Authors: ARUN GUPTA
Bakshi.
Bakshi’s face turned white. His mouth opened five inches wide as he re-
read the email several times.
‘What is this? What the hell is this?’ Bakshi said, his hands trembling as
much as his voice. His mouth was still open and vibrated like it was battery
operated.
‘You tell us. It is a mail from your inbox, dumb ass,’ Vroom said.
But I never wrote it,’ Bakshi said, unable to hide a hint of desperation in
voice, ‘I never wrote it.’
‘Really?’ Vroom said as he lit a cigarette. ‘Now how can you prove you
didn’t write it? Can you prove it to people in the Boston office that you didn’t
write it?’
‘What are you talking about? How is the connected to Boston?’ Bakshi
said, his face sprouting droplets of sweat through the oilfields.
‘Let’s see. What is we forward Boston a copy of this mail? The same
people who you copied on the website manual? I am sure they love employees
who do, well,
fair deals
,’ I said.
‘I never wrote it,’ Bakshi said, unable to think of better lines.
‘Or we could send a copy to the police,’ Vroom said as he blew a huge
puff of smoke on Bakshi’s face, ‘and to some of my reporter friends. You want
to be in the papers tomorrow Bakshi? Here is your chance,’ Vroom took out
his phone, ‘Oh wait, maybe I can even get you on TV.’
‘TV?’ Bakshi said.
‘Yes, imagine the headline: ‘Call center boss asks girls for sexual favors
in exchange for job’. NDTV could live on that for a week. Damn, I know I could
be a good journalist,’ Vroom said and laughed.
‘But what did it do?’ Bakshi said and ran to his desk. He opened his
email and checked the ‘Sent Items’ folder.
‘Who wrote this?’ Bakshi said and ran to his desk. He opened his email
and check the ‘Sent Items” folder.
‘Who wrote this?’ Bakshi said as he saw the same mail on his screen.
‘You didn’t?’ Priyanka said, as if in genuine confusion.
‘Mr Bakshi, I held you in such high esteem. Today my faith in my role-
model is shattered,’ Esha sand and put her hands to her face. She was good—I
think she should try for an acting career.
‘No, I swear I did not,’ Bakshi said, as he scrambled with his mouse and
keyboard.
‘Then who wrote it? Santa Claus? The tooth fairy?’ Vroom shouted and
stood up. ‘You explain this to the police, the journalists and over the video
conference to Boston exces.’
‘hah! Look I have deleted it,’ Bakshi said with a smug smile is he
released his computer mouse.
‘C’mon Bakshi,’ Vroom said with a sigh, ‘it’s still in your ‘Deleted Items
folder.’
‘Oh,’ Bakshi said and jerked his mouse. A few clicks later he said,
‘There, it is gone. No more email.’
Vroom smiled, ‘One more tip for you Bakshi. Go to your Deleted Items,
selected the tools menu and choose the “recover deleted items” option. The
mail will be there,’ Vroom said.
Bakshi’s face panicked again as tried to follow Vroom’s complex
instructions. He desperately clicked his mouse.
‘Oh, stop it Bakshi. The mail is in my inbox as well. And Vroom has many
printouts,’ Esha said.
‘Huh?’ Bakshi said as he looked like a scared rabbit. ‘You’ll never get
away with this. Esha you know I didn’t do it. You wear right skirts and tops
but I only look at them from a distance. Even those jeans that show your waist
I only saw…’
‘Stop right there, you sicko,’ Esha said.
‘You can’t get away with this,’ Bakshi said.
‘We have five witnesses Bakshi, they will support Esha’s testimony,’ I
said.
‘Oh, an we have some other evidence as well. In Esha’s drawer there is
a packet with cash, it has your fingerprints on I, in case you want to get tot
hat level,’ Vroom said.
Bakshi’s fingers trembled as if he was getting ready to ply drums.
‘We also have a printout of your visits to pornographic websites,’
Radhika said.
‘You know it is not me Esha, I will finally get proved innocent,’ Bakshi
said, his voice sounding like a hapless beggar’s. His eyes looked ready to leak.
‘Maybe. But the amazing publicity will be enough to screw your career.
Goodbye Boston,’ I said and waved my hand to indicate farewell. Everyone
else raided their hand and waved goodbye as well.
Bakshi looked at us in horror and sat down. His white face had now
turned red, or rather purple—even though it was still as shiny as ever. I could
see a twitching nerve on the side of his forehead. I felt an urge to make him
suffer more. I stood up to pick a thick management book from his bookshelf.
I went up to Bakshi and stood next to him.
‘Why are you doing this to me? I will be leaving you forever to go to
Boston,’ Bakshi said.
‘Boston?’ I said. ‘You do not deserve a posting to Bhatinda. You do not
even deserve a job. In fact, one could argue you do not even deserve to live.
You are not just a bad boss, you are a parasite: to us, to this company, to this
country. Damn you.’
I banged the management book on his hard head. God, it felt head was
hollow, as the impact made a big noise. God, it felt good. Few people in this
world get to hit their boss, but those who do will tell you it is better than sex.
‘What do you want? What is it you want? You wan to destroy me,’ Bakshi
said, rubbing his head. ‘I have a family with two kids. With great difficulty my
career is going fine. My wife wants to leave me anyway. Don’t destroy me. I
am human too.’
I disagreed with Bakshi’s last phrase. I didn’t think he was human at all.
‘Destroying you is a good, fun option,’ Vroom said, ‘but we have more
worthwhile goals for now. I want to do a deal with you. We bury this issue and
in return you do some things for us.’
