Conversations in 16 drawn coaches: Swaying from North to South by Puneet Rajhans
Derailments are part of the growing rail traffic in the country. Railways being the largest public sector employer has had its share of problems. Definite form of conversations come to occupy our space when the journey extends beyond listed hours.
As I ambled my way to a 140 k/hr doing train, my thoughts were glued to the conversations that would take place (and in the process tearing apart some characters) as the train would crisscross five states. Before this act could follow, I had my share of anxieties as four different modes of transport were tried and tested in the groaning Delhi traffic.
Conversations in North and South
The conversations in North and South India are not short on gossips and grudges - and the alarming part is the intrusiveness that comes into play. A train ride that takes two nights to cover, has a tryst with five states, is enough to send you to a grimly train of thought where ideas and interactions are with a tinge of assault-cum- sarcasm built into them. Some look at it as an attempt to catch up with tales that have been lost in the whirr of scams and sores. Away from North, the formidable query is: what do you do for a living followed by inquisitive nature of talks on aspirations and assumptions. Come to the North, it is as blunt as it could get; it is more than a two-pronged attack. First with whom you are associated and the meaner stuff rotating around which part of the city you come from. Having secured plausible answers, the spate of inquires follow that familiar path of durable and destiny that lie ahead of you. By God’s grace I was spared from this North-desired demolition theory.
The train had unscheduled halts, leading to a six hr delay from which it could hardly stage a comeback. Peppered with more and more mean conversations, the likelihood of staying away looked less as it stored a strong potential to declare you a misfit. Not to be cowed down, one had long sessions in solitude to let the other party advertise his remorseful existence. Three defeats in a row in Barbados had sinked in comfortably, so had the thought that Ramesh’s act (expressions come naturally to him on a foreign soil) had enough for elec media to feed on as straying is the mark of excellence. But here staying away from debates of impropriety would have been too much of a strain for oneself. So the beat continued and so did the scale of condemnations (without even giving a thought that calling yourself a perfect soul is nothing but a first act of assault on the nation state ). Spare the state and detach yourself from fantastic notions dismissed as leftovers from reality shows. As expected I secured a space by linking to thoughts of the likes of Chautala and Gowda at the immigration counters in UK to offer their unsolicited advice of forming a government on rotation, much away from this berating- all exercise which was looking increasingly fatal.
As for the food, it was palatable given the delay that had come into play; the surroundings something to cheer about; and tales enough to get bewildered and dethroned.