Moong Over Microchips

by Venkat Iyer

  Working out the Finance

  Our plan was taking shape now. We would buy land in a village and try to live there. We would have to build a small house and have some basic infrastructure. The whole idea was not to generate money but to try and live off the land. We would have to grow all the essentials that we needed to eat and the balance, if any, could be sold. This meant that the farm would have to be a mix of horticulture and agriculture. We would have to grow fruit trees and other trees but at the same time leave enough room to grow vegetables, cereals, oilseeds, rice or wheat and other essentials. In case there was not enough cash generated to buy stuff, we would have to dig into our resources and savings.

  The detailed spreadsheet I had made projected that with the money we would have left after setting up the farm, we would survive for another three years. Of course this was based on an assumption that Rs 6000 a month would be enough for us to live in a village. If we sold off all our assets, including the car and the house in Mumbai, then we would have enough money to survive for ten years before we were broke. This was assuming that there was no income from the land and we were dependant on the money we had saved all these years. It meant that we had three years to set up the place and turn it around before we started digging into our assets.

  It was a tight budget.

  The time was short.

  We had no knowledge of farming.

  We had never lived in a village before.

  We had not yet found any land we liked.

  Ah! This sounded like so many of the projects I had handled for IBM . . .

  Everything was in place on paper for the transition. All we needed was a piece of land to make this come true. We started looking in earnest. It was just like earlier when we were searching for a weekend getaway except that our criteria had changed. Now, we were not looking at the scenery but at the soil. Was this good soil? Was there local labour available? Where was the water source for irrigation? What kind of trees grew around the place? What were the traditional crops in the area? And so on. Also, from one or two acres of land we were now looking at a larger piece of land, around 4–5 acres.

  We were exploring areas around Dahanu, about 120 kilometres from Mumbai. There was a lot of land for sale in these areas but they were larger tracts of 15 plus acres which we could neither afford nor handle. We had to find something that was small and would fit into our budget. As days turned into weeks and then into months, we were nowhere close to buying land.

  A Cinematic Encounter and the Final Plunge

  It was around June 2003 that Meena accidentally met one of her old friends, Raajen Singh, in a library in Mumbai. Raajen had a small farm near Boisar and in the course of their conversation she mentioned that she was looking for a farm. Raajen immediately put us in touch with a broker named Moru Valvi in the Nanivali village close to his farm. We spoke to Moru and he promised to show us land which was for sale around his village.

  As scheduled, we landed up at his place on a Sunday morning so he could show us around. One of the first places we visited was a beautiful farm in the village of Peth. The land was on the banks of the River Surya with small hillocks in the distance. The total area was 4.5 acres which was just what we were looking for. It had a fence running along the perimeter and was fully overgrown. There were a few chikoo (sapodilla) trees and a small house at the centre of the field. It looked shabby and unkempt but seemed to have great potential. We liked the place at once but the owner was asking for around Rs 16 lakh, which was way beyond our budget.

  Moru Valvi, or Moru Dada as everyone called him, our broker who was also the sarpanch of Nanivali, showed us a lot of land but nothing caught our fancy. We exchanged phone numbers and were assured by him that next week he would have more land to show to us.

  We had not yet identified the land we wanted and nothing seemed to be moving positively. Also, I was finding it difficult to make time to go to the village looking for land regularly. Only Sundays were free and sometimes I had work to complete and we could not go. I realized that for things to happen I would have to concentrate more. Finally, a week before the American con call, I convinced Meena that the only way to take our project and dream forward was to quit IBM and concentrate on this full time. Though Meena understood the gravity of the situation, she still stuck to her stand that we needed to identify the land at least before I quit.

  I realized it would be impossible to juggle the new project and look for land. The project was scheduled to start in December and my conscience did not permit me to start the project and then quit it midway. Finally, in the first week of November 2003, I decided to submit my resignation. It was a huge step for me. I was leaving the corporate world where I was supposedly doing well, and stepping into the unknown world of farming. I had no idea what it was to farm and live in a village. There was only one thing I was sure about. I felt encouraged by the fact that 65 per cent of our country lived in villages. There must be something going there, despite all the deaths, the gloom and the doomsday predictions.

  At IBM, when one resigns, you have to fill in an electronic form and submit it to the system. On 4 November 2003, after reaching office, I called Meena at home to tell her that I was about to submit my resignation. Meena was bursting with news. A few minutes ago, she had got a call offering her a job with a newspaper in Mumbai. It was an amazing coincidence. This was something we had not expected. I pressed the submit button, taking this new development as a green signal.

  3

  Searching for Land

  The Transition

  It was a month of intense speculation at IBM after I had submitted my resignation. I had spent seven long years there and knew quite a lot of people within the organization. The phones were buzzing all through the day with calls from different IBM locations as many people wanted to know where I was going. I had told only a few friends about my venture. After discussing my current assignments and work, IBM decided to relieve me on 31 December 2003. It suited me fine. I would start the New Year on a clean slate.

