The job......part 2

read part 1 here

Abhijeet had made up his mind to join Life Biotech, and this time as he walked into the Life Biotech tower, his stride was more confident. He had been contemplating joining the organization weighing out other job prospects. He originally hailed from a village near Noida and shifting to Panchkula had looked difficult.

But the salary package was good enough to outweigh every other offer he had at hand. He had spoken to his school buddy Sanjog, who lived here and was convinced that it would be a good organization to work with. That the city smelled and looked great would be an added advantage.

He finished his joining formalities and walked out feeling rather proud of his decision and couldn’t wait to let his wife Sahana in on the good news. He couldn’t wait to enter the research lab and do what he had always dreamt of doing. He would have a discovery of his own one day and have an exclusive patent in his name. The world famous scientist Abhijeet Sharma!

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For the first time in 28 years, Abhijeet felt like a free man. His mother had worked at a garment factory and his father was a taxi driver. He was fortunate enough to be sent to the government school at Rampur village near Greater Noida. Abhijeet had been a bright boy, always topping his class. Studying in a government school had never been a setback for a boy of his caliber, and he had been quick to learn the subjects. There was a fire that raged within him, a hunger to achieve, to free himself of his humble background.

His teachers had been proud of him. The local MLA had magnanimously offered to finance Abhijeet’s higher education if he wanted to study further. Step by step, Abhijeet had climbed the ladder of education and had completed his B.Pharma degree and his M.Pharma in pharmacology.

He walked into his office wearing starched new clothes and a white lab coat, looking every inch the scientist he had come here to be. He was ushered into Mr. Narayan’s chamber and they got busy with the various work related technicalities.

He was taken for a tour of the whole building upto the 4th floor. He wondered what was beyond it, the tower seemed to be eight floors tall. The research units had a 3 door entry where they got sanitized and disinfected and changed clothes and wore protective gear to avoid any contamination and infection. He did not even have enough time to have lunch, not that he minded.

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It was almost 6 months since his joining and Sahana had been complaining that he had been so busy with his work that he not even bothered to go on an outing with her.

“I know of a lovely place,” she said animatedly, “Morni hills. Shall we go there for the weekend?”

They drove to Morni hills in their brand new car and spent the day loafing around the place. Among the spurs of the hills were two lakes and a hill divided the lakes, but locals said there was a hidden channel or tunnel as the level of waters in the two lakes remained the same.

Abhijeet and Sahana had reached one end of the hidden tunnel, and Abhijeet suggested that they venture in and swim across to the other end. Sahana was not as enterprising and suggested they race instead, she over the hill and he through the tunnel.

“Let’s see who reaches the other side first,” she winked.

“Ok then, let’s start.”

Sahana climbed up the hill slowly and steadily and Abhijeet entered the tunnel. There were very few people inside, hardly 4 or 5. It got darker as he waded through the waters and that is when he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder. He couldn’t see who it was and he felt a stranger tap him gently on his shoulders.

“Hello Abhijeet.”

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read part 3 here 

The job....part 1

“Arre babu, no one is missing, ok?  Why are you cracking your head over a non- existent case?” Kalra threw up his hands resignedly and visibly upset with Sanjog pestering him. “There will be no investigation in this matter, do you get me Sanju? The police have said there is no reason for a suspicion. On your insistence, I have spent close to two precious days looking for non existent clues in a non existent case. And now I refuse to take any more of this crap.”

“Boss, trust me, I have a gut feeling…”

“Your ‘gut’? My foot!” Kalra cut him short. He seemed to be on the verge of bursting out into one of his famous ‘volcanic’ moods.

“I will not have my star reporter waste any more of my time talking about this nonsense. There is plenty of actual…” pausing at the word for dramitised effect and making a little quote-unquote action with his fingers in the air, he continued, “news to cover. Collect your tickets for Mumbai from Sheetal, you will be leaving tomorrow to cover the economic forum meet for the next few days. And make sure you get sound bites from every one who is co-chairing this forum. Can you please excuse me now?”

With droopy shoulders and heavy feet, Sanjog dragged himself away from his boss’ cubicle. Kalra was indeed ‘the impregnable Kalra’. No one could argue with him, much less win an argument with him. How would he convince his boss that he was onto something big, something fishy?

