Down memory lane.........simple pleasures!!!

In the nineteen sixties four figure salary was something every young man dreamed about. A starting salary of Rupees two hundred to four hundred per month used to be the norm depending on qualifications and luck. And it was a great achievement if one reached a four figure salary before thirty years of age. Matrimonial advertisements gave special mention of “four figure salary”. In those days it was just enough to mention the word “four figure salary”, and clarifications were never sought for because the expectation is never much more than the minimum of the range, for an eligible young bachelor!! The “K” word was not in vogue because of the limited scope of application in such circumstances! Much water has passed under the bridge after those days! Today it is indecent to mention a salary less than 100K per month!! What a change, my God!

My daughters exchange glances and suppress giggles when I talk about the “Liberty” shirt I bought for Rs.25/- for my wedding, and the hair cut which cost me just Re.1/-. The best pair of Bata shoes cost only Rs.45/-. And anyone earning income more than Rs.300/- per month paid income tax too! After the 1965 war against Pakistan, the Compulsory Deposit Scheme was also slapped on the poor tax payer!

Buying a car was an event in itself. Car production in India during sixties and seventies was much below demand and there was a waiting period of 3 years for an Ambassador car and over 12 years for a Premier Fiat. Fiat was much in demand especially in Bombay. The price of a new car was about Rs.20000 in early seventies but the premium for ready delivery was almost same amount as the price of the car. First time car buyers usually settled for a used car, cost of which would be about 80% of a new one if it was about 3-4 years old and in good condition. And petrol price was below Re.1/- per liter. But I remember the days when I was just a boy of eight or ten when my father used to fill up his Chevrolet’s tank at about Rs.2/- per gallon!! That is about 40 Paise per liter! I was fascinated to watch the tank being filled because, in those days, petrol pumps were manually operated and one could see the liquid gurgling out and emptying the glass container. Two one-gallon bottles fitted on top of the pump would get alternately filled and contents emptied in to the tank as the operator kept moving a handle to and fro! Quite some physical activity indeed!

Shaving blades were relatively expensive in those days and after each shave it would be carefully wiped of the moisture to avoid rusting because blades were not made of stainless steel as they are now. The blades were used for several shaves and before each shave the edges were sharpened using a rough concave glass surface. There was also a very innovative appliance (manufactured in England) available for sharpening the shaving razor blades. The appliance consisted of a frame and a carriage inside it. The blade is clamped in a holder which is placed inside the carriage. The carriage is moved to and fro within the frame and a whole lot of levers and cams allowed the razor edges to be softly rubbed against a leather-like substance and thus get sharpened. As a young boy, I used to find it a very interesting mechanism and played with it a lot because it was lying idle and no one was using it!

Most young men started smoking at an early age, as soon as they left school and joined college. I used to love the fragrance of tobacco a soon as the seal of a new cigarette tin was opened. And quite early in life I started pinching one or two cigarettes from my father’s 50’s cigarette tin. At the age of 18 I was a regular smoker.
There were no menacing warnings about the health hazards of smoking and no statistics waving Health Ministers going about punishing smokers in public places. In fact smoking was a fashionable habit and youngsters in colleges thought that it attracted attention from the fairer sex. One of the favorite places for indulging in change smoking for students was the cinema halls where smoking was not banned as yet. In Trivandrum, those days first class cinema ticket, equivalent of present day upper stall ticket, cost only 11 Annas (approximately Re.0.69) and a packet of Berkeley Cigarettes cost 5 Annas (Re.0.31). Thus in just one Rupee one could see a movie and smoke 10 cigarettes too!! With another half Rupee one could indulge in sumptuous refreshments too!!

India Coffee House on the Main Road (M.G. Road as it is called today) was a favorite haunt of college students in those days. Groups of students would sit around tables drinking cups of steaming coffee and on rare occasions eating potato chips or vegetable/mutton cutlets, furiously engaged in heated discussions on all subjects under the sun. The din of laughter and talking would sometimes reach such high pitch that the management would request the guests to keep the noise levels low.