In 1963, I had come on one month Annual leave and had taken my newly acquired Lambreta scooter along with me. After staying with my wife and two children, in the house of her parents in Fort Cochin, I decided to go to Perumpetty near Ranni to visit the relatives of my mother.
Lambretta scooters had introduced a deluxe model in 1961. In those days I could fill the full tank of my scooter for Rs 20/- and could travel from Palghat to Cochin without refuelling enroute. After roaming around on my scooter in the area of Ranni, Perumpetty and Tiruvalla and I had an almost empty fuel tank with about 1/8 th Gallon of petrol in it when I reached Eravipuram near the High School.
I had one new hundred Rupee note in my Terelene bushshirt pocket on that day. After filling the tank of my scooter as usual, I asked the attendant at the Burma Shell petrol pump at Eravipuram and he told me that I have to pay him Rs 15/- for the petrol and Rs 3/- for the engine oil, poured along with the petrol in the fuel tank, I searched for my hundred rupee note and could not find it in the pocket.
It appears that while I was driving the scooter fast on the main road, the bush shirt was fluttering and the hundred rupee note may have flown out from my pocket inadvertently. When I took out my money purse, kept in the pocket of my pants, I had only one ten rupee note and three one rupee coins it. Since I had no other money with me, I asked him whether he could empty the fuel tank and give me petrol and oil for Rs 13/- so that I could reach Kottayam and borrow some money to fill the tank full and then proceed to Cochin and Palghat. The petrol pump attendant reported the matter to the owner of the petrol pump, a middle aged man of about 50 years of age, who was sitting in the side room of the petrol pump
Mr Chacko, the owner of the petrol pump came to me and told me that it was difficult to take out the petrol and oil mixture filled in the fuel tank of the scooter and it can’t be poured again in any cars or lorries. As such, I would have to pay for the whole quantity of petrol and engine oil supplied by the attendant and perhaps I could pay the remaining amount on my return trip. I told him that I was a Major in the Indian Army serving in Sikkim, currently on leave and that after going to Cochin, I wouldn’t have a chance to come on that road again in the next one or two years. So he told me to pay whatever amount I have in my purse and clear the bill and the deficit amount he would account from his own pocket.
I paid the total amount of Rs 13/- which was in my purse and thanked him profusely for his good gesture and started my scooter to proceed towards Kottayam. Mr Chacko then called me back by clapping his hands and shouting to come back. So I drove my scooter back towards his room. He then took out a five rupee note from his pocket and gave it to me and told me to give it to the petrol pump attendant, so that his accounts would be cleared.
I took that five rupees note from the hands of Mr Chacko and gave it to the petrol pump attendant to clear his account. Then as I turned to mount and sit on my scooter, Mr Chacko came close to me and put a Rs 20/- in my bush shirt pocket and told me to be more careful about money and keep it safe in my purse, without allowing it to fly off in the air. Since I had a long way to go and as I had no money with me, even to buy a cup of tea or coffee on the way, he asked me to accept this small amount of Rs 25/- as a present from the elder brother of a soldier who is serving in the Army, some where in J&K at that time.
I spent the next half an hour talking to Mr Chacko and came to know that he was teaching in one of the schools at Eravipuram and that his youngest brother had joined the Army in the Corps of Signals as a Sepoy in 1962 and after serving for some time in Mhow had been posted to one of the Signal Companies in Udhampur in J& K. As the clouds were forming up in the sky, I took leave from him once again thanked him his generous gesture and promised that when I come next time to Eravipuram I would call on him and return his kindness and thoughtful gesture towards me in a remote area of Travancore
In 1968 I had the opportunity to travel on that road in a car and I halted at the old Burma Shell petrol pump and enquired about Mr Chacko. In place of the Burma Shell sign boards, they had Indian Oil boards, and no one could give me details about Mr Chacko who used to own the old Burma Shell petrol pump at Eravipuram.
Men may come and men may go, but their good deeds will never fade in our memory. Even now whenever I travel on the road from Tiruvalla to Kozenchery, I am always reminded of the good gesture of that middle aged petrol pump owner, and instead of taking money for the petrol he had supplied, he had even thought of the tea and snacks I would need enroute. He did not want to mix up the accounts of the petrol pump with his own money and give a chance in future for the pump attendant to do any unauthorised dealings of his own in the accounts of the petrol pump for his own benefits or for the benefit of any of his relatives.
