Journalism of Courage
Arjun Laxman Pawar looks up at the four-faced clock towering over the Indian Meteorological Departments (Shimla office) main building. Then he pulls out a small Casio watch from his pocket and checks the time. The clock is falling behind. Shaking his head he walks into the main buildings lift with a bunch of keys dangling in his hand. He says something to the liftman and gets a nod in return. The old lift labouriously chugs up to the very top where a mysterious-looking back door is opened for Pawar to step out into the clock tower. He opens a wooden door and clicks some switches on a small machine. This is the master clock. The time falls back when someone meddles with the tension given to the needles, he explains.
Again exchanging a few words with the liftman,he climbs atop the lifts roof. The lift goes down a couple of floors with Pawar dangerously perched on top of it and then comes up again,going higher up than the last time till he can climb up to the shaft behind the east-facing clocks gigantic dial. Pawar quickly gets to work,and unscrewing a metal box,reaches for the machine. The hour and minute hands move and the clock is set to time. He follows the routine for the other three clocks too and finally exclaims,I have been doing this for 34 years and I make sure these clocks tell the right time,at least when Im on watch, he says,adding that he daily sets his own watch according to the world time given by BBC London. A grade I mechanic at IMD,Pawar says,Our tower clock is among the last few in the city that still work. We are preserving heritage.
Aware that he is among the very few who can maintain tower clocks,Khan says one needs the technical know-how for this job. I am also required to design and make the parts that stop functioning because they cannot be bought off a counter, he says.
Nozer Pundole of the famous CT Pundole and Sons watch stores,whose family had been maintaining several tower clocks in the city till about 15 years ago,also vouches for the sturdiness of the old clocks. They can last centuries if only they are given some attention. Unfortunately most of these beautiful machines have been left to neglect, says Pundole. He recalls accompanying his father Hoshang as a young boy to wind the manual clocks back in the 1950s. I used to love it,except for the birds and lizards that would make the towers and the clocks their home, he says.
