XPost: soc.culture.indian, alt.fan.jai-maharaj, soc.culture.india
On Wed, 5 Apr 2017 18:24:40 -0700 (PDT),
in soc.culture.indian, in article <
6738e8d0-c971-461f-8dae-57750f591c2b@googlegroups.com>,
Arindam Banerjee <
banerjee...@gmail.com> posted:
On Friday, January 8, 1999 at 7:00:00 PM UTC+11,
Viewpoint wrote:
Arindam Banerjee wrote:
Picaresque tales of an Indian publicsectorman - ?+3
Death in Ghaziabad - 1
(may be continued)
Well, that was an half-hour of absorbing reading. Began
reading casually, but by the time I was past the third
paragraph, I had to slow down my pace, sinking in each
sentence slowly, going over the already-read matter again
and again if need be ..
You'll be shot dead if you don't continue.
You've been a public sector man. You wondered what you
were doing in life. You have a love-hate relationship
with Bollywood films, but an ear for Hindi film music.
Rekha in Utsav gave you sleepless nights. You write
exceedingly well. You love the good life. You like your
profession and the challenges it brings with it. Are you
a Virgo by any chance? :) And why 'Death in Ghaziabad'?
Any title with the words 'Die' or 'Death' in it strikes
me as indicative of a gloomy piece of literature, which
yours is not.
Death in Ghaziabad c. 1978-81 AD (MA: sex, violence,
truth)
Death could come to you easily in Ghaziabad. I first saw
Death when the bus came to a sudden jolt. With sudden
rush the occupants of the left side came to the right. I
had a clear view from my window. It was of a young man
in pajamas lying curiously still on the road. He had
evidently been hit and left for dead. A small crowd had
gathered. Some stones had been put around the corpse -it
was not that of a dog, after all. Our driver was
pragmatic. He did not stop. I do not know who did the
needful, and how. Something was surely done with the
body, for it was not there when I returned to the site an
hour later. What was striking about this incident was
that it made not even the slightest change in the local
surroundings. Things went on as if the accident had
never happened.
No ambulances would ever rush with screeching sirens in
Ghaziabad, for there were not any. There was no sign of
any authority, not any that one could see. The traffic
policeman would stand helplessly at the crossing in front
of the "Ghantaghar", or clock tower building. There were
traffic lights at the crossing, and they even worked at
times. But they could never regulate the traffic. There
was a police outpost, on the road to the station. The
policemen had no cars or telephones or guns, and it is
doubtful if they even had paper available. They had
only sticks and bicycles.
Anarchy, then, was the normal state in Ghaziabad. My
neighbours relished the telling of ghastly stories, and
they apparently believed what they said and heard.
Probably they were all highly exaggerated. Once the shop
near the room I lived in was robbed. The little boy who
worked there came running to me in fear. From what could
be made out, there had been extensive murder and mayhem.
I went to investigate. The miscreants had by that time
decamped. No one had been hurt, but some money was
taken. That was the only time the shop was robbed, in my
three years of stay in Modeltown, Ghaziabad. It was the
only noteworthy shop of its kind in the entire area.
Western ways did show themselves in Ghaziabad, most
noticeably in the District Court near my lodging. Lawyers
in black coats thronged like flies, over the ramshackle
wooden furniture inside and outside the tents around the
decaying Court buildings. They did not inspire respect
upon first sight. Later on, I would come to know how
thorough and professional they were at their work. As I
now see it, they form the only chance of establishing
order among the surrounding chaos.
What was I doing in Ghaziabad? That was a question which
puzzled my friend, colleague and mentor Shordar Bigaru
Singh. What was one of my kind doing in Ghaziabad? I
should be studying in the United States, with the
intention of bringing back technical knowledge to India,
as indeed a few did.
I was dying in Ghaziabad. Much later would I know
exactly how and what about me was dying there.
How was I dying? It is difficult to explain. I had no
physical disease. My job as an antenna development
engineer, which often entailed continuous 15 hour
schedules and long field trips, was difficult and
demanding. But I liked my work, even though I knew it
would lead me nowhere.
I was in Ghaziabad because I wanted to understand certain
things, such as exactly why we Indians were so, so, poor
and others elsewhere were so rich. Books and articles
from learned people taught me nothing. I intuited that
analyses from foreign writers were wrong or shallow.
Indian writers of the kind one read in the English
language merely parroted them. My own childhood and
youth had been far too golden. I always had the best of
everything, and so, knew nothing at all. I had to find
out the answers for myself, and for that, I had to live
by myself among Indians of the kind not paid by the
public. I knew I could never be contented otherwise.
