Prologue

I opened my eyes slowly. Everything was hazy. My memory told me I had been with Vivek, Akhilesh, Jayesh and Rahul a few moments back; they were nowhere to be seen.

          Sitting beside me was a guy in red t-shirt, red jeans and red sneakers. Everything appeared so damn red to me. I rubbed my eyes anticipating that would either reduce the red-ness around the guy or wake me up from this horrible dream.

It was then that I raced my thoughts back. I was returning from an awesome party with the four friends and was high on vodka. I was behind the wheel and the Speedometer of my Skoda Octavia showed 190. Just as I was about to take a steep turn, a truck came from the wrong side and BANG!

That guy gauged my surprise and confusion and offered me an explanation about what was going on.

“Hi dude. I am Aditya.”

And I played my part perfectly well with a “where am I?”

“Oh, welcome to hell”, he said.

“Who the hell are you? And are you fucking kidding me?” I asked.

“Nope, I am Aditya, an electrical engineer till some time back. I tried to be over smart and touched a live socket while handling a small electrical problem at my home in Mumbai. Mom was eating my brain out with her regular dose of the derision, “why should I call an electrician when we have spent thousands of rupees on making you an electrical engineer. Besharam! I will be back in twenty minutes. I want the problem solved by then, understood?” he explained.

“I stared at the socket for a full ten minutes and recited Ganpati Stotra and Hanuman Chalisa”, he said and started crying.

“Don’t cry, bro. Almost all engineers are the same! Hardly anyone understands what the real practical world needs us to do!” I empathized.

He gathered himself and continued his story, “I tried to resist myself at first. But then, out of shame and sheer fear of my mother, I thought of doing something about it. I took a small rod and inserted it into the socket to see if it was working. And then . . . I got the biggest shock of my life, literally”. He was narrating how he died, if at all this was true, with such excitement.

“But, if what you are saying is true, then you must also know what brought you to hell? Why are you not in heaven instead?” I pondered.

“That?” He chuckled as if I had asked him the silliest of questions. He smiled at my confused expression and continued, “While I was departing from earth with the Yamraj as per tradition, I told him about my sad life as an engineer. You won’t believe, he cried his heart out and offered me a place in heaven. I got so excited to hear this that I automatically rattled off ... maachooo! Fatte babes! Maa ki #@%*... Maushi chi #@@^&. This string of abuses made him angry and he vowed to put me in hell!”

My mind was benumbed with this sudden collision of thoughts and as everything I ever know began collapsing, I managed to blurt, “So, since when are you here? What’s so hell-special?”

          “I’ve been here for the last two years. Hell is like a prison: four inmates in each room, and those also you cannot choose. It’s a lottery system that picks roomies. All my roommates are engineers, out of which two are Mechanical engineers from Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra. The third one is a Civil engineer from Kolkata. As expected from a classy engineer, they also don’t hesitate to swear. The one from Uttar Pradesh always keeps bragging about the kind of power he had as a General Secretary during his engineering days. Since Mechanical and Civil engineers have to deal with unskilled labour a lot, the engineers from Maharashtra and Kolkata keep abusing the warden in Marathi and Bengali the whole day!”

“Any other ‘Ripley’s Believe it or not’ challenge for me?” I asked.

          He continued with a chuckle, “Yup, loads of things that you’d never have imagined. But first things first, since you’re going to deal with this one real soon. Just like Gandhiji is the father of our nation, Ravana’s sister Surpanakha is the Mother of Hell. And she also happens to be the Mother of Engineering.”

I was totally surprised! I had always been of the opinion that some Korean, American or German guy would be the father of Engineering. But, Surpanakha turned out to be the Mother of Engineering! Gosh! I was totally baffled when he explained the whole story of how and why is Surpanakha called the Mother of Engineering! It took him hour and a half to explain the origin of engineering. It was one hell of a place for sure…yeah, hell!

          “And any spicy and saucy news?” I asked with a wink.

“Oh yeah, bro!” Now I could sense real excitement in his voice. He continued, “Just as we used to have bars in Mumbai with those bar-girls, I have heard that there are similar kinds of bars in heaven. The most beautiful apsaras or nymphs dance and make you go ooh-lala!!! I have heard from others that there are a lot of other good places to visit in heaven, take the meadows, the ringa-ringa land, the river of nectar, and all that. But, the bullshit of a problem is that we are wasting our time in hell. There is only one way to enter Heaven.”

          Just as he finished that last sentence, a heavy voice – just as the one in Big Boss announced on a speaker: “You two bastards, come to the reception area of Hell in five minutes. DISCO is waiting for you both.”

