I want to grow old with you

This is one phrase i have read in many M&B books and even otherwise. I always found it very romantic. If some is still not sure about what I am saying here, well its kind of a marriage proposal... it goes on like this - I love you, I want to marry you, I wanna have kinds with you, I want to grow old with you...will u marry me? And then the girls gives a million dollar answer - Yes! (well a million-dollar answer I say bcos after that the guy ends up spending all his million dollars he has on her for the rest of their live, until death or divorce do them apart) But thats not the main point here. The main point is that phrase - I want to grow old with you.

Why all of a sudden am talking about this? Well simply because being in Vienna at the moment I am getting an opportunity to see a lot of elderly couples these days. They make a sweet pair. They are on their vacation, mostly alone, and they seem to be enjoying each others' company thoroughly. I get to meet them every day during the breakfast in the hotel. I particularly like them... because they hve indeed grown old with each other but are not bored of each other - something that I see in the elderly couples of our country, and that includes my parents, my in-laws as well. Are they not in love? Am sure they are, but they surely are not as expressive as these people from the otherside of the world are.

They hold hands and walk together - I have never seen my parents walking side by side, forget holding hands. Men in our country prefer walking atleast 100 miles ahead of their female counterparts! Check out on your parents, on your uncle-aunts, am sure you will notice this trend without any exception (and incase you do find any exception, please let me know - I would love to meet such a lovely couple in our country as well!) They sit together and have breakfast - our mothers have this tendency of feeding their "husbands" first! and the husbands also are too happy to have the meal before their wives! These elderly couples are enjoying theri lives...hassle free, tension free, roaming around the world. But look at our parents - can they even think of going for a vacation - only the two of them, leaving us behind? Oh am sure the mothers will dies at the thought of leaving their grown up kids, and the fathers will faint at the thought of being alone with their wives for 7-10 days! When circumstance forces them to travel together (and believe me, its mostly emergency not a vacation - like they going to their son or daughter's place who stay in a different city/country) - they travel as if they are absolute strangers!!! or enemies bonded together. The day I was travelling to Vienna from Kolkata, I met an aunty in the bus towrds the air-craft, who, according to herself was travelling with her husband to UK where her son stays, but believe me I couldnot even trace the uncle - Aunty was busy toking to me, she was excited as it was her first time, and when I asked her, "Are you traveeling alone", she said, "Na na, tomar kaku o ache amar shonge" - this is another amazing thing about our mothers and aunts - they will die but not call their husbands by their names! My mother wanted to pass this on to me, I had very politely(my version of politeness) refused! Anyways, coming back to this aunty, when she told me that "my kaku" was also there, I strated looking for him, then she said , "ei ekhanei kothao hobe"!

I see my father-in-law always shouting at my mother-in-law or scolding her when they are travelling together - as if she just cannot do anything right!

I love my India, but these are the things that disturbs me - we dont know how to respect another human being, more so if that human being is our better half! This is in our blood. We love to shout at each other. In the western part, they may have more divorces...but if they are together, they are in love. And if they are in love, and while they are in love, they treat each other well.

I learnt from this elderly couples, what it is like to grow old together gracefully and lovingly...not like growing old together because we have no options. In India coupls are like that...they are together because they have no options...are they still in love? They might like to ask this question to themselves.

Coming back to elderly couples, well, I like them immensely in this part of the world. They are indeed growing old together... God bless them.

And as I sit in my hotel room, all alone, writing this...I wonder silently... Will I really grow old with him...together? like these people out here...or will my mother be successful in passing on the heir... i wonder will i hold his hand when am walking on the road, or will he be miles ahead of me... i wonder will we call each other sweetheart and darling... or will we even not bother to call each other...

The more I wonder, the more Doris Day takes over me...Que Serra Serra...

Days in Vienna

Vienna is a lovely place - i dont think I need to update you on that. Many of you must have already been here, if not then heard about it. The weather at the moment is jus perfect. The roads are so wide, clean and peaceful. The shops on the roads are what dreams are made up of. The buildings so antique yet well maintained. All take together just the place to be.

Even then the last 2 days of my life have been not very good for me? You may ask why? You may tell me that many would like to trade places with you. Nice city to be in, staying in the best of hotels, having best of food and over the weekend no work pressure to add it on... why cant you just be happy???

