My parents visited us for the first time after our marriage and my father was not at all pleased with what he saw at our house. One morning after Madhuri left for work he let me have it: "Washing clothes, wiping dishes, scrubbing the floor!" he thundered, "Are you a mouse or a man!!"

The problem with dad was that he behaved as thouhgh he were still in the police force. He treated mother like his orderly and mother behaved like one too. She woke him with morning tea, and in the evening she pressed his legs before going to sleep. If he wanted water he would just yell for it!

I don't know what Madhuri thought about my father, but, when we saw them off at the railway station, she had a strange look on her face.

That night, I got the shock of my life---Madhuri started pressing my legs! From the next day on she started doing everything my mother did for my father: She brought me ted in bed, polished my shoes and insisted on bringing me water whenever she felt I was thirsty. "Your mother has opened my eyes!" She would tell me

Then one dayu I drove back to my father's house. He himself opened the door and then I noticed he was holding a scrub.

"Fateher!" I exclaimed, "You are washing dishes!" "Yes," he said dismally, "That visit has changed your mother. She has been singing Madhuri's praises ever since and what's worse ---has started behaving like her! Now she refuses to even get me a glass of water. She says I should learn to do things myself."

"Oh, no!" I said.

"Now she has divided the work between us---she does the washing and I wash the dishes."

I was appalled.

"But to be honest," he said, suddenly breaking out into a smile, "I keeps me busy."