‘Victoria! Pick me up,’ Banerjee bellowed at a passing carriage.
‘Napoleon! Napoleon!’ Young yelled. ‘Natwarlal.’
Natwarlal rushed to substitute the Chinese man at Banerjee’s side.
‘That will be eight annas,’ the carriage driver said.
‘Half a rupee? That’s extortion! Selling your horse, are you? During the day, it’s not even two annas,’ haggled Young.
‘There’s three of you. It’s way past midnight. The streets are knee deep in water. I will have to clean my Victoria after you get off. Thank your stars I’m here.’
‘When I see you again, I will remember what you charged me,’ Young muttered.
‘I have a very poor memory, sir. I won’t remember a thing. And I’m sure you won’t either.’
16
Young employed three enumerators to conduct a survey to know the who, why, what, where and how of paan-chewing in the city. He gave each of them a red notebook, a pencil and a typed sheet with instructions.
- The first row was to be filled with the column headings.
- The columns included the name of the person (or a unique identification if names were not forthcoming), a list of ingredients in his/her paan, the time of purchase, characteristics such as gender, age and occupation, and notes for additional information, if any.
- There were fourteen types of paan and forty-seven ingredients.
- The subsequent rows were to be populated with data for each individual.
- The enumerators were to sit at assigned locations: Colaba, Fort, and Mahim.
‘Hand in your reports every Friday, before five,’ Young ordered.
‘Myself, Thorle Saheb (The Eldest One), from Kasegaon village, Pandharpur taluka, Solapur district.’
‘Hmm.’ Young was surprised. He noticed the disconnect between Thorle Saheb’s formidable name and his not-so-formidable stature. His family had abandoned the name within the first few years, and now called him ‘Bandu’ although he resisted, refusing to answer to this sobriquet outside the bounds of his house. A lion is not called a lion because he is bigger. A cow is not called a cow because she is smaller.
Bandu became Enumerator A and was assigned to Colaba. Enumerator A settled on his elevated chair with a long notebook in one hand and a pencil in the other. It provided him some height, a different stratum of air to breathe in and a wider range of vision. He felt closer to his name—Thorle Saheb. Those who saw him on the chair called him numrator after the census enumerators they knew, but he was not that. He was a surveyor, carrying out a survey for the British Chewing Gum Company on the habits of paan-chewers in Bombay.
‘Can you see the ingredients?’ the Junior Officer asked.
‘Yes. Can I sit inside the shop?’ Enumerator A responded.
‘Not possible. Do you want to assist him? It had taken a lot of trouble to convince the paanwala to collaborate with this survey.’
‘No.’
The paanwala was fast. By the time Enumerator A opened his notebook, entered a number and looked up, the paanwala had brought out a betel leaf from a bucket of water, dried it on a red cloth, applied lime and katha from two separate jars, added menthol and saffron, blended the ingredients on the leaf, sprinkled betel nut, fennel seeds and dry dates, folded the leaf, and had topped it all with a clove. To Enumerator A, the opening and closing of jars occurred at a speed invisible to the naked eye, a blur.
‘Can you slow down, please?’
‘Why don’t you write down the name of the paan first and fill in the ingredients later?’ the paanwala suggested.
‘Give me an hour. I will catch up.’
The customers had less empathy.
‘Kya ho raha hai, Nathu, so rahe ho kya? (What is going on, Nathu? Are you asleep?)’
‘Roz mawa taktos, aaj kai jhala katri vaprayla? (You usually use areca-nut dust, today why did you use pieces?)’
‘Mane lavang gamatu nathi, tamane ketali vakhat kahu chu (How many times do I have to tell you I don’t like cloves?)’
Within ten minutes, the paanwala returned to his usual absorptive state. Enumerator A had become invisible to him, until he repeated for the fourth time, ‘Can you label your containers, then?’
‘No.’
Enumerator A changed course and directed his enquiries at the customers. They appeared more forthcoming.
‘What did you order?’ he asked a man with slick, oiled hair and a thin moustache. He wore a white shirt with a waist coat that was too large for his thin frame.
