Lakshmi the cow

Many years ago, in the city of Madras, there lived a young boy called Ram. One Sunday morning, Ram was woken up by the doorbell. He and his younger sister Rani ran towards the door. They always had the habit of sprinting fast and jumping over whatever was on their way in order to be the first one to get the door. This time it was Rani who was a second quicker and she opened the door. The two children were elated and they jumped with joy when they saw their frail but lovely and loving octogenarian maternal Grandmother. Grandma had come over from her village to stay with Ram’s family for a few weeks. Ram carried Grandma’s suitcase and the two children led her into the house. As they walked in, Ram noticed that Grandma looked quite sad and worried. When he asked her what the matter was, she said it was nothing and changed the topic by offering the children the delicious fruits and other eatables that she had brought along from her farm in the village.

The parents of Ram and Rani woke up just then and were very happy to see Grandma. An hour later, all of them had a sumptuous breakfast together. They spent the whole day with Grandma. Ram and Rani showed Grandma all that they had learned and done in school since they saw her the previous time. That night before the children went to bed, Rani and Ram requested her to tell them a new interesting story. Grandma was very good at story telling. The stories she narrated, whenever she visited them, carried some wonderful moral or the other. However, Grandma was not her cheerful self at all. Ram asked her again to tell her what the matter with her was and why she was sad. Grandma broke down and started sobbing. She said that one of her cows called Lakshmi, back in her village, was very old and that she was worried about Lakshmi’s fast approaching end. Ram and Rani were pretty surprised to see someone sobbing so profusely for an ailing animal. They calmed her down and soon went to bed.

The next morning, the kids woke up early and requested their father to inform the school that they would be absent in school that day. This was because they wanted to be with Grandma. That was a time when telephones were not very common and not everyone had a telephone at home. Mobile phones didn’t even exist. Just as they were almost done with their breakfast, the bell rang and Rani ran to get the door. It was the postman. He had a telegramfor them. Ram too went to the door, and he called out for Grandma, saying that there was a Telegram for her. Grandma intuitively knew what it could be and she screamed, “Lakshmi! No! You have left us all!” Ram opened the Telegram and saw the message. It read in ‘telegraphic English’, ‘START IMMEDIATELY LAKSHMI SERIOUS CONDITION’. Ram also felt the deep sadness and straight away ran to Grandma and embraced her in order to comfort her. He asked her if he and Rani could accompany her to the village. Grandma agreed on condition that the kids sought permission from their parents. After taking permission from their parents, the three of them left for the village.

It was a four-hour drive by bus. As they got down from the bus, they were received by two elderly people from the village, who looked equally grim and sad. Grandma asked them about Lakshmi, and they walked to the farm house. As they entered the barn area, they heard deep mooing sounds. The sounds were from Lakshmi, who lay on the ground. Grandma dropped her bag to the ground and hurried towards Lakshmi. Somehow Lakshmi sensed the presence of Grandma and she slowly and painfully opened her tear filled eyes. Lakshmi was actually weeping.

Grandma went up to her, sat down on the floor and placed Lakshmi’s head on her lap. Grandma and Lakshmi looked into each other’s eyes that were filled with tears. They seemed to communicate with each other through their eyes. Grandma gently stroked Lakshmi’s neck and told her that she loved her very much. She thanked Lakshmi for all that she did for the family during the 24 years of her life. Lakshmi was delivered when our Granny was much younger. The mother of Ram and Rani too must have been quite a young girl back then. Ram watched Grandma and Lakshmi, and he saw that Lakshmi had almost human like emotions and feelings.

She looked like a cow because she was a cow, but otherwise, Ram felt something very human about Lakshmi. His heart began to beat faster as Lakshmi started gasping for breath. Grandma wept as she took Lakshmi’s head closer to her bosom. Lakshmi made strange gasping sounds for a few minutes. She raised her head a little, looked into Grandma’s eyes and slowly sank on her lap, exhaling her last breath. Grandma screamed, ‘Lakshmi! Oh my
lovely child Lakshmi’! All along, Rani, who was visibly shaken by her emotions running high, stood still holding Ram’s hand and watched everything. When they realised that Lakshmi had died, they sat beside Grandma and Lakshmi, and Ram gently ran his hand on Lakshmi’s nape. Both Ram and Rani looked at each other through eyes filled with tears.

In a few hours after Lakshmi had passed away, the men who worked in the farm prepared for Lakshmi’s funeral. It looked almost like the funeral of a human being! After they bade a highly emotional farewell to Lakshmi, they returned to the farmhouse. That day was a major turning point in they life of Ram and he was deeply affected by the entire episode of Lakshmi’s passing away. That was the day when he saw Lakshmi, the love Grandma and Lakshmi had for each other and the ‘humanness’ in Lakshmi. Since Ram was only a child, he didn’t even know how to react to such a situation. A day later, they hugged Grandma goodbye and returned to their home in their city. Ram and Rani got back to their usual routine.

One afternoon during lunch time at school, one of Ram’s classmates opened his lunchbox to eat the food that was in it. There were chunks of meat in some red sauce. He asked him what it was, and he said that it was beef. What he said hit Ram hard, and he visualised Lakshmi being butchered and others eating her flesh. Ram was extremely disturbed, and he did not feel like having my food at all. He shut his lunch box and went back to his classroom, drowned in deep sadness.

That afternoon, when he and Rani returned home, their mother asked Ram why he hadn’t eaten his food. Ram told her what happened at school. The mother who was already in sorrow due to the passing away of Lakshmi was further saddened to hear what Ram said. She seated Ram and Rani beside her, and she expressed her sadness caused by many people who kill animals in order to eat their meat. The children listened to her with teary eyes as she told them about the cruel ways people use to slaughter animals. Those few moments Ram spent with the dying Lakshmi had a deep and everlasting impact in his mind. That sight of Lakshmi looking deep into Grandma’s eyes as she slipped away into her sleep of death will remain right before his eyes forever.

In the weekend that followed, Ram’s father took their family to a farm in the outskirts of their city. It was a shelter for cows and other homeless animals. Ram and Rani were truly happy to see the animals at such a close distance, to touch them and also to feed them. Ram suggested that they name a few cows that they met there. From then on, every Sunday, they would go to the farm for a picnic. They spent at least four happy and fulfilling hours with their gentle, loving, lovable, bovine and other four-legged friends.