‘The veranda of the Circuit House badly needs railings. During my momentary absence, a cow ate up some estimates which I had left lying on a table in the veranda.’ Below this note was the commissioner’s observation: ‘I find it hard to believe that even cows could swallow PWD estimates.’
In another Circuit House book another executive engineer had noted: ‘The washbasin should be immediately replaced. I could not wash my face properly for want of proper facilities.’ Against this entry is a marginal note in the commissioner’s beautiful hand: ‘SDO will replace the washbasin at once. The executive engineer had to wash his face in tears during his last visit to this station.’
The prize remark is against a complaint that the latrine was too far away from the bungalow. ‘He should have started earlier,’ wrote the wit.
I have so many amusing anecdotes on Prem Kirpal, his love of good food and wine (he drank more liquor off me than off himself), his vast collection of unread books, his absentmindedness etc. However I’ll break my vow and tell you one about his habit of talking loudly over the phone. We were sitting in the crowded lobby of a hotel in Madrid when he was summoned to the telephone booth in a corner of the hall. Without shutting the door Kirpal began to yell into the phone: ‘Lizbeth! Hello! How are you?’ People in the lobby stopped talking. Everyone was amused. He came back and announced to me, ‘That was Elizabeth Adiseshiah, you know?’
‘Yes,’ I replied sarcastically, ‘so does everyone else in the lobby.’
‘Was I talking very loudly? Her hotel is five miles away, you know!’
It reminded me of Winston Churchill’s retort to a minister who shared the next cubicle and was wont to talk at the top of his voice. He sent his secretary to tell the minister to lower his voice. The secretary came back and explained, ‘Sir, Mr Brown is talking to Scotland.’
‘I know,’ replied Winston Churchill, ‘tell him to use the telephone.’
I recall an incident during one of the general elections when an unusually self-righteous and aggressive Janata candidate confronted a staunch Congressman. ‘After all the evil deeds done by the Congress party during the Emergency how can you vote for that party?’ he asked. Unabashed the Congressman replied: ‘I am a Congressman because my father and before him his father were for the Congress.’
‘Aha!’ exclaimed the Janata candidate triumphantly, hoping to squash the voter. ‘If your father was a donkey and before him his father also a donkey, what would that make you?’
‘That, Sir,’ retorted the voter, ‘would make me Janata.’
Here are two similar linguistic lapses committed by men expected to have better acquaintance with English. One was the late Radha Raman, once a mighty pillar of the Delhi administration. At a buffet dinner the Prime Minister pressed him to help himself to some food. ‘Not yet,’ replied Raman, ‘I’ll eat only after the Prime Minister passed away.’
Once I was hosting a lunch for a minister. When I offered the dessert to him, he wagged his head and said: ‘No, thank you! I am quite fed up.’
Vasant Sathe, intending to compliment Sharada Prasad, author of the text, and Satyan for the photographs, in the lavishly produced book on Karnataka remarked: ‘You two have immoralized Karnataka!’ Vasant certainly immortalized himself.
My favourite story of a linguistic faux pas is of a friend who broke wind somewhat loudly in mixed company. Overcome with embarrassment he stuttered: ‘Sorry, it was a slip of the tongue.’
Once upon a time there was a nonconformist swallow who decided not to fly south for the winter. However, when the weather turned very cold, it reluctantly started to fly southwards. In a short time ice began to form on its wings and it fell to earth in a barnyard frozen still. A cow passed by and crapped on the little swallow. The swallow thought it was the end. But the dung warmed it and defrosted its wings. Warm and happy, able to breathe, it started to chirp. Just then a large tomcat came by and hearing the chirping, found out where it was coming from, clawed away the dung and devoured the swallow.
Moral: Everyone who shits on you is not necessarily your enemy; everyone who gets you out of the shit is not necessarily your friend; and if you’re warm and happy in a pile of shit, keep your mouth shut.
This exchange took place many years ago between the then finance minister John Mathai and Acharya Kripalani. The Acharya is renowned for his acid tongue. He was going for the civil service and injected a particularly waspish anecdote about a young man who having knocked at many doors to find a job returned crestfallen to his father. The father reassured him: ‘I know you are a no-good son of a gun. No one in his senses will employ you. But don’t lose hope, you can always get a government job; they are meant for worthless people like you.’
