Education is a dreadful thing. It corrupts the minds of the innocent and destroys mental peace. It turns obedient docile citizenry into suspicious anti-social beings. And it incites rebellion in the most timid of souls. Do not ask me how I know this or why I am so certain. Because if you did, I would need to tell you about Parthasarthy, who plies his taxi in the National Capital Region aka NCR area.
Parthasarthy is a graduate from some college in eastern Uttar Pradesh or western Bihar. For the past seven years, he has been preparing for and appearing at the Civil Services examination conducted by the Union Public Service Commission. By virtue of some rule, sub-rule, loophole or whatever, he is allowed to write the entrance examination many times over. In any event, back home, his folks find it more classy to say that he is preparing to be a Collector Sahib, rather than admit that he is a taxi driver. Parthasarthy himself has little hope of ever getting selected to the civil services but, year after year, he goes through the ritual of appearing in the examination. If he did not, he would have to go back to his village and assist his father till their small plot of land.
Parthasarthy says he might be able to survive the filth and squalor of his village home but he simply cannot imagine living without cable television and wi-fi! He feels it is better to sit behind the wheel in an air-conditioned Wagon R than to work in the sun like an ordinary farmer. Moreover he is a graduate, and no one can expect a graduate to work with his hands!
Ever since that ordinary farmer named Rakesh Tikait decided to block the roads to the national capital, I summon Parthasarthy when I need to travel to Delhi from my home in the down-market eastern suburbs. At my age, I simply do not have the energy or the patience to suffer the aggravation of driving my own Maruti 800 to Delhi along the assault course that the road has become. Instead of driving along a smooth multi-lane highway, one has to take a narrow potholed diversion of about four kilometers. The route can take up to an hour to negotiate and is hardly a scenic ride, runs as it does beside the fish market, perennially smelling of some putrid hell, and that stinking mountain of rubbish which is mistakenly called the Ghazipur landfill.
The road remains choked with trucks, buses, motorcycles, hand drawn carts, bicycles, earthmovers, bullock-carts and tractors with unwieldy trailers. The heavy traffic, coupled with our driving habits, results in everlasting chaos, frayed tempers, long blockades and even fisticuffs. The people riding scooters, or sitting in the buses or pulling the carts pass the time of day exchanging the choicest of abuses in the loudest of voices.
All this is unavoidable because the kisans have been protesting for the past several months, blocking the road to Delhi. The kisans might be just a handful, but how else will ignorant people like me know that the farmers are not in agreement with the laws of the land? Unthinkable though it might be, the Union Government was so arrogant as to not take permission from Rakesh Tikait before enacting the laws!
Educated people like Parthasarthy fail to understand this. His ignorance is evident because he keeps cursing the kisan leaders and the government in equal measure when we get stuck in the traffic or when we hit a pothole of more than average size. With this level of ignorance, Parthasarthy is unlikely to ever get selected for the civil services.
The other day he feigned innocence and asked, “How long will this tamasha last, Sir?” As if I know. The farmers are squatting comfortably. They have even installed air-conditioners in their temporary shacks. Free water, electricity and sanitation services are being provided to them so that they can exercise their democratic right to protest. None of the ministers or farmers needs to take the bumpy stinky road via the Ghazipur landfill. So why should the farmers abandon their vigil? And why should the ministers bother about them?
But Parthasarthy is the argumentative Indian, if there ever was one. He said, “Sir, I read somewhere that this road is used by the equivalent of one lakh and twenty cars every day. If I take half the figure for traffic from one side, it translates to two lakh forty thousand kilometers of extra journey. If a car runs twenty kilometers on one litre of petrol, the unnecessary burning of petrol aggregates to twelve thousand litres of petrol. So the cost of petrol wasted is about twelve lakh rupees per day. Most of the time, the traffic moves at snail’s pace so the actual fuel burnt must be at least double. Sir, let us take a round figure of twenty-five lakh rupees. Every day. The farmers have been squatting on the road for about two hundred and fifty days. The direct monetary cost is therefore more than sixty crores since early December last year. Sir please add the wear and tear on vehicles because of this potholed road. Add the time lost. A few patients would have died because of delays on this road.”
“Pish posh!” said I. “What is sixty crores and a few lives lost? The right to protest is priceless.”
To prove my point, I leaned out of Parthasarthy’s taxi and shouted to a man pushing a hand-cart laden with iron rods. “My good man,” I said, “Do you mind pushing your cart four extra kilometers in this heat because the farmers have blocked the way?”
“Not at all Sir,” he said. “If the kisan leaders and the leaders of this country think this is the way the country should be run, who am I to object?”
“See?” said I. I refrained from adding that it is the poison called education that is the culprit. The illiterate guy pushing his cart was not unhappy. The truck drivers sitting resignedly since last night for the traffic to move were not unhappy. The urchins weaving in and out of the stalled traffic asking for money were not unhappy. Only Parthasarthy had problems. Because he was educated.
“But Sir,” persisted Parthasarthy, “Even the Supreme Court has said that protesters can’t block roads in this manner. Why can’t the police chase these guys away?”
I again explained patiently that we are a democracy and our Constitution has enshrined within it our Fundamental Right to block roads.
“No Sir! This is wrong. These guys can’t block the road in this manner. I take this road at least five times a week and I am absolutely fed up. I don’t care a hoot as to who is right and who is wrong. All that I know is that I am the joker who is being squeezed from all sides.”
“My good man, whatever gave you the impression that you matter?”
“But Sir, I pay my taxes. The Delhi Municipal Corporation levies an entry fee each time I take my taxi into Delhi. Yet this road which now takes all the traffic has not been kept in repair! The farmers don’t even pay taxes! And their agitation site has been provided free water and electricity. It is so unfair!” he wailed.
“At the risk of repeating myself I ask you, Parthasarthy – why do you think you matter? Why do you think life will give you a fair deal? Your fate is to keep paying taxes. It is not your job to question the actions or inactions of the government.”
“I disagree, Sir,” he said disagreeably. “I think the farmers have no bloody business blocking roads. The police should disperse them, and if they won’t disperse peacefully, force must be used. If they resist, their heads need to be broken!”
“Oh my God, Parthasarthy!” I said. “Heaven forbid that you get selected to any civil service or the police. With your weird notions about breaking the heads of law breakers, you will definitely jeopardize and destabilize elected governments!”
Just then, the taxi hit a huge pothole and, inadvertently, I bit my tongue.