The natural phenomenon of brown powdery cinders turning into thick sticky grime was occurring over the stacked up piles of register books and files. The air too surrounding the room was adding it to the wonderfully unkempt shabbiness as it emitted the suppressed clumsiness’ smell around. Only a glassed barricade kept the unclean office room from the crummy payment area where people had queued up.
The third floor office was swarming with people that made a snake line till the ground floor of the building. Children, ladies, elderly people... everyone was patiently waiting for the queue to move ahead. This was not an abnormal scene at one of the electric board offices in Deppari, a small suburban town of Mumbai. This one office had an extremely bad reputation of treating the customers mainly because of the notorious head clerk who was popularly known only by his surname. Patil.
Rashi held her 5 year old son’s hand tightly as the crowd grew thicker. The stagnant air in the congested room smelt heavily of sweat. It was getting extremely hard for her to control her son who was in no mood to stand in the queue anymore.
“Stay quietly here, Monu. Our turn will come now.”
“You’ve been telling this for the past half an hour. I will stand outside.” Monu protested.
“No! Stay here. Otherwise I’ll drop you in the school.”
“It’s Saturday. It’s a holiday for me.” Monu cried.
“Stay quiet.” Rashi said as she keenly watched an extremely fragile man in the other line, sitting on the floor. He was complaining of severe knee pain. While some people were kind enough to let him go ahead of them in the queue, some decided to talk to the counter manager on behalf of him.
“Why can’t you open the other two counters? Can’t you see people here are suffering? There is an elderly person here who can’t stand for too long. At least be considerate towards him.” Johnny, a college student spoke up.
“We can’t be held responsible for his condition. Blame his family members for letting him come here.” Snapped the heavily built bald man, managing the grievances counter.
“You can’t be this rude!” Rashi decided to speak up. She moved ahead and along with Johnny countered the man. “Every time I come here to pay the bill, I see this poor man standing in line. I even know his name and his reason for frequent visits. He is Jasbir uncle. He has been coming here for the past few months almost daily. I see him pass by my house daily morning. All he wants is to just transfer his electric meter to his son’s name.”
“If you know that much, go and help him yourself.” The man shut the counter of grievances and moved away from his desk. Everyone standing in the grievances line started shouting.
“Patil Sir is very strict. Why would you do that?” One lady condemned Rashi. Soon others too joined in blaming Rashi for the counter shut up.
Rashi was exasperated with their behaviour.
“My job was going to be done today. I too have been coming here daily for over two months. Patil sir assured me my job will be taken care of today...” Another man said.
“Oh! Job would be taken care of? How much you paid him to do the job that he’s actually assigned to do?” Johnny stepped up for Rashi.
“As if you guys haven’t paid “extra” for any government paperwork.” The man snapped.
The commotion grew louder. That tiny room was on fire with people venting out their frustrations at both the trio and the rude Patil.
“What the hell is your son doing? Why can’t he come here instead of sending you?” One man insensitively targeted the old Jasbir.
“I apologise. I apologise. Please move away now. Let me get out of here.” Jasbir said trying to get up. Johnny clutched Jasbir’s hands as he helped the old man get up while Rashi took the papers that Jasbir was holding...
What happens next? Would all the negativity building up inside the Electricity office give birth to any crime soon? Will the old Jasbir get his job done? Check out in the next part...
Oooo. Nice. ...