One night @ the prepaid counter

One night @ the prepaid counter
The Times of India

8 pm: Friday. MG Road. Not a single autorickshaw in sight. I hope I have better luck at the pre-paid counter.
8.10 pm: There’s a queue with at least ten persons. Thankfully, there are several travelling together, so my chances of getting a rick are that much higher. But where are they? I see four traffic policemen standing quite in the middle of the road, trying to divert empty ricks into the pre-paid bay. While some reluctantly stop and grumble their way in, others just whizz past.

8.25 pm: The queue has reduced to three ahead of me. The policemen change their strategy. Two stay on our side of the road; the other two cross the road to coax autorickshaws going in the opposite direction. They meet with moderate success.

The queue behind me is now stretching into the distance. Patiently waiting for our transport home, we recognise our predicament. In the commercial heart of the country’s Silicon Valley, we feel like the have-nots — without our own transport and no access to a BMTC bus in the proximity.

The two women ahead of me are off-duty domestic assistants prepared to shell out a fortune for the ride home. Ahead of them is a foreign tourist trying to befriend them. All’s fine until he wants to shake hands with them and the startled ladies try desperately to look away. A paan-chewing couple arrives and tries to break into the queue. But they’re promptly heckled to the end of the queue by the frazzled crowd.

Suddenly, an autorickshaw comes voluntarily comes into the bay, quite to our amazement. But it turns out the driver wants to go to K R Puram. Like an auctioneer, he walks down the queue shouting his destination. Like bidders, we shout our destination and finally, he finds Number 13 in the queue headed his way. And you thought that was an unlucky number!

8.45 pm: The two techies behind me are flipping a coin to decide whether to walk to Koramangala or wait. “Main agle mahine bike la raha hoon (I’ll be getting a bike next month),’’ declares one. The Korean tourists behind them want to know if there’s a chance of getting a three-wheeler tonight. As if on cue, a city taxi arrives and lures them away. I wistfully feel that Mumbai’s dreaded Virar fast is a better option than this unending wait.

Suddenly, I see something that looks like good news. Three ricks are headed towards us, thanks to the policemen on the other half of the road. There’s some hope that I may finally get some transport home.

8.54 pm: Two ricks arrive and my heart skips a beat. “Where do you want to go ma?’’ asks the traffic cop and I practically sing, “Chinnappa Garden.’’ “25 bucks?’’ he asks. And although I vengefully want to say yes, I think about how the previous night I had to pay Rs 60 to get home. Honesty wins, and I say, “The meter usually shows around Rs 35.’’ 8.57 pm: The driver starts his vehicle. And I think to myself: I should’ve been home by now.