Memoirs of a lost world

There was no truck visible on the road for over an hour. The office staffs knew what had happened! They were aged clerks who had come all the way to the check post, 11 pm at night and 30 km from city, to issue the receipts of Motor Vehicle Tax collection.

The Officer in Charge of the local Police Station was sitting on the front on his jeep, obviously disrespectfully to the ADM, smoking like ‘Rajnikant’.

Someone murmured, ‘Sir, police has passed the message about the raid to the trucks and dhaba owners along the road’

‘I know’, Amit replied in disgust and asked everyone to get back on the vehicles, ‘We will move ahead of the check post to the state border’ he said.

Everyone understood that the decision was to go to the place where the ### check posts had been blown away in bomb blasts a few months back and Naxals often attacked the Government vehicles.

After a few kilometers, the trucks started becoming visible, locked and parked on two sides of the road. The drivers would be having their late night entertainment in the neighbouring villages, as the official quest to reach the revenue target continued. Soon the Sal forest area started along the road. Here, there was no truck, no habitation, no light, only dense forests on two sides and sounds of crickets.

‘This area cannot have mobile telephone network’, Amit thought.

One of the jeeps was stopped in the middle of the road to block the passage. All the other vehicles were parked along the side, all lights off.

Soon lights of mobile vehicles appeared from a distance. They gradually came closer until the first Truck stopped slowly next to the jeep with over 8-10 trucks behind it; late night they invariably travel in convoys. The driver was trying to stare in the dark to see if it was an accident. The whole team, of babus and amins and the police men collected from the District Head quarter surrounded the trucks. The truck drivers tried to assess, who those people could be. Whether their convoy had more men or the unexpected raiders outnumbered them.

‘Police, Police’, one of the Babus shouted to inform that it was ‘Government’.
The Motor Vehicle Inspectors started confiscating the documents so they could be checked at the check post. A simple, may be not legal, way to get the documents inspected as legally they never stop at the check post. They just fly off. One of the drivers refused to surrender the documents and bolted the door from inside. It was obvious that he would incur a fine above 50 thousand or he wouldn’t contest like that.

‘Desi tactics’ were adopted, the glass window was broken with a stone and the driver pulled out after unlocking the door. He came out reluctantly, raising a ‘humkara’ or a war cry. That meant a call to the other drivers to come out armed.

‘Teri *&^ $$ ’, almost everyone in the team responded with a louder shout. People knew that it was no more a Motor Vehicle inspection. It was a war and one had to fight to survive.

The talwaar that the driver was carrying was snatched, many people held him and he was bashed immediately and overpowered to send the message right.

The trucks behind were still in confusion due to the darkness of the forest, as to what was happening. It meant that the trucks’ continued to come on the road and their column was building up. The Government team hurriedly moved ahead confiscating the documents of as many trucks as possible.

After sometime Amit turned back, he realized that the lights of the first truck which was stopped appeared really far off now.

No more risk. His team was getting scattered in ones and twos on each of the trucks. They were certainly less in number now.

There was immediate call in local language to fall back with whatever documents they had collected. It served the purpose as the trucks were from North India and they couldn’t understand the local language. People started returning back with the documents collected. The driver of the first truck was made to sit in the police jeep just as a ‘ransom’, so that the other trucks also follow.

Each vehicle was asked to count every head they had come with. One doesn’t want a dead body of a Government employee to be recovered from the forest next day.

Gradually, the forests reduced. The only risk left now was once the vehicles cross the region of hundreds of trucks parked en route to the check post. What if they stopped Government vehicles? Trucks on long routes are invariably armed.

Hooters of all the vehicles were turned on along with the Red Lights for whichever vehicle had it to give an impression that it was the convoy of Defense Minister of Mars.

Slowly that area was also crossed with confused onlookers contemplating whether to attack Government vehicles or to allow them to go. The hooter of three- four vehicles is loud enough to create suspicion in anyone’s mind. They had no clue that the clerks from the Collectorate were sitting in the vehicles.

