[Reader-list] Of Pension Mohalla and Khan

Wed Apr 25 21:29:21 IST 2007

dear zainab,
i so enjoyed this posting. thanks for sharing it. 
thought i'd share one of my own.
cheers
lalitha

We got into the autorickshaw in a hurried scramble barely
looking at him. Once I had said Gandhi Bazaar and we had settled somewhat I
looked at him more closely. A kindly face- the first thing that came into my
mind I’m not sure why except that he smiled at me- covered with white stubble.
I was busy discussing work with my companion and it was only when there was a
longish pause in our conversation that he started making conversation. I used
to work in a shop, he said, but I didn’t like it. You’re not your own master
there and I didn’t like having to work so hard and take orders from someone
else. I made an ok living but…so I decided to leave and start my own business. 

This is my own auto, he said proudly. Do you know how much
autos cost, sister? “Sister” - I have always liked that form of address from
strangers. It conveys a sense of camaraderie in age and experience and
thinking. No, I said, I don’t know how much auto rickshaws cost. “One lakh and
seventy thousand” he said, “only a little less than a maruti car.” I was
startled into an explanation. He was pleased with the reaction this provoked.
“I got a loan and its been 3 years and have almost paid it off.” 

“What do you do”, he asked me? I struggled to explain the
kind of urban research I do. “You study the city and its development and change”,
he responded with interest. Then he pointed out several places of interest – we
were passing through Jayanagar 4th block. “See all the new buildings
and big shopping malls coming up,” he said, “I know this area very well.”

After a few minutes of driving, he turned around and asked
shyly, “Can I ask you something sister? I want to ask your advice because you
are so educated and clever.” “What is it”, I asked? “You see all these new
malls- do you think if someone like me went and applied for a job selling
things there, I would get it? What do you need for a job there?” As I paused to
think of how to respond, he said eagerly, “I can speak a little English.” He
immediately spoke some broken English.  

“Someone like me”- those words still resound. I fumbled
then, as I do now, “maybe you can try, you don’t know till you try.” As I was
saying this I felt so inadequate- to judge what he was worth, how marketable he
was. And yet, I knew I wasn’t being truthful- the bright shiny malls that held
such irresistible appeal would probably not be interested in someone like him.
They would want someone younger, more attractive, more plastic somehow – a
better symbol of the world class cities we belong to. 

I asked, “But why do you want to leave off driving your auto
rickshaw.” Immediately he said, “I just thought of that as an idea sister, and
I wanted to ask you what my chances are.” He dismissed his question as idle
speculation. But I felt instinctively that it wasn’t. I had the feeling that he
would like to enter this new world- with its shiny tiled floor, bright colours,
expensive smells and vigilant sentries. 

Now I can’t visit a mall in quite the same way I used to- a
hurried blinkered rush in and out for the purchase I need. I realize the
privilege contained in entry and the world of aspirations left outside. 

----- Original Message ----
From: zainab <zainab at mail.xtdnet.nl>
To: reader-list at sarai.net; urbanstudygroup at sarai.net
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 9:49:50 AM
Subject: [Reader-list] Of Pension Mohalla and Khan

16/04/07

‘Pension Mohalla’, the address read on the details of the display board in his auto. I was intrigued. I asked him what kind of place was ‘Pension Mohalla’. He said these were old names of places. ‘Pension Mohalla’ is about one and a half kilometers away from K. R. Market, he explained. 

Khan is his name. His physique is on the leaner side, and he looks friendly and kind. I entered the autorickshaw outside Theological College on Millers Road. A bunch of North East boys were in his auto. They wanted him to drive them inside the college. But he told them, Paidal chalo, paidal chalo. Go walk inside. I have a fare waiting here.

My curiosity about ‘Pension Mohalla’ got us talking. In reality, it was my desperation to connect with this city that got me talking to him - my search for ordinarily extraordinary stories in this city. 

Khan owns the auto he is riding, among the few auto drivers I have encountered so far who own the auto they drive. He says his auto runs his household and that he recently got his daughter married through the earnings of the rickshaw. He completed schooling and then did a vocational course in air-condition repairs. But back then in 1988-1990, he said, there was no demand for his services. As a matter of desire he learnt how to drive. This auto, cars and even buses, I learnt to drive them all. I wanted to drive a bus, but I just cannot seem to get off riding this auto. Already, riding this auto from 10 in the morning to 10 at night, my ears burn, my eyes burn, I have backache and, look at these hands, they start to hurt. And the dust around, that also causes fatigue.

He asks me whether I am still studying. Then he wonders why I am headed towards Jayanagar. I am amazed, he says, you study here and you live there. Dikkat nahi hoti? Nowadays, it is luxury for even working class people to ride in autos and you are a student here. I am amazed. I explain to him that I live in Jayanagar and also study there and that I was at the Theological College on a special class. That’s what I was wondering, otherwise it is too expensive for students to ride in autos.

