Amanullah is ready to take a ride in the chariot of the angel of death. It is two months since water retention started in his limbs, one can count the ribs on his chest, his stomach and back sticks together, but his arms and legs are hugely inflated. Now, it's even difficult to walk around with a stick. Before he used to fish in the pond, sitting in the courtyard he would make mats with bamboo slices and give them to his sons to sell in the market. Now, Amanullah cannot move his legs, cannot work with his hands, during the day time in the courtyard, at night in the room sitting and lying, it's only his breathing which is somehow functioning.

At this age the old lady has started a shop for puffed rice and sweet balls. All night through she makes them and all day through, she sells them, hawking round the village. The amount she gets going from village to village, selling from house to house, does not enable the survival of both the stomach and the business ; how long is it possible to live this useless life?

These days, it is unbearable, Amanullah keeps calling the angel of death every day. The angel does not come. But without being called for, the President arrives now and then. Raising a storm on the screen of memory and consciousness he comes, flying in a helicopter, to redeem Amanullah's soul and to console him.

The arrival of the President in a helicopter the event occurred only once in the history of this village, but it happens daily in Amanullah’s  life, whenever he shuts his eyes he clearly sees.

The helicopter arrives, flying over the Teesta River raising a ‘fot’ ,’fot’ sound. Bending apart the quiet sky of the village and the independent air, the white helicopter came towards the crowd. The joy of thousands of farmers and labourers, hungry and naked, gathered on the school field, surged up. There seemed to be nothing on their minds except the sheer excitement of seeing the President and the helicopter.

All the pregnant young women and the girls observing purdah, who had never before come to the school field, hearing the earsplitting exciting sound of the helicopter, they, also, could not resist the temptation of seeing it for once and came out on the school field. While staring at the sky, their covered heads became bare. The fierce sound of the helicopter had such force, such excitement, everybody’s heart skipped and danced with joy.

Amanullah was lucky, after a long wait he was positioned at the fore of the crowd. The President descending from the helicopter would have to walk across in front of Amanullah to climb up to the stage. After this information was widely circulated, a lot of pushing and jostling could not have moved Amanullah an inch from his position.

At last, when the helicopter revolving its blades alighted on the ground, from the incision on its belly stepped out on the village earth, men, looking exactly human and the way the waiting Police, the elites, the gentlemen came to attention and saluted them. During all these happenings, Amanullah did not blink even once, nor did he remove his hand from his forehead, which was shading his eyes from the scorching sun in order to see better.

When the people in the crowd hearing the bold voice on the speaker of the microphone started jumping, crying aloud, long live! Long live! Even then the trance from Amanullah’s eyes had not evaporated; the surprise, that was playing on the open mouth of his face, had not been wiped out. In the increasing pressure of the crowd and jostling from behind, when Amanullah had lost his old and used towel from his shoulder, he did not know. He was busy trying to minutely study the structure of the helicopter and its external designs. Amanullah could not decide which one was the President among the gentlemen standing a little apart within the Police cordon, may be it was that one or may be the other one. Everybody was busy with their own excitement, as if everybody, except for old and foolish Amanullah, had already identified the President. As if every body was shouting,” Long live the President, long live the President” with the joy of knowing and seeing the President.

Some of them from beside Amanullah, pointed out the President to him very knowledgeably. The President, was then coming forward waving towards the well wishing crowd. At that moment, suddenly, not being able to withstand the pressure from behind, Amanullah fell over the police in front of him. And before being hit by the Police, that is before he could collect himself, occurred the miracle.

With a smile on his lips, dark glasses on his eyes, the mysterious President was walking, waving at the crowd. Coming to Amanullah, he stopped suddenly. Bending slightly, he held the old man’s hand and said something, probably wished him a ‘salaam’ or asked about his well-being.

