The Insatiable Basterds

The term ‘Basterds’ in the title is aimed at the Khaki wardi waalas of Dombivli i.e. the policemen. Today, my belief that all policemen in and around dombivli are not corrupt, entirely kicked the bucket!(seriously)..

My friend has a Tata Indica car, purchased in 2007 and has a ‘T’ permit (tourist permit, for all those of you who do not know) to it. Lets call my friend as ‘X”. Day before yesterday, one of X’s relatives drove the car in one of the many craters (read as potholes) on the Ambarnath-Badlapur highway. The pothole was so deep and there were so many huge stones in it that it completely damaged the Axle, the Suspension, the Ball Socket, the Rod on the front end of the car. A quick visit to a garage the very next day, threatened to burn a deep hole in X’s pocket. I told him “Dude, you are screwed!”

So yesterday evening, when we were sipping a hot cuppa tea and hogging Chinese food at the same time, a common friend of ours suggested that it was high time, he made use of his car insurance (no really, X had not claimed anything in the past two years and his insurance was literally rotting away). So, we decided that instead of paying money from X’s pocket (he was too hesitant to ask money from the genius ‘relative’ of his, who, as a matter of fact, is a pilot!!!), we would make the insurance company pay for it.

We made a call to the insurance company and they were more than happy to pay the claims. Why? Well, there is always a catch right? Nothing, can make an insurance company pay up so easily! Well, there was a catch. They were ready to entertain our claim on two conditions:

1) We had to take the car to the nearest authorised Tata Care service centre and

2) We had to get a FIR (First Investigation Report) done at the nearest police station

Fair enough, we thought. We could tow the car to the service center. However, a trip to the police station was not exactly what was in our minds, to get the claim. However, since this trip would not make us pay for the damages done to the car, we made peace with it.

Today morning, I went to X’s home to pick him up on my CBZ (that’s right, I own a Hero Honda CBZ!!! the original!! Burn you jealous people, Burn!!!) We went to the police station which was attached to the Ambarnath-Badlapur highway jurisdiction. The real story begins now..

We had to wait…wait…wait….a loooooong time….before we actually got to talk to one of the PSI (ummmm… Police Sub Inscpector?..a wild guess really). We told him that we had towed the vehicle to the Tata Care service station, at  Khambalpada, and that we needed a FIR so that we could service the car via the Cashless Insurance facility available there. Given below is the translated conversation between X and the PSI. The translation is from Marathi to English.

PSI: FIR kashala havay? (Why do you need the FIR?)

X: Insurance company madhey maagitla aahey. (The insurance company needs it)

PSI: Kashala? (For what?)

X: FIR bhetla tar aamhaala, insurance claim bhetnaar, nahi tar paishe aamhaala bharava laagel. (If we get the FIR, then we will get the claim, or else we will have to pay the money from our own pockets)

PSI: (Sounding Annoyed) Tar bhara ki! (Then just pay it!)

X: Saaheb, itke paishe asle astey tar insurance claim kashala kela astaa? (Sir, if we would have had so much money, then why would have we filed for an insurance claim?)

PSI: Paishe naahit tar car kashala ghetla? (If you don’t have money then why did you buy a car?) (Really, was this question necessary?)

X: (gets a bit irritated) Car ghetla tevha paishe hotey, aata nahi aahey (When I got the car, I had money, now I don’t)

PSI: (Takes us outside the entrance of the police station and says) Kitichi claim aahey? (How much is the claim for?)

X: panchvis hazaar paryant aahey (its upto 25k)

PSI: (mentioned the exact words that you are about to read) gaadi chi repairi tumhi karnaar, insurance company paishe denaar, aamhi tumhaala FIR denaar, tumchi gaadi chakachak honaar, saglya madhe tumchach faayda, aamchaa faayda kaay? (your car is going to be repaired, insurace company will give you money, we will give you a FIR, your car will be good as new, in all this, only you benefit, what do I get from all of this?

Me: (in all my cheekiness, barely controlling my laughter) tumhaala, khushi honaar ki tumhi, eka tax payer la madat keli mhanun. (you will be happy with the fact that you helped out a tax payer!!)

