Ties that bind Rakhi had turned 13, and it was a difficult age to be. Rakhi had been born born on the day of raksha bandhan, a festival where sisters’ tie coloured strings round their brothers wrists, with a vow of a lifetime of protection along with various gifts. Rakhi loved her namesake festival. Rakhi always got gifts for raksha bandhan, as well as her birthday, even when they didn’t fall on the same day. This year however, Rakhi was dreading raksha bandhan. You see, Rakhi was an only child, and did not have any brother of her own. Yet over the years it had been a kind of tradition that she used to tie Rakhi’s to the doodh wala ‘bhaiya’, the postman ‘bhaiya’, and the chowkidar ‘bhaiya’. They all used to come on their respective bicycles, bearing small gifts for Rakhi , this was followed by a small custom of applying tika and aarti, after which Rakhi was left beaming with gifts not just from her ‘brothers’, but her parents as well. But that was when Rakhi was young. Now things were ...