He
was sent to me on a spring morning, in 1998, if I’m not mistaken. He looked
emaciated, under nourished or mal-nourished and his eyes were feverish darting
to and fro as it absorbed the surroundings. He was short in stature and had
streaks of premature grey running through his hair; for he was hardly 32 years
of age at that time. He remained rather passive throughout the monologue that I
indulged in and looked into my eyes as if he were searching for my soul.
To
fill you in on the background, I have a rather notorious history of finding
depressed, disgruntled souls and setting them back on track or rather if you
want me to sound pompous; change their lives. A few of my friends knew of this
passion of mine and though they looked upon me as some kind of weirdo, they
used to keep sending me at regular intervals their friends, relatives or
acquaintances who according to them needed sorting out inside their heads.
It
was through such a friend that this guy came to me. Actually this guy’s uncle
was a friend of my friend known to me as Sundar. This guy’s uncle had mentioned
about his nephew to Sundar and Sundar had immediately passed him on to me. But
I had hesitated on meeting this guy in front of his uncle and Sundar and had
asked them to send him to me on the pretext of applying for a job at my office
and lo and behold! Here he was at 10 am the next morning.
His
eyes continued to assess me as I blabbered about a guy that I needed to take
care of the office, fetch chai, run errands to the post office, auditor’s,
client’s offices etc., as he continued to take in my office. His eyes took in
the other two guy’s who otherwise assisted me on the computer and did my
correspondence, my accounts etc, for I’m a technologically challenged guy. Raja
and Ravi were the two executives who helped me
manage a small time country office of an organisation that was catering to
communicators in the Asian region. I really needed an errand boy and this guy
though he looked lost seemed to suit the role I had envisaged for him.
I
concluded my detailed exposition of his job profile and said that I would initially be able to afford only Rs.1,500/-
as a salary and if I liked his performance, I would not hesitate to increase
his salary. The guy continued to remain impassive and kept staring at me as if
he expected me to say something more. I therefore obliged him by saying that he
could think it over for a couple of days and then let me know if he was
interested. The guy then left the office with shoulders drooping under the
weight of his invisible burden.
I
was therefore pleasantly surprised to see him the very next morning on the
office doorstep at 9.30 am. He trudged into my office and for the first time he
condescended to open his mouth and utter something to the effect that he would
join work the same day. I told him to wait a few minutes while I got his
appointment order typed and signed. He did so but a few minutes later when I
stepped out of my room for something or the other, I found him busily dusting
tables and other equipment including the old typewriter that now mostly
remained unused in my office. I was only too happy to see him inclined to work
without waiting for instructions.
I
had the appointment order typed and Jagannath for that was his name started his
second innings at my office. Jagan as we soon began to call him - his name
would later become Jugs- endeared himself to us all by his simplicity. He was
eager to learn and soon he cleaned, repaired and began to use the old
typewriter that lay mostly unused to teach himself typing.
Initially
Jugs was very reluctant to talk about himself and would only be too happy to
discuss office work rather than personal life with us. As work was such we soon
found ourselves spending lots of time together, almost upto twelve hours per
day. Soon Jugs used to run errands for me during holidays, and used to visit my
house regularly. He became friendly with the members of my family and was soon
very attached to my three children who called him Uncle Jugs.
I
soon learnt that Jugs was very good with his hands. He was dexterous fixing
things for me be it the old typewriter which had jammed with rust or the parcel
of books that I had to send to Ahmedabad by road transport cargo services.
Packing of parcels, cargo, even despatch of envelopes was done neatly and
professionally by him so much so that the courier or cargo wallahs would
appreciate the hard work that he had put into the effort of packing.
Occasionally
Jugs would go off into his own world in a sort of a trance and I would let him
be for I knew that he had memories to forget and I wanted him to get out of his
past.
Jugs
was a skilled electrician and soon all repairs at home would be fixed by him.
