One of the few questions that I encountered most after coming to Mumbai was…”what kind of city Kanpur is?” other innocent additions were, “is it a small town”, “do you have malls and multiplexes there”, “do they allow night out for girls”, etc.

In first few days, say for a week, I greeted these questions with big explanations. Telling them… “Kanpur main yeh hai, Kanpur main who hai”, etc etc. But gradually my answers got shortened. And now I just smile, when I see people getting so curious about my hometown.

Question is not ‘why’ people want to know about Kanpur. Question is ‘what’ people want to know about Kanpur. They think Kanpur (or any other city) is a town, because we don’t have multiplexes or malls or pubs or discos or because the girls are not allowed to come back at 3 in the morning. Is this all that makes a city worth living? One of my colleagues in previous office used to say, “Kanpur main rehne layak kuch nahi”. One day I asked him, what are the things he wants in his dream city? He mentioned all the things I have already written in first paragraph.

Yeah…I also came to this big city for something better. But the reason was more career opportunities and my friends not the malls....multiplexes….pubs…discos…celebrities…..night outs or any other crap. And of course, these factors could never be the criteria to judge whether the city is worth living.

Though, I am in Bombay but don’t know for how long I would be here, maximum for a year or two. Really, I would not take even a second saying good-bye to this ‘happening’ city.

If you have seen, ‘Saat Hindustani’, you would remember the kind of introduction, all the freedom fighters gave in the beginning of this movie. They said my name is ‘-----‘ and I am from Punjab, the land of great Bhagat Singh. Second one said I am from UP, place of Nanarao Peshwa. Others also felt proud on their city because it was the birthplace or the workplace of some or the other great freedom fighter.

My dada ji, just after his retirement, prepared a long list of cities which he wanted to visit during his two months long plan of ‘visiting India’. Apart from several religious places, his major interests were places related to freedom fight. For this, he started his journey from Meerut, the city where Mangal Pandey started the freedom fight. There after, he went to several places in Jhansi, Bithoor, Kanpur, Allahabad, Varanasi, Mysoor, Gwalior, Pushkar and many more.

Those cities enticed him and me, because they had a strong story attached with them. He was never interested in watching Sindhia Palace at Gwalior or Sangam at Allahabad. Instead, when we went to Bithoor, the first thing we saw was a small creek, from where Nana Rao Peshwa fled away, when they were surrounded by the British army and river-way was the only way left.

These are the cities, which have nothing like what the ‘big’ cities have. But, still they have marked their place in history. Their history speaks or rather shouts for them and they don’t need rock-music to prove that they are alive. People say, one who stays at Mumbai for a month could never leave this wonder city. Might be it is true in many cases, but certainly not in mine.

At the age of 50 or 60, when I would have enough money to buy a small house for me, would I prefer taking a place at Mumbai? NO. My final destination would be at a place, which could make me feel accomplished in life. Though, Bombay is beautiful….but beauty gradually fades away with time. What remains forever is love…and love develops in solace and peace, which you would hardly get in Mumbai.

Also, I am not going to settle in Mussourie or Shimla or any other hill station. Where the blunt hills, stand silently as a showpiece saying…”come…see me and go”. No, instead my home would be at a place where every morning when I would open my eyes, I would feel being a part of this great country, its history and heritage. 

Just imagine the pleasure of walking on the roads, where Bhagat Singh used to play, or sitting at that riverside, where Swami Vivekanand sat for hours, thinking about his life and goals.