Honesty, Integrity et al.

"Honesty is the first chapter in the Book of wisdom" - so said Thomas Jefferson. Obviously a huge majority of men and women in India have not crossed the first chapter in the Book of Wisdom. With honesty and probity in public life hitting abominally low levels with every passing day, the future does look bleak. But there is hope. There still are individuals who hold to integrity and honesty no matter what. Occasionally you do get to see instances of such integrity and honesty that really makes your day. Sometimes it goes well beyond making your day to making a great impact on your character. I am gonna relate a small incident that had a defining impact on my views of honesty.

This is not something that happened recently. This happened about 12 years ago (dont remember exactly when it happened but it was around that time). It was a nice summer afternoon in Chennai and I was in my summer vacation. So my mom decided that she'll take me to her office so that I can meet her colleagues. She works for the Department of School Education.

I was sitting on a small table in a corner of a room writing something. I heard someone walking into the room. I looked up and noticed that there was the priest of some church standing there. He was having a small bundle in his hand. I had no idea what it contained. I stopped doing my work and started observing him. He walked straight to the woman sitting on the table next to mine and introduced himself. Then he started discussing with the women on how he has started a primary school for the under prvileged children of his village and how some things are getting delayed because of the delay in getting some papers from the government. The women told him that she had nothing to do about the delay and that she could not reveal the current status of his application. She then explained to him some other procedures etc and was explaining to him the possible sources of delay and what he may do to get things done fast.

"Thanks for all the info madam. I have a small gift for you here and he opened the packet that he was carrying." It contained bundles of 100 rupee notes.

The woman was very surprised by this and was totally taken aback. "Sir, you are a priest in a church. You are a religious leader of the christian community. You advice people of your faith not to do sins. Also you pardon people when they realize their sins come for forgiveness. Being such a person, is it right on your part to ask me to commit a sin."

The priest didnt know what to say. He was visibly moved and there were a couple of tear drops in his eyes. He spoke after a few seconds. "Mam, please forgive me for this. The person who was doing the same job before you used to accept money from everyone to pass the documents. So I assumed the same about you. I am very sorry. May jesus bless you and your family."

"Thanks for your blessings. It is blessings of people like you that we need."

The priest left after this and I continued with my work.

PS:

1.) I have modified a few minor things slightly for the sake of narrative convinience.

2.) Incidentally, the woman that I had mentioned above has a son named Parthasarathy.