          I became happy that we would be given a chance to enjoy this afterlife in a disco! This excitement turned into disappointment when I learned that “DISCO” here, too, meant “Discretionary Committee” just as we have in engineering colleges!

We went to the reception desk and were greeted by a short, fat, heavily-pimpled, hoarse-voiced, curly-haired Sindhi woman. She looked very similar to one Khushboo Khubchandani aunty who used to live in the same building as mine; I remembered having teased her for all these qualities multiple times. She had passed away some ten years ago after our season-cricket ball hit her right on the forehead! Out of all the kids playing cricket, I was the only one who had gone to her rescue. I had even taken her to the hospital, but alas!

          Aditya and I were waiting at the reception for the next course of action. Aditya was tense but I was still thinking about striking a conversation with the receptionist. After a little hesitation, I went up to her and asked her if she was indeed Khubchandani aunty.

Voila! She was indeed! We talked for a while about the water scarcity issues in the society, the festivals that we used to celebrate there, the latest updates on some of her favourite TV shows. I also lamented to her about my being in hell. I asked her why she didn’t try to get an entry into heaven. She said that she was happy with her job as a receptionist in hell and was now in a comfort zone. I then asked her if she had any clue why Aditya and I were called at the reception.

          She was very sweet despite whatever we had done to her in the past. She scanned her computer to find why Aditya and I were called for the DISCO. Just as she was about to tell me the reason why we were called, the “Big Boss” ordered me to sit on the couch and that the next steps would be dictated to us in a few minutes. As I was about to leave Khushboo aunty’s desk, she told me these golden words, “Treat this discussion as your Viva in engineering college. Don’t be over smart, beta.”

          I nodded and joined Aditya on the couch. “Big Boss” asked us to introduce ourselves. We did as asked. “Big Boss” branded Aditya as a traitor and said that he would be executed from hell, too! I figuratively pissed my pants; Aditya literally did! I asked if there was something I could do to save him and get us entry into heaven.

“Hmm,” continued “Big Boss”. “Yes, as a matter of fact, you can! For a long time, we have been waiting for someone to write a thesis on the life of engineering students in India for our reference. It is becoming difficult for me to render proper justice to engineers. Some plead to me saying that their life was boring as hell on earth and hence they deserve a place in heaven. Some say that they had to spend their years deprived of any pretty women because of the sheer number of male engineers and they wished to be with apsaras in heaven. But I don’t agree. These engineering students earn so well, work in air-conditioned offices and have big homes as compared to graduates from other streams. Then why should I put them in heaven again? I wish to ease my work and confusion, and I need to know what they really go through on earth. So, Dipen, can you write a thesis on this for me?”

          “Yes, sure sir. I can write a thesis on the life of engineering students from India. But, I’d need a favour from you. I want permanent citizenship in heaven for me and Aditya. We want unlimited supply of vodka and chicken tandoori thrice a week, two beautiful angels as girlfriends, two air-bikes and a fully air-conditioned 2 BHK in the meadows near the entrance of Heaven,” I demanded. I sensed desperation in his voice and was taking my chances to make demands. And he did not disappoint me.

“Done”, Big Boss agreed.

          “Great! Now there is one more thing. I would need help from a small team from heaven, too. I want help from Yamraja, Chitragupta and two of your best fairies to draft the final thesis.”

“This is blackmail. You bastard, okay … done! Wait for a while. I will have to call up the high command in heaven and ask them if they can loan these resources for a few months.”

          After around half an hour, a well-built man with a tired expression walked in with one black guy and two super-duper-beautiful fairies.

          Aditya nudged me and whispered that the well-built, tired man was Yamaraja. He must have accompanied me also but I somehow slipped that, must have been some accident bump on my head.

Even before Yamraja could introduce that black guy and two fairies to us, Aditya whispered to me, “The left one is your bhabhi. A******e!”

I had no other option but to choose the right one who was sweet, cute and a little chubby – ekdum my type! I was happy indeed. The black guy turned out to be Mr.Chitragupta – the guy who maintains our account of good and bad deeds. He was a charming guy.

          So, here was the team that was supposed to write a thesis on the life of engineering students from India. And since I was the one asked by “Big Boss” to write it and already had credit for having penned two books, I was chosen as the group leader. So, within the last few hours, I had died, come to hell, made a friend, met Khushboo aunty, managed to strike a deal for transfer into heaven and landed with a book contract, too. And these comprised the team:

1.      Dipen Ambalia – group leader

2.      Aditya Kadam

3.      Veena Iyer (fairy #1 – Aditya’s crush)

4.      Vidya Mehta (fairy #2 – My Crush)

5.      Chitragupta

So dear reader, what follows is our final submission. I hope you enjoy what has come up as a by-product of our team work.