Of course, I would pay him for doing so; since I wanted to encourage him to
earn some additional income during his spare time by doing electrical repairs
in his neighborhood. Soon Jugs earned the reputation of being a 'Mr. Fix it
all' and soon the neighbouring offices were trying to seek his advice, for a
fee ofcourse.
I
did not try to probe Jugs about his problems nor did I take any steps towards
addressing his problem. I just let him do things as he pleased and did not
interfere in his functioning unless to guide him on something that he was not
aware of.
Time
flew by as it always does and it was soon six months since Jugs had joined our
organization. I managed to persuade my Governing Board to increase his salary
and I was only too happy to inform him that his salary on confirmation had been
raised to Rs 3,000/- per month.
My
organization used to be involved with organizing a plethora of events and Jagan
soon proved to be adept at aiding me in enabling the smooth conduct of events.
Be it Delhi, Bangalore
or Hyderabad,
or anywhere else for that matter, Jugs would be there to take care of the
logistics. The logistics involved were stupendous. The preparation of the
conference kit, the preparation of the registration chart, the photo copying of
papers, Jugs would be at the forefront of it all.
I
remember Jugs all dirty from two nights travel by train and tired after getting
the cargo cleared at New Delhi Railway station; wheeling in a trolley of
material into the lobby of the Oberoi at Delhi, which had been carted by train
from Chennai. He had the audacity to take on the Belgian General Manager there
and refuse to go to the back entrance. He stood his ground until I came down
from my room to take his case.
Jugs
would also assist me with the other activities related to the conferences. It
was our custom to host a cocktail and dinner event on the first night of the
conference so that the participants would interact with each other. While I
would ensure that the booze flowed freely, I would not buy hard liquor from the
hotel as their rates were pretty fancy. I would source my own supply of prime
alcohol and would only pay a vending and license fee to the hotel for serving
my booze. However, the hotels normally would insist that beer and soft drinks
must be purchased only from the hotel and I would agree to that.
I would have
Jugs behind the bar on the night of the event with scribbling pad and pencil in
had noting down the amount of beer, soft drinks, snacks, sodas, whiskey, rum,
gin, wine and other assorted liqueur that was being served. No hotel staff
could fool Jugs and the remaining bottles of liquor would be safely carted back
to our room by him.
It
was during one such conference in Delhi
that Jugs finally opened his heart to me.
I
was in a bad mood during the conference as the local logistic support had
crumbled and I was simply stressed out with the additional burden of finding
last minute replacements for almost everything. Finally after managing to save
my reputation and having settled the last bill that had to be paid, I decided
to relax for my return home was still a day away and my room at the hotel was already
paid for. I therefore got myself a bottle of whiskey and decided to lock myself
in my hotel room to drink and sleep off the aches and pains of the past three
sleepless nights. I called this phase “Post Conference Blues”.
Since
the Hotel management had been very nice to me, I had already tipped the
banquets staff liberally and they brought to my room a huge fancy cake,
compliments of the chef who personally had come to my room to deliver it.
Seeing me in full form and lustily hitting the bottle, the chef had rushed out
to the kitchen to bring me some superb cuts of lamb and roast chicken that I
had to the accompaniment of the bottle; leaving Jugs to demolish the cake. By
the way, Jugs is a complete teetotaler and a strict vegetarian who makes an exemption
to cakes though they may contain eggs in them.
As
the booze began to light my fire, I waxed eloquent on the woes of a Manager and
how it was a thankless job and all that jazz. Jagan having observed my plight
at close quarters couldn’t agree more. We then went on to discuss the ironies
and tragedies of life. Though becoming tipsy by now, I was deliberately leading
Jugs on and as I cried out my tragedies to him, he reciprocated in kind and out
came flowing all his miseries along with his sobs and personal history. So here
goes…
Jagan
or Jugs was born in a poor goldsmith’s family. His father stopped working early
since his eyesight was not conducive to working. Jugs was the eldest of five
siblings. The first born male followed by three sisters and a last effort in
the form of a younger brother who didn’t grow up too right. They lived in a
house that belonged to his maternal uncle and Jugs being the eldest was forced
to take care of his family at a very early age. He discontinued his studies
after completing his secondary school certificate exams.
