“What is your name?”
asked the digital interviewer.
“Brahma,” the interviewee responded.
Brahma had come down from heaven
to earth to check his creation
as of late he had heard many a lamentation
from a host of reporters.
“Is Brahma your last name?
What is your first name,
middle name?”
Brahma stood confused.
He had no idea what the interviewer
meant by the first, the middle,
and the last names.
It never occurred to him
someone won’t recognize the creator.
His pride was hurt,
but he didn’t show it.
Anyway, he picked up from his large stock
of names and ancestral history, and said,
“Take Svayambhu for my first name,
Vaghisa my middle name,
and Brahma my last name,”
hoping that there would be no further questions
to establish his identity.
“Good,” the digital interviewer said,
and went on to ask him,
his father’s name, his mother’s name,
date and place of birth,
his PAN number, Aadhar number,
his status Ordinarily
Resident, Non-resident, or Foreign
and wanted to see his passport
and driver’s license and the like CCIP.
Brahma wondered who could
this character be and could
he be one of his own creations.
As he was in a dilemma
how to navigate the situation
the interview suddenly closed
with the announcement “Session has expired.”
Saligrama K. Aithal has published six collections of short stories Many in One, One in Many, Inside India, Overlapping Worlds, Passage to More than India, and “Make in India” and Other Short Stories. His other publications include a literary biography Riyana: The Child Once Everyone Was, and a study of Toni Morrison’s fiction Toni Morrison Novelist.
