Devil in Pinstripes Read online

  ‘OKAY. We will talk about it later. I will ask my secretary to call you.’ He looked at Chanda and added, ‘Come, sit Chanda.’

  Boom! Boom! This reaction from Gowri shocked Sango. She was normally the centre of attraction. If Sangeeta walked in, Gowri would cut short all other discussions and speak with her. Not the other way around. Today he had cut short his discussion with her to humour someone else. This was unprecedented in the recent past . . . and that too for a NYBanker’s wife.

  ‘Okay Gowri.’ She felt quite troubled uttering those two words, before she walked off. The glare that she gave Chanda even as she walked away was not lost on her. ‘Will you call me before you leave for the party? I haven’t brought my car. I will come with you.’ Gowri didn’t even respond to the last line. Probably he was not even listening to what she was saying.

  The discussion between Gowri and Chanda lasted fifteen minutes. Gowri did not take any calls in that period and was all ears. As the last time, this time too, it ended with – ‘What’s happening at NYB?’

  After another five minutes of casual conversation, Chanda got up to leave. Her right hand pushed the glass cabin door, swung it towards the secretary’s chair and stopped. She turned back and asked, ‘Gowri, what was the payout bit that Sango was referring to?’

  ‘Oh that. Good you reminded me. She wants to increase the DSA payouts. She is facing a challenge in retaining her good sales guys. Actually, why don’t you look at it? Review it and come back to me for approval if you think it is worth it.’

  ‘Sure Gowri,’ and she walked off.

  That afternoon, Sangeeta received a mail from Chanda. A short, curt, three line message.

  Dear Sangeeta,

  I believe you wish to increase the payouts for the DSAs on account of competition hiking their payouts. Can you please send them to me? Gowri has asked me to review it before it goes to him.

  Regards,

  Chanda

  A CC was marked to Gowri too.

  ‘What the hell?’ muttered Sango. ‘Bitch!’ she cursed under her breath as she completed reading the message. She instinctively picked up the intercom to call Gowri. He had never done anything like this before, especially when it concerned Sango. After a moment’s thought, she kept the phone down. I will ask him, when I meet him. Anyway today is his son’s birthday. Why give him stress?

  The birthday party at Khar Gymkhana was at 4.30 p.m. Gowri’s wife, Amrita, had organised it with little or no help from Gowri. Though Gowri was a very devoted husband and valued his family, for him, his career was overbearing. It had to get first priority. Even though he was of high moral values and no one could doubt his character, he often compromised on his family at the altar of his career. The intensity of his professional focus could be gauged from the fact that this was the first birthday party of his son that he was attending. He would often make it a point to travel on work on his marriage anniversary just to demonstrate to everyone else that such was his commitment. Amrita often complained; however, she knew that her husband was an honest man. She also knew about her husband’s fondness for Sango, but trusted him and was confident that Gowri knew where to draw the line. She knew it and it actually was, only a platonic relationship.

  Gowri was about to leave. Sango was at his door, waiting to accompany him to the Gymkhana, which was a thirty-minute drive from office. The phone rang. ‘Suzanna, take the call and say that I have stepped out of office.’ And he started walking out with Sango. Suzanna was his secretary. Suzanna pressed a button on her instrument and pulled the call from Gowri’s line to her extension.

  ‘Oye Gowri. Phone lele.’ It was Kakkar, who had stepped out of his room and was now asking Gowri to take the call. ‘It’s Aditya, I have told him that you are in your cabin.’

  Gowri turned to Sango. ‘You go ahead Sango. I will finish this and come,’ and he walked back to his room. ‘Transfer,’ he told Suzanna as he walked back.

  The call lasted twenty minutes. He was not the kind who would tell Aditya that he had to go to a birthday party and hang up. When the phone was placed back on the cradle, there was no one around him. One look at his watch told him that he was terribly late for the party, and he rushed out, picking his keys on the way. The entire mezzanine floor was empty. Everyone had left for the birthday party. ‘The host is late,’ he thought as he rushed. And then he suddenly stopped.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked the solitary soul there. ‘Are you not coming?’