Raid got over. All vehicles were back. Head count was done once again. Everyone was back.

The OC of the PS was still sitting on the front of his jeep. He looked utterly shocked.

Now even ‘his’ own men were not under his control. The Sepoys were hugging each other. They were enthralled, damn excited, shivering in the cold as they shook hands with the clerks and car drivers. For some time, there was no line department there was only one victorious army and the tension was refusing to die.

The drivers of the vehicles with documents just confiscated had started to come and were depositing fines. Someone had started preparing tea in one corner of the ‘official and authorized’ checkpost.

Total revenue collection was Rs 6 lakhs plus for that raid.

To count 50!

I’ve come so far this year, 47 mails till yesterday, despite many of the mails which were posted at some point of time having been removed for various reasons.

Somehow, an idea struck that why should I not try to reach the half century. Though time is less for 3 more mails, it is worth a trail and why not? This being 1 of them.

The past year 2008 was not an ordinary year to almost everyone who was here in this small world of ours.

We saw the world order changing, quite a bit, with over weighted systems cracking down under their own weight. We saw traditions in Finance and Business overwhelmed by the tide of time, after more than a generation had gone by believing that the world stood on those pillars.

There was fear, there was anger, there was disgust, and there was hatred while there were also some rays of hope for some of us. And amidst all this chaos- which forcefully dissected our lives and left an impression that will last for years, if not till the time we live- there were we trying to protect some space for ourselves.

In this year of turmoil, as individuals, we were- or atleast I was- trying to pull the threads of our lives in one place and put the particles of dust in place, to be, the islands that we are supposed to be.

I wish and hope that in the New Year, our world moves for a better tomorrow. Hope there is clarity in our minds, hope the fear in our mind does not force us to hit at the hand that comes ahead to help us. May God bless us.

3 decades later

In the week just gone, he had completed his third trial to get across the main gate of his house by climbing its top to go out and buy a kite. Second trial was a grand success while the first and third were disasters. From the top he had landed heads down and bled badly.

That day the small kid was standing next to the entrance door of his house as he waved to his friends. It was the month of December, year 1978, and he was to join the school of his elder brother from next day.

His mother was very happy; the news of admission of the kid in a reputed school had just been communicated by his dad. His elder brother always stood first in his class in same school. That had paved the way for the admission of the younger sibling; otherwise, admission during the mid session in a convent school is impossible!

‘They admit children older than 4 years only during the regular session itself, so I had to …………’, his father was expressing hesitatingly.

But that had been happening in all the schools they had tried for admission, so it was understood. This urgency had come up only recently as the mother of the child had been appointed a lecturer in the university and had to join immediately.

They knew that the kid was a bit (just a bit) naughty and if both parents worked in university, leaving him alone at home, it could mean more problems. So the admission meant a safe home for the kid.

But the first day in school for the kid was not so good. The Aaya had taken him to the first seat in the class; he was so small for the size of other kids in the class. But other kids are possessive of their belongings, all the fronts seats were occupied for six months now. He had been driven away from the first seats to second row, from there to third and finally to the last row of three empty seats.

He had walked to a see-saw, designed like a boat, on the side of the class and wept nonstop.

That was clear cheating. He always had cried when bhaiya and didi went to school on their rickshaws. He wanted to accompany them on the rickshaw. But bhaiya had dropped him here, at the door of this class and disappeared!!!!!!!!!!

‘Bhaiyaaaaaa…….’, he cried; the more he thought of his elder brother, the more inconsolable he was. Where is his brother? Why are they not sitting together when he had come all the way with his brother? It seemed, his brother had left him there forever and forgotten him forever.

He wanted to go back to home. But the Aaya was trying to get him off the see-saw and get him back to his seat. Everyone in the class was laughing.

For some time everyone croaked something behind the teacher, he didn’t know what? He had again burst into tears and everyone had again laughed at him.

Finally the class of the smallest kids in the school had got over.

The second day in the school was better, there was a PT class and the class had gone to a playground. Each kid knew his place in the queue as they walked holding the shoulder of the kid in front. Since the last kid did not like a smaller kid to hold him from the back, he declined to forego his coveted last position in the row.

