‘M.S. Subbulakshmi,’ Manju said, noticing my worried expression. ‘Devotional music.’
I nodded as I flipped through the chemistry book to find a problem challenging enough for the little Einstein.
‘Every Tamilian house plays it in the morning,’ he said.
I wondered if Ananya would play it in our house after we got married. My mother could have serious trauma with that sound. The chants became stronger with every passing minute.
‘What is IIT like?’ he asked.
I told him about my former college, filtering out all the spicy bits that occurred in my life.
‘I want to do aeronautics,’ Manju said. At his age, I didn’t even know that word.
He took out his physics textbook after an hour. He gave me a problem and I asked for time to solve it. He nodded and read the next chapter. The tutor was being tutored.
I passed the rest of the hour learning physics from Manju. I stood up to leave. I reached the living room where Ananya’s dad was making slow love to The Hindu. Ananya had instructed me to spend as much time with her father as possible. I waited for ten minutes until he finished his article.
‘Yes?’
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I finished the class.’
‘Good,’ he said and flipped another page.
‘How’s the bank, uncle?’
He glanced up from the newspaper, surprised. ‘Which bank?’
‘Your bank.’ I cleared my throat. ‘How is your job?’
‘What?’ he said, stumped by the stupidity of the question. ‘What is there in job? Job is same.’
‘Yes, sure,’ I said.
I stood for another five minutes, not sure of what I should do. I couldn’t compete with The Hindu, and a fresh one came every day.
‘I’ll leave now, uncle,’ I said.
‘OK,’ he said.
I had reached the door when he called out, ‘Breakfast?’
‘I’ll have it in office.’
‘Where is your office?’
‘Anna Salai,’ I said.
‘That’s on my way. I leave at eight-thirty. I can drop you,’ he said.
I realised eight-thirty would mean I’d reach an hour later than my boss. It didn’t work for me. But the lift also meant I could be in this house for another two hours and be in the car alone with my father-in-law-in-courtship.
‘That’s perfect. I have to reach at the same time,’ I said.
‘Good,’ he said and went back to his paper again.
We sat for breakfast at seven-thirty. Ananya’s father went to the temple room to pray, and came back with the customary three grey stripes on the forehead. I wondered if I should go pray too, but wasn’t sure how I’d explain the three stripes in office along with my lateness.
We had idlis for breakfast, and Ananya’s mother put fifty of them in front of us. We ate quietly. Ananya had told me they never spoke much anyway. The best way to fit in was to never talk.
‘More chutney?’ Ananya’s mother’s question (and my shaking my head) was the only insightful conversation we had during the meal.
Uncle reversed his Fiat from the garage. He peeked out to look at me several times. I wasn’t sure if he wanted to avoid me or make a direct hit.
‘Sit,’ uncle said. I went around the car to sit next to him. Sitting with my girlfriend’s father in a car brought back traumatic memories. I took deep breaths. This is not the same situation, play cool, I said to myself several times.
Uncle drove at a speed of ten an hour, and I wondered what reason I’d give to my boss for not coming to office two hours ago. Autos, scooters and even some manual-powered vehicles like rickshaws came close to overtaking us.
I wanted to talk but couldn’t think of any trouble-free topic. I opened my office bag with the dubious ‘Citi never sleeps’ logo and took out my research reports to read. Dot com stocks had lost 25% last week. The analysts who had predicted that these stocks would triple every hour now claimed the market had gone into self-correct mode. Self-correct – it sounded so intelligent and clever it sort of took the pain away from people who had lost their life savings. It also made you sound dumb if you’d ask why didn’t the market self-correct earlier? Or the more basic, what the fuck do you mean by self-correct anyway?
I had two clients who had lost ten lakh each coming to visit me today. With my IIMA degree I had to come up with a sleight of hand to make the losses disappear.
The car came to a halt near a red light.
‘You wrote those reports?’ uncle asked.
I shook my head. ‘It’s the research group,’ I said.
‘Then what you do at the bank?’ he was more rhetorical.
