Life in Calcutta in the Seventies

chillibreeze writer — Sarabjit Singh

Tees Saal Baad, thirty years later, is as good a time to reminisce as any, I guess. Nostalgia strikes especially in the company of old buddies or when the drinking gets heavy. There is to it a bitter-sweetness, much like a hospitalization where the attending nurse resembles Ivana Trump. The spirit and the step become lighter and the eye mistier in the full knowledge that the good old days will never return.

It was in Calcutta, now rechristened as Kolkata, in the early 70s that I started my career as a young Boxwallah. In the executive world, much like the rest of India, British influence was waning. The India Tobaccos and the ICIs, the Dunlops and the Metal Boxes still had expatriate chieftains. The winds of liberalization were yet to blow, although the Minoo Masanis, the Nani Palkhiwalas and the Piloo Modys never failed to have a dig at the pseudo-protectionists The government of the time suffered from severe paranoia. There was a deep fear that the country’s independence would be jeopardized if foreign companies were allowed to grow. Production capacities of such organizations were pegged and penalties imposed if these were exceeded. In fact, there were times when in order to hide high profits, the books would be closed days before the year-end.

These factors in the external environment ensured low competitive pressures. Consequently there were few, if any, shooting stars on the firmament. Most young executives plodded along, knowing that promotions would come not from hard work and spectacular results, but from retirements or the odd heart attack. There was therefore all the time in the world to enjoy the good life and not worry overly on the career front.

As all hard-core Calcuttans will swear, it was possible then and probably is now, to rise above the squalor and the filth, the teeming hordes, the traffic jams and the unbelievably poor civic amenities, to a finer sensibility. There was a spirit and bonhomie that kept the city from dying. There was also an ethos, which ensured that a good time could be had regardless of the size of one’s wallet. Calcutta had its problems but it also had its compensations - its rich club life being one. Very few cities can offer a greater variety. For sports lovers there was a Rackets Club for Squash, a Cricket and Football Club for those as well as the more exotic games of Rugby and Cycle Polo; there was a Tennis Club which boasted of members who had played in the Davis Cup; a Golf Club with over seventy water hazards and a Swimming Club. Indians were barred from membership of this institution till, in a well-publicized incident, a Minister of the State Government dove into the pool, dhoti and supporters and all, to signal the end of an era. There was the Tolly Club where one could, in theory at least, ride a horse between golf shots.

Then there were social clubs like the Punjab Club, which catered to a primarily Punjabi clientele whose major activities were eating, drinking, playing cards and flashing diamonds. The Saturday Club was more cosmopolitan while the Ordnance Club and the Officers Institute at Fort William played host to Army officers who danced nearly as stiffly as they marched. The Dalhousie Institute and the Rangers Club were enlivened by the carefree, happy-go-lucky spirit of Calcutta’s rapidly declining Anglo-Indian population.

The staid Bengal Club and the Calcutta Club epitomized the true culture of the Brown Sahib. The list of clubs was quite endless and an enterprising young Boxwallah could ensure year-round free membership by participating in the various Merchants Cup tournaments. These tournaments were open to mercantile firms and drew many a pot-bellied senior executive onto the court or playground.

Each club had its own particular charm. The atmosphere at the Calcutta Cricket and Football Club Bar was akin to an English pub. The smoke and alcohol-filled evenings usually ended up with some lusty singing of bawdy songs. ‘Diana, Diana, show us your legs, a yard above the knee’ would be belted out by a dozen raucous voices. The bartender’s name was BI – short form for British India. The Royal Calcutta Golf Club served the juiciest steaks in town., which washed down with a bottle of beer after a golf game was great value for money. You couldn’t have a better meal. The Rackets Club answered the prayers of perspiring squash players in the form of a bartender called Abdul, who specialized in mixing Nimbu Panis, fresh lime juice, which were arguably the best in the city.

Clubs apart, there were other small touches, which gave life in Calcutta a flavor different from any other city. Christmas Week for instance meant a huge Santa Claus at the head of Park Street. The street itself would be lit up from end to end by one of the lighting companies. Small bands equipped with trumpets and drums would stand outside the festooned restaurants. For a small tip they would play any of the old favourites – Elvis or the Beatles, Pat Boone or Paul Anka while their benefactors swayed (or was it tottered) and hummed along.

Saturday nights meant Louis Banks, Braz Gonsalves, Pam Crain or Usha Iyer live at Trincas or the Blue Fox on Park Street. If one was feeling adventurous, there was Isaiah’s Bar on Free School Street for a different kind of action.

Sunday mornings were reserved for jam sessions at Firpos where cocktail sausages would be served gratis with the beer. It is a sign of the times, literally and figuratively, that restaurants today serve peanuts.

Among the other options was that of watching a late-night movie at the Globe, Elite, or one of the other English movie theatres in Central Calcutta. These had been converted from drama theatres and still bore vestiges of their former roles with their quaint balconies and bars. One could grab a quick beer before proceeding to Nizam’s Restaurant for their mouth-watering Kathi Rolls.

The chicken, mutton, egg or aloo rolls or combinations thereof, were a great food attraction. Calcutta’s essentially egalitarian character revealed itself in the fact that the well-heeled in their cars as well as the not-so-well-off in hand-pulled rickshaws would all descend on this institution. Sometimes, you could come across a slim, fiftyish man who would serenade your sweetheart with old love songs while drumming with his fingers on the bonnet of your car.

I wonder how much things have changed in these thirty years? Have the pressures of modern-day existence converted young executives into little more than automatons programmed to deliver? Do young men still step onto soggy fields to play five-a-side football by floodlight and emerge bruised and mud-caked? Or are they content doing eyeball exercises in front of the TV? I wonder if Diana is still showing her legs and whether there is any basis for comparing the lives of today’s young executives and ours. We won’t know, will we, till some Japanese corporation invents the Time Machine. Considering that Man has already reached the Moon, can this be far behind? H G Wells would certainly be pleased.

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—About our writer: Sarabjit works with a Speciality chemicals MNC in Pune where he lives with his family. Apart from writing he has a deep interest in Nature and Wildlife and loves to travel. He also invests time in staying physically fit.

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