Rendezvous with a maths peddler

One Saturday, after a half-day office (then I used to scribble for an advertising group), enjoying liberty, I planned to go hunting half-priced books on Free School Street. It is the stretch in Calcutta where the wise usually hang around collecting reagents for complex reactions of intellectuality that the trite like me can hardly comprehend.
On the usual route to the destination, I came across this piece of writing. “Put up any problem of mathematics and obtain quick solution,” read the piece of paper stuck on a board behind the man sitting bang-opposite St Xavier’s College on Park Street.
The board attracted cursory once-overs, curious glances, and even quizzical frowns. But passers-by did one thing in a body: they moved on without missing a single step.
An unknown nosiness stalled me to read the script subsequent to the headline. To my surprise, I discovered a price chart, offering rates charged for solving individual mathematical solutions for standards ranging between Class VII and post-graduation.
I was interrupted in the middle of trying to fathom the subject. “Sir, may I introduce myself to you?” — the humble appeal caught my attention. Parash Nath Sharma introduced himself as a post-graduate in mathematics from Patna University and he was ready to solve riddles of mathematics and statistics of any standard.
With an ambition to develop his career in academics, Sharma left his scope to join the ancestral livelihood through agriculture. “I wanted to be a teacher but there was no job for me in Bihar,” Sharma lamented. “Calcutta is a big city and am sure there are better chances here,” buoyancy reflected in his bucolic English.
To make his living, Sharma adopted this method, following some of his native folks’ advice. His atypical way of income fetched his some yields. “Two gentlemen have asked me to give tuition to their children,” the maths peddler said.
The episode was certainly one of the weird ones that I had ever encountered. Lost in thoughts of the meeting, I headed for a nearby refectory. Busy on a contemplative cuppa, I recollected the optimism that was vivid in his eyes.
I traversed down Park Street several times after that but I never met Sharma again. And, I could not ask him the complex equation of life to be simple yet happy.