The subject expert - part I

Dr Joseph the ED , the VC, the family (the father, the son and the Holy Spirit) and some of the top most of the GIM team were huddled together on the first day of re-opening… The entire junior batch was there in attendance in their new role as seniors. I found almost every face- and why not?.... GIM didn’t allow leave letters and no grand mothers could die and no uncles could be hospitalized when GIM had work…

Ram came frantically to me as I stood in the main portico exchanging pleasantries with the kids who came back after some life- most of them looking their age and refreshed.

Have you got a copy of the time table? .... Ram crash landed near me….

I didn’t have and I didn’t bother… You mean the new semester?..... Was my immediate response…

Yeah the one beginning today – said Ram, suddenly smiling at the boys and girls standing around me , as if he hadn’t seen them before the sudden flight he took down to the portico.

May be the meeting is all about that …. I said ... and in any case I don’t think they will have classes today….

Ram gave me a HAVE YOU GONE BONKERS look!!!........ GIM and NO CLASSES? ….Impossible..!

Finally by 9 30 am the time table came out  , the papers were more or less the same ( children who insist in crying gets the milk- and hence my papers weren’t touched) and then by 10 am the auditorium was full with welcome speeches , experience sharing and the stuff….. I kept off from most of them except when the situation demanded my presence… Like for instance when Jesus called me to the meeting room inside the HQ which happened to be in the ice cold North Pole.

Some things had changed in GIM like the Madam secretary who now learned to smile at people, particularly me as I walked in and out of the HQ..(when I was with Jesus the Smile went even broader) .  ( to make a confession) I used to walk into HQ just for the heck of it and then walk out just to see her smile- not that it was one great smile  which a man like me would walk up and down for, but then it was great to see a moron queen coming down to smile at lesser mortals….

Back to Jesus and his call… When I walked in we had the HOD Prof Cherian .. Huh..! I hate to call him a Prof, just Cherian would do, the VC who was long missing in action, and Dr Joseph – the ED …. Again it looked like a blame storming session or even some enquiry commission or whatever the hell… My heart went a torpedo dive until the evangelists voice woke me up….

Here we have the subject expert ........said Jesus quite animatedly…

One thing was clear… the subject cannot be women or bitching as Dr Joseph was there already , It couldn’t be politics or back stabbing as the oil faced HOD was there in full glory, it couldn’t be hiring and firing either as the ace VC was there as well… The subject expert sat down in a chair given to him…

Jesus laid down a file before me…. 

GIM is going for a repositioning .. he told me like a Marketing expert…. ( now that is the 'subject' in question !!! I sighed as I relaxed in the chair )

I didn’t get a thing from the file.......may be I was too much of an expert or may be my expertise was only a piece of fiction…

Mixed pieces of roughly made ad copies were arranged in the file in some random order.. Each one looked different and had various conflicting tones and hues but three things were common in all the 5 ad copies that I saw in the file… 

The BIG GIM building, crammed full copy, and an endless parade of bullet points ….

I didn’t read it, as I threw the file in disgust.. well almost in disgust I must say... … It couldn’t be true for me… at least you can’t call it 'repositioning' – saying the same stuff that you had been saying for ages and that too making it even more grubbier ….

The idea is to make a mark above the rest.. said the VC in his Oxford English ( I guessed that he would have written the copy of the ads as well) …

Dealing with competition.. said the HOD and even before he could finish it the VC shot into his mouth…

You cant call it competition Cherian, WE do not have any ...... we lead and the rest just follow…

Jesus had a smile which showed a tint of arrogance, a very rare one for the evangelist ..

Emboldened by the smiley approval of the Prince, the old man continued.. I pity those guys if they suppose that they are competing with us… he talked liked a medieval noble whom I have seen in plenty in English drama…

I sat silent reminded of the lessons on competition that we taught the kids at GIM.. They knew better than these grand oldies, but then that was the rule of nature- the one who know wouldn’t be the one who decide…

Cherian sat silent as well, having got his mouth full, and the ED sat looking at me as if he finally had agreed that I was a subject expert indeed.

Why are we thinking of a repositioning? …..I asked Jesus breaking the deadlock…

Times have changed,… said Jesus quite confidently and then......... he dragged… … or may be I can.. errr ummm uhhhh … I guess it’s time to have a new image for GIM …

The three musketeers nodded their heads… I even heard some sounds from my HOD’s head, could be that it’s because it was the emptiest of them all..!