Ghaziabad was killing me slowly. With every passing day,
I knew I was becoming less and less of the person I was
when I graduated. I was losing my academic skills and my
chances of a career abroad or even in a lucrative private
sector job in India. I should have at least been doing
an MBA! From being the apple of everyone's eye I had
become a complete non-entity.
And what was I gaining? As far as I could see, nothing.
I would walk alone on the dusty roads of Ghaziabad,
seeking answers, but answers - they eluded me. The local
people would look upon me with indifference, as if to say
they had seen many such as I before. Only money talked
in Ghaziabad. And yet, only if you could show it off by
living in huge high-walled houses, and possessed cars and
servants. Anyone who thinks that Indians care about
spirituality and intellect should live in Ghaziabad.
There was no Hindu temple that I could find, nor a single
book-shop that sold anything other than textbooks. There
were, on the other hand, plenty of furniture shops and
"Angrezi" liquor shops.
Death would come more quickly if I frequented the liquor
shops. But I did not care for drink, unless it was
lassi, the kind you got in just that one shop in that
narrow street. When the overpowering heat seemed to dry
your very blood, that was just what was needed to live,
and continue your questioning.
Death could come even more quickly if you dared to change
the established state of affairs. Once, boredom and
curiosity took me to view a late night movie show. I saw
a strange sight. Outside the window for the cheapest
seats, there was a queue of people cowering like so many
dumb animals, each with both hands upon the shoulders of
the man before him. Maintaining order was a person in a
three-piece suit, marching up and down with a whip in his
hand. I wanted to do something, but I did not know what
to do. I had been warned by a well-wisher never to
interfere in local matters. "If you wish to survive
here, just mind your own business. When you have to deal
with these people, put on your best behaviour, be very
polite. Unused to such, they will be taken aback and
that'll be your best chance of getting what you want." I
once forgot this advice, and spoke my mind to a furniture
shop-owner in Panchkuin Road, Delhi. The man assaulted
me!
Yes, I was dying. Ghaziabad was killing me in every way.
My ambitions and dreams were fading in the distance. All
that could be seen, all that could be sensed, were
callousness, selfishness and greed. The fruit sellers
would sneer if you asked for just one kilo - you would
not dare ask for half! "Do kilo lay jao, ji!". The
local shopkeeper, I saw, would swipe a slice or two of a
loaf of sliced bread if he sold in halves. The merchants
delighted in shaming you into buying more expensive
stuff. If you had no money you were nothing. Your
talents did not matter. Nor did your health, youth or
appearance. What did matter was clothes, for they showed
how much money you could spend. Tailoring shops abounded
in Ghaziabad.
What did people do in Ghaziabad? There were no public
libraries, no gymnasiums, no clubs. No one seemed to
have hobbies of any kind. There were no animated
roadside discussions, as I had seen and taken part in
Ranchi and Calcutta. There were no signs of romance
whatsoever - I never saw any boy with any girl; for that
matter, hardly ever any married man alone in public with
his wife. While there were plenty of liquor shops, there
was just one ramshackle "public house" selling country
liquor next to the fishmongers' area. People did not
play anything, nor did they seem to take any exercise.
Girls did not play music, nor sing, nor paint. The boys
- especially the well-dressed ones - seemed not to know
what to do. They aimlessly roamed around in small groups
on motorcycles and scooters, showing off the latest
fashions favored by film heroes.
Waves of apathy rolled on all sides. Everything seemed
so pointless, so meaningless. Life dragged on in slow
reluctant ways. If people moved, they moved slowly. It
seemed enough to live on for yet another day. Nothing
would change. Attitudes were firmly fixed. Or so I
thought, as the following Arjuna's song from Tagore's
Chitrangada would play in my head with increasing
frequency -
Disquiet profound haunts me today, o how my body burns!
Cruel arrows pierce my heart, I am drenched with pain.
Mirages dance before my eyes, fires blaze in my breast.
This garland of welcome is threaded with the thread of
Death.
Known horizons fade away before the shadow lands of
dreams That vanish as vanish the coloured palasa leaves
of autumn. This journey is without purpose; I am given to
losing my way. In this new, strange land it is my turn
now, to die!
My parents came for a visit. And suddenly things
changed. Within a few days they managed to make friends
with all the people around us. My father with the men,
and my mother with the women. The Great Gango (of whose
lordliness I wrote about some years ago) quite instantly
became like someone I had known my whole life. Chachaji
started looking genuinely more avuncular, and less like
an avaricious landlord, as my father and he exchanged
notes. Other younger men around, following his lead,
became more considerate. The elderly lady next door said
unpleasant things about her daughter-in-law, who had
"captured" her doted son. She had had to dissimulate to
her relatives in Punjab, to hear them say, "Tu yea kali
larki laanay itinee dure gayi thee!" (Did you have to go
so far to get this black girl?) The daughter-in-law did
not endear herself to my mother, for she praised her
husband in extravagant terms: "He is almost as tall, and
more handsome than your son." Chachiji however remained
aloof, as became any self-respecting landlady with
respect to mere tenants.
