajesh. A token
removal of 5 tiles from the house and token money was handed over. He asked us
to move the house items to the shed which was built by Lava a few years back.
Lava was assigned with the work of making ready the shed
livable for the duration of house construction. The task of making the shed
livable condition went on snail’s phase due to Lava’s lethargy and alcoholic
behavior.
After quite a time they moved to shed and removal of tiles
was done by Lava. And for laying the foundation stone date was fixed on 6th
of February. It is the day were we brothers should have been present and taken
the lead of initial job. Due to various reasons three of us could not make it
to native. And the person who was there also not on the sound position to do
the job because of the obvious reason. Foundation stone was laid by Abhiman.
Very next day our uncle, living next door passed away so the
work was stayed for about a week. Then
contractor did tremendous job to finish the construction upto foundation level
by first week of March and up to lintel level by end of March. There was almost
total stop of the work for about 45 days, reasons known to the contractor only.
As he was having multiple contracts where the work urgency is there he may be focusing
on them.
Finally once again work was restarted by first week of June
and the pouring the concrete at the slap was done on 24th June. We
are lucky no rains came till the time concrete work is completed. And roof was
set and it started raining from the same day. And roof was set.
There was non stop work from July till Oct. And almost
everything was went on as planned. And after getting auspicious date for house
warming, we went on printing the invitation and house warming was to be
conducted on 27th November and 28th November.
Then we discussed whether to continue the name Posokkel or a
new name. After all brain storming came the name “Matru Chaya” meaning mothers
shade.
Even the house warming ceremony was disturbed by the bad
news of demise of a person in the distant relation. We had initially planned
events like Vastu Homa, Bali, Sudarshana Homa, Gana Homa, Satyanarayana Pooja,
Shanishwara Pooja. Out of which first five were to be by local priest and final
one from a troupe from Majur.
When we had a doubt on the possibility of getting bad news
we approached local priest to see the alternative options to continue with the
ceremony. He suggested us to take the blessing of Aalade, which is of utmost
importance for maternal system prevalent in coastal Karnataka. And ensure that
no one will inform you about the bad news if at all it comes.
We had followed the instructions and advise from the priest
and went ahead with the house warming. Which was the only available option as
we had distributed invitation to near and dear ones, all the relatives and
friends. If at all to be postponed it will be hell lot of task to inform each
and every one about postponement and when the next possible date is not
predictable.
As such we went ahead with the program however last program
which was to be done by the troupe from Majur was cancelled as the co-ordinator
got the bad news and themselves wanted to cancel it. Let be their decision,
however it cost us quite an amount on arrangements, otherwise it would have been
saved.
Finally Matru Chaya was warmed up we set our feet in the
house on 28th of November. Pray the almighty to shower prosperity to
house dwellers and all the people related with the house.
