The General Marched in and Killed Me !!!

Troops in the General to kill me!!!
by Rajbir Deswal
Taking my bath I am informed that a ‘Gernal Saab’ has come to meet me. “Who,” I shout from the shower. “He says he is a gernal,” the domestic help announces.
“What the bloody hell,” I start murmuring. Such a high rank and he can’t even inform me on the mobile. Simply walks in. Without even realising I have to rush to office within minutes. Retired fellas!
I stagger to the dressing room and slip into what is wearable for the office. Shouting for the footwear, I climb down the stairs to make an ‘unwelcome General’ appreciate my disgust.
Slouched in the black sofa, he wishes me a ‘Good Morning’. He can very well read my not so charitable expression for he has seen life. “I am in a great trouble and you need to help me out, being a good neighbour. Look, I cannot rush to the police posts,” he continues.
“I lost my identity card. I have searched everywhere. Even wife’s help did not help,” he concludes.
I have a flashback, when I see the General visiting posts, being presented with guards-of-honour-flags, stars and medallions. I can see officers and men, looking up to him. His identity of being a soldier appears sharper to me. I gather myself to face him with a smile now.
“Is that all, sir!” I ask him, being a little mellowed. I experience sobering of my enraged sensibilities. Immediately, I send for the officer-incharge in the police post closeby, who promptly arrives.
I tell the officer that General Sahib wants a loss report recorded and a copy of it. The officer prepares to leave when I call him again to tell him: “The copy of the report has to be delivered at his residence. And in 15 minutes!”
“Ho jayega huzoor”, he assures me and marches out.
The General is neither amazed nor amused, for he knows the triviality of the issue. I give him a full smile. He returns it with a big ‘Thank you,’ and seeks leave of me.
I follow him up to his car, open the car door and wait till he is comfortably seated. I feel he is a General once again.
His private car moves. The General looks at me with his astute face and looks, that he donned all those years, when he himself wore the uniform. I keep standing at the iron-gate of my house, behind which stays a man of equally ‘ironic’ elements.
My footwear is brought to me. I wear the shoes and psychologically feel that somehow they are too big for me. And that I need to size up with them. Then only shall I deserve them, not as an officer of a force, but as a humble servant of the people-always ready and willing to offer his services.
All this happened only a day after Independence Day. Needless to say, I must learn to behave. Thank you, General!