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Baba Gurudebji’s charitable home on the outskirts of Panchkula was home to many homeless people. His childhood sweetheart, Sonia was a volunteer at the home and over lunch one day, she had confided how people were constantly disappearing from the shelter.

“Maybe they are moving to a better place”, he had teased.

“What rubbish! You know, this place is more a home than any charitable trust ever could be.”

She was convinced that all the people who had left Baba Gurudebji’s charitable home were actually missing. There was a mystery somewhere. She had hoped, Sanjog could investigate being associated with the city’s leading newspaper.

“Why don’t you tell the police?”

“”People have been leaving voluntarily; some claimed by a lost relative, some getting a job offer somewhere…”

“So, what’s so suspicious?”

“Don’t you see? All this is happening suddenly. I have been working here for the past five years; nothing as dramatic as ever happened.”

“Then, you have all the more reason to go to the police.”

“The trust doesn’t want to. I have spoken to them. They say, they do not want unnecessary attention! Besides, these people have decided to leave on their own so we cannot do anything.”

“Which trust doesn’t want attention? That sounds suspicious to me too! So you think they are hiding something?”

“Exactly.”

“But why bother?”

“I am not here for fun. I have been serving these guys for five years. Suddenly, if people just start disappearing, it leaves me flustered. Do I make sense?”

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As Sanjog boarded the hopper flight to Mumbai, he wondered what he would tell Sonia. He had tried his best, talking to the inmates and the trustees. The inmates seemed happy their friends had found new direction in life. No one suspected anything fishy.

The trustees had the signed documents in their files proving that the ‘missing’ people were not actually missing but had left for the better. Some of them had been claimed by their long lost relatives, they had documented the letters of appreciation from the grateful kin, some had got job offers, and everything looked in order.

He had convinced Kalra to use his contacts in the police for a deeper probe. Kalra was hesitant at first, but persistence finally paid. He managed to get the police on the job but they had drawn a blank too. Little wonder that Kalra who could tell you precisely how much a minute of his was worth, was fuming at the two wasted days that yielded nothing.

Sanjog now tried to concentrate on the job at hand, the economic forum meet, the chief ministers and their entourage, the CEO’s and MD’s of big companies, virtually the who’s who of the economic world. His colleagues Ravi Shankar Pasricha and Tarun Bhatia would be joining him shortly. He wondered whether he should discuss the case with them but eventually decided against it. Both were confidants of Kalra, and he didn’t want to draw daggers with his boss atleast during this time of the year. This year’s appraisal was crucial for a much needed salary hike. No, he could not afford to mess with it. He would have to find another way to help out Sonia.

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read part 2   part 3

Ah! to be that river!

Originating from the peaks,
Of mountains steep and high,
Gurgling and dancing and singing,
A beautiful river flows by.

It runs through plains and plateaus,
And unwinds its way out,
Of deep and green valleys,
Twisting and turning about.

It stumbles over little pebbles,
Stones and rocks and boulders,
Yet fighting its way through,
It emerges out victorious!

Pure as fire, holy as a prayer,
A crystal, clear and bright,
Shining like gold in the sun,
And like silver in moonlight!

It is a never ending saga ,
That only goes on forever.
Living in the present ,
unmindful of the past or the future.

Thus ultimately it merges,
With the vast and deep blue sea,
A confluence of determined rivers,
A heaven, it happens to be!

There are other rivers that have,
Stopped having come a little way,
Ending up as small pools of water,
Never reaching the bay.

Their existence futile and cursed,
No parched soul they quench,
Just stagnant,muddy and lifeless,
A pool of stink and stench!

Ah! To be that river!
So brave and clear and pure,
Is so blessed and divine ,
Than a filthy life endure!

(The Diwali clean up yielded this poem tucked away in a yellowed diary...written by me eons ago!! there was something about the child-like yet inspiring poem...thought i'd share....)
(Pic courtesy: Google images)

Tongue (un)tied?

“Watch out, you moron!” screamed Ankit through his car window, looking at the two bikers speeding by on the highway.

‘Hmm…A Harley Davidson! Cool bike but lousy rider’ he thought. They had come real close to his car and he hoped they had not dented his ‘baby’. He braked to a halt for a closer inspection of his shining black sedan.

“Marega Sala” he cursed as he touched the spot that had been scrapped off showing an ugly mark in its place.