John Mathai was quick to reply: ‘Having heard the Acharya’s observation with great respect, I am coming to the conclusion that Acharyaji is fast becoming ripe for a government job.’
This story, which appeared in the Times (London) highlights the humiliations the civil servants have to suffer at the hands of ministers. There was this civil servant who retired after forty years of slogging in his office. He rented a small cottage near a village and went into a self-imposed vanprastha. The villagers became very curious about him. But all they saw was that every morning a boy came to his door, rang the bell and spoke a sentence. The civil servant replied with a sentence and handed him a coin. When curiosity got the better of the village folk, they approached the boy and asked him what passed between them. ‘Nothing much,’ replied the lad, ‘he’s hired me to ring his bell and say to him “Sir, the minister wants to see you!” And he replies: “Tell the bloody minister to bugger off.” For this he pays me ten pence a day.’
A Nihang decided to stop an express train at a non-stop station. He stood in the middle of the track brandishing his kirpan and yelling defiance at the oncoming train. A crowd watched the confrontation with bated breath. When the engine driver noticed the Nihang on the track and realized he would not be able to stop the train in time, he blew his whistle as frantically as he could. Just as the engine was almost upon him, the Nihang jumped aside and let the train pass.
‘What happened Nihangji?’ asked the onlookers. ‘Did you take fright?’
‘Never!’ replied the Nihang with bravado. ‘You see how I made it scream? A Nihang never kills anyone who cries for mercy.’
Sindhis are known both for their sharp practices as well as for their clanishness: they drive hard bargains but also help fellow Sindhis to find employment. The following story was told to me by a Sindhi businessman on a visit to Hong Kong. He wanted to have a silk suit made and went to a Sindhi tailor’s shop at the airport which advertised suits made to measure in a couple of hours. The visiting businessman selected the material and asked how much it cost. The tailor replied: ‘Sir, seeing you are a fellow Sindhi I will offer you a special price. A suit of this material costs 200 Hong Kong dollars—as you can see clearly marked on the label. I charge everyone else two hundred dollars but not a fellow Sindhi. I won’t ask for 190 dollars, not even 180 dollars. For you it will be 170 dollars, not a cent more.’
‘Why should you lose money on me just because I happen to be a fellow Sindhi?’ replied the visitor. ‘So what should I offer for this suit? Seventy dollars? That I would to a non-Sindhi tailor. Eighty dollars? That would be insulting a Sindhi brother. I offer you ninety, dollars and not a cent less.’
‘Okay. That’s a deal,’ replied the tailor.
In a crowded railway compartment one berth was occupied by a man covered from head to foot with his bedsheet. A porter entered and without much ado proceeded to belabour the recumbent figure with blows and abuse: 0! Jagtara, teri maan di. 0! Jagtara, teri bhain di … etc. etc. After a while the other passengers intervened, uncovered the recumbent man’s face and asked him why he was taking all the fisticuffs and abuse without a protest.
‘The joke is on this fellow,’ he replied. ‘He’ll soon tire of beating me—and in any case I am not Jagtara.’
An es
say on Geese submitted by a school-boy reads:
‘Geese is a low heavy-set bird which is mostly meat and feathers. His head is one side and he sits on the other. Geese can’t sing much on account of the dampness of the moisture. He’s got no between the toes and he’s got a little balloon in his stomach to keep him from sinking.
‘Some geese, when they get big, has curls on their tails and is called ganders. Ganders don’t have it and hatch but just sit and loaf and go swimming. If I was goose, I would rather be a gander.’
A young Punjabi couple who I hardly knew insisted that I come to their house-warming party. I went suitably armed with compliments for the hostess and her new home. They had obviously spent a lot of money—a long drive-in flanked by royal palms and beds of roses led up to the portico. There was apparently an even larger spread of lawns and flowerbeds in the rear of the house. I fired my first compliment at the house.
‘What a beautiful frontage you have, Mrs Kumar!’
