I hear the intermittent whistling in the distance. Yeah, the song too – Gadiwala aaya…kachra nikal…The song is playing in my head and I am anxiously alert. Today I can’t miss the garbage collector. If I miss them even today, my medium-size dustbin will overflow with two-day garbage. I can’t bear the putrid smell of gases when I open the lid to dump more in it.
O! The van is here. And it’s steering towards a different road.
“Hey! Hello! Take this garbage.”
Finally, one of the three workers hears my euphemistic shout.
“Why aren’t you collecting garbage from every door in the street every now and then?”
I get a curt reply with some displeasure on his face. “There are fewer workers on those days.”
I wonder – Do they need more than three? Will more people fit on the vehicle?
So many times I have felt pity for these people who have to bear the unbearable stench of garbage. They dig their hands into the heap of unruly garbage to segregate it while on the wheels. Just as the Supreme Court dug into Sidhu’s unruly past, the road-rage case of 1988 for punching an elderly person to death. As sometimes some garbage collectors keep themselves inebriated to such an extent that they lose their sense of smell, it seems Sidhu was intoxicated by power and it took 34 years for such an insensible form of justice to bring him back to his senses. However, he will serve just 1 year of imprisonment. Thoko taali!
It’s good to know that the government is working towards Swachha Bharat Abhiyan, literally and metaphorically. But, at the same time, the work is done half-heartedly like some of these garbage collectors.
The average garbage collector’s gross salary in India is ₹2,12,465 or an equivalent hourly rate of ₹102 as per the survey by SalaryExpert. Frankly speaking, I don’t like the idea of asking or talking to someone about his/her salary. Immediately, it brings to my mind those Gujarati Uncles & Aunties (U/A) who are keen to know your ‘pagar’ (salary). Have you come across any of those who are neck-deep interested to know your pay package?
Once they come to know that you are in this or that firm, they will remark – Pagar saaro malto hase ne? Ketlo male aasre? (You must be getting a good salary, right? Approximately how much do you get?) I can bet, it will be impossible for you to not answer them. The more you try to avoid such a rigorous inquiry, the harder they will try to shoot you with probing questions. Within 2 minutes you will surrender to their persistent interrogation unlike the alleged friends and colleagues investigated in Shushant Singh Rajput’s case. It is going to be 2 years in June and still the CBI has not been able to give closure to this case.
I also read somewhere that now the CBI has also denied the right to the citizens to dig for any information on this case under RTI query. Thank God, there is no RTI at a personal level to know one’s salary!
No, by no means do I intend to take a dig on my dear Gujaratis. Not at all.
Nevertheless, if you think through it, many of these good-humoured Gujarati U/A have the heart of a good Samaritan. They keep themselves updated about the status of the aspiring boys and girls/men and women who are ‘marriage material’. Our U/A would never let go of an opportunity to play the role of a marriage broker and that too without any brokerage. A good Samaritan after all! If some Jigneshbhai’s son has already crossed the age of 27 and has not found any Aishwarya Rai for himself in spite of a decent salary or a good business, or if some Sonalben’s daughter has not found an Akash Ambani even after 25, they will consider it their utmost, unsaid responsibility to find an appropriate match for him and her.
Overall, Gujaratis are hard-working, industrious people, be it in business, stock market, or family matters. They rise like a phoenix from the ashes after every failure. Even in the case of finding an alliance. If either of the parties involved in the alliance denies the marriage proposal, naturally the ego of our U/A is bruised, however, in no time, they get back into action. Once they have dug their heels in, they would not respite until the mission is accomplished.
Generally, Gujaratis have two preferences – beauty with brains or money with brains. The lucky ones may get all three – beauty, money, and brains.
As I said, I don’t intend to take a dig on Gujaratis, if I dig a little more, I am sure men and women across cultures will have similar preferences. By and large.
You need an incredible amount of self-confidence to go digging around in someone’s brain – Ben Carson
