THE LEGEND OF SHASTRI

Let me continue from where I had stopped in the previous post. The guy whom we met on the way, to enquire about the houses for rent inside NGV actually turned out to be the broker, at least if not a genuine broker, a retired bank manager transformed instantaneously into a broker. This is the entry of the main character of the play "SHASTRI".

When we first asked him, he passively directed us to some other place to check out for the information. After this, when we were about to leave, he called us and said there's a house for rent in some block and that he would show that. You cant judge people from the persona, and thats where we went wrong. We thought he would just show us the house and everything else would be straight forward. If we cant bear the expenses, we could just reject it. We were prepared for an advance of 1 lakh and nothing more than that. Ninad gave his number to the transformed broker and we came back. We met one of Ninad's friends, whose friend was staying in NGV for a pretty long time. Ninad's fren asked that person about the ongoing rates inside NGV. He plainly said that 15k is worth staying in NGV and he actually gave another broker's number to us for enquiry. We called him too and he asked us to meet on the Monday. All this happened on Saturday. We gave this information to Kameshwar and Phani who were supposed to give the token advance to another independent house, in the evening. We asked them to see that NGV house on Sunday morning and then we can decide on the choice. The plan was to have a look the house before 10 and if it does'nt appeal, we could pay the advance to another independent house. Kameshwar and Phani went to have a look at the NGV house and were very much impressed and they both asked "SHASTRI" to reduce the advance from 1.5 to 1, and we would strike this deal only on satisfying this condition. He supposedly called the owner or caretaker of the house and he said that they have agreed for the advance of 1 lakh. We prepared for the money, me and Ninad came to Bangalore on Sunday evening. Monday morning, we both needed to meet Shastri. Phani and Kameshwar already had some weird experiences with him, mainly his speech and lectures on life. They told us about that, but we never cared for that too much.

Monday:

We met him on Monday, and he gave a twist to the story, that the owner is not agreeing for anything less that 1.5 lakh as advance. We spoke to him for some 10 mins. Within that short span, we had a slight glimpse of the kind of lecture he would be giving us whenever we meet him in future. He passed this statement " you people are software people and you can be fired anytime". I don't know, what he meant by this, and how was it related to the topic of rent and advance. We went back saying that more than 1 lakh, we cant afford and that maximum that we can is 1.2 lakhs. Within a speck of a second, he called Ninad and said they had agreed for 1.2 lakh. This guaranteed that Mr."SHASTRI" was playing a double game. I got fed up of thinking and decided to pay the token advance for the independent house the evening. But, fortunately or unfortunately, that house was occupied by evening. We were left with NGV and we asked that broker from City real estate to show some other houses.

Tuesday:

The next morning asusual on the duty, went to see some 3 houses. Only, one of them appeared to be good. We had also called another broker in NGV and we went to see the house in NGV, thinking that the house would not be the same as the one which was shown by SHASTRI. He too showed the same house and now, we were in a complete mess. A single house with two brokers, and we were passing through both of them. I called one of them and confirmed that we were not going through him and he agreed to it. We put the ball in the brokers court regarding the sharing of the commission, between them. I dont know how many people were involved. Shastri called Ninad and said that they had agreed for an advance of 1 lakh.

Wednesday:

On duty, we went to meet Shastri at his place to pay the commission and the token advance. This day, we needed to hear something, almost everything weird and stupid. We drew money from the bank and went to the Shastri's house. He made us sit for about half an hour and that span, he spoke these things. It is upto you to judge what kind of a person this guy is. Golden words from "SHASTRI": "All the terrorists should be shot dead and their kidneys should be plucked off from them after that". "For India to develop, two policies should be brought to force, Communism and Arabism". "People are making money in commonwealth games, and such people should be manacled at the corners of the stadium after the games and they should be left like that until they get dehydrated and die out". The previous one was the answer to Ninad's question "Is there any problem related to water supply?". Please note the magnitude of weirdness prevailing in him. Anyone can doubt on whether he was a bank manager. We were waiting for the caretaker of the house to arrive and finally at 11-30, we paid the money to them. By the time, we left it was 12, and these were the final words from him:"I will teach you some lessons on "HOW TO MAKE MONEY", but only if you have the desire to make. You know, why I called you back that day. I first thought why should I care for this when you enquired about the house. But then my mind said, "SHASTRI, YOU CAN MAKE MONEY", and hence called you back". We just nodded the head before leaving and thought of saying a final bye to this Bank manager turned broker. Finally, we were by now, in the making of a boulevard of a bachelor life at NGV.

We decided to shift on the coming Monday and we needed to face some problems before the final entry, like the advance was decided only by mr.Shastri and the caretaker without informing the owner. We needed to pay 1.2 finally after contacting the owner directly, otherwise would have led to some unforeseen circumstances later. I think, Saturday was the last day, that our group had some sort of contact with "THE LEGEND OF SHASTRI". The final talk was regarding the advance issue. The end of "LEGEND OF SHASTRI". All of us are hoping that the "LEGEND OF SHASTRI:part-2" wont get released. For about one month, the journey in NGV has been smooth and wonderful with cooking in full flow. Hope is the only thing which can light the flames of enthusiasm, and I'm living with it.