(c) Can Stock Photo / corepics
An Uber ride is often, a gateway to realization if we keep our minds open. The drivers see a large spectrum of today’s society, whether that be the uber rich, definitely the middle-class stragglers and in an increasing frequency the not so affluent ones. This exposes them to a wide range of experiences and tales which some of them are only happy to share in return of some politeness. Add to this mix some educated owner drivers who find a greater return in this than the 9 to 5 jobs that their education would have supported them. Such rides have often led to moments of epiphany for me towards the state of affairs in our country, whether that is about the realities of demonetization or that of women in rural India.
It was the winter of 2016 when my birthday celebration like that of many more November born was highlighted by whether we were able to withdraw our own cash from the ATM to meet daily livelihood needs. As we were slowly forced to get used to ” PayTM Karo” as a way of life thanks to our Prime Minister, Uber with their wallet-friendly feature became a lifeline for us. So it was one such uber ride at the end of a tiring day at work which gave me a peep into the supposed horrific story of black money in our country an how the DeMo was wiping that hydra out of our lives. So as Arijit Singh belted out about Aashiqui, a diminutive Sardarji in his mid-forties enlightened me about the reality of cash in our life. I leave it to the reader if this cash is black money and the source of all things bad that it was spoken up about. Sardarji had been driving his uber as an owner-driver for the last year when DeMo had hit us. He was the proud father of a daughter who was in the 5th standard and son who was about to start kindergarten. Sardarji humbly thanked the Almighty for having blessed him with the shelter of both his parents who lived with him and loved his children as the apple of their eyes. Indian citizenry is attuned to adjusting to change with a smile and it is with a smile that Sardarji brushed over demonetization as another hurdle in life’s way. His only worry was taking care of the daily needs of his family. So while he never said no to a wallet ride cash was that much appreciated, especially since the 10 lac that he had accumulated at home had been deposited in the bank. I was taken aback by the fact that an Uber driver had 10 lacs to spare at home and was reassured that black money must be a problem, and the problem was being ably addressed by DeMo. Sardarji and his ilk who kept that money at home must be corrupt people who would fester further corruption through the use of such money. The diminutive appeal of sardarji was being fast replaced by the horns of a corrupt man in my eyes. I was itching to pick a fight and show him the way. How the right way would now shine and the end of black money hydra would be enshrined in the annals of history. Sardarji was unaffected by the change in my demeanor and as the cab hurtled along Chirag Delhi flyover from Chittaranjan Park to Vasant Kunj, his humility didn’t change. He went on to explain how just last week his father had an accident having tripped while running after his son and they had needed to operate to set his fracture. Being a patient of hemophilia, he as in need f blood and had to buy blood paying hard cash to the donor. He was thanking his luck that the accident had happened before DeMo, because then neither would he have the money available to get the blood, nor would the rate be the same. Afterall in and India when a man sells his blood to feed the hunger of his family he will for sure take whatever premium he can. I was shocked back for a moment at the realization that our country is so poor that people sell their own blood to try and feed the mouths of people depending on them. The second point that hit me was that truly if sardarji’s father had been hurt during the period after DeMo, what would he have really done to treat his father. While I was still in a quandary about how he would have got the money for the blood, as sardarji spoke about how he maintained cash in the house for these emergencies I was warming up to address his queries. After all, I was from merchant acquiring, and the prime minister had opened up an industry for us. I was telling him all about wallets and all about cards, about how secure and safe and transparent everything was. And there was my next bouncer. Sardarji in his humble manner mused if the hard currency that was in his mattress turned into paper overnight how could he be sure of the electronic transaction that he an uneducated person as not aware of. While I was trying to muster up my logic to explain how things were all safe, with IIT Delhi campus as a background, sardarji continued to muse as to whether his stash that he had saved for an emergency was really black money that the government was trying to eradicate or savings that it was trying to usurp. Especially that when SBI had just announced that it was writing off a huge block of its NPAs from its books. As IIT turned to JNU, and I was coming to terms with Sardarji’s grounded reality and questions two things were upfront. Did the benefit of demonetization outweigh the sufferings of the people? Was the targeted black money really black money or savings in the form of cash that an economy driven by cash had spawned? I will leave the questions for better qualified economists to answer.
As sardarji dropped me off and the money was debited from my wallet, he thanked me for my time invoking Wahe Guru to help me tide over my troubles just as He had helped him in his trials. The diminutive man was true to his face of humility and gratitude for the Almighty and I was dwarfed and confounded in front of his questions and the reality of a land where blood was truly money.
To be continued….
