Opinion Burden of a (father’s) name

For someone who does not remember uttering the word even once, the world’s fixation with my non-existent “papa” was hard to escape. Though we are a happy family unit — my mother, my brother and I — we were often made to feel that our lives needed some fixing. “Your mother could have made things work,” said a relative. I wondered how she could have done so with someone who was abusive and who was involved with someone else.

It didn’t help that I was not exactly a bright student in school and wasn’t much of a looker either. So now, how do I tell anyone that I — the imperfect teenager with an imperfect report card — also had a ‘dirty secret’ in her closet?

My mother uses her maiden surname, a name by which most of her friends address her. When school authorities asked us to fill forms for our high-school certificates, I conveniently changed my mother’s surname to mine (and that of my father): there was no way I was going to explain why my mother’s surname was different.

As I moved from school to college, one question remained the same. “Aapke papa kya karte hain?” This time, I decided to come clean: “My parents got divorced long ago. It has only been our mum all along.”

Mercifully, no one made a big deal about it. “Humein laga tum kahin ki laadli ho (I thought you were a spoilt brat),” remarked a senior. “Haan, laadli toh hum hain. Apni mummy ki (Oh that I am! My mother has spoilt me sufficiently),” I quipped.

As I shared my story, my friends started sharing theirs. “At least you have a peaceful home to go back to. My parents are at each other’s throats all the time,” a friend confided in me.

But if I thought I had finally conquered my father-less life, a look at my official IDs would remind me that there was no escaping that reality.

At journalism school, an idea struck me: I would get my mother’s name inserted in my diploma certificate. I ran the idea past my institute’s director, who said he would give it a shot. “But you will have to be prepared should they say no, okay?” he said.

At the convocation, I could not stop looking at my diploma. It had my mother’s name in it, complete with her maiden surname, while the section with the father’s name was left blank.

Outside J-school, though, little changed. Voter ID, Aadhaar, rent agreements — everybody wanted to know my father’s name and I complied. The fact that I don’t have a husband has only ensured that every now and then I would have to stoically put down “father’s name” wherever asked.

But there are nuggets of joy news stories bring to me on a sporadic basis. The latest being the Delhi High Court directing passport authorities to delete the name of the father and reissue a new passport to a minor raised by his mother. I take these little wins as my own.

As for my passport, it still has my father’s name in it. I have not used the document yet. But when I do, hopefully for my first international trip with my travel-enthusiast mother, I will visit the passport office and do what needs to be done. It’s about time.