Pune 1.0

After having a break for two years, I now intend to resume “serious” blogging, starting with the topic “Pune the city & its people”

Well, a brief back ground first ...recently after having completed my MBA, I was selected for a job by a reputed IT company and was all set to go onsite (Chennai) from Mumbai. (that was what I was I given to understand during my interview) They say that a placement of a non Tamil guy in Chennai is the worst misfortune that can befall him. As the old adage goes forewarning is fore-arming, I was all ready to face the worst. When you prepare for the worst, things always look brighter. I contemplated on starting a part time coconut oil business in Chennai, until my friend in Chennai divulged an open secret to me that liquor business was the only one where there was gap in supply and demand (rather distribution reach  ... due to government regulations). Taking a cue from the inputs, I mentally switched over from oil business to liquor business with a decent ambition of becoming Vijay Mallya of Chennai. But alas, my jet of imagination crashed after the news arrived that ... I was to join at Pune location.

Pune (or Poona ) as you know, is the city located at the holy confluence of the rivers Mula and Mutha. For long, it has been the cultural capital of Maharashtra and an educational hub. Pune is also famous for its very helpful & obliging (!) people. However not having any past experience of staying in the city, I was quite curious about the city & its people.

As I reached Pune, I had a feeling of thrill & excitement, after all, after 8 long years spent in Nagpur, Hyderabad & Ahmedabad, finally I had landed in a place so close to Mumbai - my native place.

But as I alighted the Pune station & came out I was surprised to notice many stalls selling south Indian newspapers and hoardings in those languages. I was warmly greeted (sarcastic) by autowallas who were there to help me reach my destination. I felt really honoured when the autowallas asked for huge sums of money from me for this work. (I had never imagined I could spend so much), yet I politely declined their offer. I decided to search for a nearby bus stand, (Mumbaikar’s habit I would say) for the Bus. I enquired with a chap standing nearby about the bus for my destination and its frequency. He showed me the way & assured me that its frequency was pretty good. “comes every half n hour!!” (For a moment I thought he said every half a minute ... but ..!)

Well yes, the bus did come in half an hour and I boarded the bus. Luckily mine was the last stop and hence I boarded the bus empty and alighted the same way. After having spent a few days in the city I realized some patterns in the life of Punekars.

Cartel

Punekars are very much used to principles of Monopoly / Oligopoly with Cartel in their day to day life. Autowalas asking you big bucks in Hinjewadi or Shops/Outlets closing abruptly or Petrol Pump staff cheating you during petrol refills, it’s all due to controlled competition. This basic principle of economics is known and practised by most i.e. MONOPOLY. You don’t have an option but to accept it as it is. Don’t get surprised if you hear “No” from Autowalah to take you from S.B.Road to Deccan or if he asks you 200 Rs from Wakad to Hinjewadi Phase 1. Autowalas are known to make only trips where they get super-normal profits and thus rip off the customer, even if that means they make only a trip or two in the whole day. Well this is especially true for Autowallas near Hinjewadi who firmly believe that all IT employees have Swiss bank accounts. This might as well be experienced incase of different services you would require in your day to day activities too.

“NO CHANGE” is the only constant.

If you don’t own a vehicle in Pune, you are obliged to travel by bus (public transport) or by autos. Then it becomes mandatory for you to keep loose change.  If the meter in auto shows Rs.48 and you happen to give a note of Rupees 50, rest assured that Rs2 will be considered as tip. Same holds good for travelling by Bus, when the ticket amounts are such as Rs.9, Rs 14. At shops, I sometimes wonder whether 1Rs toffees are actually consumed or keep making rounds in the new barter system at shopkeepers.

A place with great History

Pune is known to have a number of places of historical importance. In fact the number of places to visit in Pune or nearby is quite huge. I happened to see many such places just as shown below.

This is picture of highway built thousands of years ago.. reminding us of the construction work then)

The people over here also show the symptoms of a glorious past full of Peshwas. In fact there is a striking resemblance between a typical Punekar biker (not the ones coming from outside) and ancient horse riders. The figure below explains the case of a Punekar Biker. Although bikers in Pune are notoriously famous for Jay-biking in heavy traffic with skills, they lack the speed of even a horse and are often seen riding at slow pace, same goes true for the life here.

(See the resemblance between rightmost and leftmost pic)


The Rains

“50 Trees fall as the heavy rains hit Pune city” reads a newspaper article. I wondered if Mr.Varun Rainwala had  allotted some work for himself  to be done annually. Not just the job of annual tree cutting but also annual wash of the vehicles in Pune. This is because rains fall continuously but slowly just enough as if   you open a tap for cleaning your hand or rather cleaning car. 

The images below are taken during day time and are of a PCMC Bus and a typical vehicle in Pune in busy traffic.

                           
CAR                                                BUS
                                                                   


Well you must be wondering how they look “THE SAME”...even after getting the wash through the rainy season. Don’t think that it’s bad ...It is a boon in disguise. During winter it protects people from cold since vehicles get warm, secondly it might as well be used as a black board in the parking lot for students and teachers in case required.

The REAL Estate

Yes, real estate forms a major part of all financial transactions these days. Real estate Mafias are known to manipulate (rather raise) the rates of real estate as and when required by spreading news such as additional IT park space, Airport and what not ....This is also a major way of making a “punya” ..to convert black money into white.

Magar patta, Amanora on one side, Hinjewadi on other side and city is still expanding everywhere. You can see constructions going on in every direction in the city. I sometimes wonder if so many people actually would be coming there in coming years. With the present rate of construction I am sure that during next time you Lonavala might have become an integral part of Pune.

Every day is a field day for RTO personnel as poor Bikers (me included) fail to abide by the parking regulations (probably unable to interpret the norms of parking at odd/even dates on different sides of the road or judge the 10 meter distance from the bus-stop.)

Some people, I was told, carry meter tapes to measure the distance from pole before parking (Sarcastic). Barring areas like Magar patta city, vehicle owners exceed the parking space hugely. Along with poor parking space, there is an issue of non-uniform (artistic) roads. The roads in Hinjewadi become broad and small at alternate junctions and with no pavements for the pedestrians to walk on, the real work of art in hills.  Neat & wide roads a distant dream especially during monsoon for in old city due to it’s totally unplanned construction.

Ganimikawa/ Gurrilla warefare a modern taste.

While the bad public transport forces people to buy vehicles, heavy traffic and lack of parking space makes you to adopt “Ganimikava” very essential. Bikers & autowallas are known to possess Ganimikawa tactis, to overtake others and reach destination in time. Ganimikawa helps not only on road but off road too. Unless u have a flavour of this Ganimi-kawa, you are likely to  become the victim cheating especially if they smell IT. It enables you to break the lines and go into mud pits enjoying bike ride to its core. The cues to find which vehicle in the road would move faster holds the key since otherwise you might get stuck infront of a Truck and reach home tomorrow.The way vehicles switch the lanes resembles the movement of mawlas trying to hide from enemy and then attacking in full speed when they encounter(same as how bikers hide behind the big vehicles , making their way slowly and then speed up as they get wider roads)

Disclaimer: The cities and people mentioned above are imaginary and any resemblance to any city is pure coincidence.