‘Life is a race. If you do not compete you will be like broken egghs!!!’ Notable lines which I am sure we all remember, being uttered by VIRUS in the film ‘Three Idiots’. But it seems that many people in India have been following the literal meaning of it from generations. Why am I saying so? In what context...? Bear with me for a minute; we will get there pretty soon!
Riding on my friend, Milind’s bike; covering a distance of twenty kilometers back and forth on the bumpy roads, five days a week, to reach our office does take a toll on my body. Our spinal cords, predictably and irreversibly are slowly being deformed. I do not know about him but as far as my prophecy goes, I do visualize myself stooped, groping and walking with a stick in hand. A frightening thought, I beseech to God, to not allow it to come true. That’s not all! The adventure of eluding domestic and wild animals, rapidly moving erratic vehicles taking moody turns whenever they feel like thereby choking up the traffic periodically only flares up my existing aggravated distemper.
‘I am so fed up of all this man!’ Milind remarked stopping his bike at an entrance of a narrow street in Mundwa.
It was a typical traffic bottleneck one which we were familiar with, traversing the route on an everyday basis. I shifted my position within the limited space available in an effort to release some of the pain soaring up my spine from the squeezed tail bone.
‘Look behind! Is there any space to take a U-turn?’ he asked raising his helmet screen.
I strained my neck to look behind as directed and expectantly discovered a long snarl of vehicles littered all over the street.
‘Nope! No chance!’ I uttered. My voice suppressed because of the horns that blared.
We normally do take a detour, on finding the street choked up from a distance. But at that moment, a voice told me from within, “It’s a special day”. So, with no space to move backwards, we stuck around hoping for the situation to improve.
‘But for how long should we remain stagnant? Build a camp by the side and wait for the mess to clear up? Even there is no space for a camp!!’ I told myself as we were getting late for office.
The stalemate eventually ended with Milind showing his driving skills to find the smallest of openings between the obstacles and free us from the morning traffic ordeal. The race was on from that point onwards. We were already twenty minutes late because of someone else’s fault and we had to make up for it now.
‘Don’t increase the speed. Let it be late! I don’t want to land up in a hospital, early morning, bed-ridden for six months!’ I thought.
As I was about to express the same sentiments to my biker, he did the unthinkable. Milind increased the speed near the Kalyani Nagar turning in a bid to overtake a car, causing my heart to palpitate even more violently.
‘Oh God! No hospital! Better to die instantly than be in hospital!’ I prayed.
Milind safely overtook the car, though, halting at the signal near a bridge leading to Yerwada where our office is located. I stopped praying, for the time being, to change positions and relieve some of the pain originating from my tail bone.
The signal flashed green, enabling us to start our hasty journey, over again.
‘Smoke?’ he inquired.
‘Yeah! Let’s stop near the corner.’ I said.
I knew very well that we were late but ‘What’s the big deal if we are late by another ten minutes.’ I thought. ‘Completing work within the required deadline is important not the time we take, to reach office!!!’ I exclaimed deep down in annoyance thinking about the stringent policies.
We puffed our cigarettes calmly, to their butt, stubbing them out, the moment no smoke came out, from it and our lungs.
We sat on our respective positions on the bike to speed away one last time in the direction of our office.
Milind stopped the bike with a sudden jerk as we were approaching the Yerwada road, letting out a renowned cry. ‘Thok Diya!! (Banged it!!)’
I peered from the side of his head to view the ill famed scene.
‘Special! I knew it!’ I exhaled. But what followed was even more spectacular.
A cabbie, traveling at a fairly low speed had just touched the rear end of a bike causing it to wobble a bit on the road. Two decent, well dressed, probably educated youths were on the bike. I had seen them earlier that day maneuvering their vehicle and overtaking us and others at a high, rash speed.
‘Come out! Bastard!’ they both parked their bike in the middle of the road, in front of the Tata Indica and signaled the driver to come out of the car. Like two trained hoods.
‘Your father will come and fix this! Rascal!’ one of them shouted.
‘Sir! It’s just a minor scratch.’ the cab driver said politely and asked them to move their motorcycle.
I could clearly perceive the anguish in the cabbie’s mind as the two men approached his window.
‘Pull him out!’ they yelled.
The two seized the man by his collar and dragged his body through the window. Not allowing him ample time to open the door, let alone having a modest conversation. By now the horror on the cab driver’s face was evident.
‘Stop! Stop! What are you doing?’ the man cried.
The man fell with a thud on the road. The two youths then commenced their assault. Kicking him, on his stomach, his head, stamping on his hands intentionally as the man tried to save his body parts, wailing continuously in pain. Few people, who had already gathered around, tried to separate the rowdy youths from the cabbie, but in vain. As he was just being assisted by the people around to get up on his feet, the two caught him by the collar again. Now, they started hurling and depositing slap after slap in the direction of his face and ears. All the man could do was, hide his face behind both hands, folded on it. Trying to resist their thrashing and unruly behavior. Finally they were separated by the group gathered. The two youths sat on their bike and fled the scene immediately, probably fearing a police case or something. The face of the cab driver resembled a humiliated look. He was bleeding from the corner of his right eye with red and blue patches on his face, sobbing inconsolably. Some asked him to go to the hospital but he shrugged his shoulders and trudged back to his car. He sat inside and cried quietly for a minute, rubbing his eyes with his fingers, struggling hard to compose himself. He then ignited the engine of his car and fled away from the area shamefacedly.
I was close to tears viewing the whole incident from a distance and I am sure Milind must have felt the same.
‘No! Life is not a race!!’ I told myself. ‘But why do we have to behave like broken eggs!!’
‘Are we dead? Or have our consciences become extinct?’ I asked as we finally reached office.
‘Am I traveling with dead people around me?’ the questions started flooding my mind.
We remained quiet for some time. I, because of the trauma of it, enacted again and again before my eyes. We met at four over our daily dose of cigarettes and tea, recollecting the incident and venting our anger in the form of distinct curses and abuses.
To err is human but to beat him is insane, unpardonable and absolutely does not belong to this world.
Why do we behave like beasts sometimes? Are we really humans or animals disguised in the body of humans? Who has given us the right to hit anyone? Can’t a conversation solve a problem?
I am sure most of you might have encountered such ugly incidents while wading your way through traffic in Indian cities. I am tired of blaming the government or the administration, now. Justice can be done, following other unique ways as well. Let’s try and adopt them and make our India a better, more endurable place to live in.
A gross, inhumane episode, which I know is not the last one I have seen, but one which will always be forever etched in my memory. I hope, the corpses rise up from their death sleep and instill life in their souls again…
