Write the summary of the story :- A Shadow

Sambu, the young son of his dead father begs four annas to see the film the next day. But his mother feels fear in her heart because she does not want to see her husband again on film screen because he was dead since six months ago. She fears that her husband may not be seen on screen. She had a vague idea that the producers would not release the picture in which her husband was acting.

Sambu’s mother could not tolerate the view shown by the young boys who holding the pictures of her husband were moving across and along the road. The mass protest rose. But at last she came to know that the picture was going to be shown and her husband was again going to speak, move, and sing and so on.

Actually, Sambu was highly delighted as if his father had come back to life. He repeatedly asked his mother to see the picture. But she explained that she could not tolerate to see her husband again move and speak like alive. Sambu explained her that a mere photo was also no more different that from film photo.

Sambu could not do his class properly. Getting a chance, he would speak up to his friends that his father had been paid ten thousand rupees for the film acting. Sambu persuaded his friend to go to cinema for observing the show acted and story written by his father. Previously his father had told him the gist of the story. The story was about a young girl named Kumari who was forced to marry at the age of fourteen and who refused and wanted to study in a university and earn an independent living. Then after, she was away by her stern father who was not other than Sambu’s father.

Sambu was seen sitting in the film hall eagerly waiting for the picture to begin. Since his father’s death he had not seen any film and the hall started to be darkened. After the show of trailers, the real picture started. His father came on the screen. He was wearing the dhoti and shirt he used to wear at home. Then Sambu saw a little girl on the screen to have been patted on her head by him. The girl was with a slate on her knee and he started dictating to her. He asked her a little arithmetic to which she accurately answered. Then his father was delighted. Sambu remembered how he once committed mistake in solving a puzzle.

After the film ended, Sambu gazed at the aperture in the projection room as if his father had vanished into it. The world seemed very lonely to him and he started running to his house where his mother had been waiting for him. He told his mother that it was a lovely film show and he also narrated how his father sang and acted. His mother listened to him in grim silence. He also asked her why she did not say anything. He also requested her to give him four annas every day for film. His mother warned him to be careful for his study.

Then she refused to go to film but Sambu went everyday and at the end of every show, he felt sorrow because his father was no more seen. Sambu was always longing for to have his father’s company, but his mother felt sorrow at his neglect in study. His mother was unable to understand his carvings for the film enacted by his father.

After a long persuasion, Sambu’s mother agreed to go to film. Both son and mother went to the cinema at the night show. She sat in the women’s row. She gathered all her courage to view the picture. After trailer, the real show began and by the time, she had been ready and her heart started beating faster. She could see her husband talking to her, singing and playing with children and everything seemed as usual. She felt the show as an affliction to her and she shut her eyes several times.

Then she came to saw her husband sitting in a chair reading newspaper. She remembered how he had been reading the newspaper before he died. Now she could not control her. The scene was really unbearable and she started sobbing.

Meanwhile Sambu was observing his father on screen and father was talking with a girl named Kumari who was about to cry. Immediately Sambu heard a high-pitched sobbing from women’s class (row). People present there shouted for light to on, because there was an accident. Sambu woke up and saw his mother was being lifted from the floor. So he impatiently rushed to the spot and found his mother being faint. Coming back to her sense, she told Sambu to go away. They both left the place ridding a small horse carriage. Sambu realized it was the last parting from his father.