[Exit: Ranjan and Nrupa saying bye to Navya. The door buzzer alerts Navya to the arrival Rachana and Rekha.]

[Enter: Rachana and Rekha with their handbags.]

Rachana: Meet Mrs. Rekha.

Navya: Welcome madam.

Rachana I’ve just come to know that Rekha madam works at Hares & Hounds where your sister is going to join.

Navya: Oh what a relief it is.

Rekha: Maybe fortuitous for it sets the right tone. Thank you for agreeing to see me.

Navya: What a way to embarrass this nobody.

Rekha: But Rachana thinks otherwise.

Navya: Friends tend to either overrate you or underrate you, don’t they?

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Rekha: How I wish that Rachana underrates you.

[Navya asks Rekha and Rachana to sit in the sofa while she sits in the chair.]

Navya: What would you like to have madam, coffee or tea?

Rekha: Tea, preferably with elachiand sugar without kanjoosi.

Navya: I see you are quite humorous.

Rachana: That would do for me too.

Navya: What, elachi or kanjoosi?

[Navya goes into the kitchen leaving Rekha and Rachana in all smiles.]

Rekha: Your friend is quite interesting.

Rachana: If you can rope her in, it would be a big catch for you.

Rekha: Don’t ever imagine that I will let you go. I need both of you.

[Navya comes back with three cups of tea in a tray, and they begin to sip it from their cups.]

Rekha: We don’t get to have such tea here. What’s the secret if I may know?

Navya: I’ve learnt it from my sister Nritya. What a sweet girl she is and to be honest I’m against her taking up a job. I know how faint hearted she is. I told my father to get her married instead. But she was adamant and my dad gave in. Well, being born so late after me, she’s his laadli. God forbid, if she has to face harassment at the workplace that I hear about, she won’t be able to cope up with that.

Rekha: Don’t worry about Nritya for men at our office are a decent lot. Even otherwise, your worrying about her won’t stop men at work work on women at work and it’s no stopping them if women start sitting at home. It would be like setting the clock backwards. [One chime of the clock (not in the scene) indicating it was six-thirty] Isn’t it a good omen? We have to mend men in their own den.

Navya: I think the only way out for women is to mend their own ways. I believe that women bring it upon themselves by being half-hearted about male advances. I learn that all women are no angels for many do flirt with men either for fun or out to sponge on them. I know most men do try to interest women they fancy but it is the baser lot who resort to harassing them. Maybe it’s not a cut and dry case any way.




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