Dei Robot

“Can you see this screen Patti?” , the sales executive asked Lakshmi Patti.
Adjusting her spectacles , she mumbled “Yes”
“It is designed exclusively for old people , large and very intuitive, you can type commands here”
“Commands ah ?, I cant do that”
“See Patti it is very easy , just type GET WATER , press ENTER and the robot will fetch you water”
Hesitatingly she typed at the touch screen attached to the humanoid.
G E Y..
“Aiyo I typed Y instead of T , how to remove this”
“It is easy , see , just click this button , it will remove the last typed letter”
“Same like your touch mobile, your nephew said you can use mobile phones”
Lakshmi ignored his words, adjusted her spectacles again and typed

GET WATER

The humanoid moved , scanned for water bottle in the room , fetched it and returned to her.

“Waah, super , super “
“Good good , this machine is working”
“What about other instructions?” She demanded.
“Press this button “SHOW COMMANDS” , it will list all commands, you can understand it just reading it.Just touch any command and the robot will do it”
Lakshmi Patti followed his instructions.
“You can also issue voice commands but it is not perfect yet , it still struggles to recognize old people’s voices, yet you can try a lot of usual commands”
The sales executive turned on Voice Command mode and asked Lakshmi Patti to ask the robot something.

“What is your name “ she asked.
“I do not have a name” it replied.

“We have not given it a name, what name do you want to give it Patti” the sales executive asked.
Lakshmi Patti pondered for a while and said
“I cant give names to robots and all, I will call it Dei Robot!”

               Zoro Humanoids Ltd had just begun manufacturing humanoids, exclusively for old people. Lakshmi was their first client. Her nephew Sangamitra bought her this humanoid. Lakshmi had lost her husband the previous year to cancer and her only son two decades earlier to a bike accident. Left alone , her nephew took her with her . Lakshmi was in her seventies and needed external help to live her life. Given her work schedule as a program manager in an IT company and being the mother of two kids , it was getting difficult for Sangamitra to look after Lakshmi . And Lakshmi was lonely too in her house when Sangamitra and her husband left for jobs and the kids to school . And hence Sangamitra decided to buy a humanoid .

Dei Robot was fed with Lakshmi Patti s medical records and even her biography. It knew more about her than anyone else , even herself. It was programmed to feed her medicines on time ,book train tickets every 3 months for her visit to her relatives at Tirunelveli , book cab for her travels around Chennai, call  Sangamitra whenever it booked cab so that she could arrange someone to accompany her or receive her and few other things.Dei Robot did most mechanical things what a human could do.

“Dei Robot , come here”
“DEI ROBBOOT , COMME HERRE “
Dei Robot understood her voice command the second time she stressed her words. It used its wheels to drag itself near her.

“You know everything about me ??”
“Let me tell you there are a lot of secrets you don’t know about me “
“Sorry , I donot understand your command”
“I was not giving you any command , stupid!”
“I will call that sales guy and tell him you don’t listen”
“Sorry, I donot understand your command”
“Dei Robot , shut up”

Dei Robot went on mute.

Lakshmi called up the sales executive and poured over her frustrations dealing with Dei Robot. The sales executive promised that it will get better with time understanding her, just like fellow humans.
“But give me a solution now , it does not know how to listen”
“I am saying something and it keeps repeating – Sorry I do not understand your command”
Lakshmi Patti wanted something which everyone like her wanted , she wanted some one to listen to her.
“We will repair this and call you Paatti” the sales executive assured her.
Programmers of Zoro humanoids made the required changes, updated Dei Robot’s software and deployed it on the cloud. Dei Robot downloaded it from the cloud.
It took a few months for them to make the changes along with improvements in voice recognition.

Now Dei Robot was ready to listen.
“Patti, when you want it to listen , just say Dei Robot , LISTEN – it will go in listening mode ,it will record all your stories and will answer any questions from your story “
“Ok ok. Next time it makes any mistakes , take it away from me , I don’t want this”
The sales executive used all his persuasion skills to convince her. She relented.

After the executive left , Lakshmi Patti played around with Dei Robot's skills.
“Dei Robot , LISTEN” she said.
Dei Robot started recording her stories.
“It was the 1960 s , I was a teenager when

...................................

...................................

Dei Robot I have finished my story. "

“What did you understand”
“I have recorded your story. You can test the stored information”

“Yes, yes , let me conduct a test”

“What did my husband tell me the first time I met him?”
Dei Robot searched the text stored in its database which was created from the recording earlier, for keywords “husband” , “first” and used its artificial intelligence to select the required information out of it.
It played back the recording to her with only the required clipping.

“O Bhagvan, sabaash, I don’t need human beings now” she chuckled.

Days rolled on , Lakshmi Patti’s interaction with Dei Robot got stronger and Dei Robot’s software got more robust.

Sangamitra logged into the web interface of Dei Robot which was just ready and went through all the data , the interactions between Dei Robot and her , her medical data uploaded periodically to Dei Robot’s database , her daily diet and activities. She went through a few clippings and felt emotional. Details which Lakshmi Patti dared not to share with anyone else, she had shared with Dei Robot. Dei Robot spent more time with her , was kinder to her and listened more to her than she had ever did and possibly could. She felt both happy and guilty.

“you will not feel anything if I die tomorrow , will you ?” Lakshmi Patti told to Dei Robot which was on listening mode.
“Dei Robot , speak. Answer my question – You will not feel anything if I die tomorrow , will you?”
“I will not feel anything” answered Dei Robot.
“But I will feel emotional if they take you away from me , even if there is some fault in you . Do you know that?”
“I donot understand , I have recorded this information for future use” replied Dei Robot.

..
Days rolled on.
..

It was another morning in Sangamitra’s house. She left to office, her kids to school ,her husband to his office .
It was Dei Robot and Lakshmi Patti in the house. She had not woken up at her usual time. Dei Robot as programmed went to her and checked her pulse.


1 message received

Sangamitra looked up at the message in her phone.
“Lakshmi Patti has not woken up at her usual time. Her pulse is down. She is probably dead” she got a message from Dei Robot.
Sangamitra rushed to her house. Dei Robot was right.
..
Lakshmi Patti s data was backed up in the cloud , Dei Robot’s software was reinstalled.

It wasnt just Lakshmi Patti who died on that day.
It was Dei Robot too.