Vedveer
You’ve Got Mail!
painted portraits of kings and queens line oneendof the Maharaj’s Library, a section that may have served as a tea room in earlier times. By the rectangular window that overlooks the koi pond stands a delicately carved settee. In the centre, a deep-red Persian rug anchors the space, surrounded by an arrangement of plush seating.
I use the Maharaj’s Library more as a study, a place I retire to when there is work to be done. This morning, I’m buried in paperwork, trying to figure out what exactly it would take to convert our properties into organic land.
Raj Kiran, the valet, is at the far end of the room.
The analogue mechanics are pushing towards 10.30 a.m., and Mother and I are scheduled to meet for lunch at noon.
It is four days since the polo weekend, and Mother is yet to return to her husband.
Over lunch, we’ll inevitably rehash last weekend; Mother never bores of a story she’s already told six times. She lives for the details and has the memory of a surveillance drone.
She’s quite fond of Neela and finds Alia ‘TV-beautiful’. (Which, in Mother-speak, is high praise.)
Aaditha? Summed up in two words: book smart. According to Mother, ‘Social media hasn’t even begun to scratch the surface of Aaditha’s… let’s call it “low-visibility charm”.’
As for anyone pitching her as the face of her father’s business savvy? Mother calls that ‘a marketing tragedy’.
‘The only thing she isn’t is the face of the brand; she’s its whole and soul. The child is nowhere in the media. She gets so little credit,’ Mother says.
Raj Kiran spins around the moment the doors to the library swing open. ‘Ranisa,’ he says, stepping back and bowing.
Mother is in blue denims and a white shirt. She is carrying the morning newspaper, which she places before me.
‘Good morning, Mother.’ I’m on my feet. ‘It’s okay to knock, you know.’
‘What? I didn’t knock?’ She gives me her broadest grin, pointing at the announcement.
His Royal Highness Gaurav Rathore Singh is delighted to announce that Crown Prince Vedveer is to wed Aaditha Asha Prathap later this year at Ranibagh.
Palace Spokesperson
The Ranibagh Palace, Jaipur
A photograph of Aaditha and me, taken at the Gowda residence in Bengaluru, was dispatched along with the palace announcement last evening.
Aaditha’s middle name took me by surprise when I read the draft yesterday. At first, I thought it was a mistake, but that was not the case, obviously.
In an interview, Prathap Gowda revealed that his wife named their second daughter Asha. But their firstborn, Alia, thought the name sounded old-fashioned.
Alia had her own suggestion, Aaditha. A name she’d picked up at one of her school birthday parties and lobbied for relentlessly.
There is more of an explanation in the newspaper this morning, which details the wedding announcement.
Neela watched her husband slave, trying to make ends meet, and named her daughter Asha (hope in Hindi), with a wish that her birth would herald better days for their family.
I move away from the desk and walk to the back of the room, where my eyes find the koi pond. It is a soothing sight.
Aaditha and I couldn’t be more different. We are polar opposites, with clashing personalities, conflicting cultures and lives shaped by separate worlds. And yet, somehow, those worlds have collided. I am next in line to the throne living in a modern democracy; she is the daughter of a senior politician, raised in the heart of power, fluent in its language.
It’s a rare kind of fire that burns when the world is handed to you, and still, you choose to create something that’s entirely yours. She’s probably had huge help from Prathap Gowda, but people are not buying her coffee because her father has money.
Aaditha.I say her name in my head.
Aaditha has had chances to end this, too, but hasn’t.