I will tell you why. I am glad that I am in Vienna - a place I always wanted to visit. So thank you God. Its a tourists' paradise. And you can make that out once you are on road. All around me are families, couples of all age groups and groups of young friends. Every one has company here. And there I am, all alone surfing the roads aimlessly. Looking at a kids store and thinking how Millie would have enjoyed here. Looking at the roadside cafe' and almost visualising how HE would have loved to sit there with HIS beer. Seeing couples walking on road holding hands and feeling a pang somewhere deep within.

Vienna is a nice place to be - only if you could be with yuor loved ones. I wish I had them with me here. Strolling down the roads would have been so much fun holding the hands of my loved ones. Having ice cream would be so much fun if fighting for a bite with my daughter. Window shopping would have been so much fun if mother-daughter could share some fashion tips!

Am nnot jealous to see happy faces around me, just wish I could also be one of them.

...to be continued

Vienna Diary

I was scheduled to travel to Vienna for a month on an official trip. For the first time I was travelling abroad alone and hence I was a bit confused. I say confused, because I really dont know exactly what I was feeling...the feeling was like a very toxic concuction of various stuffs, and the best or the worst part is that you dont even know all of them!

Anyways, the day came drwaing near and near... and then came 21st Aug'09 - bon voyage... the flight from Delhi-Vienna was at 01:50 hours, so you can well imagine my condition by the time I was standing i a huge q infront of the check-in counter. And standing there I realized the following

1. India is NOT a poor country - otherwise how can u explain that long queue? It seemed as if the whole of India (and part of world) was travelling to Vienna or somewhere in Europe!!!
2. Slowly I reached the front of the queue and then got the first blow - I have 6 kgs of excess baggage and so have to pay the charge or reduce the weight. Since I couldnot have possibly done the latter I paid excess baggage charges. 20kgs for 1 month trip is too less!!!

After I got my boarding pass and my wallet was 13,000 INR lighter I proceeded towards the emigration counter which also had a huge q as expected. There the following realizations struck me

1. We keep accusing Indians of being ill mannered, but believe me 2 Japanes tourists wanted to break the queue and was caught tresspassing lol... I am a proud Indian.
2. I am a proud IBMer as well. This tag helped me with a smooth emigration process - smoother than my contemporaries standing there.

After the emigration was done, I had to go through customs clearing as well - why? dont ask... bcos earlier I had paid excess baggage. There the questions were the most irrevalent I have ever heard. Wonder, with this kinda questionnaire, how do they manage to detect foul praeys?

Anyways, after all of that went near Gate No 9 where from we were expected to board - boy!!! there was no place to stand, forget a chair to sit!!! Was wondering, so many people travel out of India every day???!!! I was sleepy, hungry, tired and exhausted... oh yes, and thirsty as well. mentally very disturbed, felt like crying for obvious reasons... lonely and...anyways, i think you get the picture. Time passed by as it waits for none. And then finally boarded the air craft. There I had the following realizations

1. The only way an international aircraft differs from a domestic one is the breadth! Otherwise the place is as less as that in the latter!!! I had an aile sit and fortunately there was a young girl sitting right next to me. We stuggled to fit in our respective seats and ended up pushing each other for a bit of excess space - but alas, there was none!
2. Then around 3AM, they provided us dinner. I was excited to see them approaching but then realized I had no apetite to have them.
3. They were showing Ghazini, wtched some part n then did the most difficult thing of my life - tried to sleep in there!!!
4. The air craft was reminding me of AC chair cars in Trains in India. Struggled to sleep for a couple of hours. Dont remember whether was already awake or woke up... but it was around 6AM (IST) that I felt the need to go to loo.
5. Came out and had nothing to do so was waiting for breakfast. They served us breakfast and then soon after that we landed.

My first feeling was that - wow! I landed in Vienna!!! But as I looked outside the window, it seemed no different than Bangalore or Hyderabad airports (cant even say Kolkata Airport though). Experience inside the airport was such that I felt we Indians are much more cordial. But may be am biased. A few disturbing stuffs

1. They are very reluctant to speak in English - hardly matters if you dont understand their language.
2. The luggage trolleys were not FREE!!! u had to insert some coin - and since I had no coin, I had to pull in my own luggages.

