“Hukum Singh, just get me the numbers of good kabadis in the city. I want a spare tyre for my car. I want all the good kabadis (dealer of spare parts and second-hand goods). After all, we obliged many”, inquired the legendary Kommandant, once again after his good for nothing sons damaged an ancient tyre that the Kommandant had extorted from Razzak Bhai kabadiwala in the year 2002. “Sir, is it the same car which that poofy, little drunken gujju left on the Ambaji Highway, in the inebriated state ?”, asked Hukum Singh with a smile that comes from the confidence which one acquires after years of experience in squeezing the capitalist paunches with deep purses.
Finally,
Hukum Singh managed to find Mushtaq bhai, Razzak’s son and manage a spare tyre.
“Beta, your father was very dear to me. For me, he was like a younger brother.
What else do you deal with? Hukum told me that he saw an old piano at your
shop. You must give it to someone who has an eye for such antique and priceless
legacy. I have been very fond of antiques. In fact, your father promised once
to manage a piano for me,” said the Kommandant with the most charming
finesse in setting the cordon for the hunt. Kommandant went inside and saw his wife
pouring milk in the Mushtaq bhai’s tea and, he pounced upon the
vessel saying “no, no you can’t do this !!! these days such large amounts of
milk are dangerous and it is out of fashion. The youth do not exercise”.
“His idiosyncratic ways and thrifty nature
are getting worse day by day. My goodness, police job in a state like Rajasthan
makes one addicted to freebies and turns them into parasites”, murmured the
Kommandant’s poor wife. Mushtaq bhai left smiling but could not quite
feel either the sweetness of the sugary over-boiled tea or the bitterness of
the Kommandant’s hidden sarkari “sponge”.
I was accompanying the legendary
Kommandant to his ultimate fief i.e. Marwar that day. Some old accounts were to
be settled, still, some of the Marwar’s ghee was left to be gobbled up his
majesty and for a writer, some pristine lands were yet to be explored. But
before that, some calculations pertaining to the classical economic concepts of
average cost, marginal cost, and the opportunity cost were ravaging the mind,
body, and soul of the Kommandant and as a consequence, I was made to wash the
car, change the stepne and buy a new tyre before we
departed. And, I could witness the smile of victory on the Komamndant’s face.
The journey was pleasant as it was
already seven in the evening and the sweltering heat had dropped its armor for
the day. I was back on the roads which I had measured intensely with Colin banna in
his queen of the roads Contessa for years before my higher studies in the US.
When I left India was still ruled by the Congress and despite its saga of
corruption, one did not feel scared of transporting cows, staging a human
rights demonstration, and still, the Kashmiris remembered Vajpayee’s kashmririyat and
Insaniyat as the terror of pellet guns were not in the picture. And, the word
secular was not an abuse.
After the meandering trails of Iswal, sadri, choti sadri, dadai and
Narlai finally we reached Ranakpur. At Mana resort, Thakur Chund Singh
of Larkana house was there to receive us. Kommandant’s first instinct was to
make a monetary estimate of his host’s generosity. Mana is high-end resort
built in western-styled architecture unlike the other resorts in the area built
in haweli style. Mana made him happy but immediately started
pondering upon other alternatives which at the top included getting the cash
equivalent to the value to stay and dinner in Mana. Kommandnat, had
still kept his economist soul intact after 30 years of police service.
Thakur Chund Singh was
another legendary character. Hailing from the glorious Larkana house, he was a
direct relative to the royal family of Jodhpur. His ancestors were
well known for cricket, wine and their mistresses in Bollywood of 1950s.
None of their heirs who went to Mayo and Oxford returned with proper degrees.