  ‘By the time I could ask someone to take me, everyone had left.’ Chanda was very apologetic. ‘I did not want to go alone, so I dropped out. I didn’t know that you had not left.’

  ‘Come, come. Pack up. You can come with me.’ And in two minutes they were out of the building. They picked up Gowri’s car from the parking lot and zipped towards Khar Gymkhana.

  Fifteen minutes into their drive, Gowri’s mobile beeped. Someone was trying to get in touch with him. ‘Chanda, can you see who it is?’ said Gowri, without taking his eyes off the road. He was driving like a man possessed and didn’t want to be distracted.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello. Who is this? Chanda? What are you doing with Gowri’s phone? Oh . . . where are you?’ the rapid-fire sequence of questions irritated Chanda.

  ‘We are driving. Enroute to the party, Sango.’

  ‘Ask her to tell Amrita that we will be there in ten minutes max,’ Gowri prompted, without taking his eyes off the road.

  ‘Gowri wants you to inform Amrita that we will be there in ten minutes.’

  ‘You guys are on your way?’ Sango was surprised. ‘When did you leave?’

  ‘About ten minutes ago. Why?’

  ‘I was waiting for Gowri in office.’

  ‘Oh. Okay. Anyway, we have left. Why don’t you leave and come now. It’s getting late,’ and she hung up.

  ‘Poor thing. She was waiting for you in office,’ she said, looking at Gowri.

  ‘It’s fine. She knows the way. She will come,’ Gowri was nonchalant. He was in too much of a hurry to really get unduly hassled.

  The party was a tame affair for all of them. Imagine the entire corporate descending for an eight-year-old’s birthday party. Arjun’s birthday party had more of his dad’s subordinates than his own friends. Sango landed late and kept glaring at Chanda all along. She couldn’t have expressed her irritation to Gowri. Even if she could, she wouldn’t have. The mail earlier in the day and now the faux pas pissed off Sango no end.

  ‘Why do you want me to show the new payout structure for DSAs to Chanda?’ she asked him the next day as soon as Gowri came to work.

  ‘Kya problem hai? I have to give her some work. Otherwise, we will be giving her a donation, not salary. Is there a problem?’ said Gowri grinning from ear to ear. Sango’s insecurity was apparent to him, and he wanted to keep her humoured too. There was enormous value in her being aligned to him. That said, he was genuinely fond of her.

  Later in the day, a reassured Sango sent the document proposing a change in the DSA commission payout structure to Chanda. NFS was paying their DSAs five percent of the loan value for every loan that they brought in. Sango was now proposing that this be increased by two percent. For every one lakh of loan, she was proposing a payout of 7,000 rupees as against a payout of 5,000 rupees earlier. The logic being offered for the rejig of the payout structure was that competition banks, the likes of SCB, etc., had increased their payout which was impacting the sales channels of NFS. As per the justification note submitted by Sango, her DSAs were leaving and joining competition.

  Chanda read the note on her way back home. She knew what had to be done.

  Punctual by nature, she was in by 8.45 a.m. the next day. She was the first one in. Getting down to work on her computer, she cleared whatever little backlog that was there by ten, post which she stepped out to the pantry to pick up a cup of coffee. Hardly had she got back to her workstation, when her intercom beeped.

  ‘What the hell is this?’

  ‘Plea
se introduce yourself?’ Chanda was peeved at the tone of the person at the other end of the phone.

  ‘I said what the hell is this, Chanda? Who the hell are you to send me such a mail?’ Aah, now she knew. It was Sangeeta. As usual she had come in late and on logging into her mailbox had seen Chanda’s response to her commission payout increase request.

  Earlier in the morning, Chanda had sent out a detailed response to Sangeeta’s request for a review of incentive payout:

  Dear Sangeeta,

  I have reviewed the proposed commission payout grid for DSAs. I have also spoken to few of the sales managers that I personally know in competition and have the following comments:

  Our current payout to DSAs is higher than what competing organisations pay them for loan originations.