What’s the current image of GIM in that case sir? … I asked the panel and for the first time in this meeting I felt to be on the winning side….

Silence in competition with even more silence…

Among whom is the question… the ED tried to complicate….

That is simple..... sir…. among whom do you want to reposition, among them what is the current image of GIM ?… I said sitting straight and looking into the devilish eyes of the VC.. He never looked at men eye to eye and whenever some one locks eyes with his, he will look up and down…This time I was but sure that he will not… wherever he went, I followed…

Is that very important and information for this exercise?....... Cherian asked a smart question …

The Marketing 'HOD' that he was, I would have slapped his face for his “knowledge” of Marketing had I been sitting in the chair that Jesus so very prince fully adorned…

It is not very important sir – I said dramatically….. I would say it is the only important thing at this juncture as far as this repositioning 'exercise' is concerned..

Jesus seemed to agree, not fully though…. I wasn’t sure of the copy writers and pen pullers and I didn’t care either about their state of faces…

The meeting was dispersed even before tea and hot banana fry made appearance and that was highly untypical of a GIM meeting…

I am taking this file sir.. I told Jesus before walking out.. It may take a whole night to read all these ads…

Jesus got the message pretty fast.. I looked back while closing his cabin door and he flashed a smile - this time a plain one with no tone or tint of arrogance.....

Jesus Saves !!!

The 3 I cell in GIM was a dark and grumpy place .. The three souls that lived there ( along with a hell lot of lizards and cockroaches) knew only one boss and that was Jesus himself.. The first day of my adventure into the cave like dim lit place snubbed and pooh-poohed my thoughts and beliefs about the make of an industry interaction cell of a reputed B school.. It slapped on my face for having assumed that GIM actually meant it when from a large board that hung outside the cave it proclaimed.....“Industry Institute Interaction Cell”…

Post convocation is a lean season …all the familiar faces passed out , most of them joining their jobs, some of them taking a respite at their homes after having seen no life at GIM for two years.. Some of them joining their own business with an MBA tag.. Some quoting high prices in the marriage market with the tag and yet some jobless, hopeless and clueless in spite of the tag, or rather BECAUSE of the tag… GIM without its kids was a blank place and the immensity of the place added to the barrenness that glowered from classrooms and corners, from the canteen and the car park.. the noise was gone… a college without its students, was like a rose without its fragrance…

The teachers were all heavyhearted not because the kids had all gone but at GIM there was no concept of a vacation like in ordinary places… so even when the two – three months when the teaching shops where empty, the unfortunate teaching society had to languish in the frightening interiors of the huge place…

In a way it is better for the management to leave us on vacation .. said Ram as I came in to the faculty room where all my colleagues still sat.. I spend half my time in the 3 I cell with the lizards and cockroaches- they were far more amiable than the three odd faces that treated me as an alien and whenever I wanted to be normal , I climbed the stairs to reach the faculty office…

Why so? …… asked some one....

The idler we are, the more we gossip and statistics says that idle employees talk 90% about their management only….

And the rest 10 %? .. Anand asked..

Ram laughed and even before he could stop, I blurted out inadvertently.. May be rest 10 , they write letters about how if allowed they will change the system….

Ram didn’t laugh for this but all others did… I but didn’t hear the others; I just saw the power off in Ram’s face… I had a tint of regret but when I saw Anand and his positive reception I guess I quickly changed track…

Anand was still laughing when Dr Joseph came in calling for attention right from the door….

Now I have an announcement for all of you…he said…

Silence fell in the room as if Dr Joseph would have picked up the first guy who spoke and ask him to do a belly dance…

Just then Prof Cherian, the HOD also came in….

If winter comes can spring be far behind?.. mumbled Anand and needless to say, I produced an involuntary snicker…

ED puckered his brows at me, but didn’t venture to initiate a wrangle on that…

There was a representation made to the chairman asking for a vacation of one month for the faculty during the month of May –June.. he announced , for a moment immersed in the paper in hand and the next moment facing the audience, resembling a cow drinking from a bucket kept in its front …

I looked Ram, so did many others, huh…in fact almost every one,,,… he was the regular letter writer after all.. He sat shocked at the atrocious unanimity with which the academics at GIM at a split second decided that if it is a letter, Ram would have written it… …

Now it is decided that a sabbatical of two weeks will be granted for the faculty on rotation basis and at the discretion of the respective heads of the departments… .. ED went on...

