Africa-Press – Mauritius. The year was 1970 and I was in my final year of medicine. I went to visit a friend and his family who had recently moved from Calcutta to Bokaro, where his father had been appointed financial adviser to the Bokaro Steel Plant newly constructed with Russian aid. One morning he and I set out for a hike in the adjoining Damodar River Valley region.
It was summer, and at about 2 pm, exhausted and thirsty, having consumed all the sandwiches and water his mum had packed for us, we crossed a dry small riverbed and walked up a sloping bank to find ourselves on a bare earth narrow path that led to a small village. We stopped at a low-roofed hut-like structure that turned out to be a little shop.
Moral Decline.
Pic – Getty Images We greeted the man behind the counter and my friend asked him whether we could have some tea, to which he replied that he didn’t sell tea, but we could have water and some snacks.
So, we sat down on a wooden bench against the wall next to the entrance and assuaged our hunger and thirst. After about fifteen minutes we got up and my friend paid the bill – about 25 paise (equivalent to our cents then), and we started to leave.
Curtly, the man told us, ‘Wait, where are you going? Didn’t you ask for tea?’ ‘But you said you don’t sell tea,’ replied my friend. ‘I said I don’t sell tea, but I didn’t say you can’t have tea,’ he rejoined, even as his wife called as she held out a small tray bearing two small earthenware cups containing hot tea.
After drinking the tea, we got up and before leaving asked to pay. ‘I said I don’t sell tea,’ repeated the man in a tone of implied rebuke –‘How dare you offer me money!’
By all metrics this man was poor. And yet, he had a much greater wealth: a generous heart. It allowed him to forego the 10 paise or so that the tea cost, 10 paise which was a lot for him compared to what it represented for us.
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