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Six months later, a new Warden took over Gokhale Hall and the first thing he did was to ban 'outsiders' eating in his Hall...how easy it is to ban facilities...like that something in the manger!
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'India, which has announced it will send a space probe to Mars, is now a
country with more technological prowess than Britain, and the "best and
most beautiful spoken English in the world" is now heard in India, the Telegraph said on Friday.'
gps: There, there, I told you so...only, in his quote above, Theodore Dalrymple, not to be confused with William Dalrymple (who has a farmhouse in Mehrauli and a known love-affair with India), forgot to mention that the "best and most beautiful" blogged English in the world is also from India, especially Hyderabad.
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After I lost my Avon Green bicycle the day I bought it, I lost all interest in bikes and life as well...for a couple of days.
Six months after letting me stay in Gokhale Hall where I had food and roof, I was shunted, against my will, to Qrs BF-1/6 (bedroom) by one of those curious anomalies for which IIT KGP has always been famous....like for its collapsible gates.
Now, BF-1/6 (bedroom) didn't have a mess attached to it. But the Warden of Gokahle Hall, Prof G L Sinha, listening to my tale of woe, permitted me to come and eat my meals there as a Paying Guest.
Now, BF-1/6 (bedroom) is not an easy walking distance from either Gokhale Hall or the Institute Main Building. So, I had got to buy a bicycle. Once bitten, twice shy... Friends suggested that I buy a second or third hand bike in a rotten condition since that would be theft-proof hopefully.
My friend, NCN, found out an M Tech student in JCB Hall who was leaving KGP after his two-year stint and was eager to sell his Hercules bike which he bought it from his senior who bought it from his senior who bought it from his senior...
This bike was as heavy as the good old Humber but didn't have its fiery wings...rather. And I had to lug it up every night to my third floor digs along a stair case that had six landings, for fear of cycle thieves. Everyone in those Flats did so too...even the residents on the ground floor who had a verandah...they had to lug theirs into their Hall and lock them too. A few ardent bike-lovers, when they went home on summer vacation, carried and locked their cycles in their Offices too, tunneling through the collapsible gates when no one was watching.
Everyone those days was talking about the award-winning Vittoria de Sica movie, 'Bicycle Thieves', to console themselves that KGP didn't get the first prize...it went to Italy:
Six months later, a new Warden took over Gokhale Hall and the first thing he did was to ban 'outsiders' eating in his Hall...how easy it is to ban facilities...like that something in the manger!
After some trials and tribulations to feed and sustain myself on my own cooking, I quit my Qrs and joined the rather expensive Faculty Hostel which was walking distance from my work-place. So, I sold my heavy-handed bike to the cycle-shop boy Gopi (who is now a mature cycle-doctor) for a song, to pay my hefty mess bills.
A few years later, my friend Tyagi was leaving KGP to join Telco as a High Officer and didn't know what to do with his grand-father's bike which was a Phillips with no frills. And he gifted it to me and left KGP with an easy heart for several reasons, apart from great love for (bikeless) me:
1. No one would buy it...
2. No one would steal it...
3. He couldn't take it to Telco...he would be reverted to KGP if his higher-ups saw him riding it...
4. He couldn't abandon it like Kunti did Karna for fear of his granpa's soul...
So, I was using it happily and showing it to Tyagi when he was visiting his alma mater, IIT KGP, a few times till he got married and settled down at Telco and lost all interest in KGP and his Vintage Phillips bike.
After I was convinced that Tyagi wouldn't visit KGP anymore, I sold it to Gopi for a song again...I wanted the money as Sean Connery said in The Great Train Robbery:
...for my Vazir Filter cigarettes bought from the wholesale market in Gole Bazaar.
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