I woke one morning to discover that—like millions of middle-class Indians—I’d overnight become totally cashless, without the necessary wherewithal to buy even food. Narendra Modi’s thunderbolt of demonetisation had struck.
Unending queues at banks and ATMs prevented me from accessing funds. Fortunately, a friend loaned us some money to tide Bunny and me over the currency crisis.
Carefully doling out each rupee from our dwindling stock of cash to buy provisions evoked 40-year-old memories of hunger and hardship in New York City.
It was 1976 and we were going to stay in Manhattan—one of the most expensive cities in the world —for eight days. Our budget for this period was $100, which is all we could take out of India. Though our accommodation in Manhattan was free at an absent friend’s apartment, the $100 had to cover everything else: food, transport, entrance fees to museums and art galleries.
‘We’ll walk,’ I said to Bunny. ‘Each bus or subway ride is a dollar. If we walk, we’ll save a lot. Manhattan’s not at all that big. We can walk everywhere.’
We got to the apartment, dumped our single suitcase, and walked to the nearby supermarket to buy food. That’s when we passed the Italian bakery with the pecan pie. We stopped. We looked at the pie. It cost $2. Two more than we could afford. Bunny looked at me. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Supermarket.’
We walked away from the pie, towards the supermarket.
In the supermarket, we avoided the ice creams, desserts, TV dinners. The cheapest foods available were sliced white bread and bologna (pronounced baloney) sausage. Both were totally tasteless.
But both had calories. And calories were energy. For walking.
We walked. We walked to the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, to the Guggenheim, to the library with its famous lion statues in front of it. We walked all the way from 87th Street to the very tip of the island and took the Staten Island ferry which gives you the best view of the Statue of Liberty, ever. And the best thing was that the ferry was free. Like the view. We were learning to be survivors in the edgiest city in the world.
Every morning we’d make two bologna sandwiches to carry with us to wherever we were walking. Sometimes when we got to our destination—museum, gallery, Central Park, whatever—we’d be too tired to walk around even more to see it. ‘Can we sit down before we start looking around? I’m tired,’ said Bunny.
‘If we sit down, it’ll be closing time and we won’t be able to look around,’ I said.
We looked around, teeth gritted. Evenings, we’d limp home, exhausted, to two more bologna sandwiches. And each day, morning and evening, we’d pass the pecan pie. Each day, as we grew hungrier and hungrier, its crust seemed to get more golden, its filling more buttery. Its ghostly sweetness drenched our tongues.
At night I’d lie awake thinking about food. Thinking about stealing food, from the supermarket. If I took along our shoulder bag, would I be able to slip in a loaf of bread, a chunk of sausage, without being seen? Would anyone stop me to check my shoulder bag on the way out? What were the chances of that? Fifty-fifty? Sixty-forty? What were acceptable odds?
I’d never thought of myself as a particularly lawful person. I’d broken plenty of rules, and enjoyed myself doing so. But I’d never stolen anything, from anyone, in my life. Now I was not only ready to steal, I was desperate to do so. The only thing that stopped me was not respect for the law, or morality, or any of that. The only thing that stopped me was the fear of getting caught. Was this the only thing that law and order meant? The fear of being caught? Outside, police sirens wailed in the larcenous night. I fell asleep and dreamt of the taste of the uneaten pecan pie.
Thanks to credit cards, Bunny and I are not suffering hunger pangs or hardships now because of demonetisation. But I know a lot of people in the country are. And I think what an irony it is that the sarkar now permits any Indian who has the necessary bank balance to remit $2,50,000 every year anywhere in the world. But as of now, cash-strapped Indians are feeling the pinch of penury in their own country.
A fine irony indeed. I hope Prime Minister Narendra Modi appreciates it.
The writer is a columnist and author of several books.
jugsuraiya@gmail.com