‘Oh, thank you, thank you,’ she gushed, ‘but you have not seen my backside yet. It’s much prettier than my front.’
My second compliment evoked an equally naïve response. She was draped in a gossamer-thin sari through which one could see most of what she had. ‘And what a beautiful sari you are wearing!’ I said.
‘Oh this is very maamooli. I just wear it for streetwalking.’
A young reader sends a South Indian version of how to spell Mississippi. ‘First comes yumm. Then I come. Then sissi. Then peepee. Then I come again.’
A busload of American tourists were heading towards Punjab on G.T. Road when suddenly the driver slammed on the brakes.
Lying on the road in front was a Sardarji with his ear to the ground. Passengers trooped out of the bus and crowded around the man. ‘Hey, what are you doing down there pal?’ asked one of the tourists.
The man slowly raised his head and replied: ‘Green Matador 25 km away travelling at 80 km.’
‘Wow,’ exclaimed the tourist, ‘you can tell us that by listening to the road?’
‘No,’ croaked the Sardarji, ‘I fell off the damned thing.’
A group of Congress (I) MPs were comparing notes with one another during the Rajiv Gandhi era. As usual their chief occupation was who was nazdeek (close) to the Prime Minister and who had been replaced by whom in the inner circles. Asked one of another who seemed to know the comings and goings on Race Course Road: ‘Have you seen the Prime Minister recently?’
‘Arre kahan! You ring and ring and no appointment is given. “Too busy” is all that his secretaries say.’
‘But surely, you know him well enough to walk into the kothi without an appointment.’
‘Those days are gone,’ replied the other sadly, ‘now it’s battalions outside and Italians inside.’
Two Punjabi farmers ploughing their fields saw a Mig-23 fly overhead at great speed, emitting a lot of smoke from its tail. One remarked, ‘Bantia, look how fast it is going and the racket it is making!’
‘Sure’, replied the other, ‘if somebody set fire to your tail, you would run faster than the plane and fart much louder.’
A minister of government, whose knowledge of English was very poor, was provided with a secretary to write speeches for him. ‘Give me a fifteen-minute speech on the non-aligned movement,’ ordered the boss.
The text was prepared to last exactly fifteen minutes. But when the minister proceeded to make his oration it took him half-an-hour to do so. The organizers of the conference were upset because their schedule went haywire. And the minister was upset because his secretary had let him down. He upbraided him: ‘I asked for a fifteen-minute speech; you gave me a half-hour speech. Why?’ he demanded.
‘Sir, I gave a fifteen-minute speech. But you read out its carbon copy as well.’
This one I picked up in London on my way back home. As the aircraft was taxiing towards the runway to take off, the voice on the speaker welcomed passengers on board and introduced them to the pilot. ‘Your captain is Miss Mary Joystick …’
‘You mean to tell me this plane is being piloted by a woman?’ asked an alarmed passenger to a stewardess.
‘Yes, sir,’ replied the stewardess. ‘So is the co-pilot, Miss Jane Understudy. So also are the radio operator and the navigator, they are all women in command.’
‘I must see this for myself,’ said the passenger. ‘Please take me to the cockpit.’
‘We don’t call it that any more, sir,’ replied the stewardess.
Regarding the benefits of abstinence, you may have heard the repartee between the abstainer General Montogomery and the gay liver, Winston Churchill. Says Monty: ‘I don’t drink, I don’t smoke and I am 100 per cent fit.’ Answers Winnie: ‘I smoke, I drink and I am 200 per cent fit.’
My favourite is the one about an ageing rogue who wanted to live to be a hundred. ‘Give up smoking, drinking and going out with women,’ advised his doctor.
‘And will I then be able to live up to one hundred years?’ asked the rogue.
‘I am not sure,’ replied the doctor, ‘but it will certainly seem like it.’
