Some unfortunate day in September 2006.



The impact was hard when I heard. Enough to send my head reeling; to reduce my speech to mere incoherent blurts. But I guess he would have experienced a much harder impact, when that ill-fated hired taxi of his had a head-on with that truck on the highway, because that knocked the life out of him. A bastard of a driver, don’t know which one though. One of the two had to be, or maybe both.

They said he was on an official trip, traveling late at night. Why the hell was he traveling late at night if it was an official trip, that too when it was a taxi ride on the highway? He was always a bit too committed to his job. Why don’t these so-called highly-professional MNC’s have a policy against night-time taxi travel when on official trips? Guess they might think of it now. Too late for someone like him or his family & friends. Are those high-flying HR managers listening?

Someone from HR would have ‘notified’ his family of this ‘unfortunate incident’. Can’t even begin to think of what his parents would have felt? They would have also informed his to-be in-laws & his fiancée. They were engaged last month & were to get married in another couple of months. He had just bought two handsets with new CDMA connections for 10 grand. He said that they could talk for free through the night with these. He thought it was a good investment now instead of paying hefty bills each month till they got married. So much for a good investment. I heard all his belongings were missing from the accident site. Police suspect a post-accident theft. His wallet, credit cards all gone. Guess that bastard of a thief would have taken his new handset as well.

All this & lot more came gushing to my mind after the initial blank. Pretty much like a heavy metal number starting after the blank portion of the tape in a cassette. Not knowing exactly what to do, I instinctively called two of my closest friends to tell them about it. I know they too would have had a similar experience when I told them. Only few words were spoken among us when we met up that evening. The four of us had shared our last flat for more than a year. Evenings never used be so heavy then.

07/05/2005
About 9.40 pm I guess.
Partially inebriated state.

Yes, I had got my writing pad & a pen in my hands. All set to pen down what I wanted to. But then suddenly it was a flood of thoughts. Each thought presenting itself as the best subject to be penned down. Didn’t have an answer to the off-the-tongue, obvious, rhetoric question put to me by the person lying on his stomach & trying to read ‘Strong Medicine’ by Arthur Hailey, in the dim flickering light from the flame of a candle burning between us. “Kya likh raha hai?” Obvious because he saw a pad & a pen in my hands. Rhetoric because he didn’t wait for my reply & turned to the book. The situation of the pharma sector in USofA during mid 1900s probably fascinated him more than the answer I was contemplating. Good for me though…for I didn’t know it myself. It feels great when you don’t have to answer the questions put to you…sometimes even by your inner-self. Better if there is no one to put such questions. Or is it?

“Dus baj gaye yaar!” Another one from him. My only response is a half-minded “Hmmm…” That from him was more of an astonished look, wondering at the supply being out for almost two hours now. Actually very unlikely at this time of the year. Considering the place we stay in, more so. Another supply has gone out as well. The ‘Contessa’ supply. No, not the once famous luxury car from Hindustan Motors. It could have been that of ‘Old Monk’, but that supply went out a week back from the thekas around us, which made me get a Contessa addha instead. Even that addha had run out now. Supply of such basic amenities has always been an issue here in Delhi. 10 pm being the time when thekas religiously pull down their shutters. Its 11 pm in most other cities. In Haryana there is no such limit recognized by the likes of yours truly.

‘Click…click…click’ & suddenly white light floods the room & the cornea of my eyeballs to the extent of a tinge of pain. The flickering flame of the candle was inconsequential now. The acrid smoke from the blackened thread of the candle was all that was left after I had blown it out by a breath laden with the smell of dark rum & cigarettes. And on the white marble floor, encased under a few drops of still solidifying wax, lay the inconsequential remains of an otherwise half-dead bug which had dared to come too close to the flame. The very hand that was forced to pen this down had poured those hot drops to free the spirit; the very spirit that once free had forced these hands to pen this down.

This seems to be a perfect place to satiate the keeda of writing that has been wiggling in me since long.

Guess its time to bring it out & unleash it on you all...ha ha ha ha (here, imagine a B-grade raakshas laughing in a C-grade version of a Hindu mythological movie) !!!