From the age of
sixteen Jugs had worked in a wide assortment of jobs ranging from the menial to
the not so menial. He managed to put his siblings through school and finding
the last born male to be of a rather silly and childish nature had attempted to
put the boy into a trade school and learn to be a carpenter so that he would
not be dependent on any one else.
It
was at this juncture or should I say at the age of twenty five that Jugs got
the opportunity to work for a leather goods export company. His starting salary
was rupees five thousand per month and soon he proved to be an accomplished
floor man managing the flow of leather from the processing to the sorting and
segregation for various articles and then the final cutting and stitching of
the actual leather products. Jugs was familiar with and an expert in all.
Within three years of joining the unit Jugs’ salary had gone up to rupees eight
thousand per month and appeared, to be steadily climbing.
This
was Jugs’ prime moments of happiness. The eldest of his younger sisters had
graduated and commenced work as an accountant in a small company, the second
sister having finished her twelfth grade had joined a beauticians training
course and within six months had found herself a job in a prominent beauty
parlor in the city. The youngest sister was in the eleventh grade and the boy
was still struggling through his trade school course.
His
mother was doing her best to save and store a bit of money, not only for a
rainy day but also trying to buy some jewels for the impending marriages of her
three daughters. The father as usual stayed at home and attempted to do
whatever small jobs he could with his limited vision.
It
was at this moment that another of Jugs’ uncles brought them an excellent
marriage proposal, not for one of the girls but for Jugs.
The
girl’s family had heard of Jugs and wanted him to marry their daughter who was
barely twenty one years of age. The girl’s family was also of the same
community of goldsmiths like Jugs’ family but was more affluent and prosperous
than Jugs’ family. They offered to provide the girl with forty sovereigns of
gold jewellery and all other necessities as well as amenities for a smooth
middle class life. The girl’s family also agreed to take care of all the
marriage expenses which may be incurred by the groom’s family.
Jugs’ mother was
a bit of an avaricious lady and she just could not believe her luck that her
son was able to fetch such a huge price in the marriage market. She really
wished she had given birth to a couple of more boys rather than girls for she
would have then made two times more selling those boys in the marriage market.
Unfortunately her younger son was rather too stupid to fetch any price in the
marriage market rather it was doubtful if he would get married at all.
Therefore the greedy mother agreed to the marriage without even consulting
Jugs. When Jugs came to know of this development he was furious. He was a man
on a mission. He had to get his three sisters married and he could not even
think of marriage until he had fulfilled his mission. However the lack of
female companionship was beginning to be felt by Jagan for after all he was a
hot blooded male in the prime of his life at the age of twenty eight. The girls
in the leather unit where Jagan worked used to make fun of him for ignoring
them and used to keep calling him one after the other to spend some time with
them in the dark warehouse where he could partake of some moochie pie with
them.
Jugs would run for his life on receiving such invitations but there was
always a niggling temptation at the back of his mind to taste some of the pie
available. When looked upon in this light marriage seemed an inviting
proposition to Jugs but at the same time he did not want to compromise on his
mission. After shouting for awhile at his mother for bringing such a proposal
he gradually began to be swayed by her arguments in favor of the marriage. His
mother’s rationale that the forty sovereigns of gold that the girl would bring
and it’s potential in terms of capital for any business venture that Jugs may
plan in the future, made sense to him. The money the girl brought along could
also be utilised for getting the three girls married off.
