034 Kicking the Pregnant lady.

I once kicked a pregnant woman in her belly.

I did it with all my force. Also, it wasn't a mistake.

Weird? Scary?

Well... In my defence, the lady liked it even though it hurt her a little. Also, I am pretty sure that you have done the same many times.

Still worried?

Ask your mom. Ask her how did she feel when you kicked her when she was pregnant with you. According to my mom, I kicked her a lot when she was pregnant with me. Especially, at midnight when she was peacefully sleeping, I would kick her from inside and ruin her sleep. Mom complained about it a lot after I was born. She even threatened to kick me as revenge.

Mom was pregnant again and she was getting kicked again by my future younger sibling. Every time she got kicked, she got excited.

Today was no different.

We were sitting on the veranda. We were sitting on the floor and the aunt was massaging mom's feet. Our aunt was a really annoying lady. But every times mom was pregnant, she treated mom like a princess. Right now, it is such a time.

"Normally it should be easy as you have more kids. I don't know why it is so difficult for you this time." Aunt said.

"It's probably because of the stress. Election and all..." Mom replied.

Apparently, this pregnancy was a bit harder on her compared to the previous two. Also, the economic situation at my home wasn't that optimistic. Mom resigned from her job. Now, if we fail in the election, then dad would lose his job and we would be in big trouble.

Anu, Doodu and our cousins were playing in our courtyard. I was sitting in mom's lap and trying to take a nap while leaning on the huge belly of mom. Then out of nowhere...

"uhh... Another kick." Mom grunted.

I felt that. I actually felt that kick on my back.

"Oooh... Another one.."

And I got one more kick.

"Hihihi... Alex just got kicked by his younger brother." Mom giggled. A few days ago, she one-sidedly decided that it's a boy.

'Did my younger sibling just kick me? He is not even born and already started making it difficult for me. He is acting cute and kicking me at the same time! I cannot lose to an unborn baby.' Suddenly, my competitive spirit was raised.

I turned around and slapped mom on her belly.

Well... This is different from the kick I was telling earlier. This one won't hurt her. I had a tiny chubby palm. Even if I punch her in the face, she would barely feel it. But the kick from a foetus is not that comfortable.

"Wait... Ahh..." Mom tried to stop the fight. But she was late as my younger brother had responded in kind. He kicked again. But it didn't reach me as I was not leaning on her belly anymore.

Still, I slapped once more. But before my slap could reach her, she caught my hand.

"No more fighting. Else I will send both of you to the corner. I am the one getting kicked and slapped here." pretended to be angry.

I wondered how she was going to send the unborn to the corner. Probably, she herself would go to the corner and sit there.

I smiled thinking about that.

These days are so precious. I spent the entire day with my mom and my dear ones. Anu's classes were over. The schools were closed for summer vacation. So all the kids were at home making all the mess they could. The neighbour child also joins us regularly. His name is Arjun and he was of the same age as Anu.

Dad was always busy with the election. They were in the last phase of the campaign. Dad was leading the campaign in our area. I, mom and Anu went to the election campaign multiple times. Mom wanted to go whenever dad was nearby and giving a speech.

The aunt also wanted to see her little brother standing on the stage and giving a speech to hundreds of people. She didn't forget to boast to everyone sitting near us. To her, seeing the little boy she took care of on the stage was a dream come true. I cannot blame her. She was really an over-enthusiastic mother.

Remember the scam I mentioned earlier? Let me tell you about that.

Dad's boss's main opponent is a guy named Mathai Chacko. About fifteen years ago, his brother came with a business idea. He collected millions from the people of our area with the promise of starting a rubber factory. Everything was proper, transparent and legal.

All the collected money was deposited in a bank. But somehow, the factory failed to start. The money was in the bank for eight years and the investors were getting restless. Then, Mathai Chakko intervened. He sold his own home to repay the investors. He even gave an impressive interest. Effectively, the investors got almost double what they invested.

Everyone was happy and impressed. He even became the hero who sold his own home to save the investors. This became the incident that kickstarted his political career.

Everything was perfect. Until dad exposed them.

Fifteen years ago, Mathai Chako's brother collected millions from investors. Then he deposited the money in a small bank. But there was a small secret. Mathai Chacko owned the bank.