So be it! Be it! He had walked all alone as a jealous class had watched him.

As the teacher missed him all together, while the class was made to sit in one place in circles, he played around the entire field. He played with bigger boys and girls of other classes, who were allowed to play on their own. What was even better his brother was there with all his friends. And as usual, slightly elder girls started behaving grand-motherly to the young kid.

‘Ye bhi apni class mein first aata hai kya?’ and ‘Ye khata kya hai?’ were two memorable questions.

But that half an hour was too short and the classes had fallen in their queues to start for their classrooms leaving the smallest kid decked at the highest slide in the ground (and sadly being noticed by his teacher also).

He was asked to slowly slide down, then there was ‘Chooha bhaag billi aayyi’ played between the kid and the class teacher which the teacher lost and so she finally resorted to violence. As the chooha was being mauled by an angry cat, he had happily bitten her arm to escape her claws.

It seems all the young teachers are fascinated by bandits and dacoits, even that class teacher was! She had proclaimed that the kid would ‘Bada hoke Daaku banega’.

Leaders are born!!!! They are never made!!!. That day an undisputed leader was discovered by Class Nursery D of St. Francis Convent School, Wazirpura Agra. People look forward to their leaders; for all the schooling years to follow his class looked backwards, towards the last seat of the class, with respect and reverence.

That day his ‘bhaiya’ had been called back from his class to get his younger brother back to the Nursery class, since the teacher and staff had failed to lure him back into the trap. Bhaiya had borrowed money from his two friends to buy two candies for his younger brother.

Next day parents were summoned. They had simply lied that their son was not spoilt and that he would not become a ‘Daaku’.

The story almost ends here. The records that got the kid admission in school never changed. He became a Daaku, almost! But, he would never have become what he could, had he not been asked to compete with bigger kids and better them. There is joy hidden in the biggest pains in life, you only need to have an eye to search for it.

Amidst Cold Deserts

I’ve travelled to almost 20 plus states in India and may be more than 80 districts. While almost every place has its own unique characteristics, there is one place which I feel the word unique can’t describe.

The place is a cold desert, where we had travelled from the bordering state. They say that the other route from the state capital is very picturesque but it was considered unsafe. We could have taken a flight, but for the experience of life- shear luck- hadn’t.

As one leaves the lush green hills of the bordering state the vegetation gradually becomes sparse. And so does the habitation and population. And then those tracts begin amidst high and barren mountains, sandy in colour but rocky in constitution. Innumerable small temples like structure seem to guard the route (located in strange and far off points on the hills). I don’t know what they mean! Remembering some God, some beloved or something else? And then gradually even those disappear and so do the thousands of flags around some forlorn monasteries.

For hours one travels in emptiness and monotony, almost barred and banished of all actions in life. A casual look outside the window to see the unbounded depth below could send chill down the spine. It feels as if one has moved far away from the earth to an unforeseen land, may be the heavens, but with all its habitants having being disbanded to some other land already.

As a belief sets in that the cold barren sandy mountains are forever, one might cross over a small bridge interlinking the passage across the mountains with a deep valley beneath.

When the Purple night begins to set, the habitation and shelter remain undiscovered. Under a Purple sky, millions of silent stars mourn some silent secret buried within their heart, with chilling cold in the air- a few tents of ITBP could be the last hope. ‘Not here but there, boulders roll down from heights around this place’, someone might say as you carry your shivering body ahead.

Next morning, the voyage upward continues to a distant land and at times one might feel that this unending journey is the only reality of life, in this or the next world. The hustle and bustle of the world- the illusions of life of the mortals- one leaves behind and begins to forget. The hollowness and emptiness of one’s soul, this journey personifies.

And then a rare sight of a yak, the last living thing left on the earth after the Day of Judgment or a pair of horse playing with the soul mate and trying to recreate the world, oblivious of anything in their territory, triggers a ray of hope- there is life beyond.

