Shree Padre
Amai (Karnataka)
HOW does a dog serve its master? That's easy. A dog warns its master against thieves and alerts him about strangers entering the house. But two-year-old Bollu helps his ailing master, Mahalinga Naik, by working as a farm labourer. The dog collects arecanuts and coconuts and piles them up neatly in a spot.
Mahalinga and his wife Lalitha live in Amai, Karnataka. Bollu has turned out to be a true friend in need. "He understands most of our instructions so nicely," says Mahalinga proudly.
Because of an accidental fall from a coconut tree, Mahalinga can't bend to pick up nuts. Bollu does the job for him. During the arecanut fruiting season, Mahalinga and Bollu go to their garden early morning. Mahalinga holds the dog's chain in one hand and a bucket in the other.
Both search for fallen arecanuts. Bollu spots the nut, picks it up with his mouth and drops it into a bucket. This way, in about an hour or so, dog and master finish the task together.
During the peak season, they manage to collect a couple of buckets of arecanut. It is Bollu who picks up all the naturally fallen arecanuts.
"If left free Bollu doesn't perform the work properly. He has to be taken on a chain," says Mahalinga, "At times, I have to admonish him. After all, he is still a child, no? He has his playful moods, once in a while."
By the time the two return home, Lalitha has breakfast ready for both. Bollu is not fussy about food. He eats whatever is served.
Mahalinga started searching in his village for a good dog around two years ago. Finally, he found a puppy in a nearby household. Since the puppy was white, he christened it Bollu. In his Tulu language boldu means white.
Bollu is not a pedigree dog. It is not locally known who his parents are. He is a nondescript local breed. But Bollu has something special about him which makes you think that he is exceptional.
One day while playing with Bollu, Mahalinga wondered whether Bollu could pick arecanuts.
"I have heard of dogs bringing newspapers and guiding the blind. So, why not this work? In fact this was just a passing thought at that time. I was not serious," he recalls.
Still, he took Bollu to his garden, showed him a few arecanuts and asked him in his mother tongue, Tulu, to pick them up. In a few days Bollu figured out what was expected of him. No professional training was required, nor were there long hours of practice!
But Bollu has tantrums too. If Vidyalakshmi, Mahalinga’s grand daughter takes him to the garden, he pretends to pick up a couple of nuts and then pulls her back home.
Bollu is nevertheless serious about his work when his master is around. All the attention he has been getting has also made a difference. From picking up arecanuts, Bollu has learnt to collect coconuts. This is much tougher because they are larger.
"This is an act difficult to believe unless you see it," says Mahalinga. He gives us a demo. He throws a few coconuts haphazardly in his yard. Though it's very hard to clutch the big coconut in between his small jaws, Bollu not only picked up each one, he neatly put it near a basket outside the house. As part of his regular duties, says Mahalinga, Bollu collects the coconuts and heaps them in a particular spot.
Mahalinga, a coconut climber, was assigned this land on a hilltop in the 70s. It was impossible to farm. There was no water in the well. But being an optimist and a hard worker, Naik dug four surangas, one after the other. The suranga is a traditional water body in Kasaragod district of Kerala. It is a horizontal cave, excavated for water. Everyday, till midnight, he slaved away. It took him more than three to four months to dig a suranga. All the surangas failed him.
Luckily he struck water in the fifth suranga. Thereafter, carrying a stone on his head from the foothill on his way back home, he constructed half a dozen revetments, dug out the soil and built terraces, all the while supporting the soilfilled basket on his knees.
It was in 1998, after he raised the areca garden, built a house, a road, got a power connection, private tap water and all the amenities he needed, that disaster struck. While climbing a coconut tree, he fell down. The damaged disc made him stay in hospital for months. Though he is now able to do all other chores, climbing a tree, squatting and bending down are very painful.
Much to Mahalinga’s disappointment his two sons are not interested in farming. One works as a labourer and the other is a helping hand at a doctor's clinic. "If only they had pursued this profession," says Mahalinga. "It won't be as hard as I have experienced. They could have led a contented life.”
But Bollu has happily
stepped into the picture. He is
helping his master cope with
his physical disability, maybe
out of a sixth sense.
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