I have been alarmed at reports indicating a sharp rise in the average carbon footprint of the citizens of Mangoville. The extremely high IQ and analytical folks at the Bureau of Retrofitted Statistics have alerted me that we are among the worst polluters on the planet and soon Mangoville will be unliveable. They go on to say that in less than 100 years Baiganpally will become a desert and face the same fate as the cities of the great Indus Valley Civilisation. My initial reaction to the report was that I am not going to live that long, so ‘Who cares!’
I have since come around to the sensitivity of the subject, partly because of my conscience pricking me, but mainly because of Rickshaw Rowdy, who has been clandestinely going around selling a special kind of fuel that pollutes more and therefore the end may be nearer than we think. Before we go on to find out what Rickshaw Rowdy is up to, let’s talk a little bit about the pricked conscience.
The Department for Promotion of Touchiness (DePoT) headed by Aunty Opinion has recently employed a fresh batch of college interns who feel very strongly about the environment, and combined with their expertise in guilt tripping people it makes for a lethal combination. No one can escape their brutally persuasive arguments in support of banning various things. To be clear, ‘persuasive’ is the word employed by Aunty Opinion, I prefer ‘insulting’. For instance, their email to me read something like this:
Hands down, you must be the most incompetent and insensitive Supreme Leader in the history of banana republics. You live in a palatial house enough to accommodate the entire population of Maldives and drive around in a battle tank that would be the envy of Mangoville Armed Forces. Instead of leading by example and cutting down your carbon footprint, you are setting a bad example and also conveniently ignoring the sale of toxic fuel by Mr. Rickshaw Rowdy. You are hereby requested to hand over your ostentatious house to the public to be converted into a water park for senior citizens and organize eco friendly bhajan mandalis for children.I am sure they mixed up the audience for water parks and bhajan mandalis, but let me assure you that I own no ostentatious house or battle tank. It is a propaganda being spread by Aunty Opinion because I refused to appoint her as the External Affairs Minister of Mangoville. Here, have a look at the pictures of my house and my ride. If this screams ostentatious, I will shave off half my moustache as an apology.
Now you might be wondering why I am feeling bad if my conscience is clear. The DePoT goes on:
Your incompetence is matched only by your untidy appearance. We know you are trying to portray yourself as a “son of the soil”, “detached from materialistic world” kind of leader, but no one with an IQ of above 150 is being fooled. You are a national embarrassment. The only way you can redeem yourself is by passing laws for protecting the environment from evil people such as Mr. Rickshaw Rowdy and yourself. If you want us to say good things about how you look, you have 48 hours to pass the bill which prohibits personal vehicles and appoints Aunty Opinion as the External Affairs Minister of Mangoville for life. Failure to do so will lead us to post daily memes poking fun at your pot belly and humongous appetite for Biryani. We have over 10 million followers on Instagram.It does not take an IQ of above 150 to see that there is no connection between banning personal vehicles and appointing Aunty Opinion as a minister. However personal attacks are something I am quite touchy about, especially when they are targeted at my pot belly and appetite for Biryani. I have commissioned a survey on the feasibility of banning privately owned vehicles and also tasked Snoopy Susie with investigating the lifestyle of Aunty Opinion. As per anecdotal evidence, she has 3 fuel guzzling American cars, 5 meat guzzling greyhounds and her TV studio alone has more air conditioners than Baiganpally Airport.
Hey Supreme Leader, looks like you have been living under a rock. The air conditioners at Baiganpally Airport are not working. I won’t be surprised if Aunty Opinion has had them removed and installed them in her studio. Anything is possible in this jungle raj.
– Mango Mishra
As a side topic, I have been wondering how many people in Mangoville have an IQ of more than 150. Not that I am an expert on IQs, but as a kid I was tested as having an IQ of 53. My class teacher had put me in a segregated class of “students with special needs”. The only special need I had was a longer lunch break, which was conveniently ignored. I found everyone in the class to be exceptionally good, and when we collectively scored the highest grades in the exams, our class teacher was put to an IQ test instead of being promoted. Hence the DePoT’s warning that high IQ people will not be fooled by me is rather misinformed and laughable. They don’t know that lower IQ is better. The overwhelming population of Mangoville has low IQ and therefore are not being fooled anyways.
Now coming back to the environment. I have been toying with the odd-even formula for private vehicles, except that my own licence plate’s 4th digit is missing so I don’t know whether I fall under odd or even and hence may not be able to drive my car at all if the rule is implemented.
I have just received a Whatsapp message from Rickshaw Rowdy saying that forcing everyone to switch to bathroom slippers instead of black shoes will reduce the carbon footprint because black soles contain the most carbon. In contrast, car tyres contain a lot of carbon, but technically tyre marks are not footprints, so we can use this technicality to continue to allow private vehicles to operate as no footprint is being generated. He has agreed to promote this on his rickshaw using a loudspeaker, if I allow him to peddle the toxic fuel.
I know you are wondering what exactly it is that Rickshaw Rowdy is selling. Last month he took on an intern from the Baiganpally Institute of Technology who claimed to have developed a fuel additive that would completely eliminate the annoying exhaust note of the rickshaws. Caring for passengers and environment is very uncharacteristic of Rickshaw Rowdy, so he did not take on this intern out of concern for either. He had a brainwave that he will be able to pass off a silent rickshaw as an e-Rickshaw to get road tax refunds from the Transport Department. Going by his happy face, he has been able to convince many high IQ officers in the department so far. Now that I think of it, the omnipresent demos of rickshaws at the Transport Department’s office make sense. Before this their testing arena was desolate and being rented out for marriage functions. Anyways, it turns out that this additive is highly polluting and has also set back the clock for electrification of rickshaws, many of whom are flaunting the Green Certificate already. What a double whammy. And then Rowdy has the audacity to message me about bathroom slippers.