In the journey one could halt at a monastery; the architecture, the material of construction, the collection of the sacred scriptures- everything is a curious difference in itself but without the exception of solitude and dreariness. But what is more striking on the expedition is whatever few faces one crosses are without an inkling of expression.

Was I there? Am I visible? Or am I a soul already- a ghost invisible. The absence of life and abundance of fears unknown- of death or God or nature or the enemy whosoever wiped out life of those tracts and in whose reverence those stone faced bodies bend innumerable times- one begins to feel its omnipotence.

One reaches the highest of all the high passes, with black stone hilly tract in the adjacent areas and the contrasting white lime formation, which is desolate as everything else. It could remind of the pieces of white and the pieces of black in our soul, in its solitary existence.

But at some point in eternity, the action would restart somewhere- a few more vehicles, a few more monasteries and an unknown person rolling those cylinders with their magical chants engraved. Or to break the spell, to wake you from the eternal sleep- a resonation deep sound of some instrument would come. What would still draw your attention is that even that haunting sound touches some corner of your heart- still dormant and unexplored.

And every bare hall of the palaces once adorned would remind you of the ephemeral nature of youth, wealth, power, lust, greed and arrogance. Of wars that took place, of sabotages that occurred and of the era bygone; of our momentary lives and our eternal struggles; of fleeting opportunities and our ever continuing blunders; our seemingly misplaced belief of unwavering occupation and the truthful emptiness of everything that surrounds us and within.

One could also bring a few lapis lazuli, or Iranian Turquoise, some curios of yak bones, a few metal wares, some glimpses of nature’s beauty- pristine but sad.

One could also return richer in wisdom if one learns how solitary the soul is in its long journey. At some moment the realization strikes and sinks in that the life is short and physical and worldly gratifications transient. There is something beyond the outward attractions, some ‘gunas’ or skills, something which takes us closer to our inner self, our soul. And there are interactions, beyond physical, where that ‘guna tatva’ meets its expectation and a ‘wow/ really brilliant’ impact is felt.

There is no harm in appreciating that, there is no infidelity in that, no shame either. Because that is when a soul is interacting with another soul, the way it interacts with nature and may be unison could be longer- one never knows because that is unexplored.

We might then unknowingly be exploring ‘life’ amidst our existence in the ‘cold deserts’; our soul may be attempting to build relations which 'we' could not.

The Things that are happening

(i) SEA Shores were ever so porous- There was a coolie who used to work on a dock yard. With assistance of an upcoming politician, he smuggled some textile machines that produced cloth at speed 10 times faster than the existing machines. Since the import duties were about 500% then, buying and importing the new machines was almost impossible. Both the smuggler (industrialist thereafter) and the politician became icons in their fields.
In the times of increasing corruption at the top levels, paupers became kings in no time and there were so many of them.
However, old habits die hard. From land, to electricity, to water, to security, to roads, they still looked towards the Government for everything while their Accountants worked over time to dodge the taxation agencies. They and their children thus became amongst the richest people in the world while the average (honest) Indians slogged to make a decent living (and many a times for them). The channels of media, feeding on their money, provided precious place to them covering invariably every alternate day a new ‘riches’ rankings.

(ii) This elite gang of neo riches gambled in Las Vegas, lived in London, vacationed in Bahamas, shopped in Paris and F%^*ed in Seychelles (ok sorry, just had business meetings and networking with models), but until one day when fate caught on them at the ‘Taj’.

Then, the ‘conscience of the nation’ was “beaten” to come to life through ‘their’ media and for a change some men in khaki were treated like martyrs and got the respect they deserved (they did deserve it but so did their other brethren who were dying every day in mine explosions in Jharkhand or Chhattisgarh but for whom not a single tear was ever shed).

It was evident that people ‘who mattered’ were panicking as they saw and heard of death of people ‘they’ knew. Death had never been so close. For if it had happened to one of them, it could also happen to anyone of them.

For first time, they saw from close what was happening to the people working in the Naxal affected districts for poll duties or for imposing law and order- for years running now.

