REVENGE

I found my friends very busy that Sunday morning. Everybody was collecting this and that from here and there. I rushed to Sonal and asked, “Aren’t you going to swim in that pond today? You are looking very busy! Where are you going today? You need not take me with you but at least tell me the secret!” He replied me seriously, “You are a dull creature. What can you do for the society? We are going to teach a lesson today to our nation. We will set fire to as many buses as possible, block the roads, thrash the government employees dragging them on to the roads and create a hell in the city. All this takes place in one hour’s time. Nobody knows who did it and why they did it? We were badly disappointed and disgusted with these hellish daily bus journeys for years. We wrote letters to the authorities and held demonstrations. Nobody paid attention to us. We chose this path of violence as the last resort. Ten of us are going to execute this plan of revenge against the government”. I consoled him and requested him to bring all his friends to me for once. I took them all into a cemetery and told authoritatively, “We are living in a democratic country. Here lazy fellows would be honored and honest and hard-working ones would be crushed down. Your plan is very wrong. Police would arrest you within hours after your secret acts in the city. The court of law would severely punish you all. Your parents, relatives or friends cannot change your fates thereafter. Please do not spoil your lives with your stupid methods of retaliation. I have a bright idea with me. I do agree that majority of our government employees are just symbols of living. They have neither enthusiasm to serve the people nor innovative thinking to develop our nation fast. We kiss a cute pup when we like its beauty. We beat up a street dog when it barks at us irrationally. As you know well, the special ticket allows one to travel throughout the day on any bus in the city. You should enquire about the woes of other victims in the city and invite them to join you to execute our plan successfully. There should be at least 50,000 youngsters to implement my idea. Fifty boys and girls form a group. Thus there would be 1000 groups. Every member of each group boards a bus in the early morning at its starting point at a time. They would occupy 50 seats in the bus within a few seconds. They would carry food and water with them for that day. They would not get down from the bus till midnight. The bus conductor cannot ask them to get off because they have special tickets with all of them. This way you can implement my plan in 1000 city buses on every day. Do like this for a month continuously. They would lose lakhs of rupees due to your plan during these 30 days. The police and the courts can do nothing against you because whatever you are doing is unquestionable as per the government rules. Then our big brothers sitting in the highest court of the state would formally and legally ask us to say something about our common problems to them. Then we can hand over our small report to them. We will continue this plan until this menace is rooted out from our city. Even other victims of similar nature in other parts of India follow our route and then it becomes a burning national issue. This plan doesn’t require much money or equipment from the active participants. It’s like hiring a tourist bus at a very low cost for a daylong journey in the city. Sitting in the same seats continuously in the same bus from morning to the night won’t be a problem for youngsters. Then our dear bus drivers need not stop their buses at every bus stop. Our helpless bus conductors need not distribute tickets to all the passengers time to time. It is a cool job for all. I am here to guide you time to time. Avoid those methods of violence and follow this cool way. Work on this plan from this very day. If any foolish guy or girl has doubts about this strategy, you can send them to me. Thereafter we would implement this plan in the Indian Railways also. Our cool belly baboos sitting in the AC rooms in New Delhi then introduce more trains for poor Indian passengers throughout the nation”. “Gang Leader Bongi Junka…Jindabad Jindabad”, they kept shouting, clapping and whistling in praise of me for ten minutes continuously. I felt very delighted and excited visualizing my plan being victoriously and challengingly implemented in Hyderabad and Secunderabad by thousands of girls and boys. I felt, ‘Revenge is a sweet game for me. I know well how to handle it with the help of hot boys and girls. Bravo Bongi!!”