‘Kalkatta sada,’ he responded.
‘Very important person. If you want any insurance claims to be processed . Knows all the sahibs,’ the paanwala interjected.
As the customers stood around the paan shop chatting about the daily affairs in their neighbourhood and beyond, Enumerator A would intervene—‘which paan did you order?’
‘Who is that fellow up there on the chair?’ asked the postman after Enumerator A had repeated his question to him.
‘A government project; they’ve selected me,’ responded the paanwala.
‘It has come to this,’ he groaned. ‘A hardworking postman can’t even eat paan without being reported. Tomorrow they will ask what I do at night. How can I respond to that as a married man?’
Natwarlal, who was supposed to provide Enumerator A with tea and toast in the morning and enquire about his well-being at periodic intervals, did not show up and Enumerator A had to request the paanwala for tea. The paanwala was upset by this interruption, nevertheless offered him a cup. After a while, Enumerator A began making small paper balls and aiming them at the paanwala’s copper bowls. One bowl contained lime and the other, water. He was on target thrice. The paanwala, busy meeting the urgent and uncompromising demands of the public, failed to notice. Enumerator A soon progressed to live targets. He aimed at the paanwala’s hair. The harmless projectile landed perfectly in the centre of the paanwala’s brow and slid into a dark invisible abyss down his collar. Then he aimed at the customers. One paper ball successfully lodged on a pathan’s turban. Another rolled around the turban like a roulette ball and landed in the middle of a paan under construction. No one noticed. The paanwala folded it up swiftly, working on autopilot, and offered it to a customer, the burly constable in charge of the weapons depot at the police station.
As Enumerator A was zeroing in on the gulkand, the constable was seen returning.
‘Nathu, do you know who I am?’
‘What a question! Are you making fun of me?’
‘How long have you known me?’
‘—’
‘You’re not the only paanwala in this neighbourhood, there are four others. Adulteration? In my paan, a policeman’s paan, a servant of the Queen!’
He presented a semi-masticated paper ball, much smoother than the original hand-pressed version. Enumerator A looked on, both fascinated and petrified. The salivated ball seemed smoother, rounder and heavier. If only he had had the sense to chew the paper first, he could have launched them further into the heartlands of the shop, at the four-handed Ganesha or at the more formidable eight-handed Durga, or on the mortal souls beside them. There was a photograph, it could have been a painting of the paanwala’s father, a bald man with a formidable moustache. The frame had a flower garland around it. It offered the perfect spot to accumulate a large number of paper balls, like a pile of laddoos.
‘You there! Come down here. I’ll show you how to throw paper balls into my paan.’
‘No, I know already. I’m fine here.’
The constable reached out for Enumerator A’s ears. With the other hand he grabbed him by the shoulder and effortlessly toppled him on to the shop floor. Several of the paanwala’s precious containers rolled out, some even made it as far as the street. The paanwala picked up the bamboo chair and swung it at Enumerator A’s head. Enumerator A ducked, and the chair shattered against the pillar.
~
The paanwala at Mahim was less inclined to cooperate.
&
nbsp; ‘Tell him it’s an experiment. Later, when the survey is officially rolled out, he will not have to participate. Then the paanwalas will be required to pay for both breakfast and lunch for the enumerators,’ the officer told Enumerator B.
‘You don’t want to pay for that. Better let me work here this month while it’s still free for you,’ Enumerator B said to the paanwala at Mahim.
‘Can you vouch for that?’ the paanwala asked.
‘I swear on my mother.’
~
The third paanwala, at Fort, was devoted to de jure regulation. He insisted that the policy be typed on government paper with a seal.
‘If I come with a government authorization you’ll have to pay for the Enumerator’s breakfast and lunch. Are you okay with that?’
‘Let me talk to the committee,’ responded the paanwala.
‘No, don’t do that. You don’t want to get into trouble, do you?’
The officer asked Young to accompany him. ‘Can you please stand there and nod whenever I look at you?’
