Posts

Showing posts from June, 2013

Count My Chickens

Perhaps it will not be seen as a ploy to justify one's limitations, if I say that every mortal being suffers from some sort of phobia--some are of physical kind. Others sit deep into one's heart and works as a mental bloc to perform a certain work with natural ease. In both such cases, the reaction to a physical  task and /or cerebral challenge is disproportionate to the actual or imagined ferocity / rigidity of the existing provocation.Often the reasons for such seemingly  strange conduct elude even the person concerned, unless of course he /she is deep-pocketed enough to fathom out its cause through a series of paid visits to  a psychiatrist. Most of us are not that fortunate. We learn to live with it. In my case I had an apparent dislike for mathematics since my school days. But it was a compulsory subject at the High School-level.So there was no way for me, along with quite a few of my hapless classmates, to ignore it altogether. Besides, the maths teach

Rule Britannia, Rule....

Like hundreds of young men joining the State Civil Service every year, I too had bubbling wishes enshrined in my heart to do my best to alleviate the miseries of the poor, and try my utmost to provide administrative assistance as well as protection to those who needed most. Where, due to any inhibiting circumstances, I would find myself  powerless in that regard , I should at least be patient and sympathetic in my interaction with them. Secondly, I must maintain a low profile while discharging my public duties, and  upon successful completion of any official action, try not to make that a matter of personal glory. In an introspective mode  regarding  first item of my well-meaning wishlist , I re-live a few happy moments when I had met with success. I regret the moments when despite my best efforts, I failed to achieve what I thought was right to do---often not before being greeted with verbal as  well as administrative brickbats. Over the time I learnt to take those in my stride.

Primer for a Small-time Bureaucrat

As I baby -step into the world of blogging, I prefer to share with my readers  the memory-based anecdotes that had me and my colleagues giggling and laughing during my days in rural as well as small towns as a government officer. It is better to leave more serious topics for deliberation in coming days when I would probably be closer to my readers for more candid exchange of views and ideas. Here it may not be out of place to mention that I joined the State Civil Service more or less as a hesitant intruder under circumstantial duress. It was sort of catching the last bus leaving the terminus. I could just ward off the upper-age bar fixed for the recruitment examination by a few months then.    As for its background, I was not accustomed to the living conditions that greeted me in my previous places of employment. The summer( despite a month-long holiday ) seemed to have no ending. Sitting outdoor for a better part of the hot sultry nights in padmasan   posture on a bench/chair ( t