Everything started to appear in a different light. All
of a sudden everyone around seemed to take an interest in
me. "Why did your son not ever talk to us?" was the
question heard from all sides. "Why is he so aloof, so
reserved?" It appeared that they too wanted answers
about myself, as eagerly as I did about them. My parents
apologized; I was an only child, and so shy and never
very talkative. I became an object of sympathy.
I learnt to talk to my fellow men, instead of trying to
divine their ways by mere observation. This approach
made me see things in an entirely different light. For
the first time in my life, I could sense the mighty
struggles involved in mere survival, and beyond that, the
necessity for one-upmanship, to show that one has indeed
made it, and put others in their place. Everyone wanted
to live, and live with head held high, showing off as
much as possible. You needed to buy things. Good
clothes for a start, then the refrigerator, the TV, the
scooter... For all that, you needed money and more money.
And money depended upon muscle - who you knew, and - it
was widely proclaimed - how unscrupulous you could be.
Nobody thought that it was possible to lead richer lives
by concentrating on making each other happy. Quality of
service was an unknown concept.
This materialism was forcefully emphasized through urgent
innuendoes by the fairer sex. It acted against the more
pervasive inertia of the males, who were quite content to
laze and curse in a fatalistic manner. Inertia was
pitched against the desire for a better life. Yet there
was a deep underlying sentiment against the fate that
made things so. Why did things have to be this way?
What will happen in the future? What do we really want?
Such were the questions that seemed to naturally arise
after every meeting. The answers were never there - a
great deal of discontent would ultimately focus upon some
trivial issue. Every day just passed into another.
And I started to enjoy myself, as I realized that I was
not the only one with unanswered questions. I learnt to
cook, and my family today is grateful for that. I often
ate out in "dhabas" and restaurants such as the Pahalwan
which boasted the custom of none less than the great Dara
Singh. I drank glasses of lassi, ate Dasseri mangoes
and most importantly watched Hindi movies. They were the
sole recreation and culture of the people of Ghaziabad.
Seeing the latest movie on the first night of release was
the most socially in-thing to do!
I had a low opinion of run-of-the-mill Hindi films,
formed by seeing bad plots, doll actresses and fool
actors. Only the music and songs were superlative, as
they were accepted as a part of one's life with joy. The
first few Hindi movies I watched with disgust. Really,
was here nothing better for me to do in my life? Must I
be condemned for ever to watch such stupidity in the
company of my good friends the paanwaalas and truck
drivers?
And then I saw Rekha.
That was in the movie "Muqaddar ka Sikandar", in the
company of Pal-da and the Great Gango who
characteristically took us late to the cinema hall. I
was stunned, elated.
The next morning I tried to communicate my thoughts and
feelings to Sardar Bigaru Singh, holding court with his
jolly friends. I had mentally labeled them as the
behn***d group, as that expression, uttered in various
interesting ways , was an integral part of every
sentence from their mouths. He sister-referenced me
affectionately, and then advanced his reason for my
excitement:
"O behn***d, she is a sexy woman."
His companions looked at me peculiarly, as if to ask
which planet I had come from. I left the company of
those simplistic clods, not bothering to hide my disgust.
The sexiness of Rekha was by no means lost upon me, but
that was not the only reason for my exhilaration. At
last I had seen an Indian whose performance was far
superior to any Westerner. Even Sophia Loren did not
come close. I had, thanks to the Indian-English writers
and journalists, who exalt everything Western and deride
everything Indian, been brought up to have the lowest
possible opinion of India and Indians. Those scoundrels,
willing to do anything for a little crust of attention
from foreign columnists, and over-ready to serve the
interests of their Indian-hating masters, always took
great care to give as little positive publicity as
possible to genuine Indians and their efforts. To really
cripple them, they would put our best people grudgingly
below second or third rate Westerners.
Rekha shattered such bonds. She liberated me. She
showed that one did not have to grow up to be a second-
rate, disdained or patronized, pseudo-Western,
perennially whining loser.
A great desire for self-improvement came upon me. I did
not wish to live in a fog any longer. I wanted to know
what I was doing, at least in my professional work, to
begin with. There had to be some better methods than
those tinkering ones of my mentor Sardar Bigaru Singh.
