The story
opens with a bright morning. The long fasting of thirty days is over and the
day is of festival Eid. People all around are chirpy and getting ready to go to
Idgah, which is at a distance of three miles from the village. Rich children
will get good amount of money (in the form of Idi) to spend while poor ones will have to control their buying
temptations. Despite these economical differences, children are happy and
positive beyond a limit.
Hamid is a
five-year-old orphan boy. He is poor and lives with the only guardian of his
life – his grandmother Amina. Hamid is oblivion of the fact that his parents
are dead; instead Amina has assured him that his father is gone to faraway land
to bring lots of gifts for him while his mother will bring a lot of merits from
the home of Allah. Hamid believes in their homecoming, hence he is always
optimistic and full of life.
Amina does
some petty needle work to keep their lives get going, but in a sense too poor
to afford a sumptuous meal on a special day like Eid. Initially Amina hesitates
to send Hamid out to Idgah without a chaperone as she fears he may get lost in
the crowd but when he insists she lets him go. Soon he catches up with his
friends: Mahmud, Mohsin, Noor and Sammi. All his friends hail from well to do
families; they have over ten paisa as
compared to his three paisa Idi.
Hamid being poor is obviously ill dressed, bare foot, and poor-looking boy.
All of his
friends buy sweets, clay toys and take rides. Though he wishes to feel, touch
and buy those toys, but lack of money stops him and he is aware of it. The best
thing is his self-control and spontaneous wisdom. He knows that all the joy
rides are temporary; toys will perish sooner or later. While walking in the
fair, which is crowded with people and has sundry of shops and vendors, he
stops by a hardware shop. It is not selling toys but hardware items like
pincers, spade, hoe, scythe, tongs, etc. These items are used by adults like
farmers or labourers. At the sight of a pair of tongs, his mind races back to
kitchen where his grandma cooks rotis
without any pair of tongs (chimta).
In the process she burns her hand so often. Thinking a pair of tongs will be a
fitting gift for her, he buys one with his little money.
All his
friends jest about his chimta but
Hamid is clever at argument. He proves to them that his chimta is imperishable and invincible; it is made of metal hence it
can work in and resist rain as well as fire. In the late afternoon he returns
home famished. When he presents it to Amina, at first she shows anger, but then
Hamid reminds her about her cooking plight. She instantly takes him in her lap
and blesses him for his kindness so profoundly that tears become unstoppable.
The boy sacrifices his childish temptations in order to mitigate his grandma’s
agonized cooking process.
In this story
Premchand shows that children epitomise love, care and kindness towards their elders
and notice all trivial things happening around them.
Premchand is well known for his stories.I remember two of his stories Do Bael and Godan ,as they are my personal favorites.Children indeed are a symbol of god I believe.The above written review is concise and to the point .It tells the story in a way good enough to understand....EnjoyedReading.
ReplyDeleteThanks Shobhit...
ReplyDeleteThanks
ReplyDeletevery good thanks
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