Page 51 - Demo

THE REVIEW NAGPUR, MAHARASHTRA
JANUARY’19-JUNE’19 51
Golden Memories
Oscar and Jane Jobard celebrated their golden jubilee anniversary on 3 May 2019 in Nagpur. It was a red-letter day for the Jobard family because their daughter June (who works at Convergys, Mumbai) was married to Kevin Mascarenhas (who also works in Mumbai) at the same mass. It was also the birthday of both Oscar and his late father, Richard. The joyous occasion was celebrated at Roman Catholic Club, Nagpur. Oscar retired as telegraph master from Central Telegraph Office, Nagpur, in 1996 and Jane Jobard (née Peabody) retired as a teacher.
Oscar would like to share his memories of the golden era of the Anglo-Indians in the days gone by:
I served at Central Telegraph Office (CTO), Jabalpur from 1956 to 1962, where fifty
percent staff were Anglo-Indian, including the superintendent, Mr Alphonso, and head clerk, Barbara French. Miss French looked British, was six feet tall, and came to work on a cycle
in a skirt and blouse or dress, and lipstick.
She was most generous and good-hearted, especially towards the Anglo-Indian boys, requesting the superintendent for leniency, whenever they were absent, especially for those who missed night duty due to some function
at the Catholic Institute Club. Some days, the superintendent would come on a cycle to the club and request the MC to announce that all staff of CTO Jabalpur on night duty should get back on duty! And we did, even
though it was 11 in the night— some boys even in a slightly groggy state! But we were
all top-class workers, and
the superintendent was certain that all telegrams would be transmitted by morning.
Jabalpur was connected
to some big cities like
Calcutta, Bombay, New
Delhi, Agra, and Allahabad,
which had heavy loads of
telegram traffic. Picture the Anglo-
Indian boys coming on 20-2 (8 PM to 2 AM) duty every day in summer—when we had cuss-cuss thattis instead of air conditioners— removing their shirts before manning the
telegraph and postal lines, and taking up the telegrams stacked in rows of 20, waiting to be transmitted.
Those were the bicycle days, when we were dressed in our suits and ties, riding a
cycle to the Old Boys’ Association (OBA) dance or Telegraph Show (another
dance). The halls were decorated by the Anglo-Indian staff with paper ribbon spreading
out from the centre of the hall and, in the middle, a huge disco ball made of bamboo and coloured paper would
rotate slowly from the
central fan. The chief
guest at the dance
would be no other than
the superintendent of
the telegraph office,
who would say, ‘Nice
decorations!’ even
though he knew most
of the paper may have
been taken from the
office!
In those days, Elgin Hospital and other hospitals had Anglo-
Indian nurses, and
plenty of them would come to the dances—three or four in one rickshaw and a dozen or so rickshaws making a
bee-line to the Catholic Institute or Jackson’s Hotel. Huge numbers of Anglo-Indian boys came
for the dances from GCF Estate, the railway colony, and the telegraphs. Because
there were more boys than girls at the show, we had ‘tag–
dances’—if you were tagged, you had to surrender your dancing partner to the
tagger. Sometimes her boyfriend would refuse to surrender her and then the fight would begin (nothing serious—a little ducking, threatening,
and then a compromise over a chota). Even though our salary was meagre 130 rupees, we still had money for a little entertainment.
In 1962, I was transferred to my hometown, Nagpur, where I saw the last of Anglo-Indian bosses. Mr Gilks (a European who had married an Anglo-Indian) had just a handful of Christian and Anglo-Indian workers. The other staff soon discovered we were good and efficient workers, disposing or receiving 75 to 80 telegrams
per hour when the required quota was 30
per hour. I soon made friends with other top Anglo-Indian workers from Bombay, Madras and Hyderabad. At all the international cricket matches played at Nagpur between the ‘70s and the ‘90s, a temporary telegraph office was set up for the press. I was always sent there to deal with the foreign press reporters, to understand their accents and assure them of
speedy transmission of their press messages. Before I retired, we were working on computers where 32 stations were connected to each other through a master computer in Bombay known as (TRX), where telegrams reached their destinations in a matter of minutes.
Those were really good days!
But I am also happy to see that so many of our people are doing so well now, especially our youth. Our Nagpur branch is active and doing well. We have functions throughout the year at which all members enjoy themselves.
Life was good! Life is good!