PSI: (he surprisingly laughed at it!) kaay joke maartos! aamhala pun faayda nako ka? Aamcha pun kahi vichaar karaa (what a joke! we also want profit. Think about us as well)

X: (now, X is a guy who is strictly against bribery, so am I, so we had decided that no matter what happens we won’t pay up to get our work done. We had decided that we would stay there all day, and eat their head up, till they provide us with the FIR) Tumhaala kiti havay? (How much do you want)

PSI: fakth paach hazaar (only five thousand)

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a moron the guy was. If we had cash, then would we even come to the police station to get the FIR done?

Then, we told him that we didn’t have that kind of money. We told him that we had only 200 Rs with us (I even showed him my torn kitos) and hence won’t be able to pay him to give us an FIR. What amazed me was the fact that this guy looked after an entire section of the police station and had more than 5 head constables reporting to him, who in turn had around 5 constables reporting to them. The position which he was in the police station actually entitles him to take stringent action against law breakers. And, amazingly enough, this guy was himself the law breaker. No wonder, no one has even 1% faith in the police force nowadays.

We made a few calls to some important people, including a senior inspector, who assured us that we will get the FIR, without making any payment towards it. In the meanwhile, we spoke to about 3-4 other officials in the police station and they all demanded a bribe ranging between Rs 500 – 2000. We refused to pay them as we believed that we had every right to claim the insurance and that we were entitled to the FIR, as the officials are appointed to help people rather then harassing them and asking for money.

The inspector repeatedly kept warning us that unless we pay him up, we were not going to get the FIR! This is exactly what people mean when they say ‘power in the wrong hands’. He knew we wanted the FIR and he was not ready to give it until we paid him Rs 2000 (yup, we had managed to bring it down)

We were really waiting for a phone call, and were whiling our time, discussing the money with the official. The Senior inspector called up on X’s cellphone in some time and asked him to give the phone to the inspector who was asking for the bribe. The inspector refused to take the call and said “konihi asu de, paishe de aani FIR gheun jaa”, which when translated means “Let it be whoever it is, give me the money and take the FIR”. When we told the Senior inspector that he is not taking his call, the guy got angry. He told us to wait at the police station and cut the call. Surprise, Surprise!! He called up directly at the police station and spoke to the official. The official, literally started trembling and spoke with a childish voice with a stammer. He was so F***** up that the only words which came from his mouth were “Hoye saaheb” and “Sorry Saaheb” which means “Yes, Sir” and “Sorry Sir”. After almost five minutes, he put down the receiver over the telephone and wiped off the sweat over his forehead, chin, cheeks and who knows where else!

He frantically started searching for a Carbon copy paper and two blank pages. Once he found them, he again searched for a blue pen for nearly five minutes (repeatedly wiping off the sweat over his forehead). After almost 10 minutes, he said to us, “Itkyaa chotyaa kaamala saahebaanna kaa saangitla?” which meant “Why did you call up the Senior Inspector for such a small issue?”. To which, X quipped, “itkya chotyaa kaamala tumhi 2000 Rs maagat hotyaa na mhanun” which meant “You were demanding Rs 2000, for such a small issue, thats why”.

For the next 20 minutes, he started asking us relevant questions pertaining to the issue and gave the panchnama (FIR) in the evening. My friend is a smart-ass and he knew that the PSI was scared to death and hence would not even dream to question us on the details we were giving. Hence, he told the inspector that the left door of the car had also got damaged (which had happened in a previous adventure) and the PSI obliged us by mentioning ‘left door damaged’ in the FIR!!

Well, as far as the rest of the events are concerned, everything went smoothly. We took the FIR, filed the claim and are expecting everything to be paid up by the Insurance company in a couple of days.

But seriously, the highlight of this event was the way the guy trembled and fumbled and stammered when he got a sound thrashing from the Senior inspector. We were literally laughing our heads off!!

But on a more serious note, it even made me realise, that even officials at a high rank can be corrupt and demand money for a simple thing like a FIR, which ironically is a part of their duty, which again, ironically, is what we ‘the taxpayers’ pay for, which (sic) ironically, the police waalas do not do.

Maybe someday, they will understand that their salaries come from the hard earned money of the tax payers and that they ought to do their duty towards the common man as a designated ‘public servant’.