In contrast, for years the elite had been unscathed as they didn’t travel by train and they didn’t shop in crowded roadside markets. If ever they were forced to buy something in India, Taj and its luxury branded shops was the place! You know!

But once the incidents happened in the Mumbai Landmarks, the news paper columns were being filled, page after page and page after page.

(iii) That was a strange country. The batch of brightest of the bright people, some 50 people now, had an average salary of Rs 24,000 per month after 9 years of service. They ‘were’ the cream of a nation and their head- at the peak of his career (or verge of retirement)- had recently been valued at a salary worth Rs 100,000 per month which was less than the least salary amongst the new joiners in the corporate world- a batch of 425 from a renowned B-School.

To be blatantly honest- the batch of 425 of ‘would be corporate leaders’ had not a single JEE 100 types (leave aside single digit rank holders) and had never cleared a Prelims or a CAT. Yet they had an average salary of Rs 160,000 per month.

It was indeed good that at least some people in the country were prospering but what was a cause of concern was the high pitch groans that the industry had produced when the Cabinet Secretary of India had been proposed a salary of Rs 100,000 per month.

Group loyalties are obvious.

While ‘the young ones’ in the corporate were doing their bit of service after the Mumbai mayhem, from lighting candles to shooting angry mails against the red tape and bureaucratic hurdles- one should be informed that inhuman pay package to the best in the country is like a cosmetic face chopping the limbs, the heart and the head in the body. It is outrageous and outright stupid. A corrupt bureaucrat suits a bloody politician, it doesn’t suit a Nation.

(iv) Every coin has two sides. The fear is genuine that the act of ten mad men could motivate so many more brainless fellows like them, and the situation may aggravate in the days to come.
But the other side is also true, the crises is of our own making. The policeman is still armed with lathi! If 1 man in 10,000 has a bullet proof vest, it is a third class one; something similar to the Night Vision Device on the LoC in Kashmir.

Though the choice is still open to us.

We sang laurels for Privatization when the revenue earning departments were snatched from the Government. Now from the money made, business houses sitting on piles of dollars should dole out some and privatize the internal security of the country (or atleast within their organizations). It will generate new jobs, and provide better trained staff armed with better equipments.

My feeling, however worthless, is that this is high time that the industry (where the money is) takes some responsibility. The amount spent in one evening on an individual in a cocktail party at Taj could buy a good weapon for a policeman. One ‘Corporate strategy and brain storming session’ for 1 head in Goa, can buy a good bullet proof jacket or a night vision device for people whom we call for to lay their lives for us. (The other option is to spend that money on the marriage of the daughter of CEO.)

Benefits should not stop at the advocate of beneficence; it should also trickle down to the person next in the line.

Governments today are stark naked of resources to even pay the salaries of the left over employees, clearly internal security is beyond their agenda. Raising the issue of spending resources on the security of politicians is like entering into an infinite loop, because as the masters of the present system- they cannot be expected to finish themselves (however worthless they may be though). We have to work on implementable solutions.

(v) But are the people really bothered (or just smartly led into some fit of anger and made to believe they matter when they don't)? Or this hue and cry is intelligently being created by some politicians and their business partners as an occasion to settle some old scores?

STRANGE COINCIDENCE! The first head that rolled was of the person who was a long term target of the people who pump their money (and make many times more) in running dance bars (and in all the ‘legal’ businesses done from thereof).

But these are unending debates, you know as well as I know. Unless some sincere steps are taken (beyond the superficial ones) chances are high that the story of lapses might become so common that there will be few viewers interested to see the live telecasts in days to come.

Or maybe you and I are like the rats dancing to the tune of a Pied Piper, we shiver with fury when they play some music, we shiver with remorse when they play another tune. Who knows? For like you, I am as sad and as disillusioned with the things that are happening.

Some past in the present day

(i) That was a small batch of 53. It had a IITD Computer Science Grad (JEE 29) and captain of IITD Cricket team, another IITK Computer Science Grad who was captain of TT, Cricket and Badminton teams of his IIT, another IITD Grad who was the captain of the Badminton team, two National Debaters, toppers of one prestigious law school and many more toppers from their departments in IIT’s and JNU and other universities.

