Right since childhood I have lived a very nomadic life. Though the foreign travel is a later addition, most of the travelling hours (miles are of no consequence on Indian highways) have been clocked on the Hoshiarpur –Chandigarh road.
So frequent are the visits, since my son studies in Chandigarh, anybody who has to send pappads, achaar or mineral water for their kin in Chandigarh makes sure to call me up and ask when is the next shuttle service leaving for Chandigarh?
The point I wanted to make was that along the highway, and in Hoshiarpur town itself, there are a few landmarks that not only have amusement value but depict the social character of the area.
While driving from Chandigarh when you cross Garhshankar and reach village Dansiwal, on your left is a huge country house- The Sahota Ranch. You simply can’t miss it, for perched on the roof of Sahota Sahib’s house is a big fat cement rooster.
Though almost every household roof in the area has interesting items, the combination a manifestation of the collective personality of the area, this Kookad intrigues me no bound.
For example an airplane denotes the phoren craze, a football the favourite sport, oxen or tractor the favoured pulling power, what did this rooster stand for I always wondered? Was it a display of the owner’s favourite food or was he a Poultry king somewhere abroad?
Lo and behold, the kookad is there for a different purpose. With its desi counterparts getting lazy like the Punjabis itself, this rooster I was told has a job on hand- to wake up the lazy Punjabis at sunrise. One loud speaker and a tape recorder have been especially fixed under its legs to carry out the task of the cock-a-doodle-do and sometimes Gurbani is played for soothing the souls of villagers.
The second object that amuses is the, California International Dhaba, you see on your right while entering Hoshiarpur. Despite the horrible food it serves, no other monument in the town has become more representative of the phoren attachment of the area.
Though hardly any locals’ book its kitty halls, but it attracts NRIs as they feel familiar with name- By the Californians, for the Californians kind of syndrome.
Drive a little further up and you will see a statue of a man with a raised hand. It’s a statue of one of India’s most famous revolutionary Bhagat Singh; but it’s also the ugliest looking Bhagat Singh statue you’d ever see and teenage girls have a serious problem with its looks. They think Bhagat Singh was a handsome man and not the puny fellow the sculptor has made him out to be. Interestingly, when Bhagat Singh was being dressed via the medium of paint, I had asked the painter what colours he proposed to have for Bhagat Singh’s shirt and trousers. A Punjabi expletive had followed and he asked me to shut-up. Apparently every passerby had recommended a combination.
Whatever the issues, Bhagat Singh’s statue symbolises the sudden respect for revolutionaries of the Indian Freedom movement, after Bollywood scripted a couple of movies on them.
Nowhere in India, will you find a sign board inviting men for gossip. Well, Hoshiarpur has its own Gossip club and I have had the opportunity to sit with its members and gossip officially. Yes, officially! And the topics have varied from Monica Bedi’s comeback to her village to the corruption in the government. The idea to set up this gossip club was floated by a retired government servant RK Sud who offered his place and put a board inviting retired men to officially gossip. Do I need to elaborate further on this habit of the Hoshiarpuris?
The other landmark is a barber shop near the Session chowk, it’s sign reading -Educated Hair Dresser. Now don’t rush to the shop because the barber, a man in his eighties, has no clue of hygiene, and to make both ends meet, also sells boiled eggs , the smell of which is not very pleasant. The education bit comes in because he can speak fluent English, the sign, symbolic of two aspects of society- one which respected education and the other who thought speaking English was education.
For, how else do you explain the goof ups of the public school educated guys who are at the helm of affairs? You don’t need to go far.
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