Few days back I was having a walk in the night with Chintamani and Bihadi near Hira-Nandani we started discussing the topic, which only few psychomaniacs of our age could discuss on that pleasant place, and it was underworld. During discussion Chintamani told me that Mumbai Police is much better than other cities and was solely responsible to eliminate underworld. It was really shocking for me to hear that statement. Mumbai police is different from other cities. How’s that possible. All my past learning went into vain. The small chapter on “Discovery of India” written by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru in our CBSE text books was looming in front of my eyes, in which he clearly mentioned “kos kos pe badle paani, chaar cos pe badle waani” but still there is some thing that holds this nation together, that is the way Indians think. He wrote, we Indian however different we may look, whatever be the number of languages we may speak (its surprising that we have around 1600 languages and dialects) or whatever religion we may follow but the basic nature is same. We are still the same but if it is to be true than what trash Chintamani was speaking. Mumbai Police is different from other cities. I was really shocked to see that a particular city police is behaving in a way, which is not the characteristic of we Indians. My perception about India was under question. How can a group of people in a particular city have different attitude for work, so different that people start saying that these people are different from others as if they are not part of our great Indian tradition?
Though I was shocked at my recent discovery about the vast diversity, even in terms of work culture we have, I wasn’t sad. After all may be Chintamani might have proved my notion wrong at some place but why be sad if it is for good. So I acceded to Chintamani’s
Statement but I was anguished over the nature’s injustice for other parts of the country which desperately need good police force to bring law and order into the place. But this anguish didn’t last long as the very next day circumstances forced me to visit the police station for that first time in my life and that too the police station of most highly efficient police of our nation. Reason of the visit was some one flicked a cell phone from the Bihadi’s pocket and he was able to catch this person. So we had the culprit but he managed to pass the cell he flicked to his daughter who got down in the running bus. We tried our best to get the stolen cell from him but failed, so finally we took him to the nearest police station. We told our whole story, they listened meticulously each and every event and I was impressed and remembered Chintamani’s great words about the police here. Then came the a question which brought me back to this world and that was where this incident occurred and we told them that it happened near Powai lake and by the time we could think of what to do, we were already at a place where this was the nearest police station. Then came the most unexpected and wise answer from the other side and that was that since he flicked in that area it is under Powai’s jurisdiction. I told him that why he care about jurisdiction, we have the culprit with us, somehow get our mobile out of him but who cares and he sent us to Powai Police station, where I found equally learned and devoted SI who told us that though you have the culprit also it highly unlikely that you will get your mobile back. Everyday 8-10 cells are stolen in Mumbai and they are never found again he said in a sense of great pride as well grief (actually I am confused what he was really trying to convey, our stupidity that we went to police station or his helplessness) Even someone stole my mobile few days back and could not recover it till now, was his statement of wisdom that sent a jerk across my nerves. We tried to register the complaint but that required even more documents and proofs than what is required to get the passport in the country. Finally I gave up and came out of the station and hired the same bus (bus no. 396) and moved on to work but all the time I was thinking of one thing, how right was Nehru realizing that all the Indians are same irrespective of their region, religion and culture.
