My heart came to my mouth when I gaped at my jaw-dropping posting order in December 2016 with a deadpan expression on my visage. ‘Report to Hazaribag forthwith to raise a new NCC Group along with new NCC battalions’, amplified the ominous army telegram. I was befuddled as I and my family were to bid adieu to the beautiful city of Chandigarh for a place which sounded akin to ‘Timbuktu’, a term quite often used by our academy instructors. I dialled many of my intelligent course-mates but all were blissfully ignorant of where this god-forsaken place was. My wife was super-annoyed with my cool response and indifference to this bolt from the blue bombshell. She upbraided me no end when she discovered that I had not even shot off any representation to Army HQ requesting a change of posting which is the norm for tough NCC postings. Nidhi, my better half has always been beside me especially when the going was tough. Though she was heading the school she didn’t think twice to put in her resignation and decided to accompany me along with our daughters, Akshayata and Siddhita. Before we could say, Jack Robinson, we landed in Jharkhand where Hazaribag was finally located. Going by the literal meaning of the wonderful name ‘HAZARIBAG’, to our horror we realized that there was not a single ‘BAG’ what to talk of thousand gardens located there. There was not even a single piece of furniture or table and chair to be specific for office work for me or my staff at the new Group HQ. It was being raised and located within the premises of the stadium of Hazaribag.
From the very first day onwards, I had to bear the ignominy of the ugly sight of civilians urinating and spitting along the boundary wall. It was quite a cultural shock for me from the salubrious environs of the neatly laid out Chandimandir military station. I discussed the problem at hand with my commanding officers, staff and the NCC cadets. Most of them with enough NCC experience chose to remain tight-lipped. A few of them scoffed while some bold ones blurted out, ‘Sir, just get used to it; this is NCC, this is the way things work here in the civil environment; This is your first posting in NCC; Don’t try to be a ‘Keen-Kumar; (a comical phrase used for the over-enthusiast in the army); Behave like Romans when you are in Rome’; were the few typical stereotype responses I was bombarded with.
However, none of the wise counsel cut much ice with me. The very next day I passed the orders for strict compliance. ‘While driving through the stadium in case anyone encounters someone urinating or spitting he would stop the vehicle and the man would be checked firmly but politely’. Well-written signages and boards were installed at the centre of gravity warning people to exercise better control over their bladders. To ensure discipline, I deployed a sentry outside the HQ who was supposed to shout at the top of his voice at any civilian found to be peeing against the wall. I got the existing dilapidated washrooms renovated and cleaned up. In the process, several defaulters young and old got admonished and shouted at. But at the end of the day, we all were quite successful in maintaining the sanctity of the stadium as well as our NCC Group HQ. The word spread like wildfire in the entire town of Hazaribag. Many of the exuberant NCC cadets started ticking off the civil populace indulging in these abhorrent activities even while walking in the streets and bylanes of the town. I never expected this outcome but it certainly was an icing on the cake. It was just a matter of a few days before the situation in the stadium and our office premises came under complete control with no civilian daring to spit or urinate.
Those days my NCC Group HQ was supposed to give a weekly report on the progress made in having the number of villages made ‘Open Defecation Free (ODF). I told my commanding officers to proudly add a column now in the same report that certain areas have also been made ‘Open Urination-Free’ (OUF) and ‘Open Spitting-Free’ (OSF). In 2019 when I got posted out I experienced a tremendous sense of satisfaction of having left Hazaribag and its stadium a much cleaner place than what I found to be. The police or the law-enforcement agencies can’t be everywhere. It is we, the part of society who have to gather moral courage to tick off people indulging in anti-social activities or abhorrent conduct instead of looking the other way or sweeping it under the rug, such as jumping the red light, driving in the wrong lane, ogling at women or girls, using mobile while driving, urinating in the open or spitting. I must clarify emphatically here that these ills of our society are prevalent in almost every town and not only in Hazaribag. Each one of us must take over the mantle of societal responsibility in case we aspire to have a Singapore or Dubai ambience within our own ‘Bharat’ and make a difference. We must shed our ‘ Sanu Ki’ attitude to get things right in our ecosystem. Perhaps, this is the only way to perform better and get a higher ranking on the ‘Happiness Index’ for our country in future
surveys.