It sounded halfhearted and half complete… questions galore and I could hear more of laugh from the ED than answers and his typical laugh with air escapes and giggles in between was more irritating than the idiots at GIM who panicked around him…

I stood up and walked off…this is one thing I hated in my fellow academicians, all through an MBA programme the teacher tells the students to work hard, think of no vacations and stuff and now this scramble..No wonder why teachers never become what they make their students off…

For me it was a fore gone conclusion… the HOD and his oil face lurked in my mind… Cherian would play a foot ball with my request, if ever I made one, I knew….

Why should you ask Cherian..? Said Anand as we retired to my new office at the 3 I cell… Jesus is your boss…

He leads … said Anand with a smile… lead me oh Jesus.. Why don’t you lead me in the middle of the air, and if my wings should fail me, wont you give me another pair?

I laughed at his acting… he was flapping his hands like wings … he was singing like a kinder garden kid….

And you know what, there is an LTC in the offing.. a leave travel concession… GIM at last is waking up to its HR issues…Anand stopped his wing flapping…

I wouldn’t believe it… GIM would be one last place to think of its people as Human resources…if at all people are counted it would come as the last, after brick, mortar, and all the inanimate stuff that modern management considers as of least important in organization building…

My face sulked… more because of the thought of an unfair vacation season where I may have to work and less because I may have to work alone… Did I for a second, hate my decision to pick up quarrels with my HOD and be his enemy?

And hey … that is bad Suk… said Anand with an open smile… just a minute ago you accused THEM of being so naïve and kiddish that they want a vacation.. and now ..?

Anand left it unfinished.. I knew I had to begin from there…

I realised that I was just another one in the annoying crowd….. I wanted to go.. I wanted to break free and attain salvation and who else but Jesus could be the savior and the only route…

All the King's men !!!

The annual convocation day.

The big wigs of GIM in convocation attire- long robes with all its silk and golden brocades, the hoods, head caps and its golden tassel danglers, the paraphernalia and pomp which every one seem to mirth at , the marching tunes, the rows of students in black robes with golden borders which but by design stood way behind the ones their teachers and the management wore , the smiles , the hugs, the relief in faces that were about to escape, the contented parents, the dinner waiting, the photographs, and the long speeches that was waiting to be vomited from the big guns that sat fully loaded on the stage and finally the moment when each student walks up to the stage with his head held high , shaking hands with the guest and takes his or her certificate and pausing for a photograph…for the ‘convocated’ it was a perfect ending for a not so perfect journey …

Teachers beamed from their seats as the function began. I sat in the second row with Prof Ram next to me and Sri Laxmi just in front. I could see Dr Joseph running up and down with his Aide-de-camp, the oil faced HOD as if they were organizing the whole thing and as if without them, none of the 370 odd kids would pass out that day.

Ram scratched my thighs and said… pretension of the highest order… it is not important how you work, but it is important how you show you work!

Life is a show sir.. I said philosophically......some are show masters

And some just sit and watch … said Ram smilingly…He wanted to scratch again but I skillfully dragged my thighs out of his antenna’s reach…

Ladies and gentlemen .. came Anand’s voice….Welcome to the 16 th annual convocation of God’s institute of management…

Anand was in his best as the anchor … Every year the onus fell on to some faculty .. many have done it but never with the grace and surge like Anand did the MC job… he has immaculate English , with its intonation and accent so spotless and precise , wisdom, wit and words flowing like a clear stream …….

After the long speeches of all and sundry who sat on the stage, the dictums and sermons on life and secrets to success, it was Dr Joy -the King’s turn…

I knew his speech almost word by word…at least the idea remained unchanged year after year and I switched off… I was already hungry… the sounds of my stomach was much more appealing than the empty hum that the unceremoniously fat grand master of the GIM circus delivered that evening…

The best part of the convocation this year was you sir… the kids seem to unanimously declare as they crowded around Anand after the official function and vied to click photographs with him… I walked around unwanted by the photo mongers and feigning to be unperturbed by the flicker and flash that people in robes and their entire din created…As Anand put it once, it wasn’t entertaining to pass off like a ship in the middle of the night…


Looking dull… said Sri Laxmi, as she struggled with a big piece of chicken that refused to plunge into her plate…

And you look quite active.. I said mockingly even when I had my eyes planted at her attempts to get the chicken piece into a ladle spoon and then to her plate with elegance …

You women are quite adamant … I said.. why don’t you take another piece and give way to others..

