The Drowsy Guest

After the wedding we did not do the recognized thing and go on a honeymoon – after all, we’d already had a jaunt by coming to Bombay! However, there were many parties, hosted at various times by father and mother as well as our friends. At our very first party, we invited Mona’s uncle, Sir Henry (ed. see earlier post). The old man accepted gladly and we sat down to a good meal. After the main courses, the fish and meat were over, we were all waiting for the dessert (or the pudding, as it was called). We happened to notice that Uncle Henry’s head was nodding with his eyes tightly shut! Mother gave him a quiet nudge as the butler came in with the dessert and, to Henry’s credit, he work up so smoothly that, unless one had observed him earlier, one wouldn’t have known he’d been drowsing! I think this must have been a habit of his – and he did not seem to have a woman in his life to provide him with a nudge. I assume he must have been either a bachelor or a widower as I never heard Mona mention about a woman [ed. This was an incorrect assumption. Sir Henry married Jessie Spence Bell in 1926 in Bombay but, once they had two young children, it was decided that the children were better off being raised in England. The family had left Bombay 4 years before Najm and Mona’s wedding, with Sir Henry subsequently returning on his own.]

After our marriage, life went on much as before: I spending most of my time working on the Patalganga Bridge but, in about the middle of December, I got a call to go to Delhi to take the competitive exam for the Indian Railways. Mona, in the meantime, had got friendly with a Scottish couple – the husband being a District Collector in Sholapur. Father’s jurisdiction covered that area and Mona had been able to meet this couple (the “Wells”) when they had visited Bombay. The Wells invited Mona to spend a few days with them during the XMas week as they planned on having a lot of fun with many other officers leaving the City to enjoy a little of District life. Generally these visits to the Collector of a District would provide lots of activities such as small game shoots, etc… Mona took this opportunity and spent a very happy week with the Wells. She remembered fondly playing with Mrs. Wells’ pet lamb!

My cousin, Akbar Hydari, or rather Saleh Akbar Hydari, ICS, was then a Secretary in the Government of India dealing with the Railways. He was also a member of the Board which conducted the Entrance Exam and interviewed the candidates after they had written the papers. The interview was a very important part of the Exam as it carried a full 30% of the final mark. The theory was that as the candidates were all well qualified technically, all having good marks from their Engineering Degrees, it was important to judge their competence for working as persons in charge of a large staff, etc… Saleh, kindly, invited me to stay with him and his Swedish wife (Sigrid) when I came to Delhi to write the Exam.

There were about 20 posts available in the Engineering Cadre and some more in non-Engineering posts such as Traffic. Generally, most of the candidates opted for Engineering but, if they couldn’t succeed, they took up Traffic. In the written paper, I was about 20th down the list among the 150 or so applicants but in the viva-voce, I scored very well. Fortunately, my English education and family background were a great help in the interview so my overall position ended up being 5th. We were asked which Railway we would prefer – in order of liking. I said “GIP” (Great Indian Peninsular Railway), then BBCI (Bombay, Baroda & Central India Railway) as both had their Head Quarters in Bombay. Of course, I ended up in the BNR (Bombay Nagpur Railway)!