An Evening in Shimla

Shimla has always been the town of Sahibs. Almost two centuries have passed but the Sahibness of the town is still felt. Now we are the Sahibs here and we feel that this town was built for us. Many kings from many Indian States used to come to Shimla to lick the feet of the White Sahibs but those kings were never called Sabibs. We are Sahibs today and people call us Sahibs. We are actually living the White Culture and still maintaining that dignity.

It was Mr. Malcom who had found this place and then built this town. Without him there can’t be any history of this town. This town reminded the White Sahibs of their home, London. It is our misfortune that we have never been to London. The White had travelled to various countries and they were the real explorers.

They literally ruled the world. What a wonderful time that must have been for the English people!

Now we try our best to be Sahibs to occupy big offices and we don’t hesitate from getting involved in corruption, bribery, and every unfair means to raise our status. But they were different. The superiority was always with them and they did not do any such thing which could be anywhere near corruption. They were courageous and frank. It seems they were born to rule because they hardly ever failed, success to them was, as if, god-given. Even their love affairs were grand; they dated in grand manners.

My dear Desi Sahibs, we must be obliged to them because they gave the term ‘black-beauty’ to our common looking girls, if compared on the basis of elegance and manners with the white ladies. If they fell in love with a native girl, they did not pounce on her like our natives do. They did not rape our girls; they tried to give them every comfort if they liked them. When I see the people today, I am ashamed because they commit all sorts of atrocities on our own girls. Our girls are afraid of our own people today. Pick the history of the British Rule and you will find only one or two such incidents in which White Sabibs were involved in rapes or other anti-social activities. But in this independent India, today, thousands of girls are raped and murdered by our own people. We have carried the tag of Sahibs but we have been unable to maintain the dignity of the term. Now, our Sabibs in their high offices are the worst of the lot and they are the roots of corruption and almost every kind of anti-social activity in this country. These Sahibs shelter the gangsters, drug dealers, and big smugglers, and if they are caught, their friends, political leaders, come to their rescue.

Indians were not allowed to walk on the Mall Road during the British Rule but look what we have done to that beautiful road now. The so-called civilized independent people throw their garbage on this Mall Road and they are not ashamed of it. The White Sahibs got this road washed with water every day but now our people can be found openly urinating along the road.

We can never become the real Sahibs because that grace, that attitude that dignity is missing. We have gradually destroyed this beautiful town. In those days, the shops of the White Sahibs were praiseworthy but today the shopkeepers cover half of the road and spread their Chinese and Indian goods on the road with their shouting salesmen. This peaceful and beautiful town is transformed into a fish-market where stink and clamour have come to be the permanant residents.

The discipline with which the White Sahibs maintained is nowhere to be seen today. Their well-planned town has come to be a noisy common town where in the name of tourism and tourist resorts only shops, bars, and cold weather are left. The band that used to play in the evening has disappeared; the dressed coolies are nowhere, the dignified silence has evaporated.

Mr. Arora’s speech had left everybody stunned. The happy occasion had, as if, changed into a requiem.

Having translated these lines from Hindi to English, I kept my pen down.

I came out of my hotel and moved towards the Mall Road. There were a few people enjoying the lights and music near the shops. I found a vacant bench near a rickshaw stand and sat down.

“Sahib, do you want something?” said a boy who had appeared from nowhere.

I looked at him and guessed that he was hardly 15.

“What?”

“Do you want something for night?” the boy said hurriedly.

“What do you sell?” I was curious.

“Anything, just name it,” said the boy.

“I don’t want anything. Take this,” I tried to give him a note of five rupees.

“No, Sahib, I don’t want it. I have young girls if you want,” said the boy.

“What?”

“Yes, fresh young Shimla girls!” he stressed the word ‘Shimla’.

I was stunned because I had not come out of the effect of the paper that I had been translating from Hindi to English.

“Do you go to school?” said I out of curiosity and trying to change the topic.

“Yes, I am in Xth standard,” said the boy.

“Then why do you do all this?”

“There is good money in this business,” said the boy.

“How much do you get?” my curiosity was increasing.

“I get 30 percent of the amount paid to the girls,” said the boy.

“How many customers do you arrange every night?” said I.

“Two or three, but in Summer I get more,” the boy had begun to talk freely.

“No, I don’t want any girl but I will pay you the amount you earn,” said I.

“No, Sahib, I am not a beggar. I don’t take the money that I don’t deserve,” said the boy very arrogantly.

Suddenly I remembered the lines of Mr. Arora and begun to laugh loudly. The White Sahibs had left but we had retained a bit of their Sahibness, though in a very ridiculous manner. The boy could not understand why I was laughing. I forced him to take twenty rupees which he took after a pretended hesitation. I am sure that what Mr. Arora had said was not utterly under the stupor of drinks which he may have consumed like White Sahibs before starting his speech.