The Hidden File
I was posted to a place in the field somewhere in J & K where once I met an officer who was wearing lot of ribbons indicating that he had served in field area for quiet a long time and is having a lot of field experience behind him which generally only very senior officers have. But this officer was comparatively quiet young and his field service did not seem to appear commensurate with his age. So I asked him how he has managed these many ribbons to which he replied,
” Managed ? I feel pity on myself and have a feeling that I am being punished for no fault of mine as all my life I have been loitering around in the field area only. I do not have any senior person known to me nor does the HQ listen to me inspite of my writing so many letters to them to post me to some peace station.”
Hearing this I told him,
”There must be some communication gap somewhere in between due to which you are suffering and to sort this out you must go to the posting department of your HQ in Delhi”
He agreed and decided to go on leave to his head office at Delhi. When he went there and met the concerned officer dealing with the postings he was told that his file is not traceable and he should wait and rather help them trace it with them as there was shortage of manpower there. He saw that all the files were scattered here and there, some were lying in the almirah, some were out of it covered with the dust, while some lay on the floor packed with the small ropes etc. So the search for the file began and they all were on it to locate it . The search carried out for 2 hours and finally he found the file which was being used as a lid of an earthern pot (Ghara) covered with dust and at the corner of the room. He immediately cleaned it by hitting it with his other hand two three times and handed over the same to the posting officer. The posting officer after opening the file saw that all his life he had never been posted to a peace station so he felt pity on the officer who had come with the grievance and asked him,
”Which station would you like to be get posted to just tell me and your job is done?”
The officer was overjoyed to hear this so he requested for posting him to Delhi and was very thankful to him for being so kind and considerate in giving him his choice station. While departing after getting his problem solved he said to the posting officer,
“Sir I would be extremely thankful to you if you could do me one more favour”
The posting officer said,” Yes ! Yes! Anything else by which I’ll be able to help you”
The officer who had come with the grievance said,
“Sir if you could kindly replace this file to its original position from where it was picked up ?”
The posting officer laughed and said,
“Done”
And the file took its position back for being status quo.
The officer is still at Delhi since a long time enjoying his peace tenure.