A cat has nine lives, I have many more – 2

This is about another of my near death experiences, also in Kolkata. It was in the 1970s and involved a bus. I did my schooling in St. Joseph's College, an English medium school. My mother tongue is Bengali and my knowledge on it was limited. In college, I faced problems with the language and a pass in it was compulsory for the I. Sc. Exams. The pass mark was 30 percent and I somehow managed to scrape through with 31 percent. This preyed on my mind and I decided to devote some of my time to write in Bengali. I did it on the sly and sent the stories across to a few magazines. And – I struck pay dirt in 1967. That was when I got an employment in HAL Nashik. I was at Howrah Station to catch the train and went to the bookstall to buy some magazines to read during the journey. Believe it or not, one of the magazines had published my story. I needed a breakthrough and this was it.

During one of my visits to Kolkata in the 1970s, I came to know of a magazine that wanted writers. Its address was on the outskirts of the city and I was not familiar with the area. I talked with the locals and got an idea of the locality. I had to take a bus and had to wait for the bus to come along. It was crowded and when I asked for a ticket, I discovered that it was a wrong bus. It had started to move and I tried to get down from the moving bus. I landed on the road and the bystanders helped me to my feet. This could have had serious consequences but I lived to tell the tale of another experience with death.


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