A GREAT OPTIMIST

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 136, 5 December 1929, Page 27

A GREAT OPTIMIST

FIVE-DAY WAIT FOR FARE

The Bombay police Have taken into custody Syed Abdul Hafiz, a taxi-cab driver.

His cab was engaged recently by a European tvlio arriyed by the P. and O. liner Naidera, en route for Australia. The passenger drove round the city in Syed'a car, leturning a few minutes before the Naldera was due to sail.

He said (reports the "Daily Mail) he had not enough money in his pocket to pay his fare, hurried up the gangway after_ taking the driver's number, and promised to send the money down. Syed waited patiently, but before the money was fprthcoming the Naldera sailed.

Syed, undismayed, told his friends that the sahib would return sooner or later, and accordingly kept the taximeter running the remainder of the day and all night, and proclaimed liis determination to keep it running till the •ualdera returned, although he was told this would be weeks.

He ate, drank, and slept in the car, and adopted a threatening attitude towards people who advised him to go away. There is a. time limit to the period a cab can wait on the quay, but Syed argued with the police that he was still waiting for Ma fare. Kye days later, the police, discovering his licence had expired, served him with, a summons. He ignored it, and ho was arrested. The taxkab was also taken to the police station, with the meter still running. It showed that 184 rupees (£l3 16s) was owing, compared with lo rupees (-15s) on the day on which the cab was engaged. • If Syed is proved to'be sano he wilj be brought before the Magistrate on a charge of driving without"a| licence,