Amanullah was then, about to suffocate. Embracing him, and lovingly patting the sun-burnt, wrinkled, black skin at his back, what the President said to him, he did not understand a word of it. Neither was he in a condition to understand. His heart was beating fast; the crowd was breathless, everybody stared in absolute wonder at this great scene. Afterwards, a gentleman with a black instrument on his eyes went ‘click’, ‘click’, the President straightened, releasing Amanullah. Keeping intact the mysterious smile on his face, he climbed on to the stage waving at the crowd.

The microphone roared requesting the crowd, "Please brothers, sit down everybody..." Everybody sat down at once. Then started a tremendous speech. Though Amanullah sat in the crowd and listened most attentively, he could not totally understand the language. Primarily because he could not understand the genteel language, besides looking at the President’s chest, he remembered the event of a few moments ago and his whole body shivered and he felt peculiar. A lot of people around Amanullah were still staring at him.

At the end of the speech, the President even did not give the time to bring him some betel leaf and nut. Getting down from the stage, waving his right hand, almost like showing his thumb, he went straight into the helicopter. Making a ‘fot’, ‘fot’ sound, revolving the fans above, the President’s helicopter took off in the space.

He flew off like a Babui-bird but the excitement of the people, the heat of the crowd did not evaporate like that; that is, it did not go away suddenly, can it just be wiped away, like that? Since morning the way everybody had gathered leaving all their work, the non-formulated hopes in the crowd’s heart, the blind excitement that was raging, that it should just amount to nothing like not getting anything material and tangible after a commercial exchange. So, when the President left, discussion and debates continued in the field on the topical points like his helicopter, his looks, his dress, his voice, his speech, his qualifications/disqualifications.

People were, still then, crowding around the stage. Staring at the empty stage a disappointed voice from the crowd, said, ‘He only came to ask for votes’ centering around this utterance, everybody became busy expressing their own experiences with reference to the President.’ ‘Why surely not, he is going to build a hospital for us, establish a school for us.’ ‘Wants to give us two lacs of taka.’ Anything pending amounts to nothing.’ ‘Come off it, what are we going to do with schools and hospitals.’ ‘He he he he, listen to him.’ ‘That is why he talked about increasing the production.’ ‘If production increases, the land owner is going to be benefitted, what does it matter to a poor day labourer like me?’ ‘Hey, Hey, He,He, Hey is that helicopter his own?’ ‘How much does it cost do you think ?’ ‘I think, its not less than five thousand’ ‘Listen to this small fry’s estimation, say its one thousand!’ ‘One hundred thousand.’ ‘Who is that old man, son, isnt he Namatari’s Amanullah?’ ‘What did the President tell him, what did he give him?’ 'Come on lets go and see, come, where did the old man go.’

The crowd surrounding Amanullah kept increasing as if the honourable President was residing in him, as if it was only Amanullah’s responsibility to satisfy every body’s multifarious curiosities. And almost at sixty, the treasure that Amanullah had received which was uncontestable in taste, smell and colour had made him speechless even though he was the central attraction of the crowd; Amanullah was no more the Amanullah of before. From all around so many different questions arose, ‘Hey uncle, what did he say to you?’ ‘What did he promise you?’

The audience found it greatly amusing when Amanullah in trying to answer these questions became highly emotional. He was saying. "Eh, his chest was softer than wool."

When someone protested against this, he corrected himself and said, ‘Soft were hands, his chest was harder than iron. The way he embraced me and pressed.’

Amanullah covered his inability to describe the emotional embracing by acting it out.

A wave of laughter spread in the crowd as though a demand of their heart was met. Then as if to console everybody, Amanullah further informed,’ I saw with my own eyes, guys, there were bundles of hundred taka notes in his pockets, aha, so much money that’s why he told us-no more anybody die of hunger, no more will anybody die of lack of medicine.’

