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In those days, being a guard or driver of a train was a matter of great honor for Parsis. They were adored like the first cosmonauts by the public. Jehangirji was a tall, rugged, muscular man with sharp native intelligence. He was a driver in the services of the Great Indian Peninsula Railway Company in 1902 and daily piloted the Bombay Mail. Weekly offs had not yet been introduced and he did duty almost throughout the year barring the rare illness or a death in the family.
He rose at four every morning, the brahmamoorat (auspicious time) of the Hindus, and a ghora gaari (horse carriage/cart) took him to the Navsari railway yard. Immaculately dressed in all white, he recited two Ahunavars and then put his large watch on the side, a cue for the steam engine to be fed coal by his foremen, all of whom were dressed in black. Throughout the journey he stood ramrod straight and never sat down. Strangely, his whites were not sullied by the particles of coal and dust. Obsessed with punctuality, his train was seldom late. After a quick packed lunch was consumed in the office of the stationmaster at Bombay and the proverbial 20 winks, he sipped steaming hot tea from an outsized railway cup, as it was called, and was ready for the return journey.
It was a repeat of the early morning trip, except that at Maroli, some eight kms from Navsari, the train would make an unscheduled stop and our hero would jump off, entrusting the charge to his senior foreman. Balu, his faithful retainer, would be waiting, with a Kathiawari horse. Jehangirji would gallop away on his horse to take stock of the day’s earnings at the many pithas (liquor shops selling hooch and toddy) he owned. Before returning home, he often visited a ghanti (flour mill) which was a family business, to repair any part that was malfunctioning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He was a teetotaller and ate spartan meals. After reciting the Sarosh Baaj prayer [repeating the sentence "Sroashe asheem hurodhrem, verathre janem fradatgaithem ashavanem ashai ratoom yazamaide (We worship Sroasha, the holy, the well-formed and victorious, the bestower of prosperity to the world, the righteous and the leader of righteousness”) 125 times], he retired for a five-hour sleep. He was never involved in a single accident during his long career except once during heavy monsoon rains when visibility was very poor and a bridge had been washed away; his sharp instinct made him apply the brakes and the train stopped on the edge of a sheer fall into the river. "Someone whispered in my ear, Jehangir, stop the train!” he would recall.
He had an eye for land and amassed a mini fortune when he finally decided not to blow that whistle any more. Anyway, the day job was for fun: Driving a steam engine, pulsating with energy as it thundered over the tracks, was a macho act. He controlled his wife and two sons with the same gusto and discipline.
He was quick to realize that his favorite son was a dumbass, while the other was street smart and intelligent. The former dropped out of school after sixth grade and managed the family farms and land. Jehangirji had disaffection for the smarter one; a common trait in Alpha males and lions. The boy was banished to a newly opened Parsi boarding school in Nasik. During the long summer vacation, the lad’s mother had to plead with her husband to get him home. Jehangirji would reluctantly do so. After a few days, Jehangirji would fake a telegram from the boarding school asking for their ward to be sent back. The lonely boy spent his time running around the playing field of the school.
The patriarch transferred most of his properties to his favorite son, and precious little to the boarding school inmate,who spoke immaculate English and ultimately turned out to be a character more colorful than his engine driver father.
Like the way of all flesh, Jehangirji became weak, infirm and bedridden. However, his native shrewdness did not desert him. He pretended he was hard of hearing which encouraged his favorite son and his wife to speak ill of him in his presence. Jehangirji showed no reaction and stared impassively. He was a Malesar Parsi, who were, as a rule, tougher than the Motafalia Parsis who were somewhat namby-pamby.
As his body grew more frail, he had to be injected daily with B12 complex which cost a rupee per vial. A short doctor who had lost one earlobe in some mishap and was nicknamed Buchio (child) for some inexplicable reason, visited Jehangirji to administer the injection. One morning, Jehangirji overheard the ungrateful son telling the doctor, "Hey! Buchia! Kahaan sudhi aay buddha pur darroj ék rupiyo bagarsé (How long will we have to waste a rupee daily to inject the old man)?” sanguine in the belief that his father was stone deaf.
Two days later, Jehangirji summoned his entire family for a meeting. "You resent spending a rupee daily on your old father who has given you lands worth lakhs?” he asked his trembling son. "I was unfair to your brother and yet he has always been warm and affectionate,” said Jehangirji. There was pin drop silence when the old engine driver solemnly stated, "I cannot take back what I have given you. But you will have no progeny to enjoy this wealth.”
Jehangirji soon breathed his last. Within a span of five years, the cursed son died rather young and both his sons too died issueless; while the other brother became a smuggling don and prospered beyond belief.