The TICKET

He held the reservation ticket in pride as if it was certificate of his merit. Well of course it is a certificate of my merit he thought. Didn’t it take merit in planning ones trip home before hand? Didn’t it take merit in planning to go to office late so that one could go to the ticket counter in time to get the reservation and that too a window seat. Not everybody could do it and precisely that was the reason he had got the ticket. He smiled at his own thoughts and waited for 2nd Sept -11:00pm. It was precisely a day and a few hours away.

On the 2nd Sept at 10:30pm he was standing near his house waiting to catch a rickshaw to take him to the bus stand. From the last 15mins he was standing there checking his watch a bit too frequently. Finally he caught sight of a rickshaw nearing him. He flagged it and it stopped. The Rs 120 which the rickshaw driver demanded was a bit too much but then he did not have time to get into a discussion about how the rickshaw-wallahs or for that matter everybody conspires to get more money out of a software professional.

At 10:56pm he was near the ticket counter where a day back he had got his reservation or as he thought of it his certificate of merit. But now he was in a hurry. He enquired about the bus and was told the bus had already left a minute back. He was confused; he had not planned for this. Well the logical thing to do was to ask about the next bus which left at 11:30pm. The man at the counter got the drift and promptly gave him the seat in the 11:30pm bus after making the requisite entries. He hadn’t hoped that this would be smooth but then he had done it. If the reservation was a certificate of merit this turn around was definitely the WINNER’S CUP!!!!

The bus started on time. He was a bit surprised about this. In the last 6 years of his travels from Pune to Nashik this was possibly the first time any asiad had ever left on time or before time. Things changing for the better he thought to himself and increased the volume of his ipod.

He did not like or despise the Pune Nashik journey but then he had done that journey maybe a thousand times before and would have to do it a thousand times in the future. He just prayed that sleep would come to him easily. He had a hectic day tomorrow starting with getting the Ganpati idol and all the decoration which goes into it. Sleep was what he needed the most. The time his eyes closed the bus had just started off from Nashik Phata. That was the last time he would sleep on the bus.

The hooting of horns, people talking and the lights in the bus broke his sleep. He opened his eyes and instinctively checked his watch. It was 2:30AM and Linkin Park was blasting his head off. He looked out but he could not make sense where the bus had reached. It must be near the Chandanapuri ghat, a traffic jam he thought that is so common in these rains and he prepared to close his eyes. There was some commotion going on near the driver’s cabin, he looked up and saw that some people were getting into his bus. That was not usual for sure. Wasn’t the bus kinda full? And from when did the asiad guys started taking people on board without a ticket? Anyways I have my seat he thought and threw a look of disdain at the people standing.

But then a sight caught his eye and he could not close his eyes the remaining journey. He say a man holding a handkerchief to his head. Blood was dripping from the handkerchief and the man was in great pain. He looked at others and there were people with cuts, bruises, swollen foreheads all looking disoriented. What had actually happened? He enquired about what had happened and he was told that the 11:00PM asiad had met with an accident and that the driver had died on the spot while many passengers were injured.

He could not believe his ears. He went numb for a few seconds. That was supposed to be his bus; he had blamed the rickshaw wallah when he came to know that he had missed the 11PM asaid at Shivajinagar. Now he did not know what to do.

He felt regret at the initial thoughts which had come to his mind when he saw these people boarding the bus. He quickly shifted a bit and offered a part of his seat to the person who was standing near him. The person standing near accepted it gratefully. His seat was no longer cherished, if luck or whatever they say wouldn’t have been on his side he would well have been on the other side.

The person to whom he offered was saying something he thought, but it was not audible and he was not in a position to listen to anything. He was just staring out of the window into nothingness.

Images of the ticket counter when he got the reservation done, the rickshaw ride which made him miss the 11PM bus, the delight on getting the seat in the 11:30PM bus on the earlier reservation without having to haggle for it and finally regret on seeing the condition of his co-passengers started flickering in front of his eyes. They just came by randomly, no connection nothing.

He did not understand how much time passed but on seeing the Nashik Road flyover approaching he got up from his seat fumbled a feeble TAKE CARE to the person next to him and got out of the bus.

He put his hand in his shirt pocket took out the EPITOME of PLANNING (the reservation ticket of the 11:00PM bus) and tore it into countless pieces. He flung the pieces overhead.

All this was never planned was the only thought which came to his mind.

(This write up is inspired from a true story which happened with me on the night of 2nd September 2008. Some facts have been distorted for the sake of story telling.)