Mistaken Beliefs.

When I joined Army, father had seven more years to go for retirement. That seemed a long time. To top it, as I was leaving home to join my Unit, he said something that elated me no end. He said, “You don’t worry about the house. You enjoy your life”. In Malayalam there is a saying, which loosely translated would mean that what the patient wished, the doctor prescribed. That was the case here. The house was not my worry. As we were growing up we, the siblings knew that we were not exactly rich. But we were oblivious to the actual situation. Or so I thought. But later as we discuss our past, my siblings say that they more or less knew the position and that I was the only one ignorant! This ignorance was mistaken belief number one.

The long and short of it is, I should have sent money home. I never did. For that I put the blame squarely on my father’s shoulders. It is alright that I should have understood and all that, but my father had no business to pour such sweet music in my ears saying all that he said, relieving me of any responsibility. Maybe his ego was at play? Even if he didn’t want me to support him, it was his business to ask me to send a fixed amount home. He could have saved it separately for my sake, having known that I was an irresponsible fellow. But his philosophy was: go and enjoy, no? So I never saved. That there was no need to save was mistaken belief number two.

As a good boy, I hardly smoked or had a drink while in college, except for a that long Billiards or the perfumed Marco Polo cigarettes at the beach after NCC parade. I knew that father’s money is not to be used like that. But right from the time I donned the uniform, the macho kind, I had to smoke and drink. To cap it, our EME School used to get Wills cigarette packets with our School logo printed on them. You think I could stay away from such personalised style? No way. And everybody smoked. Westerners taught us that. Now they have taken a U turn is another matter. All in the name of business! What to talk of smoking, even sickness is business and they made us all diabetic! And drinking. I started off with scotch! If a tough guy won’t have these so called minor vices, what was he worth? Later, Rum seemed more macho than scotch. Mistaken belief number three; not just toughie acts but all poise, elegance and personification of suave!

If, on the last day of the month, there was a ₹50 in the bank, I positively withdrew it. Because the next day the pay would be credited. Each month’s salary was meant for that month. What’s the point of keeping it in the bank? Now, what I did by withdrawing on the last day, whether needed or not, I don’t know. Just that it is not required to rot in the bank. The same philosophy was utilised when people all around told me to buy a plot, book a house etc. You will not believe that those days, after the International Trade Fair in Anna Nagar, plots were being thrust upon people! I refused to buy one. Same was the case with booking a house. My reasoning was that one buys a plot and makes a house and all only when it is time to retire and settle down. Not when you are in your twenties, which only makes you get into debt and pay the loan through your nose for the rest of your life. Those days, Army gave ₹ 75,000 as housing loan and zilch to buy a plot. Mistaken belief number four.

We have someone known as Controller of Defence Accounts, who disburses our pay, deducts our provident fund, deducts our rent, charges for furniture, electricity etc. They did everything financial for our sake. I knew they took care of us, we, who had put our lives on line, without having to bother about the nitty-gritty of money. I must have been on the last vestiges of the erstwhile Army, where Officers never ever bothered about money. Those who talked money were looked down upon. So much so, that if I ever put up a claim and it was sent back by CDA with observations, I threw it aside, telling myself, to hell with them. I couldn’t be answering their bloody queries. I felt as if I were begging the bloody CDA, the bloody accountants! I must say here a particular case. In 1972, involved in the 71 war, I had put up a claim. This was returned by CDA and I promptly discarded it. Later after being married in 76, while doing a course, there was this Malayalee clerical soldier, who asked me whether I had any claim pending. He must have noticed my indifference during our interactions. I remembered my particular pending claim as the amount was a huge ₹400! I gave him the papers, he took my signatures in a couple of places and promptly CDA passed my claim! The CDA himself had in a talk, much later, told us that we Army Officers did not know how to prefer claims and hence they were surrendering lakhs (then), to the government every year! That the CDA took care of me was mistaken belief number five.

Bhagwad Gita teaches I was told, not to worry about the fruits of our labour. I believed it verbatim and nonchalantly went about my career doing what was supposed to be done. I never worried about its impact on others or on to me. Hence I never bothered about highlighting my work to ensure that it was noticed. I believed that the superiors would be as objective as I was and would evaluate me and my work-results as they actually should. That was mistaken belief number six.

Shakespeare made me feel through Caesar that ambition is not a good thing. Sometimes some education can work negatively. Being of a bit of philosophical mind, ambition was against my grain. Now, as a child growing up with grandparents, I had picked up a feeling that money and food are not to be craved for. One should not be greedy about either of those. So I never liked the words money and food. Ambition got added to it. Therefore I just sailed through my daily chores in uniform without any thought as to where I wanted to be in the future. I disregarded money, food and “career”. Mistaken belief number seven.

Many during their last tenure at least, develop contacts as insurance for a post retirement job. Since anything that seemed even remotely related to what is termed as ‘ulterior motive’, I stayed away from such ‘nefarious’ activities. Whether those with whom I interacted, found it as such or not was not the question. I would know in my heart that I was sucking up to someone with that motive. That would demean me in my own eyes. I must say at this juncture, that I never threw a party for my Commanding Officers (COs), who were, what we call in the Army as Initiating Officers (IOs) of our Annual Confidential Reports (ACRs). I never wanted to seem as if I were doing it to soften them towards me. I was that kind of a perfect dolt. Why would the CO or others in the cantonment think so! It was a normal social courtesy. I was that conscious of others’ opinion! Straight as an arrow I wanted to be. Being so stupidly straight to myself, I stayed away from requesting or even indicating to any one of those who I knew for a job. Mistaken belief number eight.

I can go on about such beliefs, ad nauseam.  Suffice to say, I never made a house of my own. I never made any investment either, to earn a profit. Profit was a dirty word, just as Market, Money, Accounts etc were. A rich Army Officer was supposed to be an oxymoron. (And one like me is a moron, you might say!) Thank God, my father had made a house in which his son who was a Class One Gazetted Officer, right from the age of 20, could stay. And I would be staying in it proudly till I breathe my last. With all those mistaken beliefs!