Voice of the Rebel

I got this sudden bout of aggression...Anger just welled inside me. There was this highly frustrating incident that happened to a cousin last week and I was sort of, indirectly involved. There is this insignificant owner of a former PG who lures the unsuspecting parents of first-time working women. I just wanted to go and break his skull. And I was frantically searching for some means to vent out this anger and well, the pen is mightier than the sword and I could draw no better solution. So I just fired away. Here goes...

Below, is one article that I have posted in our employee forum today. Please be aware and try to make people aware of this. I want it to reach the maximum audience possible. Thank you.
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Sai Paying Guest House, Door No:19, Plot No:287, 17th East Street, Kamarajar Nagar, Thiruvanmyur, Chennai.

This is a PG for working women, situated in a very serene, tranquil area. Anyone who visits here for the first time will be taken in by the calmness of the residential surroundings. This PG is run by one Mr.Shanmugham, who has a great talent for flattering speeches. I stayed in this PG for 40 days from Mid October to the end of November. And I have had a really bad experience, which I would like to share with you so that you don't get cheated by crooks like him.

Sometime in September, my mother called up this Shanmugham, whose number we obtained from one of these company forums. We were three girls looking for accomodation together. He promised us a single seperate room for the three of us(together). With hopes, we landed there only to find that he had allocated a medium sized room(in which 3 people can stay comfortably) and had stuffed 5 cots inside the room, with hardly any moving space!! When we said we wanted only 3 people in that room, he told us he will allocate another room in 10 days and that this was just a temporary arrangement. This though, is a very common occurance in PGs. So, we took light of the situation and continued to stay in that congested room(so, totally we were 5 of us).

This PG is run by a caretaker Mr.Venkatesh. His wife Mrs.Radha is the cook. This Venkatesh is something like an 'all-in-all' in the PG, who does these errands for you. Also, he is an alcoholic and he does not hesitate to come inside the rooms of the girls, late at nights, after his rounds of boozing, on the pretext of sorting out issues related to food(like one of us having an extra chapati or an extra cup of curd), though one can be sure that these issues can very well be sorted out in the common room itself, instead of in the bedrooms and all this he continues to do even after repeated warnings from the inmates. Also, the caretaker and the cook have this habit of peeping into the rooms of the girls in the mornings through the windows(obviously without the knowledge of the girls in the rooms), while they get ready to leave for their offices, on the pretext of checking whether the girls use ironboxes secretly. And most of the curtains of the windows of the ground-floor rooms are designed such that they will not cover the entire window at all. They just end half-way through. Luckily for me, my room was on the first floor. The food served here is of the poorest quality, made with only 1 vegetable most of the time, what we call 'chow-chow', which seemingly is the cheapest of the lot. I have had to pick out bugs many times, out of the curd and the rice. And the chief hobby of our caretaker is to talk about our owner and his doings, about his bad character in dealing with girls and similar matters.

The next incident clearly portrays the stinginess of Mr.Shanmugham, who runs this PG. There were cyclonic spells in Chennai, during which our PG, being an engineering marvel, was flooded with water(knee-deep). No other house in that area was affected like this. We called up Mr.Shanmugham and complained about the flooding of our house(just imagine, all kinds of flotsam and jetsam inside the house everywhere, inclusive of the kitchen) and requested him to make some alternative arrangements for our lunch that day(since it was a holiday, most of us were at home). He refused saying he cannot go and buy food for us, just beacuse of this silly reason. He commanded the cook to make some rasam rice and papad alone(he even refused to get some supplies like vegetables or bread etc..). The cook, promptly obeying him, went and made our lunch amidst the muck and dirty water(which was still knee-deep)!!! And we refused to take that stating hygiene reasons and asked some male colleagues to get us some bread. This shows the amount of care the owner has for the inmates in times of crisis.

And the greediest part is when we had to leave the PG on account of relocation, while settling the advance. He refused to handover the entire advance and the deductions were totally baseless - drinking water(which at the time of moving in, he had said was inclusive in the rent we paid), excessive usage of electricity(we used to come home around 8 and make use of the fan and light after that, so I donot know what this 'excessive usage' is all about, though all of us were aware that the caretakers used to watch TV serials all day and night, with avid interest that sometimes they have even refused to let the inmates watch!!!), curd consumption(completely baseless!!!) etc.. And he deducted Rs.600 out of the advance of Rs.3500, in my case. I screamed at him over the phone after which he banged the phone down and henceforth became unreachable, no wonder. Then, two of us vacated and moved to Bangalore.

And last week, the third girl(my cousin) was made to move out of the PG suddenly, due to issues related to the advance. He had deducted Rs.1000 from her advance and he refused to reason it out when she demanded it. Also he began to verbally assault her saying he has spies in her office and he has been observing the fact that she has been having food in her office cafeteria with male colleagues. This was outrageous and my father(our family is based out of Coimbatore) called up some contacts at the TN Home Ministry demanding some investigation in this regard. Shanmugham threatened my father saying that he will not hesitate to even murder my cousin on some night on her way back from her office using his conmen if this issue went further. So, the maximum my poor cousin could do at that moment was to just vacate that place immediately and move to my relative's house in Adyar.

It was this final incident which has prompted me to post this in our forum. Such atrocitious crooks should not continue to gain advantage of innocent people and cheat them of their money. Please warn your friends and family members against finding accomodation in this PG. This is only a request. And if such incidents are happening somewhere you know, don't hesitate to post it here, so that people are aware of it. And here are some tips that one should remember :

* Please do not be taken in by sweet and flattering words of care. The owners are experienced people in this art and will try to please you as much as possible.

* Remember to get a receipt for the advance amount you pay and KEEP IT SAFE. Also, for PGs, do not pay more than 1 or 2 months of rent, as advance. Also, before you move in, try to get a word or two from the existing inmates about the PG.

* Most important of all, get a SIGNED RECEIPT from the PG owner, for the amount that he has returned to you, while you vacate. DO NOT AGREE TO SIGN ON A RECEIPT WHICH DOES NOT EXPLICITLY SPECIFY THE AMOUNT THAT YOU HAVE RECEIVED in return. My cousin did this mistake and this has been of immense advantage to the owner(as we do not have written proof that he has deduted so much of money)

* Make sure that the owner/caretaker has specified all the conditions of the PG - the rules, i mean - before you decide to move in.

Hoping that this post has given you an insider's information on the attitude of people who run PGs(most of them, if not all). Thanks for your time and patience.

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And I don't know if what I did was right, I just posted this in the Company forum and at a cousin's nudge, I began to send this as an email forward. But it has made a profound impact on me. No, not the article or the incident, but the power of words. The response was just unbelievably overwhelming. And I knew I have made a significant difference...