I always recollect how small things can change your perspective of life completely. Though the incident did not change anything for me except it took away my dignity, made me run like a mad guy at 1 am in the Night and made me sit in the police station whole day....and trust me it is not very comforting.
As any place in India, Infosys is a crowded place. 25,000 people working and commuting daily to outskirts of the city working for a single company in fact creates brotherhood.I stay 30 km (around 19 miles) from the place of my work in Hinjewadi. Commuting on daily basis was as hard as the work itself. The unruly traffic, summer heat of 40 °C (104°F) and horrendous carbon soot in the air makes smoking cigarette safer than breathing air . I am sure most of the people spent around 2 hours commuting back and forth to office. That translates to 10 hours of commute per week! You can clearly see the faces of workers marching to their desks, cursing them selves " One more day...and that's it...I am done with this company"
Recently (2007) our company had constructed a huge parking lot called MLPL Most of the people try to save Rs 50 ($1) parking fee by parking their car on the road just outside.
The company watchmen would come out with whistle blowing on top of their lungs "Fhurr..Fhurr"
"Do not park the car here saheb...It is prohibited!". In India is a country of divisions and sub divisions. Divisions are in the form of religions, castes, money, intelligence. A software engineer however worthless he/she may be, He/She is always at a higher strata than the watchman. The Software Engineer, already frustrated by commuting, retaliates back by shouting "I AM PARKING HERE, DO WHAT YOU WANT TO DO!" . The poor lower strata watchman watches haplessly.
So my story begins. It was in 2007, I parked my car outside of Infosys. I was "working" late till 9 pm and it was time to retire to home. I packed all my belongings and was ready to go. I then realized my electronic car key was not in my pockets! Damn! I might have lost outside Infosys. Since the place is unsecured I ran to see if my car is still there. With an electronic key it is so easy to locate a car and steal it. I heaved a sigh of relief to see my car still standing there in dark at the corner of the road.
I had no option other than going back 30kms to home and 30 kms back and get my keys! It was almost about to be 10pm in the night and I had hunger pangs, but I ignored them!
I caught hold of a call center taxi driver and asked whether he can take me back to home and get the key. He demanded a hefty price of Rs. 300. At that time it was a lot of amount but I agreed to that, what option did I have? The driver's mouth was fully red with his 'Gutka' and the taxi's gutkha smell gave me a nausea. My cell phone battery also started going down. Nokia 3530 was not a very good friend when you needed it! All things DO come together!
So I took the key from my home and returned back to Infosys at around 1am in the morning. Hunger still in my stomach and a dead battery. While coming back it just came to my mind "what if somebody else found the key and took the car away?" I just laughed off this thought, this can never happen to me! .
The driver dropped me on the ill lit road. To my horror THE CAR WASN'T THERE! My nightmares had come true! Somebody had stolen my car...I went up and down the road at in the night like crazy!
For a middle class person like me the car meant a lot! Loosing it was not an option especially when the car was my dad's! I was almost in tears! Damn! I went inside Infosys to see if the car was towed. The security informed me that it was not and you are screwed! I searched everywhere and decided it was time to lodge a police complaint.
I went to Police station at the Hinjewadi corner. It was dimly light by a "zero" bulb. All of the Police were asleep in their striped under garments, some on the ground, some in chairs.All of them snoring in different frequencies. I went to the one who was on the chair and spoke in Marathi. With sleepy eyes he said "Don't worry,go home, come tomorrow" and slept off. I woke him again and he grew irritated "Go home, your friend must have taken it". I dismissed him and insisted that they lodge a report. Indian police in general are scared of the so called "educated lot" for their good connections. He agreed and started scribbling on a small piece of scrap paper in his pocket. I recounted him everything and wondered if this is how they lodge a report. He said he will inform the control posts and told me to come tomorrow morning and slept off again.
I had no option but to take a cab back to home! It was 3 am in the morning and I was going back to home in tears, thinking of my stupidities! How can I be so careless? The cab driver was consoling me, "It is very common to have cars stolen in these parts...so don't worry...some terrorist must have taken it for a joy ride.." I just hoped the terrorist was a suicide bomber and not a car bomber.
So after an ordeal of 7 hours, I reached home for the day at 4 am. Facing my parents was hard enough and ended up answering all sorts of nagging questions. Surely they must be thinking I am an ASS. I had my dinner even though my hunger was long gone! I decided to charge my dead cellphone as I continued my dinner. As soon as the cellphone charged I got an SMS sent at 10 pm from my friend in my project "KEY FOUND IN THE CREVICE OF YOUR CHAIR". Damn it! I immediately call him. He told me one of my project-mate had found the key and taken the car to his home! Who the HELL does that!? All my nightmare happened just because my key slipped from my pocked and fell in my chair's crevice! I don't believe that! And thus my nightmare ended....Well! Not just yet, I still had 10 more hours to endure the pain.
Next morning, I collected my car from the project mate and went to the police station to tell that everything is good and I got my car back. He told me to sit in a dirty rickety chair. He refused to believe me. He told me "How can he just take somebody else's car to his home?" His question was right but I had no answers. He told me to call my project mate to the police station. I didn't, I said it was silly mistake from my side. It soon became a tug-o-war between the police and me. He insisted that I call him and he would interrogate my project mate. Since the project mate was from Bihar I totally protected him as I felt the police would harass him like shit! The police said that I need to talk to his boss.He kept me waiting for 4 more hours in the station. I saws cases of a drunk woman stabbing her husband, man stabbing his friend , thief getting stabbed by a crowed! Today everybody was stabbing each other.....
I finally had to call my "connection" to get the things resolved.... I was free by 6pm.
The key in the chair's crevice had caused enough damage to my crevice!
I don't why this episode happened? Was it malice, co-incidence, stupidity or sheer bad luck....
Best of the opinions state that it was combination of all FOUR!