As we continue to ride further up, I tell him that I was in Bangalore back in 1993 sometime and the city was different then. Oh yeah, it has changed a lot now. Earlier, main aankhein moondke gaadi chalata tha, I would close my eyes and ride and today, I am afraid even as I keep my eyes open and attention focused. Traffic has increased. Now just look at this man here on the scooter, he has stopped in the middle of this thick traffic to talk on his cell phone. Back then, the city was different. Now, it has improved. I wonder what ‘improved’ means to Khan. He goes on. I encounter so many people who come from outside to study in Bangalore – from Bihar, Delhi, the madrasis – they all come here. How long have you been here? Nine months, I tell him. How long will you be here? Three years. Hmmm, even in software you see, many people from outside are coming - from Bihar, Delhi, the madrasis. There are good earnings, you can have a good life. But I remark that this city is ver!
 y expensive. Why do you say that, he asks. I tell him that commuting is a cheaper affair in Bombay given the trains and the buses. But there are buses here too, he tells me, trying to understand. But here the buses run only on main roads, I explain, and then, in Bombay, the train is always there. Ah, trains run on the roads there haan? he asks. I don’t know what to say. Then he says, I have never to been to Bombay or Delhi, but I have heard about these cities. I was born in Bangalore, have grown up here, aur idhareech main khatam hona hai. His words remind of the dialogue I had heard in the movie Namesake. A fellow passenger in the train asks Ashoke Ganguly whether he has been abroad, ‘England, America’? Ashoke says he has never been to these places but then his grandfather had told him that books are meant to help travel. Here is Khan, working through an imagination of the cities he does not know and he perhaps does not even have the books to help him travel. He late!
 r tells me that last night he watched a television programme which ann
 ounced that Delhi is the best city in India and he started wondering where does Bangalore figure in the scheme of India. Main soochne laga, Dilli ki baatein kar rahe hai yeh log, Bangalore kahan pe aata hain India mein. He says that the best thing about Bangalore is the weather – cool climate and lots of greenery. That is why they have named this Garden City, he tells me.

I continue to talk to him about the costs of living in Bangalore being high. Rents are high, I tell him. Oh yes, I agree. Back in my time, a house in my area was available for three hundred rupees monthly rent. If you gave four hundred, you would get more amenities. Five hundred, even more and with six hundred to seven hundred rupees, you could get two rooms, a kitchen, good water, etc. How much rent do you pay? I lied to him saying I pay three thousand when in fact I pay four. He is shocked and says, you find two or three people to live with you. Then you can each pay a thousand and spend about two thousand monthly on food. I cook at home, I tell him. He asks if I can make rotis and I say yes. How about rice? I tell him I eat red rice. And chappatis, you eat wheat eh? Yeah, and also raagi. Really, do you eat raagi rotis? he asks me. Yes, I tell him. We make raagi mudde at home. But back in the villages, they eat the rotis. with spicy chutneys, I tell him immediately. Yeah,
 !
 he says excitedly, clicking his fingers, you are right, with chutneys. I think we have connected now.

I have relatives in Thilaknagar, he tells me. I tell him I like living in Thilaknagar because it is a noisy and vibrant area. Yes, he says, otherwise you have houses scattered at distances. In Bangalore, he says, 80% people are good and only 20% are not so good. Only 20%, he emphasizes. See, if you ask for directions in this city, people will tell you, unlike in Bombay or Delhi where people don’t have the time to tell you. Here, in Bangalore, you see this man walking on the roads, if you ask him for directions, he will tell you. In fact, if he is going in the same direction, he will come along with you and say, ‘I am also going in the same direction’. But back in Bombay and Delhi, people don’t tell right. See, what happens is that 20% of the not-so-nice people, they are jealous of outsiders coming here and making money. They say these people are outsiders. Jealous people. 

We arrive. I ask him to stop on the main road so that I can walk into the lanes, to my house. He asks me where I stay. I explain to him. The fare reads Rs. 62. He returns forty rupees to me. I tell him to wait as I fish for two rupees. He says, let it be. Don’t bother about two rupees. You are a student here. I tell him the two rupees are his earnings and that he should let me give it to him. He smiles at me as I leave. It is a smile which tells me that for that moment of our journey together, for that time that he drove me, we traveled into each other’s lives, in Bombay, in Bangalore, in Delhi. We journeyed together.

It was desperation to seek my own words, to seek stories in this city that I got talking to Khan. I still seek the ordinary lives which have stories to tell me, stories which reinforce that these lives are not ordinary, that they make this city- whether it is Bangalore, Bombay or Delhi. I seek these stories …

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