Pushpa’s husbands’ ages ranged from 21 to 35. Her mother called them “four Pandvas” after the mighty “five Pandvas,” husbands to the all-powerful Draupathi, their family deity. Her mother told Pushpa that the marriage would ensure that, with four husbands, she would never be destitute and, God willing, never die a widow.
Although Pushpa had only recently reached puberty, she understood what the marriage meant. She had watched her fathers take turns in the bedroom with her mother. Having been raised on the Pandva lore, it is the only form of marriage the boys and girls in Pushpa’s tribe, the Pandus, had ever known. Her concerns were focused elsewhere. Her mother had pulled her out of school the day after she had reached puberty, her protestations notwithstanding. Her mother had said, “Life will teach you far more than what schools can.” So, Pushpa started plotting in her head the deeds and devices she would use to make her husbands yield to her wishes to continue school.
Husband No. 1 (the oldest), a sergeant in the army, and Husband No.2, the hunter, were dead set against the idea. Husband No. 3, the singer, was non-committal. Husband No. 4 (the youngest) was too immature to even have an opinion. Pushpa knew right away that Husband No. 3 was her best bet. The problem was, much to her dismay, No.3 was the one who showed the least amount of interest in bedroom activities.
She waited until No.1 went back to the army for another tour of duty. She waited some more for the hunting season to begin. With both No.1 and No.2 away, she went looking for No.3, found him sitting on the bough of a banyan tree playing a flute and bid him to come home. At home, she tried her best to seduce him to no avail. When she started to cry, he sat her down and told her the truth: He was a woman living in a man’s body. He told her: “This mustache, this wrestler’s physique, the swagger, it is all a pretence.” He had tears in his eyes when he confessed that he was living a fake life. She told him she understood although she did not.
The next day, No.3 told her: “I know you want to go back to school. I’ll make sure it happens.” And he did. He told his brothers that he would walk her to the school and walk her back and, with him beside her, there was not a single soul that would even think of harming her. But there was such a soul. She saw him one day when they were walking back from the school. Not all of him, just his burning eyes like those of a stalking animal. As soon as she nudged her husband, the stalker disappeared. All they heard was rustling leaves. Her husband reasoned that it was probably someone easing himself in the forest.
Within days of the stalker incident, a messenger arrived from the village of Kuru which belonged to the Kaurav tribe. The message, an invitation to a game of dice, was from Durya, the head of the tribe. The invitation was a surprise since the two tribes rarely interacted. According to folklore, centuries ago, the two tribes’ ancestors had warred with each other for decades at a time. Although there had been no known feuds in recent times, the tribes always maintained a distance based on their fabled past.
Pushpa had a bad feeling about the surprise invitation. Despite her protestations, No.2, the hunter, accepted the invitation, went to the game on the appointed day, kept losing, got drunk as losses piled up and, finally, ended up losing the family farm. When it came time to honoring the bet, No.1 had to be informed. He came home on emergency leave and, determined to win back the farm, invited Durya to a challenge match. At the match, he too kept losing and betting everything the family and the tribe owned: cattle, house, jewelry until there was nothing more to bet. Triumphant Durya offered to graciously forgive the debts on one condition: the brothers’ wife would now be his.
When she heard about the deal her husband had made, Pushpa exploded. “You don’t own me to give someone else ownership over me,” she thundered. The dispute went to the supreme village council, the arbiter of disputes among tribes and villages. The council ordered the presence of everyone involved on an appointed day. As she approached the assembly, Pushpa froze: The Stalker! She would recognize those lustful eyes anywhere. Those eyes belonged to Durya.
The council reached a decision: the brothers’ debts would be forgiven; Pushpa would now belong to Durya. The chairman commanded Pushpa to walk over to Durya’s side. She shouted: “Never!” The chairman declared: “For defying the authority of the council, the defiant woman will be disrobed in front of the assembly!” As Durya walked towards her, she grabbed a brick off the flower bed and started shouting obscenities. Durya stopped in his tracks as a firm and feeble voice could be heard from the back of the assembly: “Don’t you dare touch that girl!” It was a woman who was probably in her eighties. A few other women also stood up with her. The chairman ordered his henchmen to remove the ladies. At that point, No.3 had had enough. He went over and stood by Pushpa and declared: “My brothers may have abandoned her. Not I. She is still my wife.” The assembly descended into chaos as the woman in a man’s body led her/his wife away from the assembly.
The village mailman, who had watched the proceedings from a distance, recounted the event to his colleagues the next day. A local journalist heard the rumors, visited the village, and wrote a story. The story spread like wildfire. “One woman, four men” screamed the tabloids. It became the lead story on all TV channels. Feminist groups demanded the castration of all the men involved. Anthropologists lamented the incursion into ancient societies. Scholarly articles with titles like “Fraternal polyandry and domestic stability” couldn’t be peer-reviewed fast enough. International news crews descended on the village trudging through forests lugging their heavy equipment.
A cunning publicist somehow wormed her way into the village’s inner circle and was successful in convincing Pushpa to face the cameras. Pushpa gave feeble answers to most questions until someone shouted, “Can you talk about your unusual sex life?” Her face tightened and her eyes flashed with anger. Her head bowed, she went back into her house.
The frenzy was non-stop. Television stations were bidding each other up for the “first exclusive.” A more expensive publicist offered enough bribe to convince No.3 that he and his wife could soon be millionaires if only Pushpa agreed to be interviewed on TV. Pushpa agreed on one condition: No questions about her private life.
The whole nation waited breathlessly for the “first exclusive.” The two hosts – a man and a woman – were extremely courteous and cordial. They asked questions about her parents, her friends, her education, her desire to see the outside world. The first segment was going well and, just as Pushpa was beginning to feel comfortable, the male host announced: “We are going to take a quick commercial break and when we return, I’ll ask Pushpa what it was like to sleep with four different men. DON’T touch that dial!” Pushpa ripped the microphone off and headed towards the exit as the publicist started pleading, “If you break the contract, you won’t get a penny for the interview.”
The crowd outside was uncontrollably excited. She looked for a trustworthy face, spotted a young woman, and asked “Can you take me home please?” A mob of cameras on her trail, with a thousand questions shouted in her ears, she followed the young woman to her car. As she was getting in, she was asked, once again, “Why did you walk out of the interview?” She replied: “My community has problems, but your society is sick.”
With that, she went home to live with her four husbands.
