Long taxi ride can be quite alright and uneventful. Mine was quite boring too when suddenly a boy aged maybe around 14 or 15 came to my taxi which was waiting at the signal. He was carrying large stack of pirated books. He looked at me and then blurted out, “Mujhe worli naka chod doge?” Though a little taken aback, I nodded and said haan. In the next 15 minutes, I must have asked him 15 questions which answered rather matter of fact manner. Twice in the middle of me throwing questions at him, he tried to sell me Chetan Bhagat’s 2 States.
He told me his name which was Ramesh. He lived near Worli Naka with his younger brother and sister. He was studying in 8th Std. He reasoned out with me on why he can’t go to an English medium school. He said, “English medium mein toh fees hoti hai naa…” So he was happy going to a Hindi medium night school thought he had bunked school for the last five days. He was from a small village near Lucknow.
During this 15 minute journey, Ramesh gave me an interesting peace of information on how I can recognize a duplicate book from an original one. “Dekho duplicate book ka pages idhar se peela dikhta hai, original ka hamesha white hi hota hai,” he explained. Here he pitched his sale, “Chetan Bhagat aur Paulo Coelho original hai, le lo.” After a few minutes of silence, he told the driver to halt the cab at a signal. With a small thank you, he hopped off the cab…
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