I came outside and saw a very friendly looking person holding my name and waiting for me. He gave me a firendly smile, took my luggages and even advised me not to buy Calling Cards from the airport as they would be expensive. As we drove outside the airport, I first had the glimpse of the city. Boy, Vienna is beautiful, calm, and extremely firendly - it didnt seem like a stranger to me at all. Reason? Well there are plenty of them

1. Thecars on the road were no alien - I saw SKODA OCTAVIA, CIELO, MATIZ and all sorts of thoer big/small cars we see in India. Some of the cars which I had not heard about earlier(never mind I have a very poor knowledge on cars) resembled like some distant cousins of the cars on Indian roads - like ESTEEM, HYUNDAI ACCENT etc. The only car i missed there was Maruti 800!!! :-)
2. The buildings were so similar like the ones we have in Kolkata around BBD Bag area - ofcourse these were much well-maintained.
3. The trams! and the tram lines
4. The billboards had similar advertisements and brands - only the language was different

Soon e reached our hotel. Its a nice hotel, but again being biased that I am, I prefer our hotels. Breakfast was nice and the room though small was cosy and comfortable. Soon I settled in and slept off.

... to be continued

Some Songs and their meanings for me

Songs... anybody and everybody's companion... when u are happy you listen to them; when you are sad, you listen to them; when you wanna dance you listen to them; when u wanna sleep, even then you listen to them. And there is a song for each and every mood you experience. No matter which genre of songs you prefer, you always have one for every occassion.

Hindi songs are my all time favorites. May be because I relate to them more. There are some songs that have touched me with their lyrics. So here are a few of my favorite Hindi lyrics that have a deep impact on me...

... Pal Na Ruke Ek Pal Ke Liye
Jeeta Rahe Pyar Kal Ke Liye
Kare Koi Sitam, Mile Koi Sazaa
Dil Bhule Nahin Kabhi Pehli Wafa
So Haare Na Himmat, Kare Sab Woh Haasil
Yeh Dil Ka Musafir, Chala Ja Raha Hai...

(this is from a song named - Kaahin toh milegi, mohabbat ki manzil)

This particular stranza has always impressed me. Pehli wafa or First True Love - the most genuine emotions you can ever experience. There may be many infatuations which you may mistake as Love, but you just know when it is true. The whole feelings is so different.... and perhaps one day, it just fades away... but no matter what, you can never forget it.

...Jis Haath Mein, Ek Haath Hain
Us Haath Ki, Kya Baat Hain,
Kya Faasle, Kya Manzilein,
Ek Humsafar, Gar Saath Hain,
Bigdi Kismat Ko Yun Jo Sawnar De
Wohi Toh Dil Daar Hain, Yaar Mere

(this is from the famous song, Sach Mere Yaar hain, from SAGAR)

Wonderful feeling it is to have a true "humsafar" who can just make your journey so desirable even with its numerous ups and downs. But do we always give importance to their existance? may be not...n then they just drift away...n then you are probably back to the journey alone...

...Kal Ki Baatein Bhul Ja
Guzri Raatein Bhul Ja
Khwab Jo Sach Ho Sake Na
Unki Yaadein Bhul Ja...
...Jo Na Hare Bewasi se
Na Kare Shikwa Kisi Se
Raaz Yeh Jana Usi Ne
Zindagi Kya Hai Zindagi...

(from the famous song, Kya Khabar Kya Pata, Kya Khushi Hai, Gum Hai Kya)

This is probably the best way to let go off the past and move forward, in life...but in reality, can we??? This also reminds me about so many other songs on "Zindagi" - indeed its a big question...what is this "Life" that we are so possessive about... we keep chasing it all the time...try to make it better all the time...and one day, it leaves us quietly, n then all our efforts are gone down the drain... Philosophy, isnt it?

Kiska Raasta Dekhein,
Ae Dil Ae Saudaai
Milon Hain Khamoshi, Barson Hain Tanhaai,
Bhulee Duniya, Kabhi Ki, Tujhe Bhi, Mujhe Bhi
Phir Kiski Yaad Aayee...

