One..

19.11.1982 0532 hrs,
Place: Christian medical college hospital Vellore, Kamala Nehru ward.
I was born after a cesarean. I was christened Kumar.

Some time during the early 1982,
Place: An obscure village in the Vellore Dist, Tamil Nadu
My Father's brother had a Baby boy. They called my brother Arul.

1985 July
I went to school; I don't know what Arul was doing then.

1985-1993
Every year during the summer I went to the village. And every time I went, I carried some old clothes for Arul. In turn I had the taste of the village life, running around with him to steal mangoes, to swim (although I never learnt), to fish, to..

1993 June 5
I was sent to a Residential Public School today. When I had been to the village this summer, Arul wasn't available for play; I spoke to him while he sat rolling beedis (cheap cigarettes).

1994-2000
By now I was rarely going to the village as I spent most part of the year at school, although Arul came to see me whenever I went home. We were both growing up and I always was a little taller than him but somehow he looked bigger than me.

1998 May
I had my 10th standard results, I was in the village and Arul had been sent of to work at a leather factory. I made 84%.

2000 May
I had my 12th standard and my services selection board interview results. Arul was back from the factory; he again took to rolling beedis. He had worked 12-hour shifts for a meager pay and had to almost runaway from the factory. I made 64% in my higher secondary exams and failed to clear the interview.

2000 August
I joined a college in Bangalore paying up. Arul now had learned to roll enough beedis to pay up some debts of his father.

2001 August, I don’t know the date
Arul married a beautiful young girl from the nearby village, chosen by his father, a drunkard. She was very young and looked no more than 16, my sister told me because I had stopped going to the village. I had learnt to smoke, drink and flirt.

2002 March 3
I proposed a Christian girl from another state. Around the same time Arul had a baby girl and the baby was beautiful my sister told me.

2003 February
I was placed in a private firm in one of the campus interviews. Arul had another baby girl around the same time.

2005 May 7
The last time I saw my girl friend. Arul had a third girl, his parents were supposedly unhappy with Arul's wife not giving a male heir to the family, Arul stood by his wife, but things weren't smooth in the family. Arul was sending his eldest girl to an English school.

2006 March 3
I was celebrating the day I had proposed before four years, drunk inside a bar. Arul's wife and all their three children were found drowned and dead inside a well even as Arul was playing cricket with his friends. Arul was beaten up by his wife's relatives and handed over to the police.

2006 May 7, My house 1100hrs
I was looking at the newspaper clipping that carried a photo of Arul’s wife and children lying young, innocent and dead when Arul had come to my house. He was on bail. Bearded and gaunt, for the first time he looked smaller and older than me. He kept telling me he was innocent and his baby was beautiful. I could say nothing to him, I cried with him.

2006 June 1, 1230 hrs.
I am writing a cold blog about Arul. Arul probably is in the court to mark his presence in a register, as he is supposed to every alternate day at 1230hrs.