‘He works for the government,’ said the officer to the paanwala at Fort. Ten feet away, Young, who was shuffling through some papers, looked up and nodded.
‘How is it that this fellow at Fort is a member of a committee and not the others?’ Young asked the officer later.
‘Parsee influence. Sir, what do two Parsees do when they meet?’
‘What?’
‘Form a committee.’
As the weeks passed, two of the three enumerators kept falling asleep after lunch and inventing data to account for the paan-eating habits of the ten or so men they had missed during their siesta. It was a professional hazard. Nothing could be done about it.
~
One day, Enumerator A, stationed at Colaba, saw a customer spit over the paanwala’s shoulder into an open manhole in the corner. It was a slim but steady projectile, voluminous along its trajectory, minimal in its girth. The act was as effortless as it was exceptional. Many had tried, as evident from the red stains around the manhole. Enumerator A immediately dismounted from his perch to procure a tape from the tailor a few shops down the street and measured the distance—‘Six feet.’ He measured the radius of the hole. ‘Nine inches.’ From that day onwards, he pursued these measurements for four or five exceptional men every week. On the last page of the register, he inserted a column tabulating the number of customers who aimed at that manhole, then selected the best among them—about one in every forty. For these exceptional ones, he recorded the spitting distance in metres and the girth on a three-point scale. He invested in a measuring tape with his first wage.
‘The mean volume is consistent and the variance seems close to zero,’ he noted in one of the rows.
‘What is this column—spitting length?’ Young asked when he was reviewing the register at the end of the month.
‘The distance between the spitter and the manhole,’ Enumerator A responded.
‘And this?’
‘The number of spitters—an average of 198 each day, at one manhole.’
‘Seems enough to clog the drains. No wonder it floods every time it rains.’
‘Sir, let me tell you what I discovered.’
‘Why don’t you just do what you are told?’
‘Sir, this data shows there is a relationship between spitting distance and—’
‘Do you know what this amounts to?’
‘No, sir.’
‘It amounts to nothing. You’ve wasted so much time . why are there so many zeroes?’ Young raged.
‘Sir, many of them don’t spit near the shop. I can’t run after them to see where they spit.’
‘Then it is missing data, not zero. Don’t you know the difference? Zero means that the man spat on himself, that the length is zero. Missing should be denoted using a small dash, indicating that the data was not collected. How can I trust the rest of your work? You will not be paid until you sit for another month and gather the data again. Serves you right for using your head instead of your hands.’ Enumerator A’s smile vanished from his face, along with his colour.
‘Sir, the rest of the data does not have this problem.’
‘It is in your best interests to do the whole exercise over again if you don’t want me to substitute you with someone else who will not waste his time pursuing stupid questions like how and why people spit into round holes.’
The next month, Enumerator A retained his pursuit of how people spit into round holes. He found a logical loophole. Young had not said ‘how or why people spit’ but ‘how and why people spit’, permitting him to do one of the two tasks, not both. It sufficed. His own enthusiasm was necessary although not sufficient for his persistence. What truly excited him was the small local following he had mustered around this hobby. Some had started betting.
‘Who’s leading?’ the customers would enquire.
In a few weeks a small board was hung outside the paanwala’s shop. On it, Enumerator A listed the top three scores. He also invested in his own red notebook to list the names of the contestants. Within two months, Enumerator A had purchased a small wooden cabinet from the proceeds of his commission. It had become a norm for the winners and the speculators to offer him a small percentage of their winnings.
17
Dear Dibu,
Last week your son was eating a chicken leg near Hindu College. It was cooked. The boys at Hindu College have made up their mind that consumption of meat is the only way to reach the zenith of civilization. I turned away to avoid a public confrontation—he has also become hot-headed. Eating meat excites the nerves. When he came home, I reprimanded him. He argued that if consumption of fish was okay, it was okay to eat other animals as well. I told him that we only eat some varieties of fish because of their proximity to the plant kingdom. I do not believe in specious arguments of aesthetics or the presence of scales. He did not care. I admit, in private, that he argues quite effectively. It will serve him well.