Now this is the song of the ultimate loner... and its true...we have come in this owrld alone, will go from here alone (unless we are the victim of some terrorist activity where many die together)...but here while we are at it, we look for companions... friends, relatives, life partner etc etc... We forget that none of those relations are permanent...n in todays world, all the more not...

I know I am spreading a lot of negativity. But I have really realized that nothing in this life is permanent... everything is dellusion... even "true Love" is...

Escape...if you may

This is goodbye...goodbye forever...goodbye for good.

No, it is not what you think. I rather like you, and that's why. I am afraid I will fall in love with you. You won't like that...ok fine, am not being honest. I actually love you...love you more than I ever thought I would be able to love someone.

My love is a grasping clinging all-pervasive thing. I get insecure if you so much as look at someone else. My love and my world is be so full of you that there is no room for others, but I know you don't love me in the same way. You talk to others, you have a life beyond me... If somebody ever mentions your name and I get insanely jealous.

And neither of us wants that.

I love you to the extent that my own self is subsumed in my love for you. That I have realised, is rather exhausting and you don't like ir.

So I am stopping before I can get to those stages of devotion, longing and madness. I am quitting before you feel claustrophobic and shackled, before you will resent me and my helpless adoration. Because I am scared.

Escape while you can.

Mistakes - The only right thing in Life

(Apologies for a confused, jumbled post. But let me call it my Post-Modernist/ Anti-Positivist style).

Happily ever after…..Yes, maybe. Most of us want a life without grave illness or never see poverty. We do want our basics to be fine, whatever we think our basics are (basics you see is highly subjective).

Also, happiness is an ambiguous word. For some, happily ever after may mean five bottles of beer (my husband) and steaks everyday. Of course, we can’t define what makes people happy, matter of fact some people are drawn to depression. True, being sad somehow does it for them. All right, brand me as insensitive (no you cant really do that, as I myself, am in that phase at the moment), but hey, some people do have a subversive sense of ‘joy’.

No, no, this is not an attack on depressed people, don’t worry. This is about those irresistible imperfect choices. Wrong choices are alluring…that guy with the colorful Mohawk, that eyebrow piercing, that 90’s perm that made you look like an alien, that roadside snack, that candy the stranger gave…the first cigerratte and so on...

Look at fairytales. Somehow, most fairy tales are about wrong choices and their consequences and a journey to set it right. In Cinderella, Dad marries the wrong woman, prince falls for just that girl who is not invited to the ball…for that matter almost every fairytale is about wrong choices. I mean, for thousands of years we have told our children where wrong choices can lead us to only to ensure that they make that wrong choice! And that too in life we are left without the magic to make things fine again.

I do think making the wrong choice is the essence of life. We have to, or else how do we set it right again? Or not set it right, continue the misdeed and make a total mess. But doing the wrong thing is essential. Wait, there is a narrow border between stark stupidity and making mistakes. If you wear a superman cape and jump from a building it’s stupid, just plain stupid. But if you thought you could paint and joined an art class to only realize you can’t even draw a smiley face, then it’s a mistake.

So, why am I rambling about fairytales, mistakes, redemption, nemesis. I have no clue why. It’s like this inexplicable urge to go on a picnic with an aluminum vessel with girls on the beach and sing ‘Mausam mastana, rasta anjana’. See, that’s what I mean there is no logical reasoning. Also, when we are talking of mistakes logic and rationality are not the keywords.

Although, recently I have been thinking a lot about mistakes, wrong choices...I know, I have been thoughtful for a change instead of searching for free music online. All I can say, is my wrong choices were essential. This priceless lesson of life, yes, I was wrong and I want to set it right. Let me define myself in the Bollywood way. I would rather say ‘Bade bade shehron mein aisi choti choti baatein hoti rehti hai’ than sob like Kaka and sing ‘Humse ka bhool hui…’

...ok, I know you now want to label this post as "fully faltoo"... but dont do tht. It is not...this post is dedicated to the the miskates of my life which has made me what I am today...

Hindi Film Song Lyrics

Since I have nothing better to do at the moment, I decided to work with our famous Bollywood songs... So here it goes...

When I saw a girl in 1942, it felt like...

