Pratap Bhogilal Journey Through Life

Author(s): Rauf Ahmed
Publisher: Bhupendra Singh Anand

Page 95

THE JOURNEY | 89
masalas, I taught Mrs Miura how to make vegetable cutlets and other vegetarian stuff. I left the masalas for her. Every weekend, Miura would bring food for me if I could not go to his house. Apart from sightseeing, we were able to strike useful business deals not only for Batliboi but also for Bombay Cotton and established a fruitful relationship with C.ITOH & Co.
In fact I arranged to have a Daihatsu scooter sent to India with a view to start manufacturing in India. However, Batliboi's manager did nothing regarding having it approved by the Transport Department and ultimately it rusted and became scrap.
In the USA, 1952
In 1952 I went to Europe and the USA again. I had to go to California because Bombay Cotton was involved in a dispute with California Cotton Cooperative over the quality of cotton supplied by them. After sorting out the dispute with California Cotton Cooperative, I went to see another of our cotton suppliers in Montgomery in the State of Alabama. There was severe apartheid in Alabama which was the home of the Ku Klux Klan, the notorious white organization which practiced extreme apartheid. I had a taste of what the non-whites were suffering in the USA, especially in the South, when I was not allowed to go through the entry gate and the exit gate reserved for the Whites. Although I had a. first class ticket, I was not allowed to travel in the first class coach. Instead, I was made to sit with the Blacks. However, our friends in · Montgomery were very cordial and hospitable. Their families showed no trace of apartheid.
Another similar experience we had in Greenville in South Carolina. Dayton Rubber's representative had reserved for us at Hotel Peabody and he was supposed to meet us at the railway station. He was not at the station when we arrived so I told Bhagwati since we know the name of the hotel he had reserved, let us take a cab to the hotel. When we presented ourselves at the reception, seeing us, the receptionist said that we did not have a reservation. Soon the Dayton gentleman arrived and told the reception
We did the devil's work - Robert Oppenheimer, Director of the First Nuclear Test