Bamboos and the man

1981. Some elections taking place in Bengal. My uncle in a fit of bravado has decided to stand in the election against the ruling red party. He goes out to canvas for himself and he does not come back. Those days, even phones weren't there in those villages in Medinipur district. So, there's no way of knowing where he is. The family asks the cousin brothers to help. Of course, they are card carrying members of the red party and in Bengal, back then, party was certainly bigger than family. So, they say yes to the family but actually don't do anything to search. Then, some eight days later, post the election, uncle comes back. All tattered and smelly. Skin and bones nearly. No food for days together also makes oneself a bit light in the head. So, he is a wee bit incoherent. Or so they say, when we find out later. Turns out, he had gone canvassing and was picked up by the party guys and taken to some spot in the bamboo jungles a few miles away from our village. He escaped from them and then stayed in the bamboos till the election was over. And yes, they were known guys and so it was impossible to come back and be alive and kicking if they came to know. When you stay in the bamboos, as any erstwhile Naxalite would also know, food has to be sought, plucked or caught, rationed and one correct assessment has to be done. Is this poisonous or if this can do the trick for the day's meal? Nothing else matters. No politics. No family. No fear matters. Only hunger and what can satiate the hunger. And also the fact that nothing can be cooked. As the fire can be spotted from miles. And you don't want to die, do you? He survived to tell the tale. Many didn't. Many still don't. The reds have turned into the blue and the saffron chaps. But the game is still the same. Now you know what the recent Panchayat election was all about! Don't you? Yeah, just a Panchayat election.