Being able to live in a rented room in town like Jhansi was a luxury unimaginable to the untouchable students, who commonly had to walk eight, ten miles to and from school every day, rain or shine. Large gangs of them would cross a number of villages, picking up new members on the way, as they marched through fields and over streams carrying their books and water bottles and lunches wrapped in cloth. But of course they had a lot of fun: stealing mangoes, picking millet, harassing the farmers, falling in love. A few years later the untouchable leader Ambedkar persuaded the government to set up hostels so that untouchable children in the villages could go to school without having to walk miles and miles every day. These hostels, which are are free and even serve meals, are called harijana hostels (harijan being the name Gandhi gave to untouchables).
Jhansi always had a lot of money playing in her hands. Papa was amazed at how rich she was. In the Board school a girl was considered rich if she had one anna (a sixteenth of a rupee), or even half an anna. For Papa, having even a kani (a hundredth of a rupee) would have been to be rich. She never possessed any money. Her grandmother never gave her any, and not one of the people whose names she carefully recorded in her notebook along with the amounts they owed or promised her ever paid up.
Papa and Jhansi were best friends. To be best friends--unlike close friends, you could only have one "best friend"--the two of you had to buy (unhygenic) snacks from the (poor, diseased) old women selling them outside the school gate and eat them together. Sharing food always brings people closer, which is why it's against the rules of the caste system to sit and eat with someone outside your own caste. Buying and eating snacks as a way to strengthen the bond between childhood friends even has a special name in Telugu: "buying-and-eating" (konukku thinadam). The practice is seen as a vice, like smoking or masturbation. A mother might scold her child, "Oh-ho, so now you've gotten a taste for buying-and-eating with that friend of yours!" and slap its face.
It was always Jhansi who bought the snacks. One day she ran out of money. Luckily, the day before Marthamma had given Papa a bayda (an eighth of a rupee) to pay her term fee. Papa knew it wasn't a good thing to spend that money, but Jhansi convinced her it was OK because her allowance was coming shortly and they could pay the fee with that.
April was the month of preparation for annual exams. One day the school peon came into class and handed the teacher a note. He read the note and called Papa's name. Papa stood up. The teacher told her that, since she was no longer a student at the Board school, her name had been removed from the rolls and she was free to go home. The news hit Papa and Jhansi like a bolt of lightning. They knew immediately what had happened. The term fee! Jhansi had received her allowance as expected but it got spent on more unhygenic snacks. That evening Jhansi took a bus back to her village and brought back one and a half rupees to pay the fee plus a fine for lateness. The matter never reached Marthamma.