Do you believe in Omens? Those who do, take an event or happening as a sign of something to come.
It was the summer of 95. Four of us – all batchmates from a freshly completed journalism course – arrived in Delhi, hoping it would be our ‘Karmabhoomi’.
In those days, if you visited Katwaria Sarai near Qutub Institutional Area, you could rent a home on the same day. Rental income is the mainstay for the landowners in this village. Every square inch is utilised to create room for tenants. A single house can have up to 20 units for rent, providing ample rental income for its owners.
We found a one-bedroom hall. The kitchen was a tiny unit as part of the hall. The bathroom was outside the apartment. That was all we could afford.
The apartment was bare and basic. We left for Munirka market to buy some essentials.
I took out a crisp Rs 500 note from the envelope my dad had packed in my luggage, tucked inside my clothes. The envelope had Rs 5,000 before I took out the note.
Each of us took out some currency before we locked our new home and left for the market. We spent less than an hour in the market. We were back in 90 minutes or so.
When we reached our apartment, we found our main door ajar. It seemed like we were on the wrong floor. But it wasn’t.
Our worst fears had come true.
All our luggage was opened. The wind blew the envelope my dad had left for me, as I pushed open the main door. It was empty. All my money was gone. The same was the case with Satya Prakash Singh (SP) and MV Ramsurya (Ramu).
Jagat Jyoti Mohanty (JJ) was lucky. He had left all his cash in the pocket of his jeans which was hung on the bedroom door. The burglars did not anticipate money lying outside. The jeans escaped their attention.
We were devastated. In less than 24 hours of arriving in a new city which we hoped would welcome us and bring us joy, we were robbed.
It seemed like a well-planned burglary – the handiwork of at least 2-3 individuals who had carefully coordinated the operation.
There was a salon just outside the building where we stayed. When we left for the market, two boys in the salon were staring at us. We then thought they were checking out their new neighbours.
Looking back, our hypothesis was as follows:
One of the burglars may have followed us to the bus stand and signalled to another halfway down after we boarded the bus. This one carried the information back to the third who was at the salon. They knew they didn’t have much time. They had to act quickly. They broke the lock, rummaged through our belongings and took whatever cash they found.
We approached our landlord who didn’t seem cooperative. Later, we suspected one of his sons was involved in the theft. He would spend most of his time chatting in the same salon.
We went to file a First Information Report (FIR) at the police station. The SHO was not there. One of the constables made brief notes and asked us to return when the SHO was around.
It took us a few more trips to the police station before we found the SHO. He asked us if we suspected anyone. When we told him what we thought, he suggested we bring the suspects in. That was the final straw.
We figured it was futile to spend more time and money trying to get the cops to do their job. We were now living off borrowed money. JJ had loaned us a thousand each, and every visit to the police station left us poorer by a few rupees.
It was more worthwhile to hunt for a job. We started making our rounds of media offices with our CVs. Since we did not know anyone, we would mostly leave our resume at the front office. And hope it reaches the right hands who find merit in us.
We did not get our money back. We had to make do with the little cash we had borrowed. We survived on breakfast and dinner. In the afternoon, we would share glasses of sugarcane juice to quench our thirst in Delhi’s hot summer. Coke, Thumbs Up and other soft drinks were a luxury. We were grateful for the roadside vendors who sold sugarcane juice.
When the word of our misery reached others, we received varied reactions from those who heard. Some gave us hope. Others sympathised. One of them mentioned how starting a new chapter of our life with our money gone was a bad omen, before adding maybe Delhi was not the right place for us.
It was not a good thought to enter our mind. It did bother us a bit, but we ignored it and set out on our job search.
Rewinding 45 Days
A month and a half before that date, I interned at Resonance Communication, founded by one of Delhi’s leading journalists Manoj Raghuvanshi who also became famous as the star anchor of the video news magazine Newstrack.
Halfway through the internship, I was lucky to meet Uma Swamy who was a friend of Manoj. Uma was looking for some help in logging and transcribing tapes that she has shot for her company. Manoj suggested she could use me and my friend Ajay Singh (also from the same institute).
Uma gave us a week’s assignment. We were very happy to find work. I returned to the institute grateful for our short-lived on-the-job experience.
Uma paid us for our efforts when we returned from our institute after our convocation. It was a lifeline at that time. Never in my life has money arrived at a more opportune time. It helped me pay back JJ for the initial loan.
I have much to thank Uma for.
She led a syndicated features agency that produced corporate films and documentaries. She was also its only employee. India Features Service was growing, and she felt she could use some help. Having one more member would give her more headspace for business development. Then, she was too busy trying to manage everything from writing proposals, pitching to clients, research, scripting, production, securing the logistics, managing the payments to vendors, etc.
Ajay and I were two candidates she considered for that solitary position. She chose me. Perhaps because I had lost money and needed the job more. Uma never told me if that was the reason for picking me.
I was delighted to find a job – whatever the reason that led to my selection.
A fifth member, Gaurav Patra had joined us by then. With him, more cash flowed into our household. The one-bedroom apartment now had five occupants. We no longer needed to skip a meal daily. The fear of running out of money was not as much, as before.
By and by, the other four occupants found a job, though it didn’t come soon. Or easy.
It took a couple of months for JJ to be hired. He is now based in Gurgaon as the VP & Head – HR Operations in a global provider of wireless communications infrastructure and next-generation wireless technologies.
A month later, Ramu was the next to be recruited as a copywriter in an advertising firm. Currently, he is based in Mumbai and shapes the communication for a world leader in Audit, Consulting, Tax and advisory services.
By the time Gaurav was employed, nine months had elapsed. He struggled long and hard before he found his feet. He is now a very successful entrepreneur – having founded a Communications tech firm unleashing the power of new media – employing over 250 people.
SP freelanced for almost a year before joining full-time in a magazine that dug deep into the business of communication. Presently based in Bengaluru, he is the India head of Communications & CSR at a leading multinational corporation in the technology space.
All five are now settled in the north, west and south of India. We started on the wrong foot and stumbled through life’s journey. Eventually, we found our balance.
When we first heard the bad omen reference, it did cross our mind and continued to linger for some time. When things don’t work out, when misfortune strikes, you can get superstitious. You are only human. But you shouldn’t brood over it. You need to get out of that mindset before it is too late. And believe good things await you in future.
We did. And things worked out.