  I woke up early on 1 January 2004 to get ready for work. It suddenly dawned on me that I had nowhere to go. I was unemployed. I crept back into bed and tried to sleep longer. It was an inexplicable feeling. I was sleeping, knowing that I could do this for as long as I wanted. After working for fifteen years, now I did not have to rush and get ready to beat the traffic snarls while I drove to office. I did not have to match my shirt with the tie I wore that day nor did I have to gobble up my breakfast as I rushed down the stairs. I did not have to worry about conference calls or wonder if the proposal I had submitted was opened or not. The only scary thought was that at the end of the month, there would be no fat salary cheque.

  It took a whole week for the impact of my action to sink in. It was one long week and sometimes there were moments of panic when I thought of what I had actually done. Before long I got over the initial tense moments and was back searching for land in earnest. It was no longer only on Sundays or holidays that I could go to the villages. I would go every two or three days and meet as many people as I could. They would take me across slushy fields and over tiny hillocks identifying pieces of land they claimed were for sale. I would shortlist a few and then Meena and I would see them together. If we liked any, we would move to the next stage of financial discussions. It was a slow, tedious process and the urgency was only for us. For the villagers, things moved at their own pace. This was the first lesson I was to learn in my new life as a farmer.

  Time was not important. Everything had to be done at a steady pace in the villages. I would plan to meet someone at 2 p.m. in the afternoon only to find them walking in at 4 p.m. The explanation was simple; they had missed the bus. You miss one bus and the next one was only after two hours. At first I would pace up and down like a caged tiger till I realized that there was no hurry. I learnt to pace myself. I learnt to sit for two hours at a bus stop just watching the cattle go by and the dragonflies buzz around. I learnt that two days could mean anything from a week to a month.
You rushed around with not a moment’s rest only in the city.

  I had still not found an area that I liked. There was something about buying land. When you reached the place and stood at the centre of the field you had to get a good feeling, that’s what a friend told us once. We were still not getting that ‘good feeling’. The land should talk to you, my friend had said. Every time we looked at a piece of land we thought was great, we would feel something was telling us not to buy it. We just had to trust our instincts.

  I stopped taking the car all the way to the villages. It was too expensive, besides the price always went up the moment people saw a car. I travelled by train to Boisar and then took a bus. As I sat in the train on my way back after another fruitless search, I could not help but think of my past, the city and the transition I was trying to make. I had spent thirty-seven years in this great city of Bombay, now renamed Mumbai. The city remains the same no matter what you call it. In thirty-seven years they say the city grows on you. You become part of a well-oiled machinery where every nut, every screw, every cog goes about its task unmindful of everything else.

  It must be the only place in the world where the 7.53 a.m. fast local train has more meaning than a bleeding person lying by the tracks, knocked down by a train as he was crossing the tracks, probably while running to catch the 7.49 a.m. double fast.

  My first job in this city with Rallis India had its share of train travel to Churchgate. The daily discussions in the train would cover wide-ranging issues. How do we get the prized window seat? Was Holi on a Sunday (which meant one holiday less)? Will there be flooding of tracks in the monsoon? Or on how the outstation trains delayed the local trains coming into town. One would think that these outstation trains did not carry any people and were only being run to cause havoc to the city’s commuting masses. At no point would the discussion centre on why people just could not make it for an earlier train. It was sacrilege to even suggest such a thing.

  The great financial capital of India, Mumbai, is kind to all. During that time, there were numerous ways of making money here and there was a lot of money around. The service industry was growing and even fresh graduates were earning five-figure salaries. Discussions were changing in office canteens from train problems to cars. People talked about the latest mobile phones or the different cars available, their merits and demerits and, of course, the all-encompassing car loans. Many a precious hour has been spent on the interest percentage and the best deals in town. Spreadsheets were exchanged with the latest and most complex analysis on the loans available.

  Salaries were zooming for the middle class and money was so much in surplus that people were contemplating buying a second house or a second car or better still a bigger house and a bigger car. All one had to do was be a part of this fantastic money-spewing machine called Mumbai.

  A Different Journey

  As I sat in the train watching the landscape blur past me, my thoughts went back to the day’s events. At 7.50 a.m., the Borivali-bound local was almost empty at Goregaon station. As the train entered Kandivali station, there was a thundering noise of people jumping inside to catch seats. These were the ‘return’ guys, the ones who took the train to Borivali and returned in the same train to go to their destinations towards town. A group came menacingly towards us and rudely asked an old man to get up. The man was completely puzzled as he too had a ticket. As he tried to protest, a kind passenger advised him to quietly get up since this group always occupied the same seats. Welcome to the train gangs. These young, energetic, noisy, well-dressed guys, toting the latest mobile phones, smoking in the train despite the various signs put up, suddenly took over the entire compartment. All those who were not part of their elite group were pushed out, shoved and generally made fun of.