The country had taken them for service, from almost 300,000 applicants, at the salary of Rs 8000 per month. There was only one person amongst them with almost no genuine skills, hardly any past accolades, yet even his parents loved him from the depth of their heart.

(ii) During the Army attachment, there was a post on the LoC in Kashmir, where he happened to meet and mix with the jawans, as they laid in the bunkers night after night and see the tracer bullets fly over their head. They played with the ‘Night vision devises’ which showed nothing beyond a few meters while the news was confirmed that the enemy had imported devices that could see for kilometers.

Gradually he began to see how difficult it was to get a leave for any jawan- until the news of passing away of mother of one of them had arrived. The war hardened soldier had broke into tears and cried inconsolably and one saw in him a little kid, 3 to 4 year old, struggling to cope with his memories of that age with the helplessness of today, his duty.

Gradually the soldiers had found one like themselves in him and had confided so many things “We used to get two sets of shoes a year earlier but now only one set is given. (Someone sitting at the top is stealing the other pair of shoes). It is ok when we are on the border but when we go to home; it feels bad to go back in torn shoes”.
He knew that back home people are looked as heroes in their homes and villages.
Just for your information- the jawans were paid Rupees 5000 per month. But most people in Government job in his country don’t live for money, they live for their pride.

Jawans are brave and proud men; they continue in torn shoes on the snow capped mountains for two years and go back to their villages, whenever they get leave, in brand new shoes saved for the occasion. It is more about the pride and prestige of a family! The parents, the wife and the kids can live in pain of separation for two years, but for those 10 days of togetherness, they want everyone to know- they are part of the life of a hero.

(iii) Why only the men on the border alone?

He had been part of the teams where men had to stand on the road, their arms held up signaling to stop the fast approaching speeding truck, to complete the annual revenue quota for the district. This happened as the people in power did not approve mechanical check posts for fleeing trucks that evaded taxes (and became rich in the process) while they happily increased the revenue targets. There were close shaves for some, others were not so lucky. Someone was ran over, some jeeps were hit by the trucks, from the adjoining pond what came out was a mangled vehicle, two wounded men and two dead bodies.
In their country everyone loved festivals, except for the same police constable who people said they saw taking bribe from a tempo wala on the main crossing in the city. The constable did not like festivals because when people celebrated one festival after other in the warmth of their homes, closeness of their near and dear ones. He was asked to do law and order duties- with his lathi- day and night, with no leaves on any festival. From Durga Puja, to Diwali to Id to Christmas to Holi, one thing was permanent- his duty!
The constable was paid Rs 4000 per month in salary in the yet continuing Fifth Pay Commission in most places, Rs 65 worth of an annual increment in salary and yes, Rs 75 worth of festival allowance.
In growing discontent against the system- in state after state, the constables and the officers were being blown away by land mines and police stations were being burnt to ashes.

(iv) None had cared! The space given to them by the news paper- the beacons of national awareness- was less than the news for electrocution of a buffalo or the nth divorce and rth extramarital of some bitchy international celebrity. (Why International alone, a class of neo riches has emerged in India in last ten years who want to beat the world in all standards of perversions. OOOcch…..who am I to preach on morals? We are matured society!!!! Sorry to all! Please carry on with the L%^^ and G^& stuff with the same enthusiasm and fill pages after pages of your semi porn national news papers with that)

Anyway the poor constables and their dead bodies and their widows lost their place from the newspaper, from the national conscience and from my writing. But atleast one is within my control and so I will try to pull it back on track.

We saw the American Centre happen in Kolkata, hapless men fell to the bullets from the best international guns. We read much news, about the explosions in the railway platforms and people dying in burning trains, but nothing happened.

I correct myself, that became a habit and the initial rhetoric declined and people took it as parts of their lives and the Government compensation also declined or disappeared.

(contd.- but you would be disappointed even more)