‘Customer service,’ I said, not sure how anything I did was service. Asking people to give you their money and scraping away at it wasn’t service.
‘Do you know how to write those reports?’ he said.
The cars behind us began to honk. The Fiat didn’t start instantly. Uncle made two attempts in vain.
‘Illa servicing quality,’ he cursed at his car as he pulled the choke. I kept the reports inside as I became ready to push the car. Fortunately, the car started at the third attempt.
‘I can write them, why?’ I said, answering his earlier question.
‘Nothing. Stupid joint venture my bank has done. Now they want us to submit a business plan. And that GM has asked me.’
‘I can help,’ I screamed like a boy scout.
‘Rascal,’ he said.
‘Huh?’
‘That GM Verma. In my thirty years at the bank I haven’t done any report. Now I have to make a pinpoint presentation as well.’
‘Powerpoint presentation?’ I asked.
‘Yes, that one. Intentionally rascal gave me something I don’t understand,’ uncle said.
‘I can help,’ I said. Maybe I had found a way to bond with uncle.
‘No need,’ uncle said, his voice serious. He realised he had opened up more than he should have.
‘You get off here,’ uncle said and drove to a road corner. ‘Citibank is hardly hundred metres.’
I stepped out of the car. I said thanks three times and waved him goodbye. He didn’t respond. He put his hand on the gear-shift.
‘Don’t meet Ananya too much. We are simple people, we don’t say much. But don’t spoil her name in our community,’ he said.
‘Uncle, but. . . .’
‘I know you are classmates and you are helping Manju. We can be grateful, we can feed you, but we can’t let Ananya marry you.’
I stood at the traffic intersection. Autos blared their horns at each other as if in angry conversation. It was hardly the place to convince someone about the most important decision of your life.
‘Uncle, but. . . .’ I said again.
Uncle folded his hands to before pressing the accelerator. The car started to move. Fuck, how do I respond to folded hands? I thought. Uncle drove past me. Like a defeated insurance salesman, I lifted my bag and walked towards the bank.
21
‘Welcome sir, welcome to State Bank of India,’ Bala said. His tone couldn’t hide his anger, thereby ruining the sarcasm of his lines. He sat on my desk, waiting for this exact joyous moment when he could squash me.
‘I’m really sorry, my auto met with an accident,’ I lied.
‘Your chummery servant said you left at five,’ he said.
‘You called my chummery? It’s only nine. Isn’t that the official time anyway?’
‘No, this is Citibank. Not a public sector bank,’ he said.
‘So, people who work here cannot have a life,’ I mumbled.
‘What?’
‘Nothing. Ms Sreenivas is coming at ten today,’ I said.
‘And you haven’t prepared for it. Have you read the reports?’
‘Yes, I have. But the tricky part is she is down ten lakh. And that is because she believed these reports. So no matter how well I read these reports, she won’t trust them. Can I sit on my chair?’ I aske
d.
Bala stared at me, shocked by my defiance. I took my seat. ‘You told me to push these stocks,’ I said, ‘and now our clients are down. Ms Sreenivas is an old lady. She will panic. I want you to be prepared.’
‘Prepared for what?’
‘That she, and some other clients too, could move funds elsewhere.’
‘How? How can they? This is Citibank,’ Bala said.
‘Because even as the Citi never sleeps, we make our customers weep.’
Ms Sreenivas’ panic mode was entertaining enough to attract bankers from other groups to come to our area. First, she spoke to me in Tamil for two minutes. When she realised I didn’t know the language, she switched to English.
‘You, you said this will double. It’s down seventy percent-aa,’ Ms Sreenivas said.
‘Actually madam, the market went into self-correction mode,’ I said. I now understood the purpose of complex research terms. They deflect uncomfortable questions that have no answer.
‘But I’ve lost ten lakh, ten lakh!’ she screamed.
‘Madam, stock market goes up and down. We do have some other products that are less risky,’ I said, capitalising on her misery to sell more.