I have taken to walking around in slippers. The construction across from our house brings new earth and I cannot tell who has arrived and who has left. Subhada rubs the floors with fresh mud and water every week. Yet it is dusty within an hour.
Today, the elephants passed by. It’s bathing day for them at the river.
Mukho’s son is going to Presidency to study law. He’s a bright boy but doesn’t know Sanskrit.
The Brahmos are setting up another mission here. They condemn idolatry when there are three temples and thirty idols in our colony alone. Yesterday, your son—he is only fourteen—said, ‘I don’t believe in idols. I will become a Brahmo.’ The Brahmos write in the newspapers denouncing Durga Puja. ‘How could nature give birth to a monstrous being with ten arms and three eyes?’ they ask. Tell me, how will the poor man, with his hungry children, ill parents and the moneylender’s big stomach, worship a god he cannot see? Year after year our artists make Durga idols. Many villages specialize in them. There is dance, there is drama, there is celebration, there is the feast, there is the fair, there is the procession. Do the Brahmos want all of us to become as lifeless as the Protestants? Do they want these artists to work in factories as slave labour?
There is a cholera epidemic but nothing to worry about at home, yet.
Self-preservation is a fundamental duty. It is fundamental because it is invariant to outcomes. Self-preservation is selfish only when one does not understand what ‘self’ is. Self-preservation is distinct from individualism because it precedes individualism. Individualism is an ethic. Self-preservation is a duty. This duty transcends preservation of a group.
Yours,
Dada
18
That evening, as Pestonjee rang the doorbell of his apartment and waited for Persis to open the door, he saw the neighbour’s nameplate—A.K. Hedge.
‘Persis, have you met the new neighbours?’ he asked his wife, still at the door.
‘No. Why do you stink?’
‘Long story.’
‘Did you
shit in your pants?’
‘Shhh . No, I fell in it.’
‘Fell in shit? How can you be so—?’
‘It wasn’t my fault. It was the cow.’
‘Don’t you watch where you’re going? Always head in the clouds. A cow is the size of an elephant.’
‘Did you see the neighbours?’ Pestonjee asked again.
‘No.’
‘They must be from London.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I know. Prepare your special dhansak tomorrow. I’ll introduce myself. Don’t use the steel bowl.’
The next day he covered the ceramic bowl with a wooden plate, used for the first time since his cousin had brought it eight months ago. He tied a white ribbon around the bowl like a bow and tugged at his tie again.
‘Can I see Mr Hedge? May I have the pleasure of meeting Mr A. Hedge? Could I please meet Mr Hedge? I have come to meet Mr Hedge. I have come to meet my new neighbour, Mr Hedge, about whom I have only heard great things. How do you do? Delighted! Delighted! How very kind of you .’ he continued muttering until he pressed the neighbour’s doorbell.
‘Mr He-Hedge please,’ said Pestonjee.
‘Hedge?’
‘Yes, Mr Hedge.’
‘No Hedge. Hed-gay, Mr Hed-gay you mean, from Solapur, Bombay Province?’
‘Hejj!’ repeated Pestonjee.
‘No. Mr Hed-gay.’
‘Sorry. I was—I thought—thank you.’
Before the man could open the door fully, Pestonjee scuttled away down the stairs. The bowl slipped from his hands and fell. The brown gravy formed a dense puddle on the floor. Shards of ceramic jutted out precariously. A large stain appeared on Pestonjee’s new suede shoes. The white ribbon was safe however, suspended on the handrail, far from the mess below.
19
For the second time that week, Panditji came looking for Pestonjee at the office. People came to him; he did not go to them. This was the third company in the neighbourhood that did not bother to perform a puja. If they refused, others, even native businesses, will follow. Puja was good for everyone. The mantras brought good luck and prosperity. After discussing the issue with his fellow priests, he decided to offer his services gratis. A public ceremony will send a strong message. Expenses could be recovered from others later.
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