Immediately after the money was deposited in the bank, the entire money was given to Mathai Chacko's brother in law as a loan. Then they started a company in a nearby state under the name of his brother in law. They started a company that produced and sold mobile phone accessories.

Their investment was on the spot. With the sudden growth of the mobile-phone market, their business grew exponentially. In just eight years, the company became almost 60 times the investment. In truth, what they returned to the investors was just two months of income of the company, while the investors should be owning the entire company.

Everything was legally fine. They didn't use the investment money. They used the money from the loan. So there wasn't much law could do. The only one who would be punished is the bank manager who gave a loan of a disproportionate amount. But since the loan was repaid, it wasn't a strong lawsuit either.

But it attracted public anger. People realized that the entire act of selling his home was nothing but a drama. With that, Mathai Chacko's chances of winning the election dropped. The other opponent was already in trouble because of the kidnap incident. With this and many other tricks by dad, dad's boss was in a very good position.

If you want to see the real face of my dad and how cunningly he prepared for the election, continue reading. Else you can just skip the rest of the chapter.

Dad was preparing for the election for nearly five years. I knew this from the conversation between my parents. Dad and some 'friends' did a thorough background check on hundreds of people. Dad had many friends. But I never met most of them. Even in my past life, I knew that dad had many friends. But I met a very few of them. This was always a mystery for me. This life, I am going to solve it.

Dad and friends did background checks and chose Johny Varghese. He was an old man with lots of money and a clean background. He had four kids, all of them well educated and settled abroad. He had everything. Except for fame.

That's how dad approached him.

Two years ago, under the instruction of dad, Johny Varghese started two companies. The first one was a rubber factory. The company collected raw materials directly from the farmers for a high price. The price was a lot more than the standard market price. Rubber trees are the biggest agriculture in our area. So this action from him attracted a lot of public attention. His story became viral on social media multiple times. It was as if someone was manipulating it on social media.

The second company was an export company handling spices. Our hilly area had a lot of spices. So this also became another social media sensation. This was followed by him making hefty donations to all the famous temples and churches in our constituency. He also started a club that worked with the aim of development in our area.

He funded a lot for the development of the schools and hospitals and made sure that the people recognized it. He donated dozens of ambulances and thousands of beds to the government hospitals and made sure to leave the name of the club on all of it.

There was one thing, no one, not even Johny Varghese noticed.

Kulathil Daniel's Factory and  Kulathil Denny's Factory were the names of the factories. 'Kulathil' was their family name and Daniel and Denny were the son and daughter of Johny Varghese. 'Kerala Development Front' was the name of the club. It was a ridiculous name for a club. But dad decided it.

'Karshaka Democratic Front' was the name of the political party dad started.

Did you find the hidden detail?

All this had the same acronym.

KDF.

Dad made sure that the three letters were everywhere. He even did all the manipulations to make Johny Varghese famous.

I just two years, dad made the three letters 'KDF' synonym for trust and magnanimous.

By the time the election was declared, KDF Johnychen was a local celebrity.

There is more.

Dad collected all the easily manipulatable local small-time celebrities with a clean background. He promised them seats for the next local elections like state election, municipality election and panchayat election. So all these guys and girls became campaigners for Johny Varghese.

Johny Varghese had a good share of votes from Christians and Hindu's in the area. But the votes of Muslims were all in favour of Mathai Chacko. So dad picked a local Muslim celebrity and secretly funded him. Dad made him compete in the same election. But there was one minor detail. He campaigned only in the areas where Muslims were a majority population. This was done to split Muslim votes so that the opponent won't benefit.

Dad used many more small and large tricks.

Youngster votes, Women votes, Christian, Hindu, Muslim votes, daily wagers votes, farmers votes and many more. The votes were divided based on all types of classification and dad and the gang did their best to gather the maximum of it. If it was not possible to gather, then he made sure that the votes were split and didn't go to the competition.

As I said before, dad was no saint.

India was divided into 543 constituencies. There were 900 million voters. Voting had already begun in some parts of the nation. Our polling was in five days.

I look forward to the election result and mom's delivery.

This is going to be another eventful month.

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