I never object to anyone calling me names or making fun of me. I believe in Burn’s dictum to ‘see ourselves as others see us’. Many of my readers see me as a name-dropper and a poseur. P.S. Ranganathan of New Delhi has parodied what he thinks I would have written on the deaths of Tagore, Marilyn Monroe and Karl Marx. The obit on the poet reads as follows:
‘It was a rainy Sunday morning when I had the opportunity to meet the Nobel Prize winner. Tagore was at a seaside resort in Switzerland, the charming landlocked country of Europe. I was just returning after a two-month holiday-cum-research tour of Polynesia, Hawaii and Las Vegas. I was working on a novel for my publishers, Tom, Dick and Harry, London. This novel was also to be published in America by Fung, Wag and Kneel Inc, New York.
‘I had earlier phoned Tagore for an appointment. “Sunday, 7.30. Will it suit you?” he asked in a clear voice. “Oh, anything will suit me except my suits stitched in India,” I said. There was hearty laughter at the other end of the phone. Surely, Tagore was a man with a high sense of humour!
‘When I went on the appointed day, I was slightly late—to be exact, by about eight hours. Tagore received me at the porch and offered me nimbu de joiuce, a delicious drink (certainly, I did not expect the poet to offer me Scotch). For the next forty minutes we discussed the current literary trends. I was then vaguely planning a novel, later to be titled Train to Pakistan (published by Hind Pocket Books or Orient Paperbacks or Pearl Publications. I don’t exactly remember the name of the publisher, which is not quite material. The book is priced at Rs 4, which is quite material).
‘Tagore asked me what I was doing. “Nothing of importance,” I said. “Oh, you Sardarjis are modest to a fault. With your remarkable talent, whatever you do will be important and will certainly make a great impact on the minds of intellectuals. Now, since we are alone, I can tell you this. Your writings are quite outstanding and you are sure to be awarded the Nobel Prize.”
‘Tagore was a great soul with a great heart. He is gone. I only wish that his statement comes true.’
About Miss Monroe, the parody reads as follows: ‘Marilyn had a soft corner for me. It was just by chance that I was seated next to her in a Pan Am jet from New York to London. “Mr Khushwant, I presume, I am Marilyn Monroe,” she introduced herself. “Your name is familiar. But I am unable to place you,” I said hesitatingly. “You must have seen a naked picture of a Hollywood actress in Life. It was mine,” she said. Then I remembered.’ And Karl Marx:
‘An outstanding thinker and a remarkable writer who was fascinated by my writings. In fact he told a common friend of ours—why should I withhold his name, he was Winston Churchill—well, Marx was telling Winston that he was keen to translate my novel into Russian. Winny—that was how I used to address him—later told me this when we met at Buckingham Palace for a party. I was thrilled by this piece of news but had to politely decline the offer since
another friend of mine was already on the job. If my readers would not say I am dropping names, I can say that the friend was no other person than Tolstoy. This is what one “K” can write about another “K” in this moment of great anguish.’
If this be the truth about me, it is time for me to take an overdose of barbiturates.
One day Gorbachev, Reagan Gandhi appeared before God what was in store for their Gorbachev asked: ‘When will be free from corruption?’
‘Twenty-six years from now,’ replied God.
Reagan put the same question to him. God replied: ‘It’ll take time. At least another century.’
‘What about India?’ asked Rajiv Gandhi.
God had tears in His eyes as He replied, ‘I won’t live to see the day when India will be free of corruption.’
An argument arose as to which state government excelled in corruption. The following story settled the issue.
Six years ago an MLA from Kerala visited Chandigarh and called on a Punjab minister at his house. He was amazed at the ostentation and asked his old friend, ‘How did you manage to acquire so much wealth?’
‘Are you really interested in knowing?’
‘Of course, yes. A little extra knowledge always helps.’
‘Then wait till tomorrow, and I shall explain fully.’
The next day the minister drove the MLA down the highway for several kilometres in his personal Honda.
He stopped the car, both of them got out and the minister pointed his finger to a spot down the beautiful valley.
‘Do you see the big bridge over there?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ replied the MLA.
‘Half the cost of the bridge went into my pocket.’
Four years later the Punjabi who in the meantime lost his portfolio, went on a holiday to Trivandrum and called on his old friend, who in the meanwhile had become a minister. ‘By God,’ said the Punjabi, ‘you have beaten me flat. Crystal chandeliers, Italian marble, Mercedes. Tell me how you managed it.’
The Big Fat Joke Book Page 4