  I left them behind at Borivali from where I had to catch the Ferozepur Janata Express to go to Boisar. I couldn’t help notice a large crowd standing in between the tracks, rather than on the platform. As the train rumbled to a stop I realized why they were standing on the other side. Their friends inside were part of a different train mafia which did not let you open the door of the train on the side of the platform. Only people standing in between the tracks got in and these were the regulars or members of some group.

  After repeated requests to the person sitting inside, the door on the platform side was opened just as the train started to leave the station. I managed to squeeze in and sat among another gang of barbarians. During the journey, most of the chatter was about their workplace, bitching about their bosses or planning elaborate vacations. All of them had the latest mobile phones and this was the main topic of conversation.

  Newspapers were circulated so in effect one got to read at least 2–3 papers during the journey. During this trip, a group of municipal doctors sitting across had a problem in opening the cover of their new Nokia mobile phone, so I volunteered to help them. Once the mobile was opened, they went back to their chatter with not even a thanks mumbled. You did not exist and even if you did, it made no difference to them. My attempt to start a conversation with one of them was politely ignored. This close-knit family did not allow strangers. I quietly went back to reading my newspaper for the rest of the journey.

  An hour later, walking along the road near Boisar station, looking for the bus stop, I asked for directions from an old man. He smiled at me and asked me to accompany him. A few yards away we reached the bus stop. There was no sign or bus shelter; it was just a tea shop where the bus stopped. As the state transport bus ground to a halt, a few passengers shouted out loudly: ‘Burhanpur! Burhanpur!’ This was for the benefit of all those who could not read the fading sign on the bus. The door opened and the crowd allowed the old man to get in first, followed by women and children. The young men were the last to hop into the bus goaded by the conductor screaming, ‘Chala! Chala! (Let’s go! Let’s go!)’. It was amazing to see the bus fill up without a shove or a push. As I settled down in the dusty rickety seat, I recalled the barbarians getting into the local and rudely moving the old man out. I couldn’t help but wonder which one of the groups was really educated.

  The young boy next to me got up to offer a seat to an old man. I was suddenly overcome with shame. Shouldn’t I have done this? As if in repentance I shifted to make space for the boy to sit. To start a conversation, I asked him his educational qualifications. He replied proudly, ‘Fourth standard pass.’ I politely asked him why he did not study further. He said without a moment’s hesitation, ‘The school is in the next village and I do not have money to go there every day.’ I thought of my education and the money that was spent by my parents.

  The old man sitting next to me smiled and asked, ‘Where from?’ His name was Balkrishna Ravindra Gharat. Within a span of fifteen minutes, he told me his entire life story. I knew the name of each of his sons and grandsons at the end of it. He wrung out every bit of information about my family and myself too. At this point, I could not but think of the mobile-toting gang of doctors in the train who did not even have the courtesy to thank me for helping them out. Ghetto behaviour is common in the city and each individual lived in his or her own cocoon.

  Turning my attention to the people in the bus I found a lot of women who looked as if they were off to work. They were either teachers at the village schools or social workers doing some survey of sorts. Everyone knew everyone, including the conductor and the driver. The driver stopped in front of a school or basti for the women to get off. Each one wished the other a good day before getting off the bus with promises to meet in the evening. At one place, one of the women requested the driver to switch off the engine. It seemed like a strange request, till she stuck her head out of the window and yelled at the children outside to go to school. It was the first time I saw a human school bell.

  At Nanivali village, my destination, after the day’s search for land was over, I sat at the village tea shop for a cup of tea. The shop was run by Konduram’s wife who was a fountain of information. She knew everything that happened around the v
illage and was up to date on all news. She grilled me for the half hour I sat there and wrung out every bit of personal detail that she could from me. I knew that this information would soon be spread across the village by her. A few trips later my fears were confirmed. As I walked into Ambeda a few villages ahead of Nanivali, a strange man asked me, ‘Ravi Seth, so you are still looking for land?’

  The discussions at the tea shop ranged from the current crops to some recent murder in the next village. That was just before the general elections and they were all awaiting directions from the village sarpanch on whom to vote for. They were all in awe of the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) which, they were sure, would deliver a big electric shock if they pressed the wrong button. I did my bit, rather futilely, to convince them that this was not true.

  At the tea shop, I asked the lady waiting with me when the next bus for Boisar was due. She smiled and said it would come. When I asked for the exact time, she explained in a very simple manner, ‘It will come once it passes us and goes to the village ahead.’ Such simple explanations compared to our concept of timing where a 7.53 and a 7.59 can make a huge difference in our lives. The return trip was finally in a lorry carrying construction material for the highway since the bus did not come.

  As the train trundled into Borivali, my destination, I couldn’t but think of the differences between the city and the village, a mere 100 kilometres away. The transition had just begun for me. Will the city throw me out or will I be able to throw out the city? Only time could tell. I couldn’t help but wonder that maybe it was not ‘transition’ but ‘transformation’ that we all needed.