Blossoming Rose - 14.28%
Poet's Dream - 14.28%
Luminous Ray - 14.28%
Deer in forest - 14.28%
Moonlit Night- 14.28%
Soft Words- 14.28%
Lamp Lit in Temple - 14.28%

Attributes of Govinda that are SEXY ( Y=Yes, N=No)

Pant - Y
Shirt - Y
Hair - Y
Walk - Y
Even his damn hanky - Y!!!

Heisenberg's Principle of Love Uncertainty...

Somebody Lives...

Infront of my eyes - 50%
Near my Liver! - 50%

It You...you...you!!!

The following are fast asleep... Please rate the following

Standards - AW=Awake
As= Asleep
RA= Really Asleep
CM= Comatose

This World - Your rating - AS
Sky - Your Rating - AS
All Destinations - Your rating - RA
Road - Your rating - AS

Rajesh Khanna's Algorithm in LIFE

What Happened >> How did it happen >> When did it happen >> Why did it happen >> When did it happen >> When it happened >> Then it happened >> Ditch that shit >>>> What Happened >>.....

Things Govinda does and doesnot care about

Govinda Does Not care about : Your Grandmother's death
Govinda does care about: Walking on the road
Eating Bhelpuri
Showing girl around the town

Ok, enough now! what do you trhink, I really have nothing to do???!!! Grrrrrrrr

International Women's Day

Hmm... International Women's Day... and boy! (sorry, girl) some celebration it was, and still is. Radio, Television, Newspaper, Net, Shopping Malls, you name it, and they all have something or the other to offer you on International Women's Day...one day in a year is Your Day, woman, so go out and celebrate.

Every celebrity is writing about this day, and their feeling associated with womanhood... from Shobhaa De' to Nita Ambani to some hottie of the Bollywood Industry named Amrita Rao...they all had to contribute their views on the Sunday Times on Womanhood... so I thought, why not me? - in my own world, am a celebrity, and in my own blog, am free to express my feelings on being a woman... so here it goes... Na, dont get me wrong, my post is not about the "political" or "social" or "economical" or "blah-blah" side of Women's Day. Rather it is about those intense girlie moments, those total feminine zones that no one, no one can take away from us.

Though I studied in co-ed school and college and university, and right from my kindergarten days till the work atmosphere am in, I have had the privilege of interacting with boys, cool dudes and gentlemen, but if I lived my life all over again, one thing that will not change is that I love spending time with women. Yes, I love spending all my time with women, and stop any imagination, I am totally straight. But this is about happiness, that feeling of absolute joy and completion I know, this is the deep stuff. Recently, I was contemplating over what makes me happy and fortunately the answer was not ‘death by chocolate’ or jugs of good stout. I am happy when I am with my girlfriends. Wait, let me just elaborate this.

Let me define some of the happiest moments of my life. I was happy almost every day in Kolkata during my college days when Enasree and I started our everyday agenda together, draped in a similar kinda attire (yes, our dresses were almost similar, and even shoes!) we bunked classes, talked, giggled and talked again. God! We were happy, so, so happy. Happiness was spending time with our gang at Scottish on the backside stairs and each of us talking at the same time, happiness was in our cacophony and those O! So British Wodehouse references or random connection between Tom Jones and Anil Kapoor, or maybe simply bitching about other "gangs" and "girls".

Hmm...happiness... Happiness was forcing Enasree to miss her train timing and then all the way walking with her to Bagbazar bus stop from where she would hail her bus and i would see her off. Happiness was going out for shopping in the New Market with minimum possible fund available in our pockets - now thats what i really call "window shopping". Happiness was going for those "A" rated english movies and giggling and blushing continuously while we were watching them. Happiness was "chasing" guys! (yes, we also had our share of fun, guys!). Happiness was both myself and Enasree having a crush on the same guy and both trying to woo him and laughing off together when "that guy" went to a third girl altogether :-). Happiness was our little birthday bashes. Happiness was that scary movie I watched with Mili clasping her hands. Happiness was those shopping sprees where there was no one to stop you from shopping as all was equally into it. Happiness was some bad piece of advise given to Sonia and then not even regretting it. Happiness was those long streched telephone calls with mothers shouting behind us. Happiness was those silly greetings cards, that purple bra which only she(name withheld) thought was hot, those useless tips on sex, those remedies for hair loss, those secret recipee', and ofcourse those unadulterated gossips!

