Sequel -Really Stolen Election

It was a pleasant evening, and nostalgia filled the air, as the class of 95 from the VNIT college of engineering, met for the 20-year reunion.

Amit Sharma, who was popularly nicknamed ‘Lambu’, had been at the mic, recounting the story of the stolen elections while the batch was in their fourth year of engineering.

The entire batch reminisced as they recalled the way the fourth years had taken revenge against the third-years for having stolen the student elections – by winning the debate competition at the Cultfest, thus claiming the Best team award. Not just that, after the speech given by Srinivas Rao – Srini, who intelligently conveyed how the third years had cheated and won the elections while trying to emphasize how innovators excelled better than engineers, made the judges and the principal take notice of the unfair incident. Soon a committee was formed to inquire into the same. With witnesses from the entire first-year batch, which had been held captive by the third years and barred from voting, the committee reached the conclusion that the elections had been rigged and votes tampered with. Rahul Singh was debarred from the college activities, and only allowed to appear for his classes and exams so as not to let this affect his academic career, and the elections were held once again. This time, the ‘Macchar party’ won unabated and unopposed.

“So, three cheers to the unity of our batch that kept us going strong. Hip Hip…” Amit Sharma called out, and the hall reverberated with the echoes of a loud “Hurray”.

As the cheering lulled down, Amit Sharma spoke further.

“But what we are now most interested in is, to know how Macchar, or our Mr Rohit Gupta, finally managed to win the heart of his one-sided crush Reshma,” he said, pointing towards the couple, Rohit and Reshma, now seated together in a corner of the room.

Everyone knew this was the one and an only successful couple from their batch that had gotten married, and were still going strong.

People began to clap, with rhythmic chants of ‘Macchar, Macchar’, to make him take the mic and narrate their story.

But to everyone’s surprise, it was Reshma who got up.

“I will tell our story”, she said, amidst loud applause and cheers as she walked over to the front and took the mic.

 

1995

The elections were around the corner. Reshma, Garima, Ritu and Vidisha sat in the canteen, eating snacks.

Reshma watched as a group of boys from their class walked into the canteen and took a table in a corner of the canteen room.

One of them, Srini, who was Ritu’s officially declared boyfriend, came up to speak to her. As they talked, Reshma observed the guy who was the centre of attention of the rest of the gang. He wasn’t very tall, nor was he too handsome. But there was something about his personality that was attractive – something that made people look up to him in awe, to idolize him.

“So finally, you have started noticing him?” Garima nudged her, interrupting her chain of thoughts.

“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Reshma said, feigning ignorance, focussing on her vada instead.

“Come on, everyone knows, Rohit Gupta has a massive crush on you. Have you seen the way he looks at you?” Garima asked.

“You are imagining things,” Reshma tried to brush her off. But the fact was, she had noticed the way he looked at her. and she knew there was something there – between them.

“Amit also told me, that Rohit likes you. A lot!” Garima continued.

“What about you and Amit? What’s the latest status of your on-off relationship?” Reshma asked, trying to divert the topic.

“Don’t change the topic,” Ritu said, joining into the conversation.

“Okay,” Reshma replied, putting her hands up in mock defeat. “I know he likes me, and I too sort of like him…” Reshma said, and the girls cooed in chorus.

“But,” Reshma continued, shushing them, “and mind you, there is a big but. I am sure he will never come up to me. He is never going to propose to me. And if he never confesses his feelings for me, how are we ever going to be a couple? And before you all suggest anything, let me be very clear. I am a very orthodox and conservative girl when it comes to these things. For me, either the boy proposes, or no one does”.

There was a silence that was filled from the laughter coming from the boy’s table.

“Then we have to do something,” Garima exclaimed.

“Yes, we have to make him propose Reshma,” Ritu chipped in, as Reshma and Vidisha looked on, confused.

“And how exactly are you planning to do that?” Reshma asked, arms folded across her chest.

“You leave that to us,” Garima said, as she and Ritu high-fived each other.

 

The group turned to look in the direction of Ritu and Garima, who both now sat quite inconspicuous at the back of the hall.

“So, Garima, is this true? Did you and Ritu take up the challenge of making Macchar propose to Reshma?” Amit Sharma asked.

If there was any awkwardness between Amit and Garima, for having been one of the couples from the batch that eventually broke up, neither one showed so.

Garima and Ritu got up, and walked to the front, smiling.

Reshma handed over the mic to Garima.

“Yes, we did, and as you can see, it was quite the success!” she replied.

There were cheers and hooting from the audience.

“So tell us how exactly,” Amit probed.

“We discussed many plans. One of them was to create so many coincidences where Rohit and Reshma would bump into each other, that he would finally ask her out. I and Ritu kept track of Rohit’s schedule and timed Reshma’s entry accordingly. Many times, they bumped into each other, made small talk.”

“Did that work?” Amit asked.

“No. if anything, Roht became shyer, if that was even possible. He began avoiding bumping into Reshma. That was when we came up with plan no. 2”.

Garima handed over the mic to Ritu, to continue.

“So we realized, if anything would make Rohit desperate, he would do the needful. And man becomes desperate only when we arouse the one emotion in him – jealousy!”

“Enter Nishant, my cousin, who was studying Pharmacy at the college next door to ours. We roped him in on the plan. Reshma was a bit reluctant to go ahead, but we convinced her that this was necessary for the bigger scheme of things.”

“Wait…what? That Pharmacy guy? He was your cousin?” Rohit blurted out.

Reshma, Garima and Ritu exchanged a knowing look, and everyone began to laugh.

“Reshma, you never told me!” he exclaimed, as giggles continued.

“Some secrets are worth keeping, dear husband,” Reshma smiled.

“Yes. So Nishant and Reshma began hanging out together. The entire script was ready, written by yours truly,” Garima mock bowed as the audience clapped and nudged her for more.

“Now that we already knew about Rohit’s schedule, getting the acting part done at pre-planned spots and at scheduled times was very easy. The full-on PDA that Nishant and Reshma enacted had the desired effect. Ritu slipped on to Srini casually that Nishant was planning to propose Reshma on her birthday, which was the day before the finals.”

“So, the motive was given and the deadline was also given. So no prizes for guessing who proposed to Reshma on her birthday, a day before the finals,” Ritu said, as the crowd cheered.

“And so, the happily ever after began with the couple walking hand in hand for their final exam,” Garima continued.

“And we hope to walk into the sunset, the same way,” Reshma said to an ear thudding applause.