Learning while Travelling
By Col JC Sindhwani (Retd)
I am sure some of us who visit our barbers for regular haircuts must have experienced that, while you sit in the barber’s chair as a captive customer, he gets into a chatting mood and starts off with voluntary disclosure of his thoughts on a variety of subjects. With an apron tied on you, and his machine and scissors working, you are virtually forced to be a good listener.
My story on the subject starts when on being selected for training at the National Defence Academy (NDA) at Khadakwasla in 1959, our course landed there. After being allotted our Squadrons and given our chest numbers (which became our identity for the next 3 years) we were ushered to the Academy Barber Shop manned by a dozen barbers. It was their job to convert us from a variety of hero like lookers to get a crew cut like the North Korean leader and become a Cadet. I landed up on the chair of the head barber. His identity was painted on his toolbox which read: Atma Ram Dogra, Head Barber, NDA. After putting an apron and tying the strings round my neck, he asked me where I came from. When I mentioned Dehradun he said he too had moved from Clement Town when JSW – Joint Services Wing (earlier Avtar of NDA) moved to Khadakwasla. Here he enrolled a new team of barbers locally. Then he started off with stories of having given haircuts to various officers of all three services who are now holding senior positions. Took pleasure in dropping big names thereby establishing his seniority in his job. He claimed to have given haircuts to our Commandant Admiral Samson, and while in JSW at Clement Town, he was summoned to IMA, Premnagar, to render service to General Habibullah, the Commandant there. He impressed me, while also having reduced my hair to a very minimum non-combable head. I could hardly recognise myself in the mirror and he gleefully said he had converted me into a young soldier!
I, on my part, made it a point to get future haircuts from him only. And he would narrate stories of how he once cut Dev Anand’s hair while on a shoot in Himachal, while he was on leave there. He gave Dev a big puff with the back of his comb… etc., etc. And that he got a big tip from him. He had a new story to tell each time. While telling his stories, some which sounded as pulling fast ones, he would open the drawer of his table where some coins and notes were kept. This was his subtle way of making you add to his kitty of tips. An experienced Head Barber he was indeed. But an interesting storyteller too.
After many years when I retired and came back here, I caught up with my old barber who has now set up a proper Salon. In my young days he, like other barbers, would go house to house with his toolbox to give haircuts. He was therefore well acquainted with folks of my generation since then. So when I started my regular visits to him, I found that he was equally well informed on all matters of the world, and was equally ready to share while at work with his tools. He first gave me an update on who joined which service or job after school from our neighbourhood. Who all were locally settled, who all were stationed away. What are their family setups, etc. Who is in which state of health and what age-related ailments have rendered some homebound, whom he visits at home to cut hair, etc. So, that’s a good social update by a well-informed soul.
Then he switches to the goings on in the city. The work on smart city projects, the new developments all round. Then a mention of the local political scene, a quick tip on who is who in various activities of the town, and a comment on their performance and achievements. All his personal views. Then like a seasoned newsreader he gives his views on world affairs as they affect us all in some way. He feels the Ukraine-Russia war is totally uncalled for, has no meaning, no aim and is just a destructive war causing all round misery. His view on the Israel war with the terror groups around that country are different. Here he feels that terrorism in all its forms and wherever in the world must be eradicated. And the world must speak in one clear language here, and act firmly too. No double standards.
His next topic is our never-ending elections. Some state or the other is always in election mode. The same leaders, same views, same language which is turning more abusive each day, and most of it is lies and misleading propaganda according to him. And the debates on TV are too loud, speakers undisciplined, all speaking out of turn and non- stop. Which is a correct assessment, and I too agree when he asks me for an opinion on his all- round research. There is a mini library at our Barber Shop which he fully makes use of when there are no customers, and he has spare time. Full marks to his pool of information which he shares while giving you a good trim. No mess-tin (fauji) haircuts here.
You end up losing extra hair while gaining so much knowledge.
It’s time well utilised at the Salon (information centre).
(Col JC Sindhwani (Retd) is a resident of Dalanwala since Partition, whose family migrated from Sargodha. He was educated in SJA before joining the Army and retired in 1992.)
