On 24th Mar 2009, at around 07:40am, Captain Arvind safely landed the airbus at Mumbai Chartapati Shivaji Domestic Airport. I happily deplaned, collected my check-in baggage and headed towards the taxi bay to hire a cab upto my residence at Shivaji Park.
A sophisticated gentleman intervened my walk to the Meru cab parked approximately 30 feet away. He politely fired the question 'Sir, Are you looking for a Taxi?'. Like a good boy, I answered 'Yes, I am. Upto Shivaji Park'. He promptly replied 'This way Sir. My taxi is parked a few meters away'.
I let out a mild sigh of relief and followed him recollecting my last interaction with Meru cabs at the airport. The moment I had named my destination to the Meru cab driver, he had produced a highly distraught expression. Something which no living mammal or even non mammal can provide. The reason - Shivaji Park is considered reasonably close to the domestic airport and cab drivers prefer a single long trip to multiple small trips for meeting their daily targets.
Anyways, coming back to the sophisticated gentleman, i patiently followed as he led me to his taxi which now seemed to have been parked a few miles away instead of meters. To keep me entertained he did some monkeying around such as going in between railings and inviting me as well to join him. Unfortunately, I was in no mood for foolery. I flatly refused and threatened to part ways if i do not get to see the taxi in next 2 minutes.
He was alarmed but managed to put up a brave face. He raised his right hand, stopped an auto and said 'Sir, please get in with your luggage. This auto will take you to my taxi'. The next moment both of us were seated in the auto which, to my confusion, was stopping at every alternate taxi. During the stop our gentleman would rush out, have a brief dialogue with the cab driver and rush in again. He clarified that all these cabs belong to him but are unfortunately non functional. Thankfully, at the third stop he beckoned me to leave the auto and get into an adjoining cab.
Relieved, I pushed myself and my luggage into the back seat while the gentleman seated himself next to the driver chiding him for having parked the cab so far away from the arrivals. The driver quietly started the cab . . without the meter. I instantly reminded him but was stopped by our gentleman. He said 'Sir, this is a prepaid taxi and it does not run by meter. We all use the following card'. I took the card and opened it. It displayed the fare upto Dadar as Rs 600 instead of the regular Rs 120.
I asked the driver to stop and opened the door to step out. The gentleman realized he had caught the wrong fish and tried barring my exit by reducing the fare first to Rs 350 and then to Rs 250. I was not ready to pay anything more than Rs 100 upto Shivaji Park. With an air of resignation, he pulled 4 currency notes worth Rs 100 from his wallet, handed them to me and said 'The cab driver does not have change, please hand over your Rs 500 currency note and take these 4 Rs 100 currency notes instead'.
I said 'Sir, you please do not worry. I am carrying all denominations'. He was furious. Angrily, he got out of the moving cab, banged the door and vanished within seconds. Surprised, I turned towards the driver and asked 'Boss, what is wrong with your owner?'. He replied 'I do not know him. He is not my owner. I thought, he is with you'. I questioned 'Why did you not intervene? I could have landed up paying the cab fare twice'. He answered 'I would have spoken, if you had paid'
I closely inspected the cab during the half hour journey. Uncommonly, plenty of visting cards, hotel brochures were lying on the front seat. I had in all probability run through a small time racket of cab drivers and their accomplices formed with the intent of fleecing first time Mumbai visitors.
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