Datla Chiranjeevi Raju

HUMILIATED SOLDIER

I spent for four months in Indian Army at Madras Engineering Group and Center in Bangalore and came out as a recruit after getting the number. I could not live a caged life bearing the hardship of the job. I am an escapist and hypocrite in this regard. I continued my studies and became eligible to get some job in the civilian society. My eldest brother served in the same for seventeen years and came out voluntarily minding the studies of his two sons. He worked as a security supervisor in the private agency taking care of the pipeline network of a big petroleum company owned by the government of India. It involves frequent visits to the risky points of underground petroleum transport. He has to remain awake and alert day and night. He bore with it for two years for the sake of the small salary it offered. One day he received a letter from the District Sainik Welfare Board. His name was sent to a private bank for consideration for the position of armed guard. He felt very happy. In two months, he received a call from the bank asking him to attend the selection procedure in Hyderabad. He reached me this happiest news in his life. I rushed to meet him in the hotel near Nampally railway station that Sunday morning when he came to face the test. He did well in all the rounds and confidently said that he is going to be selected. His dream came true within two months. I helped him a little in this process reaching him the information in time. He underwent a two-day training session in Hyderabad before being inducted into the bank for work as an armed guard. He was posted to the main branch of Boco Bank in Visakhapatnam. He is living there in a rented house with his family. Recently I went there to spend for sometime attending the editing work of my diaries to be published. My brother knows me well as a fighter against corruption at individual level. He strictly warned his wife not to tell me the truth. My sister-in-law loves me as a fellow with energy to question a wrongdoer and desire to appreciate a great person of any stand or state. She disclosed me the secret one day when my brother was at the bank. The bank union concerned took a bribe of fifty thousand rupees from each newly appointed armed guard at that bank to confirm their posting. My brother borrowed that money from a relative and kept aside visualizing future developments in the process of his getting job in the bank. He does not like to go against the system risking his job at hand. He says that he got a bit happy life now after his birth joining this bank. He can sleep happily now at night which he could not enjoy for many years as a soldier. He believes that India is a country of corruption and hypocrisy presenting itself as great to rich foreign lenders. He likes to accept that truth and live with it. He served to the nation for long and it is the gift he received for his work. He is happily doing that job now not considering the bribe as an issue at all. I sent a letter to the head office of the bank questioning the corruption prevalent in the system being run under their supervision. I remained anonymous because my brother gets badly disturbed if the issue becomes serious. My sister-in-law is a very sensitive creature. She failed tenth standard and lived like a parrot in a cage in the house before marriage. She cries if something happens to me in the fight because it is going to be a one-man show. My affection and concern for these two sensitive creatures stopped me from moving ahead. I felt humiliated after hearing this news from her. If a soldier is being victimized like this by the bank unions, what about ordinary people that never dare to question anybody superior to them? There was no response from the head office. There are no evidences to go ahead because the money was already handed over. Our courts of law live and die for evidences. My brother does not believe in reliability and honesty of the bureaucracy. He likes to go along with it silently. Silence and complacency are his guiding principles in life because he has wife and children. I am a bachelor presently and so a free and daring bird. He cannot be reckless like me! For that matter how many of you can be?

Datla Chiranjeevi Raju

BUS TRAVEL IN HYDERABAD

Andhra Pradesh Road Transport Corporation is shortly known as APSRTC. It is an autonomous body with adequate freedom to decide its policies with necessary support and guidance from the government time to time. It connects almost every part of the state with its rural and urban network of daily bus services. 113Y and 113E route buses are run in Hyderabad as city buses. The prior plies between Uppal and Yousufguda Check Post and the latter between ESI and Uppal. I had to take either one of these two buses to go to my office in Panjagutta. I traveled in these two route buses for about two years as a commuter and I had very bad experience with them. Our office starts by 9:00 a.m. and ends by 5:00 p.m. I used to take this bus by 6:45 a.m. itself every morning to get a seat for me and travel comfortably to the place of work. In the return journey it was almost like hell coming back to our abode struggling to stand among the pressing crowd in the bus. I was compelled to change my lifestyle just to have a happy journey. Thus every day I went to the office remained a sad experience to me because I would miss a free bus if I don’t reach the bus stop by the scheduled time by me. I stopped traveling in those buses after quitting that job. Even today I find these two route buses very crowded. One can see the hell of journey in these buses between 7:30 a.m and 10:30 a.m and 4:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. even today. It is an endless daily serial I can say. I was infuriated by these bad experiences in my life for months together and so thought of doing something. First I made out my points of concern. The problem is “There is much rush in this route during a few specified hours in the morning and evening because a number of students and employees travel in these buses to their destinations”. The simple solution to this problem is “More number of buses should be run in this route during the peak hours at least”. There is no scarcity of bus manufacturing units in India. They are ready to supply hundreds of buses within months if the orders are given quite in advance specifying the features of the vehicles and where they need to be used. I seriously wrote a letter to Kalajito Saivinu, a retired Supreme Court judge living in Hyderabad. I received a reply from him within a week. It read, “I am also a helpless victim of this system in our nation. Hundreds of commuters are daily facing hell to travel in these buses. The suffering and strain felt by girls and working women is anyhow there. Many accidents and deaths took place during the last ten years due to this unhealthy public transport system. I don’t think that you can resolve this issue filing a case on APSRTC or the state government in any court in India because millions of serious cases are also sleeping in these abodes of justice delivery. I know the menace of judiciary in India as a judge. I once asked my friend why the higher officials and policy-makers associated with this corporation are not doing anything in this regard to provide the passengers with a delightful journey on a daily basis. I was shocked to know the truth. He told me that highly impotent men and women would be appointed as the chief executives of this setup. Those that fail to enjoy their sex life at home or outside owing to their permanent internal problems can never take good decisions for refining any system under their supervision. Resultantly they sit in the AC rooms watching films of filth and licking the skins of the paid service providers. They never see the reality standing in a few bus stops in the twin cities for a few days. People without enthusiasm to do something good for the society are a waste burden on our earth. Unfortunately 75% of the persons heading the government units are old in body and sick in mind. Some dynamic youth with love for the common and burning fire in the belly to reform the system should come into these core areas of daily public suffering. I don’t think that I can see such happy times in our nation before I die. Remember me for once if you ever see such a happy trend of governance and administration in any part of our nation. I felt very happy after reading your letter. I liked the fire in your thoughts and the kindness and idealism in your love for the common people. Continue seeing everything from a broader perspective to remain dynamic in personality and universal in outlook toward the humanity at large. May God bless you!” After reading his letter I understood that one should learn to live in the hell when everybody else is doing the same without a collective spirit. One cannot change a system remaining awake when all are sleeping around him being affected by the chronic diseases of complacence and self-centeredness.

