The brown-shirt-with-black-badge clad men inside this police station remember also to wear their black hats. They don't want the bhel-puri shop owner and his minions to mistake them for the auto-drivers and admonish them about the 'old balance' (Such a shame to be asked to pay for your eating. For what you did as a service to these shop-owners). On occasions when they forget their hats and this admonishment happens (the bhel-puri guys wait for such occasion, I guess), the policemen take it out on the auto-drivers in their usual (mamool) way. The auto-drivers in turn take it out on their passengers.
To begin with, in Srirangam, there is no 'meter' system for renting the auto-rickshaws. There is a fixed pricing scheme - fixed by the auto-drivers. It is based on their mamool, which in turn is based on the degree of shame the policemen well up in their system when facing the bhel-puri shop vendors. The rates are never exorbitantly high (else, you will quit traveling), only a wee bit costlier than what costly is for you. Any time of your Life.
Of course, the autos are free for pregnancy. Nevertheless, it involves gender constraints, for you to use that facility, at least once a year. However, in comparison to the cycle-rickshaws, you don't need to travel backwards or sideways anymore. Only, you wished you didn't have to travel at all.
Especially, when you are very old and have to go to the Temple through the South Gate road - the most crowded street of Srirangam.
When encountering a crowd, the auto-rickshaws, with their three wheels and lots of heavy yellow painted metal, can do the same curvilinear elastic movements that even the flimsiest bicycle (like my sister's BSA SLR without the cross bar) cannot.
With spectacular results, within and without.
The 'solid' you, sit huddled, facing forward and watching in bewilderment, the physics-defying things happening around you, on the road. You keep feeling you would meet the One in the real vaikunta before getting a glimpse of his idol-image at the bhooloka vaikunta (sobriquet for Srirangam, meaning Abode of Eternal Bliss on the Earth).
For some strange reason however, these same things (men and hens flying all around) have no effect on its perpetrator sitting in front of you. You wonder, perhaps, he is the one who knows The Path (no pun intended).
After all, he sits
there serene, amidst a pandemonium that you seem to envisage in your immediate
surrounding. He even keeps staring at the "Sri Ranga Thunai"
(Thunai - protecting company) sticker in front of him, as if in
contemplation of the God. He is performing his driving properly (Right
Duty). Under his professional eyes, all Earthly Srirangam Distances are
the same and all Srirangam Men are Equal (remember, no 'meter' and fixed
pricing for homogenized distances). He knows exactly what he is doing
w f i l e ( s ) l e f t ( ` k +Ecp [ d5 Dc yDc Ec EctEcEc EcEc Dc!EcDc
One of these days, somebody from the auto drivers of Srirangam is going to become a (Saint) Nammazhvar of Modern Times.
Probably that's why Rajnikanth, the superstar of Tamil movies, that ardent seeker of spiritual path and solace, sang naan autokaran, autokaran (I am an auto-driver, auto-driver) in one of his mature movies.
To be continued...