And that is why I respect that “Aam Aadmi” so much even today

This happened about 15 years back. My husband and I had gone to my home town to meet my family. We decided to stay in Mumbai for three days and then go back to Ahmedabad, the city that we lived in.

Yes, we did have a nice time in Mumbai. Who doesn’t? We stayed in a small lodge in Vile Parle East and explored the city to our heart’s content. Time whizzed. Soon it was time to go back home. We had done quite a bit of shopping so we had quite a few suitcases with us. And then I had been to my hometown after such a long time – I had bought a few things there too.

We never realized that this might create a problem for us because we assumed we would easily get tickets to Ahmedabad which was just 8 hours away from Mumbai. Several trains plied between these two cities on all days of the week so we never anticipated any problems there.

We were dismayed when we realized that we would not be able to travel by train for the simple reason that no confirmed tickets were available in any of these trains for the next few days. We could not wait that long. So we were left with no other option. We had to go to Ahmedabad by bus.

My husband made a few enquiries and booked bus tickets for both of us. We still had a lot of time to spare. But we were aware of the traffic in Mumbai. So we did not want to take any chances. We decided to leave the lodge a little early and wait at the bus stand instead. We were right.

The minute we stepped out onto the road, we knew we had a problem on our hands. Several rickshaws passed by. But not a single rickshaw driver was willing to take us to the bus stand because it was on the high way. After waiting for a long while, one rickshaw driver finally agreed to drop us there. We piled our suitcases into the rickshaw and got into the rickshaw with utter relief. My husband looked at his watch anxiously. Yes, we still had ample time to spare.

We were not too familiar with this part of Mumbai. So we relied on the rickshaw driver to drop us at the right place. After a while, he stopped the rickshaw and said this is where our bus would stop to pick us up. We trusted him and got down from the rickshaw and arranged our suitcases on the pavement. We waited for a few minutes.

I don’t know why, but my intuition was warning me. My husband too felt the same way. No one else seemed to be waiting for the bus. We checked our tickets again. The time was right. We wondered if we were standing at the right place now. We decided to double-check.

A few fishermen were standing at a little distance from us. My husband approached them and enquired if this was the bus stop for passengers who were headed towards Ahmedabad. The senior-most fisherman looked at us in surprise and said, “No Bhai Saheb. This is the bus stop for passengers who are headed to Nasik. The bus stop for buses that go to Ahmedabad is on the opposite side and quite far from here.”

We were shocked. We wondered what we could do now. We knew for sure that we would never get an empty rickshaw on the busy highway. We looked at the several suitcases that we had lined up on the pavement. We wondered how we could carry so much luggage, cross the highway which was full of speeding vehicles and then walk to the bus stop there. And my husband found it difficult to walk for long distances.

But you must have heard of this proverb No? “Jiska koi nahi uska Bhagvan hota hai.” Hmmm….Yes, that best describes our situation. There is no doubt about it: God sent us an angel to help us out of our crisis.

Maybe the panic on our faces was obvious to that senior fisherman bhai. He astutely summed up our situation. He put his hand on my husband’s shoulder and said, “Please don’t worry. I’ll ensure that you reach the bus stop on time. Just wait here.”

He walked ahead briskly and waited till he could spot an empty rickshaw. We watched mutely when he waved it down to a halt. We could hear him arguing with the rickshaw driver. He somehow forced him to drive the rickshaw on the wrong side of the highway so that we could reach the bus stop quickly. He then gestured towards us and asked us to get into the rickshaw first. After we did so, he picked up all our suitcases and arranged them properly in the rickshaw so that we could sit comfortably.

We were on the verge of thanking him when to our utter surprise, he too sat down next to us in the rickshaw. He started giving the driver explicit instructions and told him to stop after a few minutes.  

We knew, again intuitively, that this was the right bus stop. We were extremely relieved to see several passengers waiting there. The fisherman bhai first asked the people who were waiting there if this was the right location for buses that left for Ahmedabad. Only after that did he ask us to alight from the rickshaw. He ensured that we had removed all our suitcases from the rickshaw.

Sometimes a handwritten note captures the depth of our emotions more eloquently…

It took us less than a minute to check and rearrange our suitcases. We turned around gratefully to thank the fisherman bhai for all his help and to pay for the rickshaw. But he was nowhere around. He had left in the same rickshaw and had not even waited for us to pay the rickshaw wala. Even today I have only one regret: that we could not thank him properly for his timely help.

I mean – just think of it for a few seconds. He was just an ordinary person like you and me. He was not very rich either. He probably fished all day to make ends meet. Yet his actions proved that money is a mere commodity that helps us buy conveniences and that it is humanity that should matter more to all of us.

And that is why I respect that Aam Aadmi so much even today. I’m glad that humanity still throbs in a few rare human beings like these….