Therefore Jugs rather
reluctantly agreed to her intensions of getting him married. He spoke to the
girl’s parents and told them about his mission to get his three sisters
suitably married. The girl’s parents said that they would never be an obstacle
to his mission and they were rather confident that their daughter too would
never oppose his wishes. The marriage was therefore solemnised in grand fashion
in one of the temples near Chennai and the girl moved into his house for the nuptial
night as was the custom in their community. Jugs started having misgivings
regarding the marriage the same evening. That night his amorous disposition was
negated by the seeming lack of interest on the part of his newly married wife
and she mumbled that it was her monthly ritual- the curse of womanhood- that
was the reason for her being ill disposed.
As
days passed by Jugs found himself rather frustrated for his wife seemed to have
no inclination towards satisfying him or herself for that matter. She
frequently complained of aches and pains and regularly fell ill. She constantly
kept swallowing red, yellow, and blue pills and capsules which she told him
were for her body pain or for her fever. Within a month of the marriage Chitra
for that was the girl’s name tried to make Jugs go with her to her father’s
house and live with her there. She constantly complained about Jugs’ mother and
sisters to him saying that they tried to act smart with her while he was away
at work. Jugs made it clear to her that he would never leave his parents nor
would he even believe that his mother and sisters would ever resort to
harassing her for after all, why should they?
A
few days later, Jugs returned home from work one evening to find an ambulance
at their doorstep.
He
was shocked to hear that his wife had suddenly collapsed while watching TV in
the evening and was being rushed to the Government hospital for treatment. Jugs
frantically followed the ambulance on his moped for that was what he used to
commute to office. After making Jugs wait for two hours while the doctors
carried out intensive tests on Jugs’ wife, the doctors finally called in Jugs
and told him that his wife was suffering from an advanced state of cancer of
the stomach and that her chances of surviving another six months were rather
slim. Jugs was totally devastated as he heard the news. As the impact of the
doctor’s diagnosis sunk in he could not believe that this was happening to him.
His mother and sisters wailed while Jugs just stood there as if turned to
stone.
Meanwhile,
Chitra’s parents and brothers had arrived. They seemed to act as if they were
not aware of any problem with the girl except that she suffered from
constipation and invariably could not move her bowels for three or four days at
a stretch. The doctors were very clear and maintained there was no way to save
the girl at this advanced stage of disease. They therefore asked Jugs to
discharge her and take her back home.
Chitra’s
parents insisted that they take the girl to their home but Jugs firmly stood
his ground and took Chitra back to his house. It was just two months after his
marriage when he took Chitra back home. The next four months were spent by Jugs
constantly at the side of Chitra. He informed his boss that he would be
unavailable for sometime due to personal reasons. While taking care of Chitra,
Jugs soon realised that Chitra had been well aware of her problem even before
her marriage and all the pills and capsules that she had been swallowing were
all cancer related drugs. However, he did not feel any anger towards Chitra and
only treated her as he would a baby, feeding her, clothing her, cleaning her;
he did it all.
Chitra
kept on weeping that she would not be able to live for long with such a nice
husband like Jugs. Jugs was constantly at Chitra’s beck and call. He would keep
awake at nights and would ensure that she slept peacefully. Hardly four months
had passed by when Chitra took a turn for the worse. Her pulse began to fall
rapidly and she knew her end was near at hand. Chitra wanted to talk to her
parents for one last time and Jugs therefore phoned them up and asked them to
come over.
On
meeting her parents Chitra did not weep nor was she happy to see them, the
moment they arrived she started cursing them for having cheated Jugs and having
got her married to him knowing fully well that she would not live for more than
a year. She also cursed the astrologer who had told her parents that her soul
could rest only if she died as a married woman – A Sumangali as they called it.
Within an hour of her parents arrival Chitra breathed her last.
Jugs
had only lived with Chitra for six months in all. Jugs went berserk with grief.
The last six months he had spent with Chitra was something he could not erase
from his mind. He turned his anger towards his mother for it was her greed that
had led to all this. Jugs lost all interest in life. He refused to go back to
work and just sat home brooding over his sorrow. As time passed Jugs grief did
not diminish but only went from worse to worst. Jugs attempted suicide twice
but was saved both the times.
