When I was a young Assistant Superintendent of Police in Bhagalpur in the early ‘70s, life was tough and unpredictable. Working hours were long and mealtimes irregular. I seldom knew when I would return home for lunch or dinner; or even to sleep. The only constant in a life full of the hurly and burly was the delicious breakfast that my orderly, Islam, cooked for me. Every morning, he presented four lightly buttered toasts, one grilled tomato and a glorious three-egg omelette stuffed with onion, a hint of ginger and a whole load of cheese! Islam’s Special Cheese Omelette was guaranteed to provide sustenance for many hours, and I was thankful for it more than once when I got no food during the rest of the day.
While Islam loved to cook and I loved to eat, I really could not afford to eat like a prince on a pauper’s pay. Reluctantly, I directed Islam one day to cut out the expensive cheese from my breakfast. Next morning, I braced myself to face a cheese-less omelette. But no, the cheese omelette was there in all its glory!
“Why haven’t you stopped stuffing cheese in my omelette? You know that cheese is expensive!”
Islam was all innocence and light. “But Sir, I bought four tins because of the erratic supply. Surely, you don’t want me to throw them away?”
So I relished Islam’s cheese omelettes for a couple of months more. Finally, his stock of cheese ran out and I morosely ate cheese-less omelettes for some days. And then suddenly, after many tasteless breakfasts, Islam presented the most wonderful cheese omelette – not with Amul processed cheese but stuffed with the delicious cheddar that could only be Kraft’s! I ate with unbounded joy! After I finished breakfast, I knew I would have to confront Islam about the cheese, because Kraft was far more expensive than Amul.
Islam had a facile explanation. “Sir, you never objected to cheese. You only objected to the cost. I bought this Kraft from the circuit house khansama, who usually purloins the provisions meant for visiting VIPs. He sells the Kraft cheese at a fraction of the price of Amul.” He gleefully added, “I have bought five tins!”
I was confronted by an ethical dilemma of gigantic proportions – Should I order Islam to return the cheese to the khansama or should I simply enjoy it? I knew that any SHO worth his salt could draw up a watertight FIR against the khansama for theft and against Islam for receiving stolen goods. I would be accused of abetting the crime, conspiring to steal, receiving stolen property, and destroying evidence. The choice was between the right course of action and the main course of breakfast. Islam saw me dithering, so he gave the clinching argument, “Huzoor gustakhi maaf ho, but the khansama will in any case pilfer and sell the provisions. If I don’t buy the cheese, someone else will. If you don’t eat it, someone else will.”
I hesitated no longer. “So, how many more tins of Kraft cheese is the khansama willing to sell?” I asked.
Published in The Tribune on 16/3/23 with some edits.