A fantastic welcome awaited him at home also. Crossing the glittering gate of the old lady’s eyes, he entered the courtyard and ordered ‘First give me the stool, let me sit down,’. The daughter had come to visit the parents from her in-laws house, the mother scolded her and said, ‘Why are you standing there foolishly. Go and get the hand fan.’ When the daughter entered the house to bring the hand fan, the old lady whispered, ‘Hey, Amanullah’s father, did the President, give you some money?’ ‘Aw, come off it woman, not money, not money.’

Fanning the father, the daughter pouted her lips and protested, 'Hum, Father is always talking. The whole world knows my father has got money from the President. You will have to buy me a new saree, father!’

‘No my dear, not money, love! Respect!' ‘You all never understood the old man’s worth. The country’s President embraced me.’

Before he could finish, Amanullah’s voice choked with emotion. His eyes closed. With all his senses he felt the miraculous touch of the President’s love and kept nodding his head. His wife and daughter silently watched this scene. The banana leaves moved with the wind and spread the sound ‘aha,aha’.

‘Has father come?’ ‘Here I was looking for him everywhere.' Saying this the younger son Ashimuddin came and stood near him. He had heard the story, returning from his earth digging work in Ratanpur. With a son’s pride for his father, he did not go to his betel- leaf stall at the evening bazaar. After a long time again, Ashimuddin sat down close to his father with his naked son on his lap.

After this, one by one came his younger daughter-in-law, elder daughter in law, group of granddaughters and sons, neighbour Tepi’s mother, Ajiruddi and his wife and Kamar Ali. In Amanullah’s small courtyard started being a kingly occasion. The warmth of the President’s love and the President’s helicopter, spread in the hearts of Amanullah’s family and relatives.

Suddenly, Ashimuddin scoldingly told his wife, ‘Bring the betel- leaf , give it to everybody'. Though absolutely involved in the discussion, the wife remembered the morning’s event. This husband of hers kicked her on the arse for having given father a betel leaf from the shop for free. Now he was saying, ‘O! the President, if he had only come in the morning, she would have escaped being kicked' she ran  to get the betel leaf and nut from their house with this thin thread of disappointed desire and the horrid imagination of the helicopter.

Elder son Akimullah had gone to his in-law’s house, in the neighbouring village. Returning home, he first entered his father’s courtyard along with him was his father-in-law in front. With his sandals in his hand, the shirt on his shoulder, and a bent spinal chord, the old man today, as was usual, did not go straight into the house of his daughter and son-in-law but from the road called out to Amanullah and coming near him in his characteristic manner kept on congratulating Amanullah.

That night there was no need to light the oven in Amanullah’s house. The younger son had offered betel-leaf and nut, the elder son being advised by his wife along with his father-in-law to invite his own father, mother and sister for dinner in his house. During dinner the discussion centred round the President and after dinner the same discussion lengthened. At the end, when Akimullah’s father-in-law was leaving, he said, ‘Brother, since the President desires to come, he will come. Since he wants to meet he will. Please tell him about my pending case, will you?’

Is it because the President never returned that his son’s father-in-law did not even for once come to see sick Amanullah?

On a long sigh Amanullah’s chest became very empty. He kept thinking, if only for once again I could meet him, then...

Suddenly hearing a known voice crying aloud, Amanullah’s confusion of thought and feelings evaporated. He listened intently to the old lady’s crying tone, her language of grief. He felt himself quieten. On his lips a happy smile emerged. He knew even if everybody gave a sigh of relief after Amanullah’s death, only this woman would flood the village with her tears.

Running with a basket full of sweet balls of puffed rice under his arms, when the old lady put her foot in the courtyard, Amanullah called out in a thin voice, ‘I am not dead, don’t cry, please. Before I die, I will let you know.’ Amanullah’s aged wife stopped in her tracks like a stone statue. She stared as if after living with her man for three or four decades, she could not recognise him. In her surprise laden eyes, joyous tears had filled to the brim. The old lady opened her mouth, voraciously cursed her grandsons for informing her wrongly.