It
was four years later that I happened to meet Jugs. Jugs’ uncle had clearly
communicated that the guy had been going down hill for the past four years and
had no care or concern for professional development as well as his own personal
hygiene. My objective at the start of my association with Jugs was to arrest
Jugs’ downhill slide. I had to make him get interested in coming back into the
main stream of life both personally and professionally. For indeed I not only
wanted Jugs to get back on track with his professional life but also remarry
and settle down to a normal healthy life. Jugs took almost four and a half
years after my first meeting with him to completely recover from his bouts of
depression which gradually became less frequent and finally vanished
completely.
Meanwhile
Jugs managed to get his three sisters married off one after the other; as an
annual feature, it seemed. Jugs had grown with my organisation and personally
too that he had become a fully fit normal human being drawing a salary of
rupees eight thousand per month while also making some additional income by
providing electrical repair and installation services during his spare time to
friends and neighbours which fetched him an extra five thousand rupees per
month.
I
now considered Jugs fully fit for remarriage and casually broached the subject
to him one evening after completing our work. He was not in the least bit
flustered upon hearing me talk of his remarriage. This was a good and healthy
sign for indeed I didn’t want Jugs going back into depression. However Jugs
appeared noncommittal and did not allow me to proceed further.
I
then decided that the best way to move forward was to approach his mother and
discuss this with her. So one afternoon having ensured that Jugs could not move
out of the office by loading him with lots of paper work - filing and such
stuff - I proceeded to his house and met his mother who was alone at that time
for the father had dozed off for an afternoon siesta. I told her that at thirty
six years of age Jugs needed to get into another relationship for him to have a
normal healthy life. His mother was more than too happy to consider the plan. I
told her to look around for a suitable girl within their community for the
woman would not even consider any girl outside their community.
It
was back to work as usual for the next couple of months and I was completely
immersed in my official activities. It was 2002 and there were a lot of
tumultuous events that were happening within my organisation and I had not much
time to spend with Jugs. It was in September that year that I had to be away
from the country for almost a month. As soon as my work permitted I returned to
India
for I was missing the spicy food of our country.
The
moment I stepped out of the airport I found Jugs waiting along with my family.
As soon as the car moved out of the airport he turned around from the front
seat next to the driver where he was seated and at point blank range told me “I
am getting married day after tomorrow”.
I
was taken aback for I had not anticipated this at all. However I was happy and
wished him well while promising to be there for his marriage. I asked him
rather subtly if his family had made enquires about the girl and her family.
Jugs shrugged his shoulders and said “I have left all that to my mother”.
Having
heard Jugs say that he had left his Mother to handle the checking of the antecedents
of the girl’s family was a bit of a shock to me. Knowing his mother I was a bit
worried and my worries were soon proved right. I only knew Jugs’ mother too
well to worry about the match that she would have found for her son. I was
proved right on the day of the marriage when I visited the small marriage hall
where the wedlock was to take place.
I
found the girl’s family to consist of rather dirty smelling uncouth men and
women who seemed rather crude and uncivilized. The men from the girl’s side
were all reeking of liquor and one or two of them even had small knives shoved
under the waist belt beneath the shirt worn by them. One look at the girl and
her rather foul family and I could tell that Jugs was in for trouble for the
second time. It was a pity that I was not involved in the bride selection
process by Jugs’ mother who used my being away from the country to hasten the
process. It was only Jugs who had made her wait until I returned for the
marriage to be held. It was rather late in the day for me to do anything about
it.
I
waited for the drama to unfold as it did. There is a saying in Tamil that it is
only the hurt wound that is always hurt again. So too it is the way of karma
that the suffering are made to suffer further. This does not mean that God is
mocking the sufferer but only means that God is further strengthening the soul
of the sufferer. While Chitra had been too soft and ill all the time, the new
bride Mohini was as hard as nails and physically as tough and healthy as a
female of the species ever could be. She also had a sex overdrive that could
put any stone crusher or cement mixer to shame.