‘Forget it. I am done with Citibank. I told you to do a fixed deposit. You didn’t. Now I move my account to Vysya Bank.’
My sales rep brought several snacks and cold drinks for her. Ms Sreenivas didn’t budge.
‘Madam, but Citibank is a much better name than Vysya,’ I said.
‘Give me the account closing documents,’ Ms Sreenivas said. We had no choice. First hour in office, strike one. The TV in the reception showed the CNBC channel. Internet stocks had lost another five percent that day.
In the next two weeks, our most trusting customers, hence the most gullible ones to whom we had peddled companies that did nothing more than make a website, lost a total of two crore. My own customers’ losses were limited to the two ladies, as I could never sell those companies well anyway. Bala, however, with his empire of smart people who rip off rich people, had to answer country headquarters in Mumbai.
‘I have seven complaints,’ the country head of the customer service group said in a conference call.
‘Sir, it is just an overreaction to the volatility,’ Bala said.
‘Don’t quote from the research report. I’ve read it,’ the country head said.
The call ended. Bala’s face had turned pale. The bosses had decided to visit the Chennai branch. I first thought I imagined it, but it was true; Bala shivered a little at the news. Mumbai said we shouldn’t have marketed Internet stocks to individual investors, let alone housewives, in the first place. Of course, they had never complained when the commissions kept coming in. But now five customers had closed their accounts and one customer had sent a letter all the way to the CEO of Citibank in New York.
At my weekly sales meeting, I told my sales reps not to sell Chennai customers anything apart from fixed deposits, gold and saris.
‘Sir, we don’t sell saris,’ one of my reps clarified.
‘Sorry, I was trying to be funny. We don’t sell gold either, right?’
‘We do. Gold-linked deposit, sir,’ she said.
Yes, I didn’t even know my group’s products. Actually, I didn’t even know why I was doing this job. I nodded and smiled. In customer service, you need to smile more than a toothpaste model.
‘Is it true that Ms Sreenivas lost ten lakh?’ another of my lady customers walked into the bank. She chuckled, and sat close to the sales rep to get the full lowdown. Too bad we couldn’t give her the details due to confidentiality reasons. We couldn’t offer returns, but at least we could have given gossip. Maybe that could lure customers.
‘Krish, come here,’ Bala came to me like a petrified puppy at seven in the evening.
I had packed my ‘Citi never sleeps’ bag to go back home and sleep. We had our bosses coming in two days. I had spent the last few nights making presentations for them. It was the crappiest, most thankless job in Tamil Nadu. No matter how wonderful I made my slides, the numbers were so bad, we’d be screamed at anyway. Last night I had reached home at three and then woke up again at five to teach brother-in-law dearest. I didn’t want Bala, I wanted a pillow.
‘Bala, I. . . .’ I stopped mid-sentence as he had already turned towards his cabin, expecting me to follow him.
I went into Bala’s office. He shut the door as softly as possible. He drew the blinds and put the phone off the hook. Either he wants to fire me or molest me, I thought.
‘How is it going?’ he whispered, quite unnecessarily as people had already left for the day.
‘Fine. I sent you the presentation. You approved, right?’ I said. He had given me an OK in the afternoon. The last thing I wanted was another night out.
‘Yeah, that’s fine. Listen, buddy, I need a favour from you.’
Bala had never called me buddy. The room smelt coconutty and fishy. The coconut came from Bala’s hair, the fish from his unspoken intentions.
‘What favour?’ I asked without smiling.
‘See Krish, this job, my career, it is everything to me. I have given my life to this bank.’
I nodded. Come to the point, buddy, I thought.
‘And you, as you will admit, aren’t into it as much as me. Don’t take it the wrong way.’
He was hundred percent right. But when someone tells you to not take it the wrong way, you have to take it the wrong way. Besides, I had spent the last three nights working hard with only ATM guards for company. I deserved better.
‘That is hundred percent false,’ I said. ‘I’m dying from work. I do whatever you want me to do. I sold that crap Internet. . . .’
‘Easy, easy,’ Bala shushed me.
