Living in the Capital with a wife and a child and surviving on a meagre salary as a government employee was quite difficult. But somehow he managed to provide for his family adequately, if not abundantly. He worked at the Land Revenue Office, a department noted for its corruption. Government employees from other departments  did everything they could to secure a position in this department just because the income, by way of corruption, was unmatched against any other department.

But his ethics made him despise the job. He hated it from the core of his heart and was angry that corruption had pervaded each and every corner of the office and had made everyone its victim. But there was very little that he could do. After all, he had to support

his family, and this was the job that was providing them

with bread and butter. So he went along with his job like an automaton: he would go to the office,

sit on his chair, do what was required of him and return home. He seldom spoke with his colleagues, and didn’t have any friends in the office.

And along with anger, there was also a sense of pride in him. He was proud that he was incorruptible. His friends, they had already lost their self-respect, whereas his was still untouched. And even though everyone in the office was good to him, he made sure to maintain a distance between himself and his colleagues: he feared being contaminated by their touch. He had even approached his superior for a transfer to another department where he could have some peace of mind. However, it was not granted. Perhaps he was considered an asset in the department because of his ethics, and he was required to be there as an ambassador of the ethical practices that the department claimed to follow.

Rajaram, Keshab’s colleague in the office, had been with him for the last five years. Rajaram was among those staffers who snatched every opportunity to squeeze every single rupee out of his clients. And although he worked in the same position as Keshab, he resided in a beautiful bungalow and owned plots of land in prime locations within the city. Further, since both Rajaram and Keshab resided in the same neighbourhood, it wasn’t unusual for Rajaram to provide Keshab a lift in his car.  

And although Keshab was not very fond of Rajaram, owing to the latter’s corrupt nature, he did not want to seem rude by rejecting this friendly gesture from Rajaram. This gave Rajaram the opportunity to brag among the office colleagues that he was Keshab’s closest friend. Keshab couldn’t do anything about it. He could not go to each and every staff and say that it was not true. That wouldn’t make any sense. Besides, he thought,” What difference does it make? Let him brag if it makes him feel proud. It does not change who I am”.

One day, as Keshab was wrapping up his work and was getting ready to leave the office, he noticed a thousand rupee note in his drawer. Although it struck him as strange, he picked up the money and put it in his wallet. And as it had been a hectic day, he did not give it further thought. He called his wife, as was his habit before leaving the office, to check if she needed anything. A bag of rice and some cooking oil was what

she requested. He went home with the supplies.

Next morning, when Rajaram came to pick him up as usual, Keshab noticed a strange look on his face. Rajaram’s smile, his gesture, body language, everything was rather unusual. “Rajaram didn’t behave this way before,” Keshab thought. But not paying any heed to all this, Keshab sat silently in the back seat of the car, and on reaching his office he went straight to his workstation and settled for the day’s work. As he opened his drawer to get some papers, suddenly he remembered the thousand rupee note that he had noticed the day before.

Then the events of the previous day slowly dawned upon him. Rajaram was especially interested in one particular file that had come to his desk, and had also made more than a few requests for expediting that file. Accordingly, Keshab, not wanting to dishonour his friend’s request, had processed that file on priority, although there were a lot of other files pending in the queue. He remembered how Rajaram had thanked him more than once for the help. This was unlike his nature. Was that thousand rupee note a cut from the bribe that Rajaram had managed to nip from the service seeker?

Suddenly he felt that his other colleagues were also treating him differently. They were all smiles when he passed by. Earlier, he felt superior to them when he walked around in the office and they treated him likewise. But today, he felt that they were treating him as their equal

“They must have known about the thousand rupee note”, he thought. His heart sank in despair. “I have crushed my honour and dignity, I am no better than these corrupt hounds moving around my office.” He felt he had lost the only thing that he treasured the most in his life—his self esteem. That day, when he left the office, his head was drooping and that ever proud chest was caved in. To make matters worse, he remembered that he had used that thousand rupee note to buy ration for his family. Now the poison was in his blood. Even before he realised it, he had already become corrupt. That night he could not sleep. He could not share his ordeal even with his wife. “What have

I done,” he murmured. “I am now infected. I can no more hold my head high,” he thought. “How will I live with this guilt for the rest

of my life?” He could not sleep a wink that night.

Next morning, he woke up with a heavy heart. His wife sensed something was wrong and asked him if everything was ok. He just nodded and said nothing. He went to the office early in the dawn that day, just to avoid facing Rajaram and others. Once settled in his desk, he took out a thousand rupee note from his wallet and placed it in his drawer. He was glad that his colleagues weren’t there yet.

Slowly the office started coming back to life as service seekers and employees began pouring in. Again his desk piled up with files that required to be processed that day. And again there was this familiar face of Rajaram stooping by his side requesting to expedite one of the files from the pile....