Thursday, October 18, 2012

My dad's memoirs- Episode 2



 (Chronicles of my dad down the memory lane in his own words)



I remember this incident during our stay at Ghaziabad. I was evaluating answer papers of the departmental competitive exam.

A burly Haryanvi man who took the exam tried to offer me a fat bribe to give him good marks in the exam. He was very influential and gained information from birdies of the whereabouts of all the five answer papers which were sent to be evaluated all over the country. He went to all those places, offered bribes to the evaluators and persuaded them to give him good marks. His fifth paper was sent to be evaluated at Ghaziabad, to me. He called me constantly for two days on the phone and started harassing me. I thought I would give him grace marks if he wrote something but his paper was blank. I had to fail him. He invited himself to my home. He saw two-year-old Aparna playfully running about here-and-there. He threatened me saying, “You seem to have a small happy family today. Just take care that it might not be the same tomorrow.” He was a hefty man and in no way I would have matched his strength. He threatened me saying that he would carry me and push me off the terrace. My wife got scared listening to his ultimatum. She called her brothers and everyone in the family panicked. I avoided venturing out alone on my scooter and stayed put safely inside home. He would hover under the apartment, pacing angrily and watching out for my posting of the evaluated papers.  I managed to parcel and send away the bundle of evaluated papers secretly and safely.

I even considered contacting the police. After a couple of days all our neighbours came to know about the problem. They had a nice chat with him saying that I am a man of scruples and would never fall for a bribe.  They told him to ‘fix’ some corruptible higher authority in the examination cell so that they would change his result and that there is no use trying to ‘grease my palms’ as I would not be so easily bent on principles. They told him that I am a hard working, innocent and an honest man and it would do him no good by threatening me except wasting his time. He came to know that I already parceled the papers. He finally saw to that his physical strength is nothing in front of my honesty and left us alone.

12 comments:

  1. Your dad is a role model. An honest man. Hard to find nowadays. I salute him. Please convery my regards.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow!! Truly an inspiring post... hats off to your Dad's honesty!

    Very difficult to find such people these days

    ReplyDelete
  3. People of that generations were mostly honest and hardworking. They usually encountered trouble from the younger generations, and many times for the safety of their loved ones they may have been forced to do things that they did not want to do. It is great to know your father managed to survive his threats.
    Now a days it is more and more dangerous to be honest, that is why we have so many corrupt people all around us.
    Our best wishes to your father.
    My father too is like that only, and i often wonder how he survived through a lot of unpleasant things in his life. He is 91 and is still fighting cases, which he has put against people, who have cheated him.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Aparna,

    First visit. Read all current posts as well as episode 1 of this plus the poem after that. I admire your grandfather as well as your father for their sticking to principles. Stiletto was a poem indicating how one feels at loss of partner. Honesty was inspiring. Had a good laugh at marriage one. What is the status now? Dahi - Puris look mouth watering.

    Take care

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wow..What a man!!
    Very inspiring. :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. A beautiful, very inspiring memoir. Thank you for sharing it here Aparna :)
    My regards to your father.

    ReplyDelete
  7. The problem with meekly obeying these kind of bullies is, there are always more powerful ones who would be ready to take advantage. It's better to discourage them and make things very difficult for them (if at all things come to a life-threatening situation) so that they either get fed-up or don't attempt such adventures again. Of course, word spreads fast and other similar people might be discouraged as well. Your father did the right thing and it was good that the neighbors helped.

    Destination Infinity

    ReplyDelete
  8. That is a show of mental strength by your dad despite the threats.A role model for most these days

    ReplyDelete
  9. Who would've blamed your dad if, for the safety of his family, he would've passed that ignorant brute. How sad that your neighbours had to placate that corrupt individual that there might be some higher ups who'd succumb to his bribes. With third rate people qualifying without knowledge and then competing with our best brains for jobs (as engineers, pilots, politicians, newspaper reporters, lawyers, doctors, authors - you name it) there is no hope for India shining. Only the fear of swift and certain punishment will stop the rot.

    ReplyDelete
  10. You actually wrote everything exactly from your dad's journal?! Wow!

    A man/woman of principle is an asset to the family, institution and the country. Proud of your dad.

    You are indeed fortunate to have a dad as him.

    Joy always,
    Susan

    P. S: Thanks for coming by my blog and also the follow. Happy.

    ReplyDelete

Please be nice :)

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...