I MET PAPA IN MY DREAMS

When news of Adi’s father’s demise came he cried, not because he was sad, but because of the commotion it created at home. He was only three years old and did not understand why his relatives were pouring into the house and the sight of his mother crying incessantly scared him.

It’s been two years since and now he knows the matter at hand: his father was martyred and will never return home.
Adi lives with his mother and younger brother in the village of Mehwa in Uttar Pradesh and studies in Lower Kinder Garden in a nearby school.

Memories are fallible when one is this young, but when asked about what he remembers about his father in a heartbeat he said, “Ladoos!” and shied away. His mother explained that his father always brought Adi’sfavourite Indian sweets – ladoos – whenever he came home for holidays.

She also told us that one morning, a few weeks after his father’s death, Adi woke up with a jolt. When his mother asked him the reason he said that his father visited him in his dream and gave him a ladoo. He then leapt out of his bed and ran to the living room where his father’s garlanded photo is kept and wept in front of it. He missed his father’s love.

Such situations are tough to handle”, she said caressing her son’s hair. It’s hard to not feel the anguish of the mother who is only 30 years of age. At just over a quarter of her life she lost her husband and subsequently faced ridicule from her in-laws, moved into her father’s house and is now focused on her two sons.

“After my husband died, I devoted myself to my children’s future. We moved into my father’s house because the school Adi and his brother study at are closeby“, she said with pride. Her family is making do with her husband’s pension amount; her in-laws do not contribute monetarily.

Her strength is commendable. We are sure that with a determination like hers, Adi will achieve his goal of becoming a doctor!