J - DIARY PAGE: TUESDAY-17 DECEMBER 2002

TUESDAY- 17 DECEMBER 2002

I was standing in the queue at the railway booking counter meant
exclusively for the ladies. The man behind the counter was a slow hand;
a couple of ladies were before me and I knew my turn would come after
sometime. Nothing else to do I looked all around. There were several
other counters with only the men standing in long queues, each one
waiting for his turn to come. The lady behind me was getting irritated
at the slow pace of the booking clerk and was cursing him, and taking
this opportunity I entered into conversation with her just for the sake
of passing the time.

Uproar at the next counter made me look around. A young fellow and a
man in police uniform were having some heated arguments. All that I
could gather from the hullabaloo, the policeman was trying to push the
youth and break the queue. The argument got hotter to the extent that
there was pushing and shoving. There was a scuffle and the man in
uniform spoke in a demeaning tone to the young man. He spoke to the
youngster addressing him as 'tu', meaning 'you' in English. There are
three forms of addressing in our Indian languages ------- "tu, tum and
aap' ------ all meaning 'you'. 'Tu' is used for close friends and young
ones only; 'tum' is used for friends, close relatives, those well known
to someone and commoners. 'Aap' is used to address any unknown person
and some one of respect. The policeman suddenly addressed the youth as
'tu' which was not the proper way of addressing a stranger in
public.

The harsh and high tone of throwing words at one another continued for
quite some time. There were about three score people all over the place
but no one bothered about the happening. I wanted to interfere as I
felt the youth was not at fault and the man in uniform was taking
advantage of his being the guardian of law. He threatened the young man
of dire consequences later on.

I looked around found a couple of policemen entering the railway
reservation office and closing in towards the young man. By then my
turn had come and after paying at the counter, I was on my way.
Crossing down I did not find the youth or the policemen, and an
inquisitive inquisition revealed that the policeman had taken the young
fellow with them. I was disturbed for these men who are thought to be
the guardians of law are the nuisance makers and they are ready to
bully the innocent at their will. I felt guilty as I could not help the
young man but no one came forward to speak out a word in his
favour.

This incident reminded me of something that I had come across at this
place. A couple of years back, one morning I had gone to this
particular place to get tickets for my family. After filling up the
reservation slip I handed it over to the booking clerk. He worked very
slowly on the computer and I had to wait just outside the glass
partition with my right hand inside the small opening to pay the amount
and collect my ticket.

He looked up and said, "Madam you have to pay a fine because of your
mistake. I have to cancel this ticket. You should have been careful
mentioning the date of your journey and the return journey; both the
dates have been mentioned as the same day."

I was taken aback at my mistake and the whole thing worried me as this
was my first experience at the booking counter. All this was because my
travel agent had earlier cheated me several times and I thought the
best way of getting rid of him was to get it done on my own. Very
softly I said, "But you should have checked it before feeding it in the
computer. Anyway, I will pay the fine but I want the cancelled ticket."
He looked at me and suddenly he changed his tone and said, "I will take
the risk of canceling and you need not pay the fine. Please correct the
error in the reservation slip." I got my tickets, paid the amount and
no fine for the cancellation of which I had been asked for.

Back home I was told that the person had taken advantage of my
ignorance and was trying to make some money by unfair means.

I am no longer a novice, but always check up the status of the
availability of tickets on the internet and then go to get it because
on line services of buying tickets is available in India only in a
couple of cosmopolitan cities.

Today's incident makes me feel guilty for not lending help and brought
back a reminder of the incident which I had faced out of ignorance.