The air was thick with dust, carrying the scent of ripening crops and dry earth. The sun blazed high in the sky, its heat pressing down like an unseen hand, seeping into the cracked soil. The fields stretched endlessly, their golden hues swaying in the slow afternoon breeze.
Mangala bowed low in the field, her fingers digging through the tangled roots, pulling out weeds, breaking up the hardened earth.The rough soil scratched against her palms, but she barely noticed. Sweat trickled down her back, soaking the thin fabric of her choli, but she did not stop to wipe it away. Hard work was as familiar to her as breathing. Pain, exhaustion—these were things she had learned to carry without any complaint.
Somewhere in the distance, a bird cried out, its call lost in the vastness of the fields. The village was far behind, hidden beyond the shimmering mirage. Here, under the unrelenting sky, Mangala worked with the patience of someone who had long made peace with toil.
She worked quietly, her hands moving with a rhythm so familiar that her mind could wander and still keep up. Her mother had once told her that the earth remembered—remembered who had worked for it, who had suffered for it. But it also remembered who owned it.
Her rough, calloused hands had touched this earth for many years, just as her mother’s and grandmother’s had. Yet, no matter how hard they worked, the land never really belonged to them.
Suddenly, a sharp voice broke the silence.
“Oho, Mangala! You missed a patch. Where is your mind? Pay attention!”
She looked up, squinting against the bright sun. The landlord was standing at a distance, with his arms folded, watching her with anger in his eyes. He never got his hands dirty; that was for people like her.
“Yes, Saheb,” she replied softly, dropping her eyes. She went to the spot he pointed out and worked faster, not wanting to show her tiredness. A still hand was a useless hand and a useless hand was dangerous.
The field stretched on, golden and endless, but Mangala felt the limits of her world closing in.
***
By noon, the heat had erased any sign of the morning’s calm. The sky shimmered and waves of heat rose from the ground. It was time to eat.
The landlord’s wife appeared at the edge of the field, carrying a brass plate covered with cloth. She walked slowly, stopping just close enough before halting, her stance – stiff and rehearsed.
Mangala and the other women stood silently.
The landlady set a small plate on the ground, then quickly stepped back, as if even being near them was hard work.
Mangala and all the other women working in the field knew the drill well. They could not take the plate until their landlady had moved far enough, until there was no chance of their hands touching.
Only when the landlady had turned and walked away did Mangala pick up the plate. It had cold – leftover rice, thin watery dal and a small serving of chutney. She ate quickly, not for the taste, but to fill the void in her stomach.
Just as she put the plate down, a small voice called out,
“Aaji!”
Mangala turned to see the landlord’s daughter running toward her, holding an earthen pot of water in both hands.
Mangala felt a cold shiver moving down her feet.
The little girl’s face shone with innocent excitement; her tiny fingers wrapped around the pot as she offered it to Mangala.
She did not yet know the rules.
But then, a sharp gasp came from behind her.
“No! No! Stop right there! You silly little girl, what are you doing? Set it down!”
The landlady’s words hit Mangala like a slap. The little girl froze, her smile vanished. Slowly, she bent and put the pot on the ground, stepping back just as she had seen her mother do.
Mangala swallowed the lump in her throat. She picked up the pot and gulped it down. The water was warm and tasted earthy.
When she looked at the girl again, she saw in her eyes a deep, quiet shame—not the shame of doing something wrong, but the shame of seeing that the world itself was wrong.
***
Mangala immediately got back to work. While she was toiling the earth, her thoughts drifted back to her childhood. She was eight years old again, chasing her mother along a dusty path, with the smell of firewood clinging to her.
She remembered the water well from her village. Its stone edge was smoothened from years of use, worn down by countless hands. Women gathered around it, talking and laughing, their bangles tinkling as they filled their pots with cool water.
Once, when she had run ahead, her throat parched, she reached for the rope of the well. But then, a voice cut through her joy.
“Stay back!”
She turned to see an older woman standing near, her face cold, her hand firm on her own pot. “You cannot touch the well,” the woman said. “Your touch will pollute the water.”
Mangala stepped back, her small hands falling to her side. She watched as the older woman lifted a pot of water, letting drops fall over the edge. The drops splashed on Mangala ’s feet, darkening the dust.
She wanted to ask how her touch could be so dirty when those same hands had worked the soil, and cleaned the very houses whose owners would never let her be near them.
She said nothing. But she never forgot.
***
By evening, the sky turned a deep orange, and long shadows stretched over the land. The day’s work was done.
The workers gathered outside the landlord’s farmhouse. He stood at a distance, his clean feet were firm on the ground while theirs were still covered in dust and dirt.
He reached into his pocket and brought out a handful of coins. Mangala stepped forward, but she did not extend her hand.
She knew better.
He dropped the coins onto a cloth at her feet. They fell with a soft clink.
She knelt and picked them up one by one. As she got to her feet, she saw the landlord’s wife watching from the doorway. Their eyes met for a moment before she turned and disappeared inside.
Mangala balled up the coins in her fist, feeling their weight—not just metal, but the weight of history. The same hands that had worked the fields, cleaned the village – were not allowed a touch of kindness.
The landlord’s daughter lingered near the doorway, her tiny fingers curling and uncurling, as if fighting an unseen power. For a moment, her hand jerked forward. But then, as if remembering the rule, she let it drop to her side.
Mangala walked past her, past the well she was not allowed to drink from, past the temple she could never enter, past the houses that she had swept and cleaned, past the lanes of the superiors, beyond the village that she toiled for, where she never truly belonged.
***
The village that was full of hands—hands that only welcomed her work and service but otherwise turned away from her, hands that took without giving back, hands that knew her only from a distance.
When she finally reached home, she barely had the time to sit down, before her granddaughter ran to her with open arms. Small, warm hands pressed against her tired skin, unafraid and free of the world’s harsh rules.
Mangala knelt and held the child close, feeling—for the first time that day—the touch not as a burden, but as love that is pure, unpolluted!