Effective and in fact indispensable though they often
were, they were of no use in the development of
complicated systems such as phased array radar antennas.
To understand anything, one must know everything. I
embarked upon a solitary voyage of discovery. My
engineering books and notes arrived at last, and I
studied them diligently. I made many trips to Nai Sarak
in Delhi, to buy university-level course books on all
subjects that interested me. I took them with me on my
daily trips from Ghaziabad to Sohna, reading as I jerked
along in the crowded four wheel drive. I read them while
not clambering up and down the huge Scientific Atlanta
antenna positioner, connecting this, or adjusting that.
While returning, it was usually dark, so there was
nothing else to do except think of Rekha, and wonder if I
could make it for the late night show.
Thus things went on. Gradually, as a result of my hard
work and the grace of my dear Mother Kali, the mists
cleared. I made bold and drastic changes in the
established designs, with strikingly positive results.
From first principles, I made analytical models based
upon the specifications, then run computer simulations to
find the best parameter values and also the tolerances.
Project after project made it from my drawing board to
the prototype and production shops. I worked in the hot
sun on the roof, tuning the heavy corrugated horn
antennas the Bigaru way, month after month. I chased
after parts in the prototype shop, learning all the
nitty-gritty details. I dealt with the military clients,
and attended field trials where jet planes thundered at
treetop height in the plains near Ambala. What an
experience! How wonderful it is to ultimately see all
the hard work bear fruit - produce the perfect radiation
patterns with first the computer design and then the
prototype antennas in our 5 Km long test site, finally
going on to pass the stringent inspection tests with
flying colours! Such joy was my only reward.
There were rare times when I enjoyed elite society. After
our radar trials passed successfully, we were invited for
cocktails in the Air Force Mess in Ambala. What a
magnificent place! Polished wooden floors, huge graceful
rooms with long heavy curtains, elegant furniture of the
like I had never seen before, a bar with muted lighting
and such stately atmosphere! Khansamahs in starched
white uniforms and gold braid glided about like stately
goldfish, bearing crystal glasses containing gin and
whisky along with many interesting edible tidbits. It
was an environment for James Bonds, and indeed there they
were all right. I mean the pilots who had flown the
sorties, who were the most remarkable people I ever met.
They did not seem to belong to this world, those men who
dated Mrityu, the gentle but deaf and blind goddess of
death, every sunrise. Their courage, frankness, physical
excellence and detachment made the rest of us feel pretty
inadequate. Their charming ladies fluttered around in
colourful organdies. The total effect was intoxicating.
After the shabbiness of my living quarters it was indeed
heaven. I felt glad to think that my work would help to
bring back these heroes safely back from enemy territory,
instead of getting shot down by our own people.
My greatest recognition came unexpectedly. I was
outside the house of an insurance agent, who was also a
junior staff member of my company. I did not like the
man very much. He had the pretentious upstart quality,
so common among those of Ghaziabad, who had newly learnt
to differentiate themselves from the rest by bastard
mannerisms. He was inviting me to have tea in his home,
and I was trying to excuse myself. All of a sudden, his
mask slipped off and he humbly said that it would be an
honour for him if a man like myself would partake of his
hospitality. I immediately accepted, and did not forget
to show my regard for his aged mother in our traditional
manner.
I was developing into an Indian! I delighted in gossip.
I had started to enjoy Hindi films. I could even do
fairly well in the radio quizzes! Hindi film songs
soothed my soul. They were the expression of the sad and
battered soul of the masses, the only living legacy of a
great past now found pure and unscathed only in its music
and ancient literature. I even followed the latest
fashion, and once wore a tailored bi-colour zipped jacket
to my work! "Ustaad, kiska pocket maarooN? (Boss, whose
pocket's to be picked?) " queried Sardar Bigaru Singh.
Hindi film plots were never unpredictable. It is
ironical that a drama of such intensity and character as
I never found on the screen would become, for a while, a
part of my life.
*****
In this period of my anguish and searching, an incident
occurred under the roof of our common dwelling that is
well worth recording. It was a death, the first I
experienced at close hand. Even now a coldness comes
upon me as I think about it. First I shall give some
details of the place, and the people.
The house was partitioned among three brothers, who had
inherited it from their late father, a goods' clerk in
the railways. Let us not ask how he managed to build
such a big house with a clerk's wages. Maybe he had an
inheritance, or maybe the Goddess Lakshmi had placed a
bag of gold under his mattress. In any case I was
grateful for his enterprise - it was not easy to get
rooms for rent in that part of Ghaziabad which boasted no
less than three cinema halls within walking distance. I
was further lucky in that they allowed me to cook non-
vegetarian food in the house.