  Competitors feel that our DSAs are highly paid and therefore, have apparently stopped poaching our DSAs. They feel that our DSAs are too expensive to deal with.

  In view of this, I would like to request you to provide me with the names of the DSAs who have moved to competition and the impact that this has created on business. I will review the payout grid once you provide these details and then revert. Till then, I am putting this request in abeyance.

  Gowri, I will revert to you on this once I have more details as requested, from Sangeeta.

  Regards,

  Chanda

  Sangeeta had seen this note in the morning and was furious. In that agitated state of mind, she called up Chanda.

  ‘Is there something wrong in my mail?’ Chanda said innocently. It would be incorrect to say that this call was completely unexpected.

  ‘Nobody has declined any approval requests of mine. Do you understand that?’

  ‘Someone just did sweetheart.’ Chanda was not the one to give up. Mentally, she was very strong.

  ‘I don’t know why they even hired someone like you, who doesn’t even understand the business. Why don’t you just go and handle the call centre, bitch?’

  This infuriated Chanda but she kept her cool and added, ‘Sangeeta, I will respond calmly to your comments. I am not paid to take this shit from you. If you think there is anything wrong in my message, please take it up with Gowri. He asked me to give my views and I have done that. I am hanging up.’ And she kept the phone down. ‘What the hell! How dare she speak like that?’ she muttered to herself. She was shivering with anger. No one had spoken to her in that tone ever. The phone rang again. She picked it up. ‘Hi Chanda.’ It was the same voice. ‘YA?’ She was angry and her tone left no stones unturned in making the other person know that.

  ‘Cool down Chanda. I was just getting irritated. Come let’s catch up on a cup of coffee.’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘I am sorry madam. Smile now. I am coming down.’ And Sangeeta hung up. She came down to Chanda’s desk and the two of them went out for a cup of coffee.

  This was not something Sango would have normally done, but the problem was that everything that Chanda had said in her mail was true. If she would have carried forward the fight to Gowri, it would unnecessarily bring these uncomfortable issues like sales force management, their productivity, their payouts and related issues to the fore and might affect Gowri’s perception of her. Hence, she wanted to quickly kill the discussion. For her, Gowri’s impression of her was sacred. She couldn’t afford to let Chanda’s tirade dent that impression.

  That was the last either of them heard of the incentive discussion. It, however, had one impact. Sangeeta realised that Chanda was no pushover and she had to be watchful of her.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ Mona asked Chanda, one evening, a few weeks later. She was a part of Chanda’s team at SCB before she quit and joined NYB. Now she was a sales manager in the western team, reporting to Sangeeta.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Today in our team meeting, Sangeeta told us not to pass on any information to you directly. Anything that goes to you has to be routed through her. She didn’t say why.’

  ‘Follow instructions,’ said Chanda, as she walked away from the coffee vending machine towards her desk. She, for once, considered mentioning this to Gowri, but dropped the idea. Gowri’s relationship with Sangeeta was too strong for her to compete against. A strong voice echoed in her head – ‘Pick your battles’. She had heard Aditya mention that to Amit once.

  On the work front, things only improved for her. Gowri started giving her a fair bit of importance. For him, she was the link into the bank. She was the reliable ‘informant’ who could dish out all the juicy gossip that did the rounds in the bank – something that Gowri craved for all the time. He involved her in sales, product management, marketing, process management and everything in which she could contribute even in the tiniest of ways. In a nutshell, he kept her humoured and happy, though it came at the cost of Sangeeta’s peace of mind. But that was the real Gowri. Outside home, human relationships and emotions didn’t matter. Everyone was to be used. Be it Chanda or Sangeeta.

  Along the way, Vikram Oberoi resigned. His intention to resign had brought along winds of change for Chanda’s fortune at NFS. However, he was retained by Aditya and hence, his position did not come up for grabs, laying to rest Gowri’s plans to pitch for that job.

