On October 25, J Rangarajan has three things to celebrate. One, it is his daughter’s 11th wedding anniversary. Two, it’s his Bullet 500’s 11th birthday. Three, it marks the 11th year of his comeback to adventure biking. Since 2006, he has undertaken many long distance rides and the most memorable one came just two years ago, when he rode from Chandigarh to Chennai.
“In 2005, my son was married and the following year, it was my daughter. I had a sense of having fulfilled all my duties and it was clearly time to return to the road. To make it dramatic, while I was in the United States with my son, I ordered a Bullet 500 to be delivered on October 25, 2006, the day of my daughter’s wedding,” says 66-year-old Rangarajan.
He tries to be on the road as much as possible, even working his business calls into road trips. Rangarajan runs a dog training school which has a presence in India and the United States. As part of his job, he calls on his clients and their pet dogs. In India, he takes his Thunderbird or his Bullet 500 to his temporary workplaces. “In 2015, I went on a group ride from Delhi to Leh/Ladakh. On the way back, I detached myself from the group at Chandigarh and did a solo ride back to Chennai, going all the way down to Kanyakumari before that,” says Rangarajan. Of course, there are voices dissuading him from going on these bike trips, waving his age in his face. But, he finds enough inspiration to defy them.
P R Venkatachalam, his friend who rides a Bullet, is part of this inspiration. Venkatachalam is a cancer survivor. He had cancer of the voice box and as part of his treatment, he was operated upon twice in 2008 and lost his voice. Today, at 68, Venkatachalam has not hung up his riding boots and does long-distance solo rides regularly.
From his 17th year, Venkatachalam has ridden Royal Enfield bikes. The hobby took a beating due to a demanding career as civil engineer. After his cancer treatment, he returned to the hobby to keep his mind off what he had gone through. As he cannot talk, he emailed me this. “Around the time my cancer treatment was complete, my son had bought a new Enfield bike. I wanted to start riding bikes again. I began with short rides and then purchased an old 1989 Bullet in 2009, overhauled the machine, personally overseeing the restoration process. My first ride was to Kerala and Mysore, and I realised that I was good enough for the long road. Soon, I joined The Madras Bullet Motorcycle Club (Mad Bulls) and was happy to see my old teenage buddy Rangarajan in the same club. Since then, we have go on many joint rides and also gone solo many a time, covering the length and breadth of the country. A trip from Chennai to Shillong is part of those memorable rides. I do solo rides to Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra regularly. In March 2017, I was diagnosed again with cancer, this time at the base of my tongue. I underwent a major surgery and recovered fast. Now, I am okay and did a solo Sabarimalai ride in September, despite heavy rains in Kerala. Riding is a liberating experience,” says Venkatachalam.
Navroze Contractor, an independent photography professional, is clearly an Indian legend when it comes to the long road. Around 40 years ago, Contractor pulled off an ambitious road trip to England on his BSA Goldstar. Seventy-three years old now, Contractor never left the long road, hitting it time and again, even after an open-heart surgery three years ago. “Since the operation, I have clocked 30,000 kilometres on my bike,” says Contractor, who now rides a high-powered superbike.
Girish Mylandla, 54 years old, puts it succinctly. “Physically, they may not be right for the road. But mentally, they are.” He speaks from experience. In the 1990s, Girish Mylanda did four major road trips, covering the country from its tip to the top, on his 350cc Bullet. In 2012, after he turned 49, he attempted a similar ride, with the same old bike. There were only four more states to be covered when his bike developed massive problems and he had to truncate the trip.
In the final analysis, the ride had nothing to do with the road. It had to do with the mind. And therein lie our strengths, our victories.
