Paru: The Kalyani of My Stories

(An attempt to express through words what cannot be captured by them)

In all my fiction so far, only the story Uttumi depicts a true story from my life. I didn’t change so much as a name, except for one; I could not bring myself to. Uttumi was still alive when I wrote the story. Since she was a prostitute in my village, I thought I would change her name, but then the story turned out to be impossible to write at all. I thought about finishing it and changing the name before it was published, but the very thought was intolerable; I abandoned it. The story first saw the light of day in 1956 in  “Janasevaka” weekly and was part of my first collection,  “Sangharshana”, in 1957. Uttumi remained Uttumi.

But I had to harden my heart and change the name of Uttumi’s daughter. Her real name is Paru.

In the published story, she appeared as Kalyani. I probably was not brave enough to send it out without changing her name after describing her in it the way I did:

‘Uttumi’s daughter Kalyani was my age. She was my classmate in elementary…