‘What kind of things?’ Bakshi said.
‘One. I want to have control of the call center for the next two hours. I
need to get on the mass speaker.’
The one management is used to talk to everyone. Why do you want it?
Will you talk about this email?’ Bakshi said.
‘No, you moron. It is so save jobs at the call center. Now, do I have the
speaker?’
‘Yes. What else?’
‘I want you to write out a resignation letter for Shyam and me. Layoffs
or not, we are quitting Connexions.’
‘You guys are quitting right now?’ the girls said.
‘Yes. Shyam and I will start a small website design business. Right,
Shyam?’ Vroom said.
‘Yes,’ I said. Wow! I thought.
‘Good. And this time, no idiot will take credit for our websites,’ Vroom
said and slapped Bakshi’s face. Bakshi’s face turned sixty degrees from the
impact. He held his cheeks but remained silent, apart from a tiny dry sob. His
facial expression had a combination of ninety percent pain and ten percent
shame
‘May I?’ I said.
‘Be my guest,’ Vroom said.
Slap! I gave a slap on Bakshi’s face. The face turned sixty degrees in the
other direction. It was my most fun career moment. The shiny face turned
hot.
‘So you will do the resignation letter, okay?’ Vroom said.
‘Okay,’ Bakshi said, rubbing his cheek. ‘But Esha will delete the email
right?’
‘Wait. We are not done. Our business will require start-up capital.
Therefore, we need a severance package of six months’ salary. Understood?’
Vroom said.
‘I cannot do six months. It is unprecedented for agents,’ Bakshi said.
‘NDTV or Times of India, you pick,’ Vroom said as he took out his phone.
‘Six months is possible. Good managers break precedents,’ Bakshi said. I
guess no number of slaps could break his jargon.
‘Nice. Last thing. I want you to retract the right-sizing proposal. Arrange
a call with Boston. Ask them to postpone the layoffs to try a new sales-driven
recovery plan for Connexions.
‘I can’t do that,’ Bakshi said.
Vroom lifted his mobile phone and put it in front of Bakshi’s face.
‘I’ll make sure all of India knows you by tomorrow,’ Vroom said. ‘Listen,
you idiot. I don’t care about this job, but there are agents with kids, families
and responsibilities in life. You can’t just fire them. They are people, not
resources. Now, which news channel is your favorite?’
‘Give me half an hour. I’ll set up a call with Boston,’ Bakshi said.
‘Good we’ll bury the email. But you get the hell out of the call center,
this city, and this country as fast as you can. We need a new boss. We need a
normal, decent, inspiring human being and not a slimy, blood-sucking goofball
with fancy degrees.’
Bakshi nodded as he continuously wiped the sweat from his face.
‘Good. Anything else?; you had some questions about my monitor?’
Vroom said.
‘Monitor? What monitor?’ Bakshi said.
#33
Bakshi gave Vroom the key to the speaker room. Soon, Bakshi was on his
phone, calling Boston to arrange management meetings. I have never seen
him work so efficiently.
Vroom went to the broadcast room and switched on the mikes. I went to
the main computers bay to check for sound quality.
‘Hello, everyone. May I have your attention please? This is Vroom, from
the strategic group.’
Vroom’s voice echoed through Connexions. Every agent looked up at the
speakers as they continued to talk tot heir customers.
‘Sorry, to bother you, but we have an emergency. This is about the
layoffs. Can you please disconnect all your calls,’ the speaker said.
Everyone heard the word layoffs and a thousand calls ended at the same
time. New calls flashed, but no one picked them up. Vroom continued:
‘Idiots have managed this place, because of which we have to suffer
tonight. For their mistakes, more than a third of you will lose your jobs. It
does not seem fair to me. Does it seem fair to you?’
No response came back.
‘C’mon guys, I want to hear you. Do I have your support to save your
jobs band this call center?’
All the agents looked at each other, still in partial disbelief. Many of
them said a weak ‘yes’.
‘Louder guys, all together. Do I have your support?’ Vroom said.
‘Yes!’ a collective scream rocked Connexions.
I was standing at the corner hall of the main bay. Every agent glued his
or her eyes to the fire-drill speaker. Vroom continued, this time in a firmer
voice.
‘Thank you. My friends, I am angry. Because every day, I see some of
the world’s strongest and smartest people in my country. I see all this
potential, yet it is all getting wasted. An entire generation up all night,
providing crutches for the white morons to run their lives. And then big
companies come and convince us with their advertising to vale crap we don’t
need, do jobs we hate so that we can but stuff—junk food, colored fizzy
water, dumbass credit cards and overpriced shoes. They call it youth culture.
Is this what they think youth is about? Two generations ago, the youth got this
country free. Now that was something meaningful. But what happened after
that? We have just been reduced to a high-spending demographic. The only
youth power they care about is our spending power,’ Vroom said, and even I
was amazed at the attention every agent gave him.
Vroom continued: ‘Meanwhile bad bosses and stupid Americans suck the
life blood out of our country’s most productive generation. But tonight we will
show them. And for that I need your support. Tell me are you ready to work
hard for the next two hours?’
‘Yes!’ a collective vice cam back. The whole call center vibrated as
Vroom paused to take a breath.
‘Good, then listen. The call center will survive if our call traffic goes up.
My plan is to scare the Americans into calling us regularly. Tell them that
terrorists have hit America with a new computer virus that will take their
country down. The only was they can be safe is if they keep calling us to
report there status. We do it like this, pull out every customer number you