“Thank you - You are Having Orissa & You are Entering W.B…”

P.W.D. (ROADS DEPTT.) GOVT. OF W.B.

Blogger - Anshuman Singh

The following travelogue is the first hand experience of the author. The blog is not meant to draw any conclusion or public opinion.

… this is what a mile stone read when I crossed Udaipur, the last village in Orissa, and enter Digha, oops!!! New Digha, (I could not draw the line separating New Digha from Digha or Old Digha whatever you choose to call it). Sometimes I feel the correct line should have been “Beware - You are Leaving Orissa & You are Entering W.B.”, though the feeling was not the same until I visited West Bengal recently on one of my official tours.

As we crossed the border our taxi was stopped and surrounded by at least 10 odd people waving sticks as if they were ready to hit me. For once I got scared and asked the driver to rush and not to stop the vehicle (we had hired our vehicle from Bhubaneshwar). Our driver was smart enough and he stopped saying - “Agar nahi roka to ye log gaadi ka sheesha tod denge” (if I don’t stop the vehicle these people will break the window panes of the vehicle.). The people around started yelling at the driver in Bengali, and I could not understand even an iota of what they said.

With my heart thumping, I got down from the vehicle and asked if anyone knew Hindi to which all of them replied – “Haan boliye!!!” (yes speak up.). Trying to be as polite as I could get, without revealing that I was scared, I enquired about the matter. I was told that a West Bengal registered vehicle without a permit (one needs to get a government permit after paying the road tax while crossing state border in a taxi) had entered Orissa and was held up there by the police for not having all the papers. In retaliation West Bengal taxi union had decided to stop all the Orissa registered taxies until a decision was taken on the issue.

I requested to allow us to go back to Orissa to which they disagreed saying that I might take another route and enter West Bengal (of course they were smarter than I was.). I was held up in New Digha for almost two hours and I decided to utilize the time for lunch in a restaurant where I was the only customer. After two hours my driver came and told me that the problem has been sorted out and all the vehicles have been released after collecting Rs. 200, equivalent to what the West Bengal taxi had to pay in Orissa.

(…to be continued)