Almost everyone made and exemplary record of dropping out and dating at least
10 French and British ladies. 1960s and 1970s brought a decline in
the fortunes. The hukum culture was fast disappearing and they were
losing their lands in wine, women, and gambling. Two of their men committed
suicides when the Cambridge returned royal ladies were caught making passionate
love to painters and writers who visited the palace. With this legacy of love,
lust, and ego, Chund Singh was smart enough to realize the futility
of such archaic and royal attitudes. From his childhood, Chund Singh
was friends with the Marwari baniyas and hardly went for hunting. Chund Singh
was more often seen with Jain munis like Roop Muni ji than with the
swords, horses and drunken women.
Kommandant took a quick shower before
as we were to join Chund Singh Ji for dinner. We were halfway through
the lobby and Kommandant made a U-turn. I was puzzled and followed him to
discover that Kommandant was packing all the toiletries in his shaving bag. I
asked the reason for such a hurry. “We gotta leave early tomorrow morning and I
never leave the business half done……mine is always a final solution”, he
replied, once again with the familiar smile of victory on that huge dark face
with egg-sized eyes which often reminded me of Karl Gustav rocket launchers.
The evening was spent amidst the
wilderness of Ranakpur with Vat 69 and Fratelli. Cool breeze added flavor to
the churning of minds with love, liquor, and lines. Chund Singh
ordered his favorite teetar sulas and rabbit keema. He had deputed his
10 best hunters for two days in the scorching loo winds of Marwar to
find a delicate one. The delicate ones were delicately devoured by the
Kommandant. He, dressed in his characteristic white kurta-pyjama dripped with atar and
talcum powder, enjoyed every bit of the rabbit, fish, and teetar.
Chund Singh regaled us with the
stories which brought me far away from the world of Wall Street and think tanks
of DC. He had been to Pakistan a few months back to visit his relatives who
were Sodha Rajputs and still ruling the Principality of Amarkot, once the
birthplace of Akbar. He was given a warm reception in Pakistan by the Sodha
clan which was still living the memories of pre-independence India when Rajputs
reigned supreme in Rajasthan. Chund Singh was invited to hunting bouts,
lavish drinking parties where the royal ladies were still trying to relive the
colonial era. He also enjoyed the hospitality of air force officers in Karachi.
For a moment it seemed that India was never partitioned. Sodha Rajputs were
still living in the era when there were clan rivalries, court politics, and
feuds among the Rajputs over succession and possession over the thikannas.
However, things had changed a lot in India. Sodhas never faced the
sweeping land reforms which uprooted the royalties in India. Even Chund Singh
was more a merchant by mindset than a Rajput. He enjoyed curd rice more than
the mutton curry. Except for his upturned mustache, his every bit had turned a
wise merchant.
These days Chund Singh is
going through personal crises. His daughter married to a good-for-nothing son
of a retired Lt. General of Indian army. Lt. General Sahab got good
promotions owing to the seductive looks of his wife and her insatiable lust
which had made many generals happy. Both of them never realized that the son
did nothing except flirting with the young wives of majors and captains and by
the time Lt. General retired he had turned into a useless devil. He had thrown
his wife out and refused to give any compensation. For a proud Rajput like Chund Singh daughter’s
divorce is a nightmare as interiors of Rajasthan are still on the ventilator of
old traditions that had far outlived their utility.
In these matters, Kommandant is a nice
man as he goes out of the way to help his friends out of the problems, in
return expecting good green leafy vegetables, corn, and some refined ghee.
Kommandant has a very strong and earthy persona with years of experience in the
sands of Rajasthan and a network of contacts. He could manage to get a good
compensation for Chund Singh’s daughter which made the proud Rajput
feel indebted to the Kommandant. While going back Kommandant had already
started releasing lethal fumes which could send any sane man into comma within
split seconds. Then he brought that sadistic smile which comes after making
someone smell the evilest and unholy farts. Chund Singh Ji tried to
cover up with his royal dignity and used his oversized mustache to guard against
the onslaught of stinky and colonial farts.
Next morning, Kommandent and
I finished a beastly breakfast that was complimentary. After two days of stay
even I had acquired the essence of his expertise. We rushed to the SDM office
where he had to finish some work. I got a chance to see the office compound.
