Village visits to interact with long haul pilots' families

1. On the road with
Dar’Sel’Jamshedpur to Delhi
1-8 June, 2015
PART TEN
RAMESH KUMAR
Chairperson,
KRK Foundation +
Co-Founder,
Transport Mitra Services

2. Day 5: Drove down 20 odd km
to Ichak through narrow
passage – some concrete-
paved, some kucha rasta for
meeting Darcl Pilot parivar with
gifts. Women thrilled with
sarees. Quickly packets opened
and color and saree length
debate began.

3. Darcl Pilot Parivar freak
out over gifts. Kids gladly
receive cricket bat/ball,
dance and share their
dreams. The visit by Darcl
team galvanises them a
great deal. Nothing to
match the personal
touch.

4. Darcl Pilots’ favourite Vinay Dhaba @ Hazaribagh on
NH33. Fleet controller Subhajit Chatterjee chats up
with his folks, whom he talks to daily, but seldom met.

5. At this Indian Oil Retail
Outlet, Subhajit collects
sample fuel to consider
fuel filling for his fleet on
Faridabad-Jamshedpur
route.
Surprisingly, this IOC outlet
has a Driver Rest Room
Facility. But occupied by
dealers’ staff and they
affirm that it is NOT meant
for drivers!
Hello, IOC, are you
listening?

6. Adjacent to the IOC pump on Hazaribagh-Barhi road on
NH33, we bump into two jockey drivers from Chennai to
Patna at the dhaba owned by the same IOC dealer. An
interesting debate on value of human relationship between Akib Ahmed and
Mirzabhai over hot chai. They halted to avoid night time driving due to tricky ghat
section and the naxalite-infested area. Why take risk? Sharma, Mirzhabhai’s colleague,
from Rajasthan, says drivers’ lives are not valued correctly by owners, government etc.

7. Day 6: Ran out of sarees for distribution. So
fresh buy @ Barhi, Jharkhand

8. Darcl pilots from Barhi arrive in advance to
escort us. Fresh stock of biscuits, toffees
and lollipops get loaded.

9. s
Another IOC outlet,
Barhi, Jharkhand on
NH2. Exterior good.
Poor maintenance of
Driver Rest Room
Facilities.
Who’s responsible: IOC
or its dealer?

10. Destination: Dapok village, 20 km
form NH 2 (Barhi), that sends a huge
chunk of Darcl pilots. Women, kids
and elders gather in the local school
ground. Subhajit Chatterjee spells out
Darcl plans for Pilots Parivar.

11. Gifting @ Dapok
village

12. Kids go berserk with
sports item and
lollipops. Women
curiously chat about the
color and fabric of sarees
received.

13. What a reception? Gift or
no gift, the fact that Darcl
officials came to their
village – far away from
cities/towns – is a big
thing for these Darcl Pilot
Parivar. A smile. A
handshake. Dhanyavaad!

14. More stoppages before
exiting Dapok village.
Word spreads like wildlife
about the visit of Darcl
officials and pilot parviar
throng the narrow gullies
and wait under the
banyan tree as well.

15. Another family waits on the highway for an interaction
with us. Brilliant kids with high ambitions, whom Darcl
promises to support.

16. At last, we exit Jharkhand! What a scintillating week it
was. Hang on, the trip is NOT over yet!