Demonstrators on the main Pune-Mumbai highway demanded quotas for Maratha people in education and government jobs yesterday, echoing the longstanding quotas for people of lower, scheduled castes. This is probably not the place to talk about that in detail except that the protest was alarming and and descended into violence with vehicles stoned, smashed and set alight.

My journey from Dignity at Neral was delayed as no driver wanted to brave the rioting and resultant traffic jam of hours after the strike was called off at 4.10pm.

I always stay at the Leela when I come to Mumbai. It’s handily close to the airport with means that I never risk missing my plane because I’m stuck in the Mumbai traffic. It’s very comfortable and the service is outstanding yet homely. I’ve been here so many times that the staff recognise me and often stop for a chat.

When I eventually arrived – the highway was clear, dark and quiet – a young assistant from Reception showed me to my room but it wasn’t ready. This wasn’t a problem for me at all. I was ravenous anyway so I decided to drop my bags in the room so that they could finish cleaning it in peace.

As I ate my pizza an almost cringingly apologetic staff member came and apologised, bowing and scraping several times and told me that I’d been upgraded to a suite.

Now, of course I was delighted but did try to tell him there was no need. It was a tiny mistake from a new member of staff. Really no biggie and easily remedied. He replied that he was upgrading me in case I was angry and upset.

This made me think of the time when we were in Goa at Diwali in 2014 and the packed hotel was struggling to cope with the combined demands of its rude nouveau riche clientele and a sustained spell of cyclonic rain. They ran out of plates at breakfast time. Hardly surprising when people were taking multiple plates and stacking them up complete with huge amounts of unfinished food all over the restaurant. I gave the waiters on duty some polite, gentle feedback after I was left with two sliced of machine-grilled toast and no plate to put them on, and was asked to see the manager, who promptly waived our restaurant bill for the rest of our stay

How ridiculous it is that these hotels felt that they had no option but to succumb to angry emotional blackmail from entitled disrespectful guests throwing their toys out of the proverbial in this highly status-conscious stratified society. I do wonder if this overgrown baby demographic has any shame at all. Have they been so pampered that when anything at all threatened not to go their way in life, that they just threaten a tantrum and suddenly everyone else must throw themselves down in front of them? How can they treat people like this whose job is to be constantly gracious?

It’s an interesting juxtaposition, isn’t it?  I’ve always thought that you can tell a lot about a person from the way they treat waiters.