Sona Pujari

Sona - her name means literally GOLD - is today a bank officer in the Mahila Milan Savings Bank, but a bank officer with a difference, who can get money out of the proverbial stone. An official from the Ford Foundation, who once accompanied Sona on her rounds, described her as one of "Nature's great entrepreneurs."
But how she got there is just as interesting as what she does today.
~
It's Wednesday morning 11 AM in the old stone coach house that is Mahila Milan's office, bank, meeting place, sanctuary, anything you can think of.
A day, in short, like many others.
And History of a sorts is being made, between Shekhar and Sona Pujari. Shekhar - cross-legged on a bamboo mat, surrounded by bank ledgers.
Opposite him - Sona.
But Shekhar's happily daydreaming about his sweetheart.
This morning, Sona is learning to write.
Shekhar shows Sona where to sign. How to write the total in each individual passbook.
“Two hundred and Five plus Five.”
“Makes 210? “
”Yes! “
”OK, so I write Two here?”
“Yes, then One. “
”Where? “
”Here! Write a One and then a Zero.”
“That's what I have written. And I've used English letters! Use your eyes, boy!”
Sona doesn't have much patience with the daydreaming Shekhar this morning.
I look at Sona today, and think back to when we first met, and she hold me how she'd first come to Bombay, over twenty years ago.
“I am Sona Yadav, I'm from Karnataka and I live in Kamathipura 14th Gulli. First, I used to do the business they do in Khamathipura. And then I came out onto the street.
Sona says her brothers hated her. They treated her like Cinderella - rags to wear, all the chores to perform.
When Sona was twelve they married her off. But her husband's family also beat her. She was returned to her parent's house. A divorce was pronounced.
And then, when Sona was still only fourteen her brothers informed Sona she was going to enter a temple, as a Devdaasi or servant of God.
“Of course, I was frightened. But I then had to think about I was living in such a bad condition. I had to think about me. I had to think about my stomach. I didn't really think about what was going to happen to me in the future. I just left.”
I don't think Sona really understood that Devdaasi is today an euphemism for prostitute, that the temple is often a brothel, and that the Gods she was to serve are truck drivers and migrant workers in need of pleasure and release.
I'm sure her brothers also forgot to add that the owner of the temple - 4 wooden cubicles to be shared with ten other Devdaasis - had bought Sona and her virginity for five thousand Rupees.
Sona was remarried, but this time for keeps and for free. She was married to God, and God didn't demand dowry, just her body. The brothers were finally rid of Sona, and she came up by the slow train from Karnataka, like a head of cattle headed for market.
But Sona didn't accept her fate willingly.
“When I first came over here, they used to try and force us to go...I mean, it was like a form of oppression: "Go there! Do this! Do this business!" Then, after about a year, I said: "Look. I just can't do this anymore. I'll do anything. I'll clean your toilets. I'll clean the place. But I just don't want to get into this business."
“So you were only a prostitute for about a year?”
“Yes, they had paid money to bring me here. So that's how they forced me to do this for a year.
The brothel owner, of course, quite literally owns the girl. If she runs away thugs will be sent to fetch her back. She earns little, has to pay for everything, is in a state of almost total financial slavery.
But girls do get out, by a mixture of cunning and sheer grit, and by saving somehow to buy their freedom back from the brothel owner. And this is how Sona escaped.
“They beat me a lot and they tried to get me to do it. But I resisted it so much. And then I worked out a deal with them that, instead of doing this, I would do the other household works for the other girls, do their bazaar and get their food, water, whatever they needed. And that's how I gradually managed to get out of and pay my debts.
Of course, it wasn't quite that easy. Sona got cheated over some jewelry, had to go back to prostitution on Twelfth Gulli. She got pregnant by one of her customers.
“Who is going to keep anybody in Khamatipura if you are not in prostitution? That is the one big problem. I just had one thing in my mind, that I must catch hold of some man and get out of here. I got this guy, he also hoodwinked me. He told me that he was going to get me out, that he doesn't have a wife or anything. He got me out of 12th Gulli, and then I moved to 14th Gulli. But that was also no good. He also ditched me and left me.”
One child, another on the way. Sona was drowning in quicksand. And then a friend said: hey, come and help me make chappals. And, in a bound, Sona was free!
“I didn't even have a cot over there. I was just staying on the road. And I used to do different things. I used to get bananas and sell them I used to get peanuts and sell them so whatever little petty business I did it all!”
I then made a tactical error. You could call it a mistake. Sona was cradling an eighteen inch God, made of tin, bamboo and clothed in gold and green silk. I asked her who the God was, to tell me its story.
Half an hour later, I was a lot wiser.
Sona's God is called Yellama. This is her story as retold by her devotee - Sona Pujari
Now, Yellama died from a snakebite. Her father took her lifeless body and made a present of it to the local Rishi, or God.
The Rishi, in turn, sent another Rishi to answer the father's plea. This second Rishi turned himself into a snake and sucked out the poison. So the young Yellama is restored to life.
She returns to spend the rest of her her childhood with her hermit father. She grows into a young woman. Her hormones start pumping. She sets her sights on yet another Rishi. She pesters him until he eventually agrees to marry her.
This Rishi - Number Three - gives Yellama his pet snake - It's amazing how often snakes crop up in Indian mythology - but then so they do in Adam and Eve.
Anyway, Rishi #3 gives Yellama his pet snake for safe-keeping. He puts it in an earthenware pot and warns Yellama of terrible consequences if the snake is harmed or escapes.
Rishi #3 and Yellama head down to the river, cavort, change shape and substance - these things tend to happen in Indian stories - they become Shiva and Parvati, make love, return to their original state as Rishi #3 and Yellama, and find, lo and behold, the pot's broken, the snake's escaped.
The Rishi does what all Rishis do: curses Yellama, banishes her to the jungle. Times are bad, the river Ganga has dried up. Yellama wanders the countryside alone and afraid. She contracts leprosy. Some farmers offer to give her shelter.
But Yellama says this is impossible. I'm filthy, I am diseased.
So what? Come in and eat with us. We don't mind!
After the meal, they all pray together to Shiva for something, anything, a change in the weather, in their luck.
And Shiva answers their prayers in a big way. The Ganga suddenly starts flowing again. Their crops are saved. Yellama is restored to health and beauty. So the farmer and his family takes a solemn oath to go round India begging in her name out of thanks.
And so twice a week, Sona bathes, puts on her finest gold sari - the word Sona is Hindi for Gold - and walks round Central Bombay with Yellama, asking for offerings.
Now you know the story of Sona, and the story of Yellama - perhaps going from prostitute to bank officer is not quite so amazing.
I think Yellama's probably the key to understanding why Sona has developed such a ferocious reputation as a street banker. It's her way of giving thanks for her deliverance.