She wouldn’t listen and tried with even more ferocity as if I was standing there for the same chicken piece… and bang… ! it launched itself to her plate with a thud and with a large gobbet flying and landing on her gold and pink sari…

I laughed and she fumed… For me the best part of the convocation this year was not the show which was done, but this one…

Anand joined us after the photo session but by then we had almost reached the end of our dinner… Sri Laxmi had washed the oil and gravy stains in her sari, which but remained as a shocking reminder of her failed adventure with a bowl of hot chicken curry…

This is awesome .. said Anand .. to see so many happy faces, so many young guys and gals walking into corporate life… I feel so proud….

I didn’t speak; instead I concentrated on the ice-cream…

You no longer go to the gym isn’t it ?.. said Sri Laxmi…

I do….. every month I go and pay the months fees… I said and laughed at my own joke..

Anand and Sri Laxmi that night, either had gone down drastically in their humour appreciation skills, or they had a ploy not to encourage my crude sense of humour.. not any more…

And you don’t feel happy seeing our happy faces… I said with a large globe of ice-cream stuck in my throat …its not every day that GIM gives its subjects such sumptuous feasts…

Anand looked me, and making sure that his fiancé has her attention elsewhere furtively whispered.. FUCK U !!!

The ice cream globe went in with ease !

Ah…. Here is our man… in came the voice of the king who came in with his entourage…. They were still wearing the convocation robes as kids would wear their school dancing dress all the way back home, after the school day…. We stood up- half in amazement at the sudden royal interference and half in reverence ….

Great job professor Anand Mohan… said the king as he first extended his arms to an unsuspecting Anand who still had a glass of juice in his left hand and a spoon on the other.

Then the King hugged the MC of the day and proceeded for dinner with all his palanquin bearers following him.

Sri Laxmi started giggling the moment the group left , and I joined her, much to Anand’s dismay … The group went from corner to corner and table to table , throwing pleasantries at parents and their wards , a shake hand or two to the teachers and the guests and then proceeding to attack the food counter… I could see Jesus clung to his mobile phone most of the time and couldn’t see Manohar- his brother in law who was noted for his absence.. after all such occasion are where the King’s family show cased their unity in diversity..

The Maharajah’s of Mysore ..I said to Sri Laxmi in a hush tone … on a given day every year used to visit their subjects like this…

Sri Laxmi raised her eye brows…

Anand filled in… that was on Dusshera Suk .. and they used to go naked…..

Sri Laxmi sat shocked…and I said..

But I am sure that one would have looked far decent…

And then she laughed… her ice cream fell all over the place, and still she laughed and she almost fell down.. Anand tried to hold her arms but she slipped and fell, this time really down from where she was still laughing……

Anand stood there like an idiot, with one hand up with the spoon still in it and the other one scratching his ass!

The Chess board !!!

That was the last day of the annual campus placement season. GIM was no IIM and hence there was no placement week and no day zero’s and day one’s. It still was far better than many thousands of also ran B schools which never saw a corporate stepping in to select students for jobs… the last day the number of students attending the recruiting programme was quite less (others having got placement offers already)

I had just returned from my last but one class where contented faces gave me quite a respite….. I didn’t care whether they where relieved that finally it is over or whether they were actually in love with my classes… Cheerful professors sat, stood and shared jokes in the common area of the faculty room…for most, their teaching plans were hitting the last lines and in a day or two the teaching shops will close shutter and leave students for their study leave….

After the camaraderie and patch up that followed the big fight, it was all serene.. For a long time of a week, GIM looked like an ideal place to work.. People took care of their business, and I was slowly getting attuned to the change that Anand always prophesied would come.. Meeting happened between me and the HQ about my taking over the corporate relations team,( under Jesus of course) and after every meeting I got convinced why I should not walk into that trap. I but couldn’t say a no , in spite of the awareness that most of the problems in life came from either saying a yes too fast, or saying a no too late.. In my case the NO was an issue..

