Children Short Story – Telephone Trouble
Photo credit: mconnors from morguefile.com
This incident is a bit of olden days when there was one and only BSNL landline connections. Also it was not that much popular that it would be present in all houses. Only public booths were present, very rarely few houses used to own and rest in shops which also was used for business. People used to go there to call distant relatives and pay them the price.
Now the process was, on responding from the other side only at the very first second it would start with Rs 3 and then that would continue till 3 mins and then after 3 mins for each min beginning one rupee used to increase. Now this was the story with public booths and houses who use to own the telephones. But for shops, they used to do mutual understanding with BSNL, that they would pay one rupee / min on total. So for others say if it is less than a min they had had to pay 1 rupee and if its less than first 3 mins they had had to pay Rs 3. But for shopkeepers they had had to pay just the amount equal to number of min excluding the seconds in these cases.
So in this scenario, once Swapnil went out of home town for job purpose. Now he used to work the whole day and then at night used to call his mom and dad to chat with them for sometime on whole day’s life, take their news of health in turn and share some information as done in usual cases for people working like him outside their home town. So Swapnil found out the only shop in his locality, where he was staying, with telephone facility in that. There was no other booths nor did Swapnil like to irritate any member of a house owning the telephone calling from there.
So he used to regularly call at his home from that shop after returning from office. Now the first day he went to the shop, the shopkeeper greeted him fine and also informed him of one discrepancy with the phone.
He told, “See Swapnil, this phone is too good except one problem. It time and again gets disconnected in the midst of the call. I have informed so many times to BSNL, but it seems to be that they are least bothered about these. Now if I stop paying them they would simply disconnect the phone itself. So better than that let the phone be present with this problem. You people since can at least speak, kindly adjust.”
Swapnil got used to that gradually in a day or two. Just after has he spoken for a minute or two, the phone used to get disconnected, he used to put the receiver down and then take it up again and again dial and connect. This was well continuing till on one Sunday, Swapnil came to know the original fowl play.
Swapnil was standing in the queue to call at his home when he found that one person started talking. He was noticing when suddenly his eyes fell on the shopkeeper. He saw the shopkeeper bent down and did something and immediately the phone got disconnected. The person who was talking was also a regular customer, and so again dialled and again started talking. Swapnil not being able to become 100% sure, kept on watching the shopkeeper. He noticed that after then everytime the shopkeeper used to bend down the connection of the phone was getting disconnected.
Swapnil understood that to make profit the shopkeeper only is applying some tricks and doing something and disconnecting the phone. So that for less than 3 mins the person has to pay the full amount Rs 3 but the shopkeeper would just pay money equal to number of minutes. So the extra would be his profit. Swapnil immediately made up his mind to play a trick with the shopkeeper.
Still while his turn came, he just went through the place in front of the shopkeeper towards the phone, to just check out what actually the shopkeeper does when he bends. He found there was switch at the bottom, which actually he presses and the connection gets cut. So Swapnil now as planned started talking in phone. Suddenly his connection got cut. But Swapnil pretended and continued to speak.
Swapnil escaping all others notice saw that the shopkeeper got a bit confused. As he pressed the button, he saw the bill as usual started coming, but unlikely Swapnil continued to talk. He then pressed the button couple of more times, but still in vain. He felt that some technical problem has happened and that Swapnil would speak the rest of the time after the bill came out and after he actually disconnects no more bill would come.
Swapnil noticed that the shopkeeper started sweating in tension on a thought that he would incur a great loss in this fashion. But as he was also quite sure, as he came out, after his pretension for some more time, the shopkeeper unable to control asked him, “So were you still able to speak and hear.”
Swapnil quickly asked, “Still means? I was already doing that from beginning. What happened in special? When?”
The shopkeeper said, “No I mean say around 1 min later were you still connected? I mean I noticed you continued your whole talk in one continuous connection. Usually this is not the case.”
Swapnil simply said, “Yes. Quite strange I also though realised, but again yes it was so.”
The shopkeeper said, “See boss I dont know why but before you actually disconnected the phone, much before that the bill came out which generally comes out when you get disconnected, and that too for that period of time till then and not including the future period. So please could you pay for your rest time that you spoke?”
Swapnil to this said, “See boss, this is somewhat wrong that you are asking for more amount than what is coming in bill.”
The shopkeeper understood and let him go with the bill amount only. But from then for next quite some days the shopkeeper noticed the same nature. He after first time started thinking seeing other customers that the technical problem was gone, but seeing Swapnil he started believing that its Swapnil who while starts his phone does something in special for which his switch does not actually work for him unlike for others. So like this he would run in a loss.
So now for others as they didnt discover his trick, why not for them let this continue. But for Swapnil, let him not disconnect the phone anymore as then only it would give him correct amount for the time period Swapnil spoke for. In that case he would make a bit less profit and also then when Swapnil speaks a bit less than any particular minute. But still for one he could manage. As it would be tough for him to compare how many minutes is actually coming in total for him and the amount at the end of the month as for that month he has not kept track from beginning, and then have to wait till next month end. So till then this experiment might cause him a great loss. Also he called the same person who created the switch for him, to know what does Swapnil do in actual, but in vain. From then Swapnil as he wanted used to speak in one continuous connection.
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