Knock! Knock; Mr. Gupta was woken from his little nap in his elegant Mercedes by the beggar tapping at his Mercedes window. Mr. Gupta raised an eyebrow and then took a hundred rupee note from his purse and rolled the windows down to give it to the beggar; on receiving the note the beggar sported a huge grin on his face from ear to ear. Mr. Gupta thought the grin was very familiar when he had last seen it; but despite his best efforts he couldn’t remember. Well remembering things was definitely a problem for Mr. Gupta; he was the Country Manager India of one of the best companies in the world Ingrid Corp. Ingrid Corp was a name to reckon with in the Indian markets today largely due to the efforts of Mr. Gupta. He had so many things to keep in mind so he didn’t bother and went back to his slumber after asking the chauffeur to increase the cool of the AC.
Pramod! Pramod; all of a sudden the shy boy woke up from his slumber. His mother was looking for him; he had been sleeping in the terrace in the hot May sun for a time period he could barely recollect. His mother called him “Come quick the newspaper guys are here”; it had been the norm for the last few days, after all the son of a daily wage labourer had come first in the state wide Senior Secondary Examinations and to top it Pramod had averaged 98 percent which had never happened before in the thirty year history of the examinations. Pramod was tired and that’s the reason why he had gone off to sleep in the terrace; and he had the look on his face that said it all “not another one”. As Pramod quickly ran down the flight of steps he realized that these people weren’t the newspaper guys, his mother neither had the discretion nor the education to gauge who’s what. As he came and the visitor stood up from his seat and said “Well done! Son you have made us proud”; well he was no other than Sambhu Ji the local MLA with his band of merry men.
Pramod hated politics and politicians but he had no choice. However Sambhu Ji was determined to annoy Pramod more, the thing that Pramod hated about politicians was that they used to break into a nonsense speech at every instance. So as expected Sambhu Ji went on and on with his speech which seemed to last for an eternity. After completing his speech he pulled out his purse and gave Pramod a hundred rupee note, “Tera Inam” he said and left. Pramod was delighted he had seldom seen a hundred rupee note before leave alone touch it after all his father’s daily wage was all of thirty rupees.
That night the whole family; Pramod and his parents went for a movie. They had never been to one all their life and they had the time of their lives enjoying popcorn, samosas and cold drinks. While returning back Pramod could see the same grin from ear to ear on his parents’ faces and even Pramod was probably grinning in the same fashion too pity he didn’t have a mirror to look into.
“Sir, we are home”; Mr. Gupta woke up and while getting down from the car he just happened to look at the rear view mirror. He could see the grin that he couldn’t see forty years back.
P.S – The story is a humble tribute to my interactions with achievers who have stayed humble and grounded even after all the success which followed by humble beginnings.
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Image source: ca.wikipedia.org
Anil Soni
Shashi……..your blog inspire me to again return back…...where I used to be? The work of contribution rather than accumulation should be the core mantra of our life……...which I forgot these days.
Thanks for sharing this with us.