Enlightenment Journal | Spring 2011

14

The Rickshaw Driver       

Nipun Mehta

“Where to?” the rickshaw driver 

asks me, with his mouth full of 

tobacco.

“Vijay Char Rasta,” I say. I’m headed 

to meet a few friends to talk about the 

purpose of life and things like that. After 

some light conversation, the rickshaw 

driver and I quickly become friends. 

“Are you from Ahmedabad?” he asks. 

“No, I’m just visiting a friend.” 

“Just a visit?” 

“Yeah, he’s opening a restaurant, and 

he wanted my parents to inaugurate it. 

I’m helping him launch the café.”

“Café? You mean, it’s like a Barista?” 

he asks, showing his knowledge about the trendy coffee joints in town.

“No, not quite like a Barista. It’s called the Seva Café.”

“Oh, what’s that?”

“Well, it’s a place where most everyone is a volunteer, and no one gets charged 

for their food. It’s going back to our cultural roots, where each person is treated as 

a part of you, and not a customer—Atithi Devo Bhava. We start each relationship 

by giving, and not by thinking of receiving.”

As we talk more about the Pay-it-Forward model, the rickshaw driver gets more 

and more blown away. “I can’t believe that such a thing can exist in a world like 

this. Today, everyone is after money. No one gives. Corruption is everywhere, even 

in our government. The world needs more people like your friend.”

“What’s your name, by the way?” I ask the pumped-up rickshaw driver.

“Mohan. Don’t call me ‘kaka’ [uncle]. I’m like your brother. Call me Mohanbhai.”

When I press him a bit about his own life, Mohan goes on to describe his bad 

habits. “Sahib, what can I say? It’s hard. I know it’s bad for me, I’ve seen all the 

tobacco-related cancer patients in the hospitals, but it’s hard to let it go.”

I suppose we’re all in the same boat with our bad habits, but Mohan has got 

honesty working for him. In between the loud, honking horns and the exception-

ally noisy rickshaw, Mohan drives slowly along the side of the street, so we can 

converse. He even starts singing some poems, in praise of human virtue.

“How long have you been in this city?” I investigate.

He says, “My whole life. We used to have a farm and all, in our village, but now I 

just drive a rickshaw. It’s good money.”