They say you are happy when you are totally focused in the present, that moment of inexplicable bliss when your mind is not regretting the past or is worried about future. Every time I am with women, I am in that state of bliss (and yes, I am aware how this sounds!). Also, I have hardly met any woman (actually there are a few of them, but anyways) whom I don’t like. Somehow I find it super easy to like women. I agree that a major part of our life goes in obsessing about men, come on, humor me I am in this typical chick flick writer mood today. But somehow for every trouble, every sneeze, every little disarray we run to women.

So today, I celebrate International Women's day by remembering all my women friends, who at every point of time helped me by giving me immense pleasure and happiness, just by being with me. They actually helped me be thankful to God for being a woman... God bless them all and make their life desirable and self content in every possible way.

Conference Calls

Canada. California. New York. Armonk. Mexico. And, to ice the cake, Bangalore. The conference call was scheduled to start at 9:30 in the morning, and at 9:29, I realized that the phone in the corner of my desk did not have an international calling facility. I was sitting there, all prepared, my papers spread out in front of me, my pen handy, my head going over the different methods of opening the conversation, saying “Hi” or “Hello” or “Good morning”, and then, I sat there listening to the sweet yet hideous female voice telling me that this service isn’t available on this phone.

I wondered what to do. The clock ticked away the seconds of the one minute left for me to sign into the call. I gulped and took a decision that I knew I’d regret. I flipped open my mobile and punched in the numbers. I prayed hard, hoping the call would end in a few minutes. It didn’t. It lasted for an hour and fifty minutes. I sighed and resigned myself for a fat bill this month. The recession time has hit our Industry big time. Companies are on cost cutting mode... but what about the poor employees? Am still dreading the time I will see the bill for this month....

Conference calls, according to me, are a supreme waste of time. I think more work can be accomplished through an email. The first twenty minutes are obviously spent in introducing all the people in the call. The next thirty-odd minutes go away in outlining the agenda for the conference call. The remaining hour or so is spent in asking people to speak up; apologizing for loud cell phones; apologizing for the rackets behind their respective backs; and finally, asking everyone present if they understood the last point. More often than not, there will be at least three jerks who would not have paid attention, and they would ask you to repeat the last point.

The frustrating thing about these conference calls is that you cannot abuse anyone verbally. If the same meeting is held over emails, then before sending each and every email, you can let out the wonderful stream of expletives, and feel good about yourself and the other person’s lack of knowledge. You can question his/her ability to think straight, his/her man-/womanhood, his/her ridiculous name, and lot of other things. But on a conference call, you have to hold your tongue and treat even the most outrageous of jerks with an amount of respect. It takes so much out of you. You can’t even make fun of funny names!

Anyway, I have had too many conference calls till now. I think I’ve devised a formula to survive each one of them. I call it “Apparent Indifference” - if you give the impression to the other jerks on the call that you’re indifferent about the outcome, then they’ll fall over themselves to spell out each and ever point of concern and make sure that each and every doubt has been answered. This, of course, helps me in making the meeting a success.

Oh, I hate conference calls. Of course, the only advantage the conference call has over board-room meetings is that you can fart loudly and get away with it... but having said that I have never enjoyed this experience much, only because I hate the idea of farting in public - with one exception - my husband! He is excused, i love him too much to feel irritated about this one (of the innumerable) bad habbit of his :-)

Auto-nomy of Autorickshaws

[Put your city name] autorickshaw drivers are evil, greedy, and uncivil anti-social elements.

This statement seems to have more support in Kolkata that both Mamta Bannerjee and Buddhadeb Babu's followers put together; or in Bangalore than all the Dravidian parties put together. It is also a frequent topic of discussion at most (well..middle class) social gatherings. The interesting thing is (at least for me) that there is little or no debate. It is a simply a one-way rant. [Any Indian city name] auto-drivers are scoundrels of the first (or even better..zeroth) order and that’s simply the end of the story. Since the unfortunate victims of this country-wide badmouthing orgy are usually not invited to middle-class social gatherings to narrate their side of the story, I have decided to play Devil’s advocate. As people see it, they are the devils and I am their advocate. I enjoy taking unpopular positions and I dont mind being clobbered for being so obviously on the wrong side of the issue.