He got back into his car still cussing under his breath, fretting about the dent. He had driven a couple of miles, when he saw a huge crowd blocking almost the entire road. He peeped out calling for someone from the crowd.

‘Hello bhaiyaji…..Is there a problem? Why the traffic jam?”

“Accident sir, two bikers just crashed into a slow moving truck carrying heavy iron rods. Both were dead on the spot.”

Beads of perspiration started to form on Ankit’s forehead as he got down from his car and walked to the place of the accident. He couldn’t look on beyond a minute. The mangled remains of the Harley Davidson and the bloodbath around it revealed a gory story. Two lifeless bodies lay nearby awaiting the police and ambulance to transport them.

He reached home looking quite disturbed. Neha, who was tending to her garden, saw him and ran to the driveway.

“You look like you just saw a ghost. Why so pale and dull, love? Anything happened?”

He recounted the happenings of the day narrating how guilty he felt for having cursed them. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. They were not driving carefully. Maybe they would have met with the accident even if you had not cursed them. Stop feeling so guilty.”

“or maybe not…” he said eyes closed in thought.

Neha cuddled his head, giving him a hug, as he stood begrudging himself. 

“It’s ok baby…it’s not your fault.”

“It’s not a one off incident Neha, this has started becoming eerily repetitive!” he threw his jacket on sofa and slumped into it, staring blankly at the wall.

“You are only imagining things, Ankit. You cannot just say something for it to happen.”

“Oh really? Well, you remember the article I wrote about Vikram and his struggle with cancer? About how brave he was being, how he was an inspiration to everyone...blah …blah..? And what happened? He passed away couple of days after that article got published. How do you explain that? Maybe I have a cursed tongue or something.”

“He was struggling. He was dying anyway. We both know that. That article was a co-incidence.”

“Would you call Neelima didi’s bus accident a co-incidence? The bus had its entire right side ripped off. All eighteen people on the right side suffered grievous injuries. You know why? All because of this,” he said pointing to his tongue, “this damned cursed thing.”

“Ankit, my love, you did not cause that accident. You merely told didi to sit on the left side of the bus.”

“I told her, 'didi sit on the left hand side; even if there’s an accident, the impact is lesser there'. Am I a freak? Why did I have to say such things?”

“But that saved her life, didn’t it?”

“That is not the point. I kind of find that freaky. I cannot explain why I said what I did.”

“Well, well…let’s prove that all this is a co-incidence, ok? So say something just like that, umm…say that something will happen to me”, she tried to make him see reason.

“Are you trying to make fun of me? It doesn’t work like that girl. I don’t think about what I say. I just say it. Ok?”

“Say this roof is going to collapse on my head”, she suggested gesturing to the ceiling and smiling.

“Neha….”

“Hmm…..how about the gas, is it going to explode as I turn it on. Say it and let me try,” she said walking to the kitchen.

“Neha, don’t…..”

Without waiting for him to finish, she continued, “am I going to get electrocuted? or  perhaps fall down and break my leg?”

“yea, woman, go break your leg! Enough Neha, you are unbelievable.” He sighed and walked to his room.

“I am only trying to tell you that you are worrying unnecessarily”, he heard her voice trail off as he shut the door of his room.

“Ahhh…..ouch….Ankit…” he heard Neha’s blood curdling scream and the sound of something falling down with a thud. He rushed out to see what happened.

He saw Neha sprawled on the floor. Apparently with her leg broken, having slipped over, he wondered over what!

image courtesy :google

Raavana

There was once a big guy with a lot of heads. On a particular day when the combined grey matter of all his heads were in resting stage, he unceremoniously kidnapped a married woman and whisked her off to his exotic land. He regretted his decision pretty soon. For he paid for it with all his heads rolled off his proud and arrogant neck.

The once mighty Raavana is paying for it every year since. As thousands of years later, people still find it entertaining to see his head blasted off with crackers. Amidst festivities and distribution of sweets.

In the very same place as the festivities, thousands of women are being whisked off unceremoniously every day. Putting even the mighty Raavava to shame! But the modern Raavana walks tall with his proud and arrogant head still intact on his head. The wails of the outraged women notwithstanding. 

Wonder when these Raavanas will pay for their sins? Wonder why this lopsided justice? Wonder…?