(h). 8th. Posting - DD, Census, North Bengal

I joined as a Deputy Director of Census Operations at the Directorate of Census in Calcutta on September 6, 1980. Later, I assumed my charge as the  Regional Deputy Director of Census Operations for the North Bengal Region with headquarters in Siliguri. I supervised the field operations of Census 1981 in close coordination with the District Census Officers. Census allowed me to travel throughout North Bengal (known for its natural beauty) extensively.

In Siliguri, we stayed in a rented house belonging to one Habu Sarkar in Babupara. It was a beautiful house, having a hexagonal drawing room encircled by glass windows on all sides. Being located near a marketplace, it had the advantage of easy accessibility to daily essentials and emergency medicines while remaining out of the din and bustle of city life. There was a cinema hall, too, nearby. The railway station was also not far off. During my stay in Siliguri from September 1980 to mid-1981, I stayed with the family in this house. I had spent some memorable moments with a sense of fulfilment here. My wife's nephews from her elder sister deserve thanks for arranging this house for us.

During this period, I visited Darjeeling for the first time in my life. Though I had stayed close by at Mekliganj for more than four years, I did not have the opportunity to visit this place then. In the current assignment, I made several trips to Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Kurseong, and other places in North Bengal for the census work. 

I still feel a chill down my spine when I recollect an incident that occurred during one such trip from Darjeeling. We were coming down from Darjeeling via Punkha Bari Road1 and had stopped somewhere after Kurseong. We had got down from the car. There was a deep ravine on the offside, close to a place we had stopped by. My elder daughter was then six years old. Suddenly, to my horror, I found her almost on the edge of the hills. One or two steps ahead, she would be down in the ravine. I was a few feet away from her. I jumped and caught hold of her and somehow managed to save a catastrophe by the grace of the Almighty.

I also visited Jayanti in the course of my census meeting at Alipurduar. The village Jayanti was deep inside the forest in the Buxa Tiger Project area. It was located along the Jayanti River and presented an exquisite view of the surrounding landscapes and wild fountains. The Bhutan hills had risen from the bank of the river Jayanti here. The river passed by the side of the forest bungalow, where we had made a stopover.

One unfortunate side of this posting was that the education of my elder daughter suffered irrevocably. She could not get admitted to any good school in Siliguri and had to read; in a neighbourhood school. I could feel she was losing interest in her studies;  initial devotion to her studies never returned. I blame myself for this, eve though I had no way to prevent it.  Being in a transferrable service, I had no option but to serve wherever the govt placed me. Even if I had agreed to the Minister's proposal to stay back in Jhargram, that could only be for some time. I would have got transferred from there at some other time. That could have been more inconvenient. Later in Calcutta, she had, however,  her education in two of the best Govt schools first at Bethune and then at Sakwat Memorial Govt Girls' School.

After the census fieldwork was over, I was transferred to Calcutta and placed in charge of Salt Lake Tabulation Office - I, set up for the tabulation of census data. The office was in Purta Bhawan, Salt Lake.

When the Director of Census transferred me from Siliguri, Calcutta had an acute shortage of government quarters. I did not have any prospect of getting any govt., accommodation. My friend Balai Chakrabarti of whom I spoke in the early part of my service history, arranged a privately owned accommodation for me on rent at a locality called Alambazar near Baranagore. It was a two-roomed accommodation having a big room and a small one with a small kitchen on the adjacent covered veranda. The kitchen was so small that my wife had to sit in the small room and cook in the oven placed inside the so-called kitchen. The rent was ₹300 per month.

Subsequently, we shifted to another rented accommodation, a better one, in a part of the ancestral house of my colleague and friend Ashok Chatterjee. Located on Ratanbabu Road, Baranagore, it was relatively conveniently positioned. We lived there comfortably, becoming almost a part of the family, consisting of Ashok, his mother, wife, children, and a brother.

Ashok’s mother, Jyotrimoyee Devi, was a graceful woman, strong, learned, and independent-spirited. She had accepted us lovingly.

I have memories to fondly remember from the houses of both Alamabazar and Ratanbabu Road.

Ashok, in whose paternal house we had shifted from Alambazar, had a daughter and a son. He has been a good friend of mine. He is a large-hearted person. He has helped me in many respects. When I was posted in Midnapore for a few months, it was in his allotted quarter that I had stayed with my family. He did not even allow me to pay any rent for that. He was staying elsewhere at that time. He had helped many other colleagues in the same way. He was a bachelor at that time. The quarter was in his name, but he rarely stayed there. Ashok now stays with us in his flat in the same cooperative building. 

When working as the in-charge of the Salt Lake Census Tabulation Office, I found some actions of the Director of Census Operations (under whom I was working) dishonourable from the point of administrative proprieties and questioned them. It appeared to me that the Director had started seeing through the ears. He remained encircled by sycophants and had his judgment about other officers influenced by them. Some of his observations and actions were impairing my dignity. He had even sent an officer junior to me to oversee the work in my office. According to administrative principles, no junior officer can evaluate the performance of a senior officer. I met the Director, pointed out how his actions harmed my dignity and proceeded on leave. 

On the expiry of the leave, I joined the office and then relinquished the charge of it the same day (31-03-1982) to take up my new assignment as Deputy Director of Small-Scale Industries. [3] 

I may mention here that I had served under the very officer who had then been holding the post of the Director of Census Operations, in his earlier assignment, as the District Magistrate, Midnapore. He had selected me for the Census post after having seen me working for about two years.

I feel the officers, at least some of them, who used to keep the Director company, had been instrumental in creating a poor impression of me.  I preferred to stay in my workplace doing my duty rather than go elsewhere to keep others in good humour.  Unable to get me to their fold, a section of officers might have joined in a whispering campaign against me.

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