In a bizarre development from Chhattisgarh, a Railway Employee named Pankaj Raj Gound posted at Deepka in Bilaspur District decided to request his station master for a week long leave so that he could sit at home and eat as much chicken as he could before the holy month of Shravan started.
Following is the alleged application letter:
In the letter, Pankaj, a TA-II employee who works as a porter at Deepka railway station, requests the station master with folded hands that as Shravan was starting from the month of July, no chicken would be cooked at his home during the entire month. He argues that his body will get weak due to lack of chicken in his diet, which would ultimately render him unable to do his job with efficiency.
He thereby requested his station master to grant him a leave from 20th June to 27th June so that during that period he may eat so much chicken that he would cover the quota for a full month, in order to stay strong enough to work 24 hrs a day.
The letter incredibly has an acknowledgement signature and a stamp of the Deepka Station Master, giving it credence. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the authorities had approved the leave request of Pankaj, as it was laced with kilos of tandoori logic.
The month of Sharavan is considered the holiest by Hindus and many refrain from eating non-veg food during that period. Incidentally some Maharashtrians celebrate a mini-version of Pankaj’s request in the form of a Gatari Amavasya where they eat and drink to their heart’s content on an Amavasya before the Shravan starts so as to make the one month abstinence bearable.
(Reporter’s diary: I thought I would write this news report with some funny commentary, but I could not think anything funnier.)