Sakhina. A true story.

Sakhina lived on the street in Chandni Chowk, Kolkata. She was tiny, with deep brown skin and huge eyes, ringed with kajal. She did not know how old she was, but my guess was six or seven. Her dress was all in one piece, but filthy - and her hair was matted. She scratched her skin and hair a lot because of the nits on her head. She said that they ran down her back. When I held her, they jumped on to me. And it was hard not to be close to her because she ran at me, a hard little torpedo of a child and I would pick her up and swing her in my arms. And when we slept on the floor of the school after the midday meal, she would shift sideways into my armpit, not so sweetly pinching any other child who tried to get near me.

Sakhina's home was at the edge of the pavement not far from a school, just the size of a crawl space and made of flat pieces of plastic, tin, cardboard and tarpaulin. They had a cooking stove and bedsheets of some sort, a few utensils and maybe a few extra pieces of clothing, but that was it.

Sakhina played in the street, with sticks and stones, throwing them at the stray 'pi' dogs, making cheeky faces or even obscene gestures at passers by until this elicited a resounding slap from her mother. Mother had a grin from ear to ear, but a steely glare reserved for her child - or possibly children, as I never discovered who else was in the family - and on the two occasions when I saw her father, he was blind drunk.

Sakhina told me her mother sold things and worked hard and that her father slept a lot. The child had managed to learn quite a lot of English in the little school and, probably, through her own fierce intelligence and the skilful acquisitiveness of someone whose daily goal is to survive. Sometimes, I saw her howling and crying, but these occasions were few and far between. She was beautiful and I have never forgotten her.