SHOUT

 SHOUT

I took  LTC  to Delhi with my family after a long planning.  After two days of train journey, landed in Delhi Railway Station. I had booked the  hotel  in Karolbagh over phone.[ No email, no STD, No Mobile and only trunk booing those days]. Now do not ask me what is trunk Booking ?. Since the train was late by 5 hours, I thought it would be wise  to inform  the hotel manager about the late arrival and take his help for the route before  I proceed from the station. I told the Auto driver to take me to nearby telephone booth..

I telephoned to the hotel and  got the answer in Hindi. I asked for the   Keralite Manager with whom  I used to talk. The person at the other end answered to my query that he has gone on vacation  to kerala. At this juncture, the Auto driver intervened and asked me, where  I want to go ?.He then added that ' He can help me'. All hotels might have been booked for  Asian Games, he added. I tried to confirm once again with the hotel over telephone and got the same  response  in Hindi  that my reservation was cancelled due to security reasons. I did not get any suspicion at this point. So I rang up  again with  another number  of the hotel I had, from the same booth and again got the same reply. At that time I became little tense, but  I did not show it  to my  wife[ That was the first time she had traveled to North] as I was pretending to be very  brave and was trying to impress her with  my     [ broken] Hindi language in our first trip to Delhi.

Then the Auto driver came up with  a solution. He said, 'I know a good hotel near karolbagh and I will try to get the hotel bookings for me there'. I agreed, and He took us  to that hotel and spoke something to Hotel manager. It was almost dark so even though  the rates were high, I took one room there. The room was good but the doors were not strong and locks were not proper.  Somehow we felt something is wrong somewhere  and we were  not feeling comfortable. We decided to go out secretly  to our original Hotel where we had made our reservation and  we left that place silently under the pretext of going for a tea leaving our luggage in the Hotel. To our surmise, we found that the ' Malayali Manager' was sitting in the counter and  he told me he was expecting me. I asked him about my phone calls and he said  in surprise that no phone call was received by him. I checked the numbers found correct. Then .....we realized that we were  trapped by an organised gang.

I decided to take a room there and  left my wife and my young children there and came back to the hotel where my luggage was there. On the way I was angry but I was frightened. but then I remembered a piece  of advise from one of the most respected  senior officers of my career. I was attracted to him for his intelligence and  balanced approach. He told us in some context  to Shout loudly whenever you feel  you are trapped  to  gather attention of people around. His advice have been my code of practice in many issues especially  in my formative years of career. So I decided to use that simple tool.

As soon as I reached hotel, I started speaking in loud voice which gathered attention of others immediately and the management  responded immediately by asking me to vacate after paying  one day rent. I continued to argue and told them that the Auto  driver, the booth owner and you  were In collusion for the  organised cheating. I did  not relent, till the owner came and  finally he told me to get out. I escaped immediately from there and I cannot imagine what  could have happened to me, if I stayed there. Looking back, I  thank God for giving  me timely wisdom and the  good people   in my life.