Skip to main content

Godman


Fiction

The passengers were turning the air-conditioner knob of flight SW 2552 from Ahmedabad to Delhi when the announcement came.  “We regret to inform you that the air-conditioning of this flight will not function properly for a while due to a technical hitch which is being rectified.  We solicit your cooperation and regret the inconvenience caused to you in the meanwhile.”

“The air-conditioning will not work till we reach Delhi,” Shiv Kumar heard the passenger sitting next to him say.

“Why?” asked Shiv Kumar.

“Didn’t you see the VVIP passenger for whom the flight was delayed by two hours?”

“Yup. That’s Khushi Ram Baba, isn’t it?”

Who did not know Khushi Ram Baba?  He was a godman who was in jail for some time for raping one of his devotees.  The news had become a notorious controversy discussed in great detail by all the news channels in the country.  The godman reportedly fell ill while in jail and needed specialised treatment.  So he was being taken to a multinational hospital in Delhi.  Shiv Kumar knew all these details though he, like the other passengers, was ignorant about the cause of the flight delay until the godman was brought to the boarding gate by a huge retinue of cops all around him.  Surrounding the cops were the bhakts of the godman who kept chanting “Jai Sri Ram, Jai Khushi Ram, Jai Jai.”  It is only after the godman and his bhakts were escorted to their seats in the front part of the plane by the airhostesses that the passengers were allowed to board through the rear entry.

“Khushi Ram cannot endure air-conditioning,” explained the fellow passenger to Shiv Ram.  

“Thank God, he is not allergic to body odours; otherwise we would have been asked to deboard,” said Shiv Kumar.  The plane had begun to smell of sweat mixed with deodorants and body sprays because of the temperature.

“The bugger should have chartered a flight,” mumbled the fellow passenger.

“This is a kind of publicity,” responded Shiv Kumar.  “See the way his devotees are behaving.”

The bhakts were chanting the praises of the godman.  They had even refused to put on their seat belts saying, “Why do we need seat belts when God himself is travelling with us?”

A little child started crying somewhere in the seat behind Shiv Kumar.  “It’s so bloody hot in here,” shouted a man who must have been the father of the child.  The flight was already at the level height in the sky.  Sitting in his aisle seat Shiv Kumar looked at some of the passengers.  An old man got up from his seat on the other side of the aisle. 

“Help me, please,” shouted the old man.  He had pressed the call light but no one bothered to attend to him since all attendants were apparently busy with Khushi Ram Baba and his bhakts.

One of the cabin crew came to the old man as fast as she could walk in her tight miniskirt.

“I find it difficult to breathe,” complained the old man through his wheezing.  “Can you raise the air-conditioning, please?”

“I’m afraid it’s not possible, sir.  There’s a technical snag.  Shall I find a doctor for you?”

The old man nodded.  The airhostess went to call a doctor from among the passengers.

“It’s only another half an hour to our destination,” came the announcement.  “We thank you for your cooperation.  The inconvenience is regretted.”

Children and old people lay in their seats looking like withered stems of uprooted plants.  Babies woke up occasionally and wailed.

Shiv Kumar retched.  He rose quickly and rushed to the washroom.

“Nausea,” said the feelow passenger when Shiv Kumar returned and occupied his seat having relieved himself in the heavens.  So to say. “Nausea is the prerogative of the sane.”

The bhakts resumed their chanting as the announcement about the imminent landing wafted through the plane like a consoling breeze.

There was another retinue of cops waiting at the Delhi airport when the flight landed.  Only Khushi Ram Baba and his bhakts were allowed to deboard through the front exit which opened first. 

“Jai Sri Ram, Jai Khushi Ram, Jai Jai.” The chant drowned the mumbling and grumbling of the passengers.

PS. This story may sound impossible and most improbable.  But it is inspired by the following report:

‘Asaram Bapu and his devotees create ruckus aboard Jet Airways flight




Indian Bloggers




Comments

  1. I like the way you bring your articles Sir !!

    ReplyDelete
  2. In situations like this, DGCA should suspend operations of the airlines for few days. They won't harras their passengers next time.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The entire systems from cops to govts support the perverted and the corrupt. Why will DGCA be an exception?

      Delete
  3. Yes there are a class of people who do all such gimmicks. God save our country from such Godmen. Amen.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Replies
    1. Undoubtedly. But if anyone thinks it is just one off case they are mistaken. I have had personal experience of another godman who was equally absurd in his greed for land.

      Delete
  5. This country is full of such Godmen and their blind bhakts who are exploiting common people. I liked the way you narrated the story.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, Purba,these godmen and their devotees are a real menace and the govt should wake up to that reality.

      Delete
  6. I read the report. It is disgusting. But did the airline really switch off the air conditioner? They can be sued.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No, the ac was not switched off but the temperature was far above the desired level. That's what I gather.

