The Wrong Deed For The Right Decision

 Spring had set in; it was a pleasant evening.  As I passed the beautiful fountain, the major attraction of Jammu University, I waved to the handful of friends I made at library. They were sipping energetic masala tea at Sharma Maggie point.  I didn’t give in to the aromatic whiff of tea, to the bowl of Maggie and to the constant coaxing of my friends to join them. Mumbling the song that just got played on the radio at Sharma café I made my way to  the parking lot, where my scooty was parked, put on helmet and set about the journey. There was something magical in the air that day, cool air was breezing, caressing my cheeks and swaying my ever-flowing hair. I felt like a girl out of the santoor soap ad. Sometimes the beautiful ambiance is enough to make you feel beautiful, but a big situational irony was about to unfold in a few minutes, I had no clue about.

I saw a few people in a blue uniform. I recalled her saying “wear your helmet and you will never get caught” the phrase my best friend repeated ad nauseum, so the crime of riding without license went on for seven months and my best friend being accomplice, was lucky to carry it out for 3 years after which we realized the need to carry the license which has another funny story attached to it.

I was wearing  helmet  , my rescuer in the hour of need , but today I had a  hard luck , anyway my friend’s preach was  playing like a mantra in my head which was enough to give me shot in the arm and I approached  to confront them,   a wave of horror passed through me , when I saw a girl’s scooty got seized and when I looked at her from top to bottom ( you know girl’s thing ) my eyes got stuck at the bottom and I was dumbfounded at the sight, she was wearing exactly the same loafers that I was wearing ( gosh!!! That’s brutal, they are gonna seize my scooty too!!!)

And then one of the policemen approached me. He was short height,  had big mustache, his eyebrows were so bushy   that he could be presented in fashion app like NYKAA for endorsing thick eyebrows trend.  He reminded me of   Kroor Singh from popular epic fantasy chandrakanta from 90’s. He  started pouring questions like the  rapid fire round,  the  ones you see in kofee with Karan show ( if you woke up as  Rakhi sawant or arrange in the scale of 10 or guess the song and movie and etc)  or the ones you
   experience  in service selection board interviews  ,( right from education to Do you have a boyfriend?  And if you don’t have, why don’t you have?) and  here it were  from pollution certificate to insurance, and license remains the star of the certificates but if you didn’t carry any of them you would have to pay hefty amount and in case you didn’t  carry license your scooty get seized and you need to go to court to get it back.  

So, here I was , so sure  of myself and god knows what gave me so much confidence,  Priyanka Chopra’s mantra played in my head,   “Be confident!! And if you are not, feign it”. To his swarm of questions my answers were only monosyllabic “yes”. Now it was my turn to show  him  all the imaginary documents I was  carrying,  to which I explained ,  “ I carry them  every day  without fail , but today, on this  fateful  day I washed them along with my scooty so I have kept  them to drying  at home. To which he pointed to a man, who was probably his senior (madam WO dikh rahe hai apko unke pass jao!) you see that man standing beside the jeep, go to him. There were already so many people along with their vehicles.  Some people were on phone, some were showing their documents, as I walked to another policeman, I was simply told to hand him the keys. As I was about to do  that,  my inner shrewd  goddess popped in,   jolted me and  literally held my hand and prevented me from handing the keys,  took charge of the situation  and  spoke from inside that I have just called my friend to bring all the documents and that she would be here in 10 minutes. I actually had made a call but i simply wanted someone beside me at that time.

Now it’s time for the entry of the partner in the crime, who got me into this tribulation.   We are a kind of friends who are at each other’s beck and call all the time and at this hour she had to be present after as she got me into it , not directly but obliquely , it was her idea to roam around without license after all .

So her entry was more like a hero in an old Hindi movies, who would usually come in open jeep to rescue heroine from goons, but this was a different scenario she came in her newly bought k10 “Why on earth she is so elated?”. Was it some kind of adventure or she is smiling at her private joke, which  most of the times are pj’s or she found the IPS so attractive that she is seeing a future husband in him, God knows!!  She parked her car at a distance, walked to me, gave me half hug and asked “what to do?” “You tell, you are smiling as if you have been dreaming about him every day”, I replied.  Oh! God, she is smiling even more, like teenage girls after striking a glance with most  sought after  boy in the school.

Let’s talk to him, she said. To the far left of the group, stood a tall man, in uniform ,two stars on his shoulders, his deep brown eyes and  chiseled jaws added to his aura he had  stocky build looked like a model turned an IPS. No wonder why my   friend was smiling for no reason and now she was blushing and so nervous that she started spouting nonsense that didn’t make sense and before I could jump into conversation, we were shooed away, The last time I suffered a humiliation was in school, in 7^th standard, where I got a slap from my Hindi teacher for I was incapable to recognize difference between ( badi and choti ouu ki matra ) . I had too big an ego to stand the humiliation that the next day I spent entire time for Hindi test and scored 14.5 out of 15 in Hindi and that was my way of setting a score. but here,  there was nothing I could do , as I can’t get license made in an hour and handing my keys was implausible .

The only option that seemed logical at that scenario was to run away, but how? They were catching people who were trying to run. And it seems funny and embarrassing   if you are caught later on, especially for a lily livered like me. We saw a couple on a bike sped past, and they were unable to catch them. My friend looked at me.  What? I said.  “You want me to do this? Never” I declared . God knows! What possessed me to commit such a bravery  at that point of time. I secretly kept my scarf and helmet in the dickey, started the scooty, twisted the handle to a level I had never done before. All eyes on me, I heard someone said  in Punjabi   (oh kudi te pajj gayi!!!) the girl ran away.  Leaving my friend behind, I never looked back. Finally, I applied brakes outside my house,  I was panting,  my heart was racing wildly, I could hear my throbbing in my ear. How did I pull it off I can’t believe!! My phone was ringing madly for so long, I only realized it when I came back to my senses. I tapped on the receiver button, my friend went bonkers! she was hurling crazy words. I said nothing. Just after a pause of five seconds, we both burst into laughter!

I don’t advocate breaching of law nor do I advise driving without a license. I did go to RTO the very next day to get my license made.  My two take away from this particular incident is that we only realize our true self when we get into that situation. If this event hadn’t happened I would never get to know that I wasn’t as guileless or naïve as I thought I was and every problem comes with a solution though the solution in this incident wasn’t righteous that’s only up to us and the situation only decides the right and wrong of the act.

PS: I GOT  THREE LEARNER’S LICENSE MADE BEFORE I GOT THE DRIVER’S LICENSE.