The son of the eldest was my landlord. He was known to
be too fond of drink, and so, by popular agreement, a bad
lot. As a matter of fact, he was an amiable chap, very
polite. I did not see much of him. He lived with his
parents in Delhi. All he wanted was that my rent should
reach him regularly. When I once delayed, his cousin
came to remind me, with two people of ruffianly aspect.
The second son - Chachaji to all - was what one may call
a pillar of the local community. He knew all the local
news. He was fond of gardening, and outward show. Jovial
and cordial though he was, there was something about him
which made one suspect he was not entirely trustworthy.
Perhaps this feeling came because he was of the opposing
landlord class. He had a reputation for being too
clever, holding down one job in Delhi and, it was said,
many small "dhandas". He lived with his wife -Chachiji -
and his two young sons who ran the shop. The sons were
very "good". That is, they heard everything you said,
agreed with everything you said, and said that whatever
you wanted would be done. But they would never do
anything for you. Just give you the polite run-around.
They were expert in making money through the sly, small,
means typical of their class. Chachiji was very
reserved. She and her married daughter were plump,
large-eyed and fair. They amply met the bovine standards
of beauty in upper-caste North India.
The third son is not important. He was completely
dominated by his wife, a large, uncouth, bossy woman. I
heard her boast how she threw out her tenants, using
goondas. Their belongings had been thrown out into the
street. They had not agreed to pay more rent. How could
that be tolerated? Next door's were tenants who had been
paying fifteen rupees a month for the last forty years!
My quarters, now. I had two rooms, and a kitchen. They
were enough to contain my worldly possessions: a steel
trunk for my clothes, books, a hold-all with a thin
mattress, a kerosene stove and some cooking utensils.
There was a door from the kitchen to an enclosed verandah
which opened through another door to a largish cemented
courtyard. There were two rooms beyond the verandah on
the other side of the courtyard. There were high walls
(one exterior, the other interior, partitioning us from
Chachaji) on the other two parallel sides of the
courtyard.
Two great friends lived in those two rooms. Their
friendship was known far and wide. They were both young,
in their late twenties, I would say.
One of them was really handsome. In a god-like way. His
eyes were far-seeing, visionary. He walked as if always
in a dream. He was a supporter of the politician Hemvati
Nandan Bahuguna. Possibly he had a political career in
front of him, as he was a lawyer, and had been involved
in student-level politics. He once talked to me
admiringly about the bravery of Cubans: such a small
country, yet so defiant of the Americans! He was the
only man in Ghaziabad for whom I had genuine regard.
Unfortunately he had a throat problem - he had to gargle
for hours.
The other was quite the opposite. He was completely
nondescript. You could not find him on a crowded railway
platform. He was a truck driver, hoping to buy a new
truck for himself. He had an ingratiating manner, as if
to compensate for his limitations. Jyoti-da had given
him the name "DaNt-kala". He had been living in my
quarters before, so knew all the parties quite well. I
think he had been kicked out when in a drunken binge he
and his associates had voiced far too much appreciation
of Chachaji's daughter.
"Oi DaNt-kala,(O one who shows his teeth out of
foolishness)" he would say, with a most charming smile.
The man was not very bright. He thought that Jyoti-da
was being friendly. Unsure, wanting to reciprocate, but
not quite understanding what was required from him, he
would stand and grin, exposing his teeth.
"Aaro kalao, (Show more)" Jyoti-da would add, with a
bigger smile. DaNt-kala would then do just that, to
Jyoti-da's immense satisfaction, that he would manifest
later to his cronies such as myself.
I shall now describe some other people around who milled
about when the tragedy happened.
Rajju, the small boy. Given proper education, he would
have become something, for he was quite bright. He had
no relatives, and simple hung around the place, doing all
the odd jobs in the shop and the house. What I remember
most about him was his shirt. It was made up of many
different pieces of fabric, cast-offs from the tailoring
shops, carefully stitched together. With that shirt he
had managed to climb to the lowest rung of the social
ladder in Ghaziabad. He was not so old to be as sly as
his young masters, so, quite often, I found him useful.
Guriya was the daughter-in-law I had written earlier. She
was Chachaji's tenant. As a mere tenant
(may be continued)
******
All I know is - it was not my fate to lie cold and stiff
beside the banks of the Hindon. My death, so far as the
dusty roads of Ghaziabad were concerned, was to be
altogether more pleasant. Within several months, I would
marry the most beautiful and brilliant girl in Calcutta.
And I would never, just for myself, from this world ask
anything more.
[ (may be continued)
Please do continue.
Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
http://bit.do/jaimaharaj
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