An incident...

On that day I was in a queue at Dadar ticket booking counter. Being the connecting link between western and central railway of city local trains, Dadar is the most crowded station of Mumbai. The overcrowding of the station is also evident in the booking counter meant for long distance trains. Every queue looks a quarter of a kilometer long with impatient faces around. It was not a situation where ‘the other queue moves faster’. People in different queues were giving sympathetic gestures to each other, gestures which if translated to words would perhaps have been read as “I, here, am no better”. And yes, some of the first timers in such long slow-moving queues must have considered themselves to be the most unfortunate creatures next to the terrorist hostages. However, I, since seasoned with such situations, was just killing time by looking around people. And in Mumbai, at any point of time, public places like these have enough pretty faces to keep one engaged.

During this not so wasteful time-pass, one couple caught my attention. Though not newly married they looked attractive partly because of their young attire and partly because of their elegant English speaking style. They were standing quite close to me in the very next queue at my left. I started observing them with a little more concentration.

I could clearly see the husband wearing a collared T-shirt with ‘East India Company’ engraved on it and ‘UK’ printed at the chest pocket. The rest of the T-shirt was plain except some logos here and there which I could not decipher.

Four centuries before, this British East India Company, stepped into India for trade and subsequently became instrumental in establishing British Empire on this soil. At the outset, I wondered how one could wear a dress symbolizing the company which conspired to take away the political freedom of people in the name of business. Another important reason of surprise was how the person managed to get a T-shirt of the company, which died hundred and thirty years ago.

There was a break in my thought, when I heard the wife complaining on the slow progress of the queue. After a while, the husband approached the counter at my right, which had hardly five people. That counter was actually meant for freedom fighters and senior citizens. The same was clearly mentioned on the signboard over the counter. The husband might have missed that. But the irony was this gentleman with a British East India Company brand T-shirt was standing in a line meant for freedom fighters. And this view looked so much inapposite and funny that I could not resist in sharing the same with couple of persons around. And each person, who witnessed the same, enjoyed the scene and gave a puzzling and satirical look at the gentleman.

However, the gentleman did not get a helping from the counter, and had to come back to join his wife in the original queue.