Kanpur: How old are you? Asked a man to another stout man fondly called Pappu Bhai. He said that his age stands at 50 years. But what his Shafiq uncle told about the empty area of Jajmau around the year 1970 was worth grasping. At present this location is not scantily inhabited. It is equipped with everything that inhabitants require in their daily life.
Quite an elder in age the uncle disclosed that there was a time when Jajmau did not have a tea shop. There was a small shanty which used to operate like tea shop in the afternoon. What looks presently in the heavily populated area was only covered with wheat fields in those yesterdays. Its path was trodden by the labourers in the evening when they move on to their respective destinations after completing duty in the tanneries at that time.
There was no main road that connected Nai chungi with Purani chungi during those days. The traffic used to be not as much in this tannery town, he pointed out with a gleamed face. There was nothing like today's scene, he made it clear.
How has the area changed? When asked to comment, he assured to talk on this aspect later. His disclosure sprouted out of his extreme happiness. It was because of his both the lanky sons were declaring resignation from their bachelorhood respectively.
It was his cheerful revelation in light of elder son getting married now and the youngest son was supposed to tender his resignation from the Bachelors' Party after the year's end.
From the city's crowded localities the people started shifting by and by in this vacant area. Remembering his past days, he stated that it was quite a tough job for him to supervise the construction of a boundary wall fifty years ago. He thanked Almighty for returning within the precincts of that boundary after five decades.
Though his present-day health does not allow to engage himself in hard work. His physique is remarkably weak now. He walks with the help of a black three-legged stick obtained from his eldest brother's family.
However, he does not forget to make his neighbours laugh upon his quips, as he made during the course of the conversation at the time of the programme. The honest person who was recommending him some Unani medicines for his knee pain began cracking up by the way he pronounced the peculiar Arabic name of the medicine.
