A young entrant to the Army was posted at a non-family station for many years when he got news of a son born to his wife left in the village he entertained his pals and told them that he had decided to name his son Pandey. Why? Asked his friends
In our village neighbors are very cooperative he explained and so we number our children according to their vicinity. If it is neighbor number two we name the child Dua if it is number three he is named Trivedi number four Chaturvedi In my case it was neighbor number five so he is named Pandey.
His friends were nonplussed. What if it is the product of a mixture of neighbors?
Then we call him Mishra
Disgusting! they remarked. What if the paternity is unknown? That’s very simple we name him Gupta.
What happens if the mother is too shy to divulge the identity of the father?
Then we name him Sharma. (Contributed by Manohar Bhatia and Kanwal Kaur New Delhi)
Article extracted from this publication >> January 14, 1994