      Who will dare to sue against a godman? I know a few individuals who did with another godman. The lawyers of the plaintiffs were bought off by the godman's men (and women!). The judges were bribed. Some plaintiffs were beaten up by the godman's goons. Such is our world.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Prelude to AtoZ

  From Garden of 5 Senses, Delhi [file pic] Hindsight gives an unearthly charm and order to the past. There can be pain too. A lot of things could have been different, much better, if only we possessed the wisdom of our old age back in those days. As a writer put it, Oedipus, Hamlet, Lear and a lot of those guys must have thought, “I wish I had known this some time ago.” Life is a series of errors with intermittent achievements. The only usefulness of the errors may be the lessons they teach us. Probably, that is their purpose too. We are created to err so that we learn, I dare to put it that way. I turn 64 in a month’s time. It’s not inappropriate to look back at some of the people whom life brought into my life so that I would learn certain lessons. No, I don’t mean to say that life has any such purpose or design or anything. Life is absurd. People come into your life as haphazardly as vehicles ply on your road or birds poop on your head. Some of these people change the chemist

Why I won’t vote

From Deshabhimani , Malayalam weekly Exactly a month from today is the Parliamentary election in my state of Kerala. This time, I’m not going to vote. Bernard Shaw defined democracy , with his characteristic cynicism, as “ a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve .” We elect our government in a democracy. And the government invariably sucks our blood – whichever the party is. The BJP and the Congress are like Tweedledum and Tweedledee though the former makes all sorts of other claims day in and day out. BJP = Congress + the holy cow. The holy cow has turned out to be quite a vampire and that makes a difference, no doubt. In our Prime Minister’s algebra, it is: (a+b) 2 which should be equal to a 2 and b 2 . There is an extra 2ab which is the holy cow. In George Orwell’s Animal Farm , the animals revolt against the human master and set up their own nationalist republic. Soon politics develops in the republic and some pigs become leaders. The porcine

How Arvind Kejriwal can save himself

Narendra Modi and Amit Shah have a clear vision. Eliminate all opposition. Decimate them or absorb them. My previous post [link below] showed a few people decimated by them. Today let’s look at the others: those who are saved by joining the Bharatiya Janata Party [BJP]. 1. Himanta Biswa Sarma  This guy was in Congress and faced serious charges related to the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam. He also faced corruption charges related to drinking water supply in Guwahati. His house was raided by the Central Bureau of Investigation [CBI]. Then he switched over to BJP and all his crimes just vanished. It’s as simple as taking a dip in the Ganga and all your sins are forgiven. Today he is the chief minister of Assam. Nothing is heard of all the charges that were levelled against him. 2. Amarinder Singh  This former Captain in the Indian Army was a Congressman until Modi’s Enforcement Directorate [ED] started raiding him, his son and his son-in-law. He put an end to all those raid

The Good Old World

Book Review Title: Dukhi Dadiba and irony of fate Author: Dadi Edulji Taraporewala Translators: Aban Mukherji and Tulsi Vatsal Publisher: Ratna Books, Delhi, 2023 Pages: 314 If you want to return to the good old days of the late 19 th century, this is an ideal novel for you. This was published originally in Gujarati in 1913. It appeared as a serial before that from 1898 onwards in a periodical. The conflict between good and evil is the dominant motif though there is romance, betrayal, disappointment, regret, and pretty much of traditional morality. Reading this novel is quite like watching an old Bollywood movie, 1960s style. Ardeshir Bahadurshah, a wealthy Parsi aristocrat in Surat, dies having obligated his son Jehangir to find out his long-lost brother Rustom. Rustom was Bahadurshah’s son in his first marriage. The mother died when the boy was too small and the nurse who looked after the child vanished with it one day. Ratanmai, Bahadurshah’s present wife, takes her

Kejriwal’s Arrest in Modi’s Kurukshetra

For some mysterious reason, Arvind Kejriwal’s arrest reminded me of Haren Pandya. Maybe, because Pandya’s 21 st death anniversary is approaching (26 March). Have you forgotten Haren Pandya? He was the Home Minister of Gujarat before Narendra Modi assumed dictatorial powers in that state. Modi chose to teach humility to Pandya by making him the Minister of State for revenue. Pandya chose not to learn humility from Modi and resigned from that post in Aug 2002. Remember Gujarat of 2002? You should. A fire engulfed a train on 27 Feb 2002 killing 58 Hindu pilgrims who were returning from Ayodhya where they had gone to discover their god, not very unlike Christopher Columbus undertaking a voyage to discover India and messing it all up. What caused the fire in the train? Lord Ram knows probably. The upshot was that there was a riot in Gujarat by Hindus against Muslims. Haren Pandya is one of the BJP leaders who gave statements in many places indicting Modi for the riots. He asser