“I thought God dealt me a raw deal with diabetes and high BP. Not just that. He constantly beats and pushes me down. I am the unluckiest person on earth” Mr. K lamented at the close of our clinical encounter. It was Mr. K’s first visit to our clinic. I see patients in the clinic on Mondays and Fridays and it was a Monday morning. There were not many patients waiting and so we had some time to talk. After obtaining clinical information from him, we were discussing about his life.
Mr. K recently retired as a clerk from the registrar’s office. He worked there for more than 25 years. Registrar’s offices are fertile grounds for corruption and bribe. “On an average day we would earn 14-15 lakh rupees in bribes for land registrations” Mr. K did not even bat an eyelid when he said this. This amount is way more than my annual income, and I struggled hard to keep my jaw from dropping.
“The sub-registrar would make all the collections and put them in a cloth bag. He would shut the cloth bag with wax and affix the official seal.” It was interesting how bribes were being treated the same way as official cash collections. There was so much order and discipline in organizing the bribe.
“My friend and I were the designated couriers. We will take the cloth bound bag in a yellow cloth bag (referred popularly as ‘manjapai’ in Tamil) and he would ride the bicycle with me as pillion rider. We would go all the way to the Tahsildar office, 2 Km away, where we had to deposit it with the Tahsildar’s secretary. The secretary will give us a receipt. We must carry it back with us and give it to the sub-registrar” Mr. K described his everyday routine of collecting the bribe, packaging it and handing it over to the higher authority like a meticulous and religious duty.
“I am so angry with those crooked fellows. I have couriered lakhs and lakhs of bribe money for them for so many years. Some days I have even felt tempted to take the money and run away. But I resisted the temptation and have sincerely carried out my duty as a courier. But when I retired, the cheap fellows just put a 100 rupees garland and 300 rupees artificial silk shawl and sent me away.” Mr. K was very upset that he was not given due credit during his farewell party at office.
“They have looted so many people, rich and poor. They have taken their hard-earned money to just give one signature. They all sat together and shared the money and became rich. But they never thought of sharing even a small amount with us. What did we poor people do? Why shouldn’t we be given our fair share?” Mr. K was demanding fairness and justice for the people who were weaker and lower down in the job hierarchy. “I have contributed so much to safe transport and delivery of the bribe. Don’t I deserve a share of the bounty? They were dependent on me and my friend for carrying the money safely and we upheld their trust for so many years.” Mr. K’s voice was filled with pain when he said this.
“I now must give my daughter in marriage. A good alliance has come. It will cost more than 10 lakh rupees for the wedding. I can’t even afford to do a simple small wedding for my daughter. Last month I went to my officer’s son’s wedding. It was so grand and lavish. There were more than 1000 people in the marriage. He was able to do it because of all the money he looted from poor people.” Till this point, it sounded like rightful indignation of the underprivileged, but soon after this he said, “While he was taking bribes in lakhs, all I and my friend could manage was money for coffee, tea, snacks and some 50s and 100s thrown in here and there. What can we do with such small bribe amounts?” It did not sound all that righteous anymore.
“God has been very unfair to me. I have faced oppression at so many levels. I was born in a poor family. I did not get good education. I got a menial job as a clerk. And all my bosses oppressed me and deprived me of my rightful share in the bribe.”
This conversation with Mr. K was shocking for me. Having been born in an urban middle class family into a privileged caste, belonging to male gender, the first time I came face to face with poverty, gender, caste oppression and discrimination, I was completely shaken. This conversation with Mr. K gave me a similar experience. Riding atop my moral high-horse, I could easily chastise Mr. K for asking for a share in the bribe. I could judge him as being insensitive to immoral acts and being a part of the criminal enterprise. But I was torn between two extremes. One part of my mind was disgusted by the normalization of bribe in Mr. K’s narrative. He was narrating his job of being a trustworthy courier of the bribe money without any shame. The other part of my mind was feeling sad for his sense of injustice, helplessness and frustration for being used for the huge criminal enterprise and left out to dry in the end. I was also not sure what stand I should take as his physician. Should I listen to him, allow him to vent, and provide him a non-judgmental space for expressing himself, or should I call him out for being part of an immoral activity and tell him he is better off without a share in that bribe money. Throughout the conversation I was oscillating between the sense of moral anger and sympathy for his situation.
“Thank you for patiently listening to me doctor. I can’t even go to court to demand justice. For people like me, justice is a very distant dream” said Mr. K and walked out. Mr. K understands he is demanding a share in criminally earned money, but the injustice bites him nevertheless!
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