Pitfalls of Temporary Duty – the Delhi-Bareilly experience

As a member of Customer Services it was but natural that I proceed on Temporary Duty to Air Force locations, sometimes at short notice. It began with my first TD to Air Force bases at Bareilly in UP and Tejpur in Assam. I had got a promotion and, while my immediate boss wanted to retain me in the office, his boss wanted that I go to some Air Force base. And, as luck would have it, one of our Service Engineers was retiring and I was asked to take over the inventory from him. He held charge of two bases – one at Bareilly, the other at Tejpur.
The time was December and it was my first ever TD – I expected to get guidance from the officer who was retiring. But, it turned out that he was not happy with our boss because his request for extension had not been approved. Hence, he bore a grudge against him.

Unfortunately, he was a Bengali, hence, my colleague wanted to vent his anger on me.
Anyway, the journey from Nashik Road to New Delhi was uneventful. We had boarded the Punjab Mail and, in those days, there was a First Class compartment. By manipulating with the TTE, my colleague managed to wrangle a couple of berths for us.
We got down at Faridabad and took a cycle rickshaw to the house of my friend’s son in law – it was terribly cold as it usually is in Delhi in the middle of December. The cyclerickshaw-wallahs had covered themselves in blankets and pedaled without removing the coverings. After a north Indian dinner we retired for the night.
Next morning, he wanted to go to the Air Headquarters – to follow up his request for extension. I tagged along with him and, saw some important landmarks of New Delhi. Then we went to the house of another of his son-in-laws in Delhi for lunch. Our plan was to leave for Bareilly by taking a bus from ISBT - accordingly, I arrived at ISBT by evening but my friend was nowhere to be seen. I rang up his daughter and she said he had already left. I was getting in a panic because one bus was getting ready to leave for Bareilly when I saw him coming. (to be continued …)


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