Old structures had ruined and the hew ones were just a shoddy replica of the
colonial British buildings albeit with a much poorer quality.
Bakhtawar Khan, his batchmate had
invited us for lunch. I was expecting to meet a burly retired Inspector General
of Police but I came across a mystique. Khan Sahab while his posting at Alwar
came to know of his wife’s stage four cancer. He thought of Shahjahan and
remembered Mumtaz of his life. The thought made him embark on a spiritual
journey after the doctors failed. After 40 days of death-like spiritual
practice in the graveyards with ten tantriks, he finally got his
enlightenment. The other tantriks died in the course of the sadhna.
It was a horrifying journey. “Huzoor, every night the spirits came and beat us
black and blue, tested our guts and courage. By Allah’s grace, I emerged
successfully”, told Khan Sahab. Now a 1400-year-old Sufi soul visits him every
three months and helps him find solutions to people’s ailments like cancer and
mental diseases. Khan sahib has disciples who are 1200 years old. I could not
control my amusement and asked if he is 500 or 600 years old. Given the average
age of his company, that was the least I could quote. Today his wife is healthy
and Khan Sahib is a revered saint with 1000s of disciples visiting him from
Gulf countries and different parts of the country. He has become a sought after
man by politicians and business tycoons.
It seems not much has changed in India.
World community might be feeling scared after Brexit, Trump’s ascension to
power, Erdogan's militaristic fervor and China’s threat to the world order, but
India still appears living happily with the 1000 year old Jinn’s and
Sufis. Their lores and magic tales still fire the imagination of a
country facing acute water shortages, separatism, malnutrition, communalism,
and Naxalism.
While coming back we had our dinner at
Singhvi Sahib’s house in Sumerpur. Singhvi Sahab is an old friend of Kommandant
from the days when the Kommandant had joined the police force as a young Dy.
Sp. But Mr. Singhvi mentioned that in those days Kommandant was not so brutal
and shameless with his lethal fumes. With age, he seems to have developed this
strange hobby of rupturing the nostrils of quite and docile men and women
around him. Singhvi Sahab is another legend in his own way. His ancestors had
ruled Marwar as prime ministers of the Jodhpur riyasat. They had a huge
collection of antique items and Berreta revolvers, many of which some
very refined charan darogas whisked away. Singhvi Sahab looked like a
smuggler with his black shades and Charles Shobhraj styled hat. He looked
coming straight from the Bollywood movies of the 1960s as some assistant of the
villain Ajit. Singhvi’s sahib's real life was also quite like the Bollywood of
the 1960s. He had worked with Haji Mastan in the prime of his youth and then
went on to become a successful entrepreneur in Chennai.
There were times when he funded
elections, dated the Bollywood diva Helen but the honeymoon period didn’t last
long. Suddenly the gods were infuriated (as told by his wife) because of his adharmik activities.
Police was desperately searching him in some old cases of financial
fraud. Somehow he escaped and reached his village in Rajasthan in the late
1990s. Since then he has been trying to build his life again but the past glory
never came back. With the Kommandant, he went to dangerous dungeons with
the police dragon light and .38 Smith and Wasson, in the hunt for hidden
treasures but they got nothing. He still lived in his past glory and ceases to
relent. These days he is desperately searching for the Nagmani and wants
Kommandant to be his strategic adviser in this paranormal venture.
After stuffing ourselves with a rich
Marwari meal of gaata saag, ocra, kadhi and loads of paapar soaked
in ghee, we were heading back to Udaipur. But this time it was me who was in
the direct range of lethal fumes and expectedly the radioactivity levels and
the lethality was much stronger than what Chund Singh Ji had to bear
with. Finally, I came back and took shower twice as those fumes had penetrated
my each and every cell.
Kommandant said with the familiar grin,
“ I hope you enjoyed the journey back home”, and went in his study giggling
under the breath with the victory of carpet bombing my nostrils.
.
