OF BIKES AND MEN
Murali Sivaramakrishnan
Every evening, as children, we used to keep our ears peeled for the familiar clinging of my father’s bicycle bell on the far side of the road across the hilly slope. He always had some goodies or other hanging in a pouch slung across the handlebar. And we ran to swing the gates open and hug him. The bicycle was a valuable property in those good old days, and father was proud of it and cleaned it every other day with oil and an old rag. Then came the days of the motor bikes—and they came in so fast too. Even before we could say bike there were one too many models to choose from. Father too bought one, I recall. There was so much excitement when he came riding so majestically. That night we couldn’t sleep and we waited for the dawn to run towards the scooter and inspect it from headlight to tailpipe. It was some kind of collaborative make—part Italian and part local. We still hadn’t started turning in our own then. Later when my brother went to college father bought a proper motor bike for him. Gone were the silent byroads and mountain trails through which the slow bicycles trudged. The face of my land was changing—roads became big and bigger. The bikes were deciding our lives for us. More than the car more than the buses, bikes were too popular. Every boy dreamed of riding one—it was more imagination than the reality—the feel of the bike, the pleasure of the throb-throb of the machine as the right hand turned the accelerator and the wheels rolled forward with the air in your face and your hair all flying back… Yes the bike was more myth than reality. Of course there are gradations of bikes as well—the scooter was the conventional model that signified the middle class utility vehicle. The 375 horse power motor bike—Royal Enfield Bullet, in those days—stood for the macho machine. Then there were competitors—the smaller and sleeker models started coming in—Java, Rajadoot,Yezdi-- the models were any number. Soon enough it became difficult to choose from. The period of the Hundred CC machines was ushered in. Big companies of international standard had begun collaborative efforts to win the Indian market. Nowadays there is hardly any house in the urban areas that does not sport a bike in its front yard. Sometimes it is two or even three. This is not the case only in big cities-- even in suburban areas and in villages the situation is no different. One cannot even imagine a time when one dint have a bike. Perhaps the bike is the symbol of the affluent middle class. Once when I rode up to a friend’s house he was so surprised that he had not heard my bike. “May be,” he remarked, ”may be, it is a sophisticated variety!”
When father rolled in his first motor-driven scooter we experienced for the first time a deep sense of displacement—the bicycle was shifted and the pride of place was bestowed on the bike. And as we moved from town to city we had to look for a house with parking space. And of course our house had to be immediately linked to a motorable road. During the monsoons we had to cover up our precious bikes with a tarpaulin. And of course there was this periodical servicing. Our town did not have any petrol pump in the beginning but soon enough they sprang up everywhere as mushrooms after the rains. Of course many fellows got employment as petrol gun boys. The motor bike was a twentieth century invention but its effect on the way of life of our people has been so remarkable. Our culture now revolves round the bike. Roads are meant for the automobile, cities are structured according to the direction and facilities of the main roads and the negotiability of the bikes and cars. The poor pedestrian has to give way for the dictatorial bike. Isn’t the motor bike the Great Dictator of our times? The melodious tinkles of the bicycle bells have given way to the harsh horns of the bikes. Keep off, keep off—that is the warning each bike rider exudes when he moves about on the asphalt. Yes, the bike is certainly a cultural symbol of the male ego. It is made out so by the advertisers. It is most often the macho male that rides the bike – the girls quaintly sit behind hugging the fellows. There are of course special girl varieties—the scooties !
The advertisement gurus know just how to handle the consumers—they play about with colours, signs and symbols. As with everything in the consumer-oriented world the bike is just adequate promotion material. There are ads where the skies smile in all blue cloudshapes and the bike winds about the skies—the riders are equated to angels with or without wings. There are also ads where the bike rider achieves so much muscle power that he could win anything and in any game! There are other wry ads where the guy handles the bike likened to the shape of a girl—how cleverly each of them wyes with one another to create a sensual appeal to the mechanical device. Consciously or unconsciously the innocent observer is wielded through a process of cultural conditioning by the global media. The bikes drive on in all their glory. Yes they are driving us. They roll on through our nerves and tissues through our cells and imagination—they are now so real than reality. They are all about us. They symbolize our urban spaces for us. They tyrannize our very souls. The bicycle has a dignified position now—as a healthy eco-friendly benefactor, pollution free and hazard free. The bike for all its ungainly clumsiness has ousted it from the main part of the roads. Do I hear that faint tingle of father’s bicycle bell from across the fields now? How I long to run down wind and throw open that wicket to receive him? But I am tearing through the highway at tremendous speed on this sophisticated machine. Without lifting my hand from the handle I can see the time on my watch. Only a few more seconds to destination. And the bike has seen me through. Isn’t it fast?