Jugs
was in a daze within a week of his marriage. Mohini had grown up in a fisher
folk colony and was geared up for anything and every thing in life. She could
not fit into the vision that Jugs had for a mate. Within a couple of weeks
Jugs’ mother cried out to him that his wife was physically harassing her, Jugs
was angered upon hearing this and condoned his wife in no uncertain terms. In response
Mohini swung out her massive fists at Jugs’ frail frame and rocked him
backwards all the way to the floor. Mohini left the house in a huff along with
all the jewels never ever to return.
The
ensuing wrangle between Jugs’ and the girl’s family would put any Tamil movie
to shame. The girl’s family hoisted a dowry harassment case against Jugs and
his family. In response, Jugs filed an assault case against his wife and
another reporting theft of jewellery. Jugs was almost arrested but with
intervention from some influential friends, Jugs was saved; by none too less
than the City Police Commissioner himself. In less than two months Jugs was
back to square one now not only titled widower but also separated from his
wife. Exactly a year after his wedding, Jugs was legally divorced and single
again.
The
best thing about Jugs’ second marriage fiasco was that it did not affect him as
the first disaster had. In fact, I watched in surprise as Jugs seemed to bloom
into a more mature person than ever before. His disastrous marriage did not in
any way affect his performance at the office where he continued to grow from
strength to strength.
In
fact, 2004 was a year of transition for my entire organisation was in the
process of moving to Delhi
as deemed fit by my Governing Board. Not wanting to displace my staff I had
moved them on to sister concerns and partner organization where the scope for
their growth was unlimited. As such Jugs moved onto a partner organisation
working out of Germany
with an office in Chennai that was serving the newspaper industry and the
professionals therein.
Jugs
bore no ill will towards me for pushing him intro second marriage. While our
relationship remained cordial my professional pre-occupations meant that I
spent less time with friends such as Jugs. The actual shifting of the entire
office infrastructure from Chennai to Delhi
entailed a huge amount of work and I sought Jugs’ help every now and then to
assist me in the process. I felt it was time for me to move as Jugs was now
fully independent and in no way needed me mentoring him.
I
gradually moved base to Delhi
and was involved in the process of setting up the new office and re-structuring
systems and processes to suit the new environment. Though I did not stay with
the organization in Delhi for long, due to differences of opinion with the new
set of Governing Board members, I continued to stay on in Delhi doing a few odd
jobs for I needed the corporate exposure of working in North India (which I
must admit is a bit different from working in South India) with the support of
my friends there. The two and a half years I was in Delhi resulted in gradual severing of
communication links with Jagan.
I
therefore did not have any knowledge of what he was upto or how his career was
progressing until I returned to Chennai a few months ago. On enquiring with
common contacts and friends, I came to know that Jugs had gone back to the
leather goods export company which he had originally served in. I also heard
that he had fallen in love at the age of thirty eight and was involved in a
relationship with a girl working at the same unit who was about thirty years
old and a divorcee like him. The girl had a small baby boy and Jugs had taken
both under his wing. He had refused the girl’s offer of marriage and had just
wanted to maintain a live in kind of relationship with her since he did not
believe in the bond of matrimony any more.
On
further enquiry I came to know that he had tried taking the girl to his house
but his mother had been livid with fury at the very thought of all the gossip
that the neighbours would indulge in. Jugs had therefore quietly vanished with
the girl and had moved to another leather export unit in one of the interior
districts of Tamil Nadu.
I
prayed that dear Jugs should finally find happiness in his life and was proud
of this bird that flew out of my hands and took charge of its life. I wish our
paths would cross again and I would find Jugs in tow with a few kids somewhere,
sometime, someplace in the future. I pray that God allows him to be third time
lucky and seek all your blessings upon him and his new found family.
