A Letter to the Auto Rickshaw Drivers Union Leader

Respected Sir Mr. Union Leader

 (Dual salutations are necessary to honk-in the attention of the individual)

With the rain gods having answered our prayers, I am hoping you too would be influenced and impressed by your peers (you are close to attaining the status of gods) to listen to the pleas of mere mortals like me who have to rely on your three-wheeler force which has been unleashed on the streets of Mumbai.

To begin with, I would urge you not to take offence to my request, since we cannot afford a strike of your forces which you have already threatened (though I am not sure how your forces can afford to miss a day’s earnings). I beg of you don’t do so, as we have come to understand that your force is not dependent on us (at least their vanity implies so), it is we who are dependent on your force (however contradictory this may sound to the economic concept of buyer and the seller relationship).

My first request is that if we do make an error of hailing one of your forces, can the person at least look at us and acknowledge us? If this is not asking for too much, then I can go on. Can he also listen to us as to where we want him to take us? We only do so since he does not carry a route board like the Buses do, telling us where they go, so we never ask them if they would take us elsewhere. If this is a crime, then can your forces write on their chariots as to where they ply, then we won’t commit the crime of taking him where we want to go.

I am sorry for the impertinence, but I am hoping you are still reading.

My second request is can we expect your forces to understand that Mumbai has street-jams during office hours and so, during those hours, traffic would be slow anywhere and everywhere. If this is well understood, then they would not have to rudely (apologies for this word, but many feel that this too is an understatement) tell us that he cannot go on that route as there would be traffic. Don’t tell us what every kid in the city knows.

My third request is similar to the above. Thanks to the inefficiencies (a word I am sure you would empathize with) of the BMC, the roads and the drains of Mumbai are at an all-time low (both literally and figuratively) and the rains only add to the troubles of the road, (leave we mere mortals alone). So to say that some road would be very bad and there would be water-logging, etc. only means repeating what again every kid in the city knows. If all was well, wouldn’t we have taken a bus? I apologise once again to compare your supposedly divine three-wheelers with those mammoth eight-wheelers, but please treat it as a slip of the keypad of my silly laptop.

Thanks for being so understanding, and I am again hoping that the paper is in your hands and not under one of the treacherous wheels of your divine chariot.

Finally, the cops and the government tell us that an auto is supposed to ply anywhere and we passengers simply need to board the vehicles and then tell (‘tell’, I repeat, not ‘ask’). At the risk of hurting your sentiments by invoking such elements who simply  hurl rules without knowing how to implement them and knowing fully well that you and your forces care two hoots for such rules, can I ask you if such ‘meaningless’ rules are far from the truth? If public vehicles like that of yours are going to act as per their whims and fancies then what are they ‘public’ vehicles for?

Further, isn’t the rustic arrogance of your forces slightly (or is it highly?) misplaced? For the sake of a theoretical discussion, just try to imagine (please…try…you might just exercise your brain after a long time!) a state where all Mumbaikars decide to boycott your forces services (Sir, please don’t laugh so loud……adversity makes people come together and if you are educated enough, then you must have read about recent minor revolutions both within and outside India), then what would your ilk do?  Sell vegetables or go back to the state of penury they have come from or learn some new trade (along with the tricks of that trade of course).

Then why push us passengers, to the wall? If this profession is not suitable to your forces, ask them to leave it for more worthy and needy folks, instead of earning the wrath of the same people who pay for their livelihood. Gandhiji (I am assuming you know him as all political leaders quote him without taking him seriously) had said ‘customer is god’. Technically we are referred to as ‘passengers’, but then we are customers nonetheless, and if you can’t treat us like gods (apologies on behalf of Gandhiji), please treat us like human beings at least! We are not asking for too much, I presume, after all, we have never asked any of them to ply us for free and nor have we asked them to stop the meters during traffic-jams.

Before we lose our civilized ways and get down to rustic mannerisms (by hammering the shit out of some of them – to use some lingua franca), which though might not befit us and could happen only in utmost provocation (and we are just a few degrees away from that state) wouldn’t it be great if you could impress upon your forces to behave, instead of being one of them? Unless you think that to be where you are, it is important to agree with them, else you could be thrown out during the next elections and all this is for the lust for the position which many of you have it by sheer use of brute force. Even if we do tend to understand and empathize with your compulsive inefficiencies, we don’t have to take it for long. The water level is rising (Excuse me, I was not referring to the rains…this is metaphorically speaking!) and it won’t be long before it crosses the bearable limit.

This whole letter is only to communicate that change or you and your dirty-ilk will be changed! Challenge and threaten and you will meet your waterloo (please don’t separate the word into two different words – not having water in your loo is anyway something you deserve!).

Once again if I have hurt your sentiments, then it was intentional and needless to say, I don’t regret it a wee-bit and would repeat it if need be.

Yours irritatingly,

A harried and terribly troubled Passenger