  Amit kept hassling Aditya for the promised business manager job, which was taking its own sweet time in coming. Whether opportunities didn’t exist or whether Aditya didn’t swing them for him, he couldn’t tell.

  In the midst of all this, however, Aditya got promoted to become the CEO of New York International Bank. As compared to being the head of retail banking, where he served for much longer than what anyone thought he would, he now wielded much more power over a wider canvas. There could have been no better news for Amit.

  20 December 2007

  Bandra Police Station

  Mumbai

  Naik let out a deep sigh as he moved away his hand from Amit’s shoulder and sat down on the wooden plank next to him. Amit’s eyes followed him in earnest. It was as if they were pleading. Their helplessness was evident. The eyebrows shrunk around them as if they were holding the weight of the entire face and preventing it from falling apart. The folds on his forehead looked like the cracks in the dry lands of remote Thar Desert. Chanda’s hand was on his knee. She could feel it shivering in anxiety. Worry was corroding her from within, but she had to keep a facade of courage, else Amit would have broken down. She had never seen him so stressed.

  The anxiousness was not because he was sitting in the police station. It was because he did not know why he was there. Naik had not told him about it.

  ‘I am heading back to office. I will get the CEO to speak to the state home minister. We need to get someone at that level involved in this.’

  ‘Why isn’t anyone telling me what happened?’

  ‘It’s quite murky Amit. It’s unfortunate that you have been brought into this. But it is not your doing.’

  ‘What is that damn “IT”?’ Amit was screaming now. Blood-shot eyes and veins throbbing around his temples made it evident that he was very close to losing his mental balance. Hours had passed since he came to the police station, and no one had yet told him what the issue was.

  ‘The dead guy is haunting us Amit.’

  ‘Who? . . . The same guy?’

  ‘Even his family is dead. You know that.’

  ‘Oh shit! This is exactly what I was fearing. Now what?’

  ‘His father has filed a case in which he has also named you. This has the blessings of that state’s chief minister.’

  ‘Who is Jai Shankar Ram? The warrant mentioned someone by this name as the complainant.’

  ‘He is the father.’

  ‘What are the charges?’

  ‘Abetment to suicide.’

  Amit’s hand went up and clutched his forehead. ‘Oh my God! But what have I done? I don’t even know him. I haven’t even met him. How can I abet a suicide? Shit man! This is ridiculous! What will happen now? Please do something. Get me out of this.’ And he looked at Cha
nda, sitting next to him. She looked worried sick. ‘This could be a bad one,’ he told her. It was becoming unmanageable.

  ‘I will try and move a petition today. I don’t want to give you unrealistic commitments. Highly unlikely for us to get you out of this place today. We are being drawn into a political quagmire and you know as well as I do that THAT is not good news.’

  ‘What the hell, Naik? I am a senior vice president in the New York International banking group. No one can treat me like this. I can’t be held responsible for doing what the organisation expects me to do.’ After screaming at the top of his voice, he realised what he had done. Everyone in the large hall was looking at him. Being the centre of attraction and that too in a place of ill-repute wasn’t a particularly exciting proposition. Holding his head with both hands as if it would fall off if he won’t, a sudden silence followed as he sank back in his seat. His back arched over and his head came to rest between his knees, his palms still clutching his face.

  He looked up again. First at Naik, then at Chanda. And then towards his right, where beyond the pillars, and rows of tables with pot bellied constables sitting behind them, he could see numerous semi-rusted rods of steel. Behind those were faces – extremely intimidating, unshaven and rowdy-like. And then he saw a face, which looked like his own – a shrunken face, an inch of beard on it, unwashed with long dirty hair untidily flowing all over his face. He was terror-stricken at the thought of him behind those very bars. Thankfully, he was shaken back to reality. Rakesh Srivastav was standing by his side. Hand on his shoulder. ‘Let’s go,’ he said.

  Amit got up from the bench, Chanda too followed. He looked towards Naik. ‘I will come back Amit. Have patience. I will find a way out of this.’ Amit just looked at him without saying anything.