Then she put some puffed rice in a bowl from the capital of her business, got a glass of water and gave the old man to eat. Herself she went to the corner of the courtyard, put some dried leaves in the earthen oven and lighted a fire. After cooking a handfull of rice, she will have to go off again.

Amanullah, sitting with his legs spread out started muching the puffed rice violently. Moving his cheeks and mouth. At the same time, the two of them kept on a conversation about the state of their family affairs. At the reference to the incident of the old lady’s failure to procure some help from the member, suddenly the name of the President was uttered by the old lady.

‘Did you hear, the President is supposed to give a speech today on the member’s radio? May be he will talk about you? Will you go to listen?’

What does it matter?

Chawl's mother said, 'one day they talked about you on the member’s radio. The king talks frequently on the member’s radio. Why doesn’t he talk on Amanullah’s brother-in-law radio?’

After exposing their knowledge or ignorance on topics ranging from the President to the radio, medicine, science, business and commerce, economics, etc. They decided Amanullah would go to the member’s house in the evening and however he would, he will get ten takas out of him. With that money his wife will go to the medicine-man tomorrow.

Mixing two chatak rice in the gravy of ‘Kachu’ shoots the old lady herself fed the old man, though  he was still hungry, Amanullah absolutely refused to have the last two mouthfuls. So the old lady seeing no way out, put it in her mouth, had two full glasses of water and taking herself went out. All alone, Amanullah had nothing to do. He spent his time thinking impossible things that could happen when he went to his member’s house in the evening.

With seven huge tin shed rooms, the member’s house was quite big. At the front of the house was the office room, beside the room was a huge mango tree. Under that tree was a breach of sliced betel nut tree. There in the evening, many people from the village gathered to spend their leisure time. There is a variety of discussion, story- telling and gossiping, passing around the ‘hukkah’ and the member sitting with his feet up talking as if giving a speech, the news from his radio, ‘Bhawaia’ song. All together it is ususally a very successful gathering.

Since becoming sick, Amanullah had not been able to come here for a long time. Though he came today leaning on a stick, he did not sit on the bench. He went straight to the front of the member’s chair and like a beggar, raised the topic in the manner of a prayer. The member did not hear, Amanullah repeated. The member hearing, could not understand. He lowered the volume of the radio, then everybody present heard it. In reply, the member started in a speech-giving voice, ‘Look here man, can you go to the doctor with ten takas for this disease? I told your two sons to raise money and get you admitted into the hospital in town, but your sons in reply ask what would be the benefit of keeping the old man alive? And it is not absolutely untrue. The days are numbered now, keep praying to Allah, uncle.’

From the bench, many voiced agreement, Amanullah could find no language of protest. In his chest, something was trying to arise in an upheaval. His legs were shaking, he did not have the strength to keep standing. To rest Amanullah sat at the member’s feet on the grass and gasped for breath.

'Hey brother, that President of yours is going to give a speech, listen carefully.'

Some laughed aloud. At that moment, the President with the name of Allah started his speech on the radio. A young lad to tease Amanullah further said, 'listen to this granddad, that same voice, who embracing you had given you so much love and respect.'

This raised another wave of laughter on the bench, the member now raised his voice and called out angrily, 'keep quiet everybody, listen to the speech.'

Only one reproof from the member shut up everybody. Amanullah felt a flame of anger grow within. As a result, his whole body began to shake. Not able to sit quietly, he got up leaning on his stick. Not saying anything to anybody, raising a sound of the stick, he started walking towards his house.

It was a narrow, uneven path overgrown with grass, on both sides of the path was the member's paddy field. Amanullah could not see anything in the dark. The President's speech, the scolding of the member, people's sarcasm. All were pricks in his heart. He started walking faster through the filled darkness. After going a distance, one foot fell into a hole, Amanullah tripped and fell into the water filled paddy field. There was a splashing sound, a few paddy plants moved aside and made room for Amanullah.