Autorickshaw altercations - part 1

"Don't think I am new to the city so that you can quote whatever fare you please. You can try the trick on someone else. I know the city like the back of my hand! City Railway Station to Meenakshi Temple is exactly 120 rupees, not less, not more," I put my point across as forcefully as I could.

From the choice of my language, from the accent and from my general demeanor, the autorickshaw driver was certain that I knew Bangalore not like the back of my hand, but like my own back! At 10:50 pm, he clearly had the upper hand and he knew it. He threatened to leave me marooned at the railway station and pick up the next client who was already waiting in the wings, should our negotiations fail.

The driver stuck to his guns, "You can either give me 250 rupees flat or you can go by the meter. The choice is yours. But after 10 pm, it is one-and-a-half charge, mind you. Also, Kalena Agrahara is quite a distance from Meenakshi Temple. It is outside the city limits. It will be one-and-a-half charge over that. I will not get a client on my way back. I will need 30 rupees extra for getting back to the city."

It looked as if there was no end to the miscellaneous charges. In a single breath, he continued, "Plus, you are carrying excess luggage. There will be a charge for that. Right now itself I want to clarify that this meter is an old one. I don't want any unnecessary argument when you get down. You will have to pay the meter charge matched against the new conversion rates. Also, I don't carry any change. You will have to give me the exact fare. If you need to stop at an ATM, there will be a waiting charge as well. All put together, it will work beyond 250 rupees. But it is entirely upto you. I don't mind going by the meter at all." The driver trailed off with a few sentences under his breath which I couldn't exactly follow but caught some choice words like "sumne" and "bejaar" and understood that the barb was directed towards argumentative customers like me.

A part of me wondered whether I would be timed in milliseconds for taking a leak and whether there was a charge for that as well, but resisted the urge (pun unintended).

The mathematics seemed to assume staggering astronomical proportions. The flow-chart was complicated with several "decision points" which could lead the unwary customer to his doom. It was unclear who would eventually do the arithmetic since a bewildering number of complex topics were involved here- ratio-proportion, percentages and fractions to name a few. The driver appeared sufficiently equipped to give the protagonist of Good Will Hunting a run for his money (rather, with my money)! It looked a cheaper and a more straight forward option to purchase the autorickshaw from him and drive it myself !

I had half a mind to give him a mouthful and let him go but the other half of the mind chose to mollycoddle him- discretion after all, is the better part of valour. That I was being taken for a ride was certain, but at 11:00 pm, I actually *needed* a ride or ran the risk of spending the rest of the night at the station platform. I decided to bite the bullet and bravely declared that I would pay by the meter. Bad choice! But ours is not to question why, ours is but to pay and ply!

It was definitely a less travelled road at that time of the day for Bangalore city. Robert Frost perhaps had this road in mind. The street lights had a dull, lazy feel to them and lit roads which were equally sleepy. A pack of irritated street dogs gave the autorickshaw a hot pursuit, coming frightfully close to my heels, but thankfully lost steam midway.

The seat on which I was perched, was not exactly fixed and had a mind of its own. It squirmed and protested against my weight (or actually the lack of it) and suddenly buckled so that I almost toppled over. It looked a precarious balancing act to hold the seat in place and my nerves as the rickshaw negotiated man-made ascents and descents with the ease of a roller-coaster.

The auto-driver broke into a little Kannada film song Ninnindale... as he went over the fly-over from where directions to Lalbaug could be seen. He was in a jolly mood, sure that his month's expenses were taken care in a single ride! 

The song was brought to an abrupt end when the autorickshaw ground to a halt before it could reach Hudson Circle. The driver yanked the lever a few times to jumpstart the auto. The vehicle initially responded with strangulated yelps which gave a ray of hope; it then let out a groan and with a last whimper fell completely silent. "No fuel," he announced calmly. "We have to wait for another rickshaw to get us to the petrol pump!" Shaken... I was, but I had to at least pretend that I was not stirred!

- to be continued