Capflagration

Santosh Tyagi

MOUNTING STRESS: Shekhawat tries to explain

Nobody had ever seen Shekhawat so agitated. He flared up, began shouting, broke into expletives, started gasping and holding his chest, sat down on a chair and took deep breaths. Water was rushed to him, while a crowd gathered around. After half an hour he regained his composure and Arun Patil dropped him home by car.
It all started with Santosh Tyagi not wearing her Club cap and Razia Khan questioning her during the exercises. Like every other day, the former just shrugged her shoulders – clearly indicating that apart from her, Geeta Sardana also wasn’t wearing the cap. Before Razia could respond, Shekhawat intervened, urging her to desist from any 'toka-toki' because wearing the cap is “not compulsory”.
“I have already announced that if anybody does not want to wear the cap, we must not insist,” he said. “Do we come here to exercise or wear a cap? Is this the military where everyone must wear caps? It is not compulsory. Cap, Cap, Cap... I am fed up!”
In between, Arun interrupted: “But there is a thing called discipline?”
By then Shekhawat’s voice started rising. With members like Ved Prakash Grover, Ruksana Khan and Ram Shankar Shukla declaring that from tomorrow nobody will wear the cap, Shekhawat lost his temper. He became increasingly incoherent and the final straw was when Razia took off her cap and kept it aside in protest. Shekhawat figured he was getting outnumbered and began shouting louder and louder, interrupting the exercises time and again. We realized we should not engage him in an argument at that stage and everyone stood silently. Sunita Jajodia even took his side and started talking about “cap ka politics”, but she too became silent when Shekhawat started panting for breath. He was trying to make a point that even though he did not agree with the ‘cap rule’, he wore it daily to the Garden.
All this while, the lady who unwittingly started it all, looked on as a mute witness. “I did not utter a word,” she insisted.
Srichand Arora:
Yeh kya ho raha hai, yaaron! Cap ka itna bada issue? Bhoolo kal ki batein, kal ki baat purani... Aaj mein jiyo aur khushi khushi laughter aur exercise karo!!!
Jagmohan Papneja:
Integrity has no need for rules. Don't miss all the fun on the issue of caps.