40 years of struggle, Class IV tag yet to arrive

Amarjot Kaur

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 7

At 71 years of age, Tarsem Singh, the oldest porter at the Chandigarh railway station, carries a ten-gallon head on a weak pair of knees and a persevering heart that spells its passion for porting with a flashy ‘Billa number 22’. He has been wearing the same copper plate since the ’50s — the time when Chandigarh was a small village known for its railway station and was not given the grey, brutalist facelift by Le Corbusier.

In fact, the making of Chandigarh in 1960s is quite vivid in Tarsem’s memory, but it is the railway platform that he has been most rooted to. “I have been here for 60 years, staying in Mani Majra — among the first inhabitants of Chandigarh. Back then, the railway station would host about a train or two and was only a transit point. Nothing has changed in all these years, except the number of trains; not the money we earn, not even our struggle for being recruited as Class IV employees. Just that from ‘coolies’ we are now ‘porters’ and ‘sahayaks’. What difference does it make?” he asks, cynically.

Tarsem’s sudden urge to justify his scepticism acquaints one with a latent worry that he has been nursing for a long time now. Buried under the weight of financial crisis, he speaks of the 40-year-old struggle of coolies for permanent employment in the Railways as Class IV employees.

Talking about his young son’s alcohol addiction and how he ended up spending all his life’s savings on sending him abroad (to Malaysia), his features soften. “I am the only breadwinner of my family. My son, who has a family of his own, doesn’t work. He lives with me; and here I am at the platform again, ferrying people’s weight when I can barely carry my own. My knee is weak and I am getting treatment from the Government Multi-Specialty Hospital, Sector 16,” he says.

Most of his money, he says, is spent on his deteriorating health. “How I wish I got a pension too. Not that it would keep me from working, but I could have spent it on my health or educating my grandchildren,” he says.

“At the time when I started, there were just two coolies here. I also worked as a mason, white-washer and did several odd jobs to educate my son and marry all four of my daughters. A chunk of my savings, Rs 1.5 lakh, was spent on sending my son to Malaysia, but he came back with an alcohol addiction. I cannot work much, but sometimes I earn Rs 500 on a good day. Is that enough? It is more when I compare it with an anna I would get when I started earning. But there is inflation too,” he rues.

Leaving with a smile and with Rs 300 in his wallet, which he shows off with pride, Tarsem Singh retires to the platform again without wasting time. “Coolie chahiye, bhai saab,” he asks a passenger, picking up his bag. “I can still carry 40 kilos, madam,” he gets back to his work, hoping to make an extra buck.