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.