The announcement is coming today Prof Sukesh Menon… said Anand as we sat in the common area, sipping tea…

I knew… even with the fight and fury among my co prof’s in the back ground, my worry was the summoning to the Kings cabin…

The corporate relations team is being widened…. Prof Sukesh Menon will now be in charge of the 3 eye cell… said Anand as if he was the kings’ drummer…

Anand had gone mad. He didn’t even care that Ram was there just next to us, and as I dreaded he turned to me and said…. You know why? Prof Agarwal who was handling it has resigned … it is supposed to be secret … this guy left on incompatibility reason …….

I sat with a question mark blooming on my face …

With?... I asked quite a stupid question… at GIM all such areas as corporate relation fell under the direct regime of Jesus and the faculty who “coordinated “ it under him often has nothing much to do…At least that is what I understood till then ….

And you are simply walking in… said Ram as if he was reading a condolence message… he didn’t say that I was the first outsider to ever have had the good fortune to do this job (thankfully) !

Simply… !! HUH.. how dare he say that…I mumbled... I didn’t walk in simply….when I met them, I nodded and approved all the theory as to why it was “important for my career to also take care of the industry interaction part along with my teaching and whatever research I was doing”…

I smiled in endorsement of all the pep talk as to how good it would be to have a team of my great self, Jesus and the others in the I-I team.. I was all in concord to the gorgeous picture of GIM and its perfect I-I team. The only gap was mine and only I could fill it… The VC made the cake and Jesus topped it with his “you are my brother” icing… I hated such cakes but I ate them too often without any protest…

So that means…. ? I asked naively looking at Anand, as if he decided things, (but only after Ram left the place)…..

Anand didn’t blame my stupidity… I guess he was used to it by then,,,….

That means you are chosen because they think you have some compatibility with Jesus…

Jesus… I called out inadvertently...

How can be such a serious area handled with such laxity… I wondered as words fell out without my consent…

Laxity is your assumption suk.. said Anand and he sounded real… They are playing a game.. like chess ..until you can foresee some three moves at least in advance you possibly cannot survive…

I was flabbergasted .. I didn’t see so much of postulation and hypothesis behind my meeting the management and then again, I didn’t know them as Anand knew them …

The power to ideate, fantasise and assume makes man different from other animals.. said Anand…

Shut up.. I said….. you sound like you are the next Ram here… why do you see only negative… ?

Well dude,,,,, what is a positive without a negative? He asked…

I didn’t reply… I couldn’t win him in arguments …

You cannot defeat me possibly by your tit for tat…. I still said …

I don’t have to…. said Anand… you are doing it yourself…

Anand always told me - not every smile springs from a smile… at GIM for various reasons, smiles looked like smiles for me and if at all I read between the lips, I read it wrong…

I was being moved in the chess board ..I saw kings and queens who planned and executed strategy.. I saw brave soldiers who fought and died battles for some one else… I heard a lot of sound and fury, saw a lot of blood and dust!

But what the hell was a joker doing in the chess board?

UFO>>>>!!!

I returned with a heavy heart, (well! a heavier heart) than I left when the King called me… petrified like a cattle in the meat shop I was in a dawdling crawl to the kings abode but in return I ran, literally… what happened there is but a different story altogether…

I returned to the faculty room to witness a huge noisy hubbub.. I could hear shouting from a corner and could hear Ram’s voice…I could see a crowd and that included some students..

You are an impossible psycho…....came up the voice of Prof Ram.. and you better get treated before you totally rot this place….

Now this was too much, I mean..... it was not at all a clue at the GIM faculty room…it could be any one on the other side.. almost every one there, could fit into that title...... Impossible psycho…

Do you know whom are you talking to…… I saw as I walked (or ran? ), the well oiled face of Prof Mathew Cherain, My HOD..

I hadn’t had any moment’s gap to think whom to support… I needed no gap to judge, in a flip of a second that it would be the oily jerk that would have created the ruckus…

I am the HOD.. screamed the man from his cabin.. he was shaking like a drunk facing a storm ….

The story is public …..retorted Ram in such big decibel that will put even airports to shame….… even the gate watcher knows how creeps like you make it to the top…

Dr Joseph , the ED was seen rushing from nowhere frenetically, seemingly to save his aide-de-camp … his face was more distorted than normal and had turned crimson…

He, looked like was called to fight the fire that was on…

What the hell are you all doing here? …. he shouted at us- the on lookers…Anand and me in the front row…

ED seemed to have forgotten that 'when shows are on, crowd will gather',,,,

People went back a little but stayed put, the show was so entertaining to let it go..