‘There is nobody here. We are not planning a James Bond mission that we have to whisper,’ I said.
Corporate types love to pretend their life is exciting. The whispers, fist-pumping and animated hand gestures are all designed to lift our job description from what it really is – that of an overpaid clerk.
‘I’m not doubting your hard work. But see, in corporate life, we have to look after each other.’
‘What? How?’ If he didn’t come to the point in two seconds, I would slap him. In my imagination, I already had.
‘I am your boss, so I can look after you anyway. But today you have a chance to look after me.’
I kept quiet.
‘The country manager is coming. They will ask how the Internet stocks sales to housewives came about. I have to take the heat anyway. But if you could. . . .’
‘Could what?’ I prompted, just to make the scumbag say it. He didn’t.
‘You want me to take the blame?’ I hazarded a guess.
He gave a brief nod.
‘Wow, that’s unbelievable, Bala. I’m a trainee. Why will they believe me anyway?’
‘You are from IIMA. It is conceivable you had a big say from early on.’
‘And if I say it, my career is fucked.’
‘No, you are a trainee. I have to recommend your promotion. Consider that done anyway. But if I am held responsible, I don’t get a promotion, ever.’
‘You are responsible,’ I stared into his eyes.
‘Please, Krish,’ Bala said.
The boss-subordinate relationship had changed. Bala begged me for help. I realised the power I could hold over him if I gave in. I could come to office like sane people. I could leave early. I could snooze at my desk. OK, so maybe my career at the Citi overpaid clerks’ club would get affected. So what?
I could have said yes then, but I wanted him to grovel some more. I kept quiet.
‘The country manager as it is doesn’t like me. He is North Indian. He will forgive you but not me,’ Bala said. I wondered if he would cry. I could have enjoyed the show longer but I also wanted to go home and rest.
‘I’ll see what I can do.’ I stood up.
‘Is that a yes?’ Bala said, his eyes expectant.
‘Good
night, sir,’ I said, emphasising the last word.
22
My father never calls me. I have no idea why he did that night. I wanted to sleep before the misery of tuitions and office began all over again. But at eleven that night, Ramanujan knocked on the door.
‘What?’ I called out. Since the day Ananya had visited, I hardly spoke to my flatmates.
‘There’s a call for you.’
‘Who is it?’ Even Ananya never called me this late.
‘Your father. Can you ask him not to call at this hour?’ Ramanujan yawned.
I froze at the mention of my father. I prayed my mother was OK. Why would he call me? ‘Hello?’
‘Am I speaking to my son?’
I found his addressing me as his son strange. We had never had a one-on-one conversation for the last three years.
‘It’s Krish,’ I said.
‘That’s my son only, no?’
‘If you say so,’ I said.
Silence followed as two STD pulses passed.
‘I’m listening,’ he said.
‘To what?’
‘To whatever my son has to say to me.’
‘There isn’t anything left to say. Why have you called so late?’ I said in an angry voice.
‘You sent your mother your first salary cheque?’
‘Yes,’ I said, after a pause.
‘Congratulations,’ he said.
‘Is mom OK? I hope you are not calling me for some guilt trip of yours. Because if mom is not OK. . . .’ I said, separating my words with pauses.
‘Your mother is fine. She is proud of you,’ he said.
‘Anything else?’
‘How’s life?’
‘It’s none of your business,’ I said.
‘Is this the way to speak to your father?’ he shouted.
‘I don’t speak to you,’ I said, ‘in case you didn’t notice.’
‘And I am trying to increase communication,’ he said, his voice still loud.
I could have hung up the phone right then, but I didn’t want him to take his anger out on my mother. I kept quiet as he ranted about how I had let him down as a son. He didn’t say anything he hadn’t in the last twenty years. I also knew that once the monologue started, it would take a while to stop. I put the phone on the table and opened the fridge. I took out an apple and a bottle of water. I went to the kitchen, cut the apple into little pieces and came back. I had two bites and drank a glass of water. Squawks came from the phone receiver.