Datla Chiranjeevi Raju

UNRELIABLE FRIEND

The first person I liked after joining the University of Hyderabad in 2000 was Kuracha Srinivasa Rao. He belongs to a village very near to ours and perhaps this regional feeling made me find him more friendly and interesting than others available.

In course of time, we became very close friends. He was studying M.Sc. Physics and I M.A. English. He was very popular in the campus. Nobody calls him with his real name but Bhayya. He was a bright student when studying in Kakinada and his lecturers considered him genius and hard-working. He neglected his studies being much involved in his busy life of friendship and popularity on the campus. He stayed back one more year in the campus to complete his studies for this reason.

He talked with everybody with a smiling face and addressed many with a sense of affection and warmth. Thus he could earn and retain many friends and well-wishers without much investment. He encouraged me to become the Mess Secretary of our hostel (Men’s Hostel ‘A’). I could carry out that duty happily with the assurance of dependence that I had a good friend to support me in times of heavy stress or unexpected problems.

He was later elected Cultural Secretary and did some interesting things to show his love for the students on the campus. He is presently working as a junior lecturer in physics at Sri Chaitanya Junior College near Nizampet Road. He is earning about 25,000 rupees a month. He also provides tuition to two rich students at their homes. He bought a two-wheeler recently and planning to buy a pre-owned car after sending it to his father back at his village. He is trying to present himself attractively to the party of the bride because he is intending to marry very soon.

He never keeps his cellular phone with him perhaps to escape from the nuisance of frequent calls from every Tom and Dick who talk this and that which he may not like for some reasons.

I recently informed him that I too bought a mobile phone. He rarely calls anybody taking the initiative perhaps because he thinks that all his friends are good folks and they know how to conduct themselves well in the society.

Yesterday morning my artist friend Veeranjaneyulu told me that Bhayya would stay at his abode for the whole day and night. I met him about five months ago and so desired to spend with him all the time. His affectionate words and his cute look make me rejuvenating. I wanted to delight in it.

I freshened up myself very fast and rushed to the rented portion of my friend in Jubilee Hills.

Bhayya did not come at all. There was no information from him regarding why he did or could not come. I spent my time happily talking with my friend and browsing the Internet on his computer. I felt irritated with the unreliable behavior of Bhayya. I love him very much and so eagerly waited to see him but he did not turn up. I know about this most apparent demerit of his personality for the last four years and he proved that he did not change his lifestyle even to this day.

Nothing serious or unexpected occurred owing to his failure to come to see us as promised but both of us got very disappointed at his casual behavior. A single distracting trait in us can make many of our dear ones disheartened and severely hurt at times. In this case, he is our dear friend and so we don’t mind believing in his unreliable promises because we don’t like to hurt him banning him forever from our friendship as a disciplinary action against him for his reckless behavior toward us on many occasions.

Imagine the stress and strain supposed to be borne by his spouse after marriage if he continues the same kind of behavior even with her. Then she remains a lifelong victim because she cannot leave him considering it a felony on his part.

It is not difficult to refine ourselves time to time. We should identify our drawbacks and overcome them to earn new friends and retain our old well-wishers. Reliability is a very fascinating trait of a person and everybody should self-tune oneself toward practicing this virtue in most of the possible occasions and situations. Otherwise many continue considering one a silly bloke without much consideration or botheration about the interests or pains of others being generated and perpetuated because of him or her.

We need to learn about virtues and practice them in our personal and professional lives to remain dependable and trustworthy in our familiar circles. When we fail to do it, one day we get badly victimized by the same vice in us, which tortured many.

Does anybody like to face such plight? Be alert.

Datla Chiranjeevi Raju