What is this ? ….I asked Anand hoping to hear the story from its beginning…I was like some one who walked into a cinema post interval... the climax wasn’t spicy without knowing how the story developed…

Will tell you… this was brewing for some time now.. said Anand with a wicked smile… volcanoes better erupt than hold back..

The HOD looked like an overflowing oil tank….. slipping and flowing now and then ,here and there.. worlds failing to match his fiery facial expressions…

Now this was new for me.. the most revered senior professor at GIM fighting with a greasy lunatic… when the one professional I adored, was in battle with a qualified schemer , I knew for sure who would be the reason…

What is his problem.. argued Ram with the ED who tried to pacify the war lords.. … why the hell he has to poke his nose into my affairs.. ?

And his dirty ass into almost every ones.. said Anand with a stupid grin…

I laughed and laughed a little loud…

The ED turned to us, leaving the battle front..

Now aren’t you ashamed..? he asked me and Anand.. you are enjoying this nonsense..…

We were startled, I mean I for sure was.. I didn’t had the time to see and analyse Anand and his face,,, I just didn’t get enough time to even form my defense before be jumped on us again…

Sir.. would you stop it… Anand raised his voice to the old man who looked like he was about to eat us alive… Now if YOU cannot control your colleagues fighting that is because YOU fed it.. YOU groomed and nurtured it.. That is your headache.. Don’t try to put a show on our expense.. You are no bloody KING here…

What? …..Taken aback, but not to give up the old man barked bizarrely like an angry dog would when thrown stones at it..… What did you say…?

The war front had changed… the crowd now got a new show to watch.. I don’t remember what Ram and Mathew Cherian did at that moment because in this new flank attack that Dr Joseph had opened, I was also a party…

I said what you heard.. said Anand smiling.. if the faculty are fighting and when you ask them to stop ,if they don’t stop, that is because you have given them the wrong leadership by example.. You have been impotent and incompetent as their boss… now just because you think we will obey and never question don’t try to attack us… the same guys who pay you ,pay us as well…isn’t that clear?

Dr Joseph and his red face look like a broken tomato.. Why not? ....Hit so hard, it had to smash…

Stunned stillness provided a strange background to this uncanny anti climax.. No one talked and every one retired to their cabins and pigeon holes, waiting for the next step…

I saw Dr Jesus coming in, I knew it was going to happen but compared to what I thought would happen, he went directly to Ram’s cabin .. Heads that didn’t dare to show up till then slowly came up..

Buzz… Anand came in my chat box online……

You don’t talk if we are called.. he wrote.. I will do the honours…

I knew he was quite disbelieving about my conversation skills in testing times, that too with the bosses…Anand had this.. he was always certain and cheerful.. may be that is why I wanted to be him ….

I had a smile while I waited…

We will have a meeting… announced Jesus after his talk with Prof Ram standing at the centre of the large room where the faculty sat, lived, played, shared jokes, gossiped, read, prepared, made cut copy and paste research and now fought as well … in another 10 minutes in the conference hall… I request all you ladies and gentlemen to be there…

He walked out with the intended pun looming at the troposphere and Jesus looked like an alien who just came out of a UFO that was parked in the garden outside…

The traces of my birthday cake were still lying scattered here and there, laughing at me and the whole system…

The birthday boy - Part I

Why do we celebrate birthdays? ..... asked Anand while I was engrossed in that day's Business line….

It was my birthday and no one at GIM knew it…. now this question woke me up from the illusion that no one knew it…

I do not … I said unflappably …. So may be I wouldn’t know…

Anand laughed as he came and sat near to me in the common room.. it was the first tea break of the day and the faculty room was full of talk and laughter…

You didn’t answer me but ..insisted my friend…

I do not know… I think it is just to declare ones self importance.. existence… may be like brands advertise…

There you go… he said….. so GIM is implementing this new style of advertising from today…. The management would be hereafter celebrating its staff’s birthday officially…

I didn’t say a WOW but an awe escaped through my larger than proportionate mouth, to nowhere….

HR policies being reframed… said Anand with conviction looking at my 'not so appreciative' face… the change agent in him wouldn’t die…

By the way suk…. Happy birthday… he said and caught my hands... his eyes sparkled even though the doses of medicines and the therapy had made him a poor looking cousin of