Laxmi - The Goddess of Wealth

PROLOGUE

I had decided to write a story but I didn’t know about what though and how.Not that I had a dearth of things to talk about nor was I suffering from a Writers block. Rather a strong lack of it and too many ideas flitting and flying through the mind. Hence I was unable to focus and therefore unable to start.

But then came my cup of tea, literally, in the hands of my maid Laxmi, the girl who turned up on my doorstep a year ago asking if I needed a childcare maid or cook. Well I needed one back then as I still do today but somewhere through the months, the girl has ensured we need her, instead of just any maid.

  

STORY

 Her name is Laxmi and she was born in a little village in Odisha, a beautiful state in Eastern India, about 20years ago. Her mother died in childbirth, her father remarried and her stepmother was like a fairytale one-who had wanted to poison her or abandon her up in the dense jungles of Sundergarh. So her grandma- her mom's mom took her in and brought her up. You'd think her life was rosier since but not really for a poor child living in the tribal belt of Orissa. 

Picking Mahua flowers and seeds from the jungles, processing them into country toddy, oil and papads, selling fish, constructing buildings and and roads, she had done it all and was quite proud of the way she had supported her family all through her childhood, with the one wish - that nobody called her a burden or cast her away like her own father had. 

Then when she was just 8yrs or so, she came back from a river visit feeling feverish and 2 days later her right leg swelled up and began to throb with intense pain. As is rampant in illiterate villages, a quack was immediately called who promised quick recovery. Though her leg suddenly erupted into a violent reaction, they took her to the local hospital only after 4 long days of waiting and worsening it. The Doc actually advised amputation of her leg due to the severity of the infection by that time, but her gran wailed in front of the CMO who finally prescribed some heavy-duty antibiotics and allowed her discharge. How was he to know that the caring Gran would then proudly renounce all faith in modern medicine, throw it all away and start treating the girl in her own way - country remedies of Neem and Turmeric. Well she did heal the wound but only superficially. The recurring pain was always treated with home remedies and the skin around it remained dead. Nobody had the time or the need to look at her wound more, least of all the girl who just stayed grateful that her leg was not cut off. 

Her Gran then sent her to the village school where she did fairly well, could have made a good life for herself perhaps. But her own Maternal uncle, unemployed, drunk and violent got wild with the money being spent on her (and this when she was not only earning but also getting a study grant from school) and started wreaking havoc in her school-threatening her and everyone around with sharp weapons. He wanted to simply 'end' it all, with her. So the teachers asked her to leave, for everyone else's safety and the little child of 12 never saw school again. 

Cut to June 2010, she was working as a maid in my house, taking care of my baby, the cooking and umpteen other things. She was to go back to her village and get married in December, and was full of dreams for the future. Only that the shadows of the past came back to haunt her.

That leg of hers had all this while been decaying inside and was now in an advanced stage of Osteo-Myelitis- thats medical lingo for Bone Infection. The Orthopedic surgeon said the infection probably entered through her bloodstream all those years back and afflicted her bone was never treated; only thin scar tissue got built which kept exposing her leg bone (Tibia) on simple, minor cuts as well. This could lead to bone cancer or bone TB if left unattended for long, he said and as no medicinal treatment is possible-the choice was a bone & skin grafting operation or just status quo in sheer helplessness. The surgery would need an Orthopedic surgeon and a plastic surgeon. Net cost was upwards of 2 Lakhs but look at God's grace that the one Orthopedician I chose to go to , does charity work, in NCR , and agreed to take up her case. Yet the cost remained around Rs. 70,000 or so.

Laxmi means "Goddess of Wealth" and ironically she had been such to her family and friends all her life. But now, her family suddenly had no money (after having given 3 pending feasts to the villagers and buying a fridge, a cooler and an almirah, apparently for her wedding!); her erstwhile caretaker "Didi" holding some Rs. 12,000 of hers(her prev. salaries) but was still "struggling to return her money", though she had just built a house in her village in Bihar! Her own reserves, after being dipped to by her family for 'house rent' in Rourkela and a TV were just about 10,000.

So where did that leave me?! The easiest option was to send her home, leave her to her family's care, just hoping things will be alright and not caring too much. After all she had been with me for just over an year and was anyways going back in another 4-5 months, so how did it matter! 

But sometimes the easiest roads are the toughest to walk on. I knew letting her go back without an operation could ruin her only chance of permanent healing and destroy her life perhaps. Hence after years of armchair activism, I gave myself a chance to make a genuine difference in someone's life, to really try and save a life. But that was not an easy road at all, certainly not one I could walk alone and reach a good end that could basically give the young girl a good start. 

And here comes the Miracle that makes everyone believe in GOD, a bit more. Hence I reached out, in the best place I knew - FACEBOOK and was rewarded with hordes of little angels reaching right back.It was surprising, heartening and blessing to get such immense help, from so many friends and quarters, people who were barely in touch over 10-20 years and who without a trace of hesitation eagerly came forward to help. The money accumulated kept going up, enabling the poor girl's operation and post operative treatment/ medication.  In fact the money left was high enough to support not 1, not 2 but at least 9 different NGO-driven charity plans. Well intentioned money, well spent and so many brownie points gathered by one and all. Laxmi is back on her feet, healthy, young and again full of dreams. Hope her dream-savers are in her prayers always.