My Premier Padmini

One pleasant evening when I returned home from the office, my little son Vishnu, who was always reprimanded for being a chatterbox, ran to me and broke the news that our old, dilapidated house was sold and the sale was to be registered shortly.

My tiredness due to hectic work at the office was gone in a jiffy. I gave him a rupee to buy a toffee of his choice. “Visehnu”, I said in an expansive mood, “today you can go out and play till it will be very dark.”

I was on Cloud 9 because my dread of buying a pre-owned Fiat car of the Premier Padmini model was going to materialise.

I had already got my driver’s licence and dreamed of sitting in the driver’s seat of the car of my choice.

Of course I had learnt the basics of driving a car when I was fifteen years old. I used to handle the steering of our Baby Austin car while my father was driving near the Sir Thomas Munroe statue on the island area of Mount Road, Madras. I controlled the steering carefully while my father took care of the clutch and the accelerator.

"Dear," my wife said, serving me a cup of steaming coffee, "the vexsome issue is over." Ram Yadav’s finally agreed to buy our house and paid an advance of one lakh rupees too.”

I finished drinking the coffee in quick gulps and ran upstairs to demand my elder brother some part of my share of money even before the sale was completely effected.

I demanded him to give me forty thousand rupees out of my expected share of two lakh rupees.

My brother gave me the required amount without asking me any questions. He knew what I would do with the money.

The next morning I met Murugadasan, a dealer and a mechanic in pre-owned automobiles. “Das,” I said,” I want to buy a pre-owned Premier Padmini car within forty thousand rupees.”

Das nodded positively and took me to famous Telugu comedian Rajbabu’s house in Kodambakkam on his two-wheeler. He said that the actor’s lady wanted to dispose of their Premier Padmini car as her actor husband passed away recently.

It was a double joy for me. On the one hand, I was going to buy a car which was owned by my favourite comedian, Rajbabu. On the other hand, it was a car in my favourite colour, 'white'.

I must speak a word of praise about the great actor’s philanthropic nature, who never flaunted the benevolent aspect of his personality. Apart from getting constructed houses for weaker sections, he had donated large sums of money to the needy on condition of anonymity. 

When Rajbabu’s lady fixed the price of the car at Rs. 37,000, I was too shy to bargain. I paid the amount and got the keys and the book of registration certificates. It was registered on the actor’s lady’s name, Lakshmi Ammulu.

It was fine with the car for a few months. I went to the office in my car at least twice a week, since the cost of petrol was prohibitive to use it every day.

I used to visit Marina Beach, Lord Murugan temple at Vadapalani and Amman temple at Mangadu, in the outskirts of Madras city in my car. My wife and kids, Siva and Vishnu, enjoyed the weekend trips by the car very much.

But my happiness with my Premier Padmini was short-lived.

I was transferred to Hyderabad from Madras. Then my financial and mental troubles began. My elder son, Siva, was in the second year of his graduation course, and my younger one, Vishnu, in the final year of his pre-degree course. So I could not move my family from Madras to Hyderabad immediately. I had to support myself in Hyderabad and maintain my wife and kids in Madras financially. I had done a rough arithmetic calculation of my budget and decided to continue to own my car despite my financial woes.

I brought my car to Hyderabad via the roadway. I and the automobile mechanic Dasan drove the car alternatively, as it was an arduous journey of about 650 kilometres. It was too much for the ageing car to undertake the long journey at a stretch. So, we had a night halt at Ongole.

We refreshed ourselves at daybreak, continued our onwards journey and reached Hyderabad at six 'o'clock in the evening.

It had been proving financially very difficult for me to maintain my car, inspite of meticulous budgeting. 

I had to dispose of the car for a pittance Rs.15,000 after shelling down about Rs. 20,000 towards the repairs. I signed the papers of the sale with tears streaming down my cheeks

I have some sweet memories about my Premier Padmini to date. I had escorted my elder niece Madhavi to her in-laws' house in my car soon after her wedding.

On another occasion, I drove my wife, kids and in-laws to Keesaragutta, the Saivite pilgrim centre, in my car.

My grand-niece Padmini, who is settled down in life as an AI engineer now, used to think when she was ten that the Fiat Automobile company had named the model as Premier Padmin after her.

Of course, Padmini is always premier to me.