Keya Sarkar: Not so Swift, is it?

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Two years after I had moved to Santiniketan from Mumbai, my behind was sore. Cycle rickshaw rides through Visva Bharati roads can get your bum sore for a long time. Evening outings were restricted to emergencies.

Cycle rickshaw drivers are completely drunk by seven in the evening and the West Bengal State Electricity Board often ensures pitch darkness.

Apparently cycle rickshaw lights are not manufactured any more! Lesser mortals on rickshaws have only fireflies to show the way.

We decided to buy a car. The option was limited to the Maruti stable since that is the only company with a service station within a 50-km radius.

Also, the car had to be small enough to navigate the roads in the villages where many of my friends stayed. Although I hate its "bread box" looks, we settled on the WagonR for its functional value. Also, our friends who owned WagonR swore by it.

Unfortunately, the day before we were going to call the dealer, a friend rang up. Passionate about automobile functionality and design, he was pained by our decision, especially when Maruti was going to launch the Swift in a couple of weeks.

He succeeded in changing our minds and we waited to check out the masterpiece.

The Maruti dealer was in Burdwan, an hour away by train. He wooed us like we were buying a Mercedes. We got picked up from the station the day we went to Burdwan and they drove all the way to Santiniketan to give us a demo on the day of the launch.

We succumbed to the Swift's retro look and the smooth service, and booked an azure-grey VXI with ABS on May 28.The delivery was promised in a month.

We took this as normal dealer-speak and prepared for rickshaw rides for a few months.

In fact, we got worried about how we would break the news to our friends. Santiniketan has a small car population and any new owner is ostracised as a polluter.

We don't have a garage and I went around the garden to figure out which thick foliage we could hide the car behind! We thought of the potential loss of income of our regular rickshaw man, the unending joy rides that the rickshaw drivers' kids that I teach would demand "" all kept us from being in a desperate hurry to acquire our Swift.

In the meanwhile we enquired about the car loans available. Most people we spoke to suggested ICICI Bank. I spoke to their representative and explained to him my current financial status.

As requested, I sent him my bank statements. He got back to say that even though I had no regular salary statement I was a borrower he would consider.

When we met in person, he said, "So you teach at Visva Bharati University?" I don't know whether everyone who stays in Santiniketan faces this or I have a face that looks like I teach at Visva Bharati, but I am tired of answering this question.

From someone I had shared my financial details with, that was particularly unkind. Or maybe that's courtesy in this part of the world.

He probably felt sorry that I was not employed by the only worthwhile institution in Santiniketan but did some vague consulting assignments instead, and this was his way of letting me know that I could well have worked for the university.

It is the middle of July now, and not only is there no sign of the car, but neither the dealer nor Maruti have a clue about the date of delivery.

As we go through the motions of calling the dealer, the regional office in Kolkata and the Gurgaon call centre in the hope of a date (or even a probable month or year of delivery), we wonder whether or not it is the law of Santiniketan in motion.

In the land of the cycle rickshaws it is not easy to acquire a polluter.