Let’s a first get a few things straight. Very rarely do I ever encounter an honest, transparent and law-abiding auto driver in India. Just imagine my role as being a public prosecutor for a criminal who is not going to be able to attract any decent lawyer to defend him. All I am going to do is to ask some unasked questions and do my lawful duty by making an honest attempt to see things from the auto drivers’ perspective.

So let’s list down all the unquestionable “truths” about Indian autos and see if they stand up to some semblance of scrutiny.

Auto drivers use a lot of disrespectful and foul language.

Right. No debate about that. Auto drivers are not known for their politeness. But are we perhaps possibly dealing with a cultural difference here? An average Punjabi uses extremely profane curses as punctuation, prepositions and conjuctions (and the occasional interjection) on a day to day basis, but most people in North India may not take these curses literally. The day to day struggle of those below the middle class is expected to produce the occasional outburst of rudeness interspersed with the actual intended communication. And by the way, my educated and well-behaved husband also uses words beyond any strech of my imagination when he is driving.

The point: Dont read more into the language than is necessary. Politeness and propriety are often linked with socio-cultural backgrounds. Germans are rude. Americans are brash. Brits are snobbish. Auto drivers are ... like that.

Auto drivers are rude and uncouth

I know this is a little way-out, but have we ever stopped to consider how we behave with them? Do we all behave like angels? Or do we perhaps show a little bit of that age-old Indian class superiority (Caste..I am afraid is a bad word nowadays) when dealing with people who are, from an socio-economic standpoint, below us? Is it just possible, just a little, that a lot of us in the middle class are simply not used to “those sort of people” answering back or being assertive? Is there a slender possibility that we are part of this vicious circle of uncivility?

Auto drivers overcharge and do not respect government stipulated rates

Let’s ask this question. What is the “correct” rate for auto travel? How do we know that the government has not set ridiculously low rates, rates that keep the auto drivers in grinding poverty? An average Indian auto driver makes 30 rupees, while driving through nightmarish traffic. Just a thought. And about abiding by "government" stipulated rates... tell me something, how many of us providing services ever think about whether the charges we levy for our services are over or underrated? A doctor's fee, a lawyer's fee, a consultant's charges - r they all justified? The rare the skill of a doctor, the more he charges! A specialised doc will charge more than a regular MBBS... then why an autodriver will not charge you double the rate when it comes to hailing an auto at night, or when the supply is less??? Its economics, you see.

I believe standalone Meter regulated fares will never work. Auto drivers will always find a way to “heat” them up. So it is important to realize that there are 3 forces at play in this game. (The game is defined as the “negotiation” between prospective commuter and the auto driver)

1. The fare that the commuter is willing to pay
2. The fare that the auto driver is willing to expect

One of the problems is that the commuter does his calculations based on

1. An assumption that the auto driver is anyway likely to state an inflated fare
2. The amount he can afford based on his average earnings etc
3. An approximate idea of general economic inflation, government approved meter rates etc

While the auto driver does his calculations based on

1. The percentage of the fare that he will, in any case, have to pay as “hafta” to corrupt policemen
2. His understanding of inflation and prices of petrol etc
3. His estimation of
   how well off the commuter is
   how urgent is the commuter need
4. His desire to lead a life at a level above that of slum-level existence.

In this sort of an unbalanced game, I am just wondering if we should apply a free market model to autos. Of course, we will have to solve the problem of police ownership and cartels, but I think, a variable pricing model could work moderately better than what we have today. We accept variable pricing in a lot of situations - property rates, airline tickets, tatkal railway tickets etc. So how about a three tiered model of

• basic autos - with low end fares
• Mid-tier autos
• Luxury autos

The numbers of each one of them will be determined by actual demand. Further, a series of call-centres (kind of like the Call-taxi model) that log all auto journeys (start distance, end distance) and also monitor the legality of the meters. Auto drivers should also rotate between the three tiers to make the system fair for everybody. Where the government can play a role is to pay some sort of a monthly stipend to auto drivers that will go a long way to improve their lot and potentially reduce their desperation to cheat and fleece. How will the government pay for this? We could consider a per fare tax on mid-tier and luxury autos that the government earns.