Divya: But how did the end come?
Deva: Dr. Aslam would be able to tell us. Has anyone informed him?
Ramya: Why, I called him. Don’t we need a death certificate now? I told Nayak to come as well to find out if Rajiv had left any will.
[Enter: Dr. Aslam and Nayak one after the other.]
[Dr. Aslam examines Rajiv’s body and closes its eyes.]
Divya: What went wrong with him Doctor saab?
Dr. Aslam: Looks like it’s a stroke.
Deva: Without a warning that is!
Dr. Aslam: Why I had been warning him not to pump himself with his faulty success pump all the time. But sadly he wouldn’t listen. Why, the mantra of our time is to fast-fruit life before age ripens it. In a way, he lost his way in life much before death has snatched it away from him.
Divya: Maybe it’s true with every life, doctor.
Nayak: More or less, yes, but it’s truer with people like Rajiv who place success above all else. Why they even shut out all that is associated with their early life believing they had outgrown their humble beginnings. Losing their life’s moorings thus, they allow themselves to marooned by bogus characters. But there are honourable exceptions. Why, didn’t bandit Valmiki become sage Valmiki?
Dr. Aslam: How come?
Nayak: It’s a cultural question that’s understandable. When the bandit accosted some saintly soul who it was I don’t know, well it’s a cultural dilution of the day, the good man asked the bad guy to ascertain from his family members whether they were prepared to share his sins. To the bandit’s shock and dismay, everyone of his family, including his wife, refused to share the sins of his banditry, the source of their livelihood! And that turned the bandit into a sage poet who bestowed Ramayana to the world of letters.
Dr. Aslam: Nothing surprising about it really as intellectual growth makes man ever humbler. The problem with man is he mistakes his bulging bank balances as a sign of his outgrowing his humble friends.
Ramya: Sadly Rajiv was a victim of that myopic of success.
[Exit: Nayak, Dr. Aslam and Rangaiah.]
Divya: Had he lived, maybe he would have repented.
Ramya: Do you honestly believe that he could have?
Divya: I’m not sure but what if he had died out of remorse.
Ramya: It’s unlikely the way he had behaved only yesterday.
Divya: Well, of what use it is talking about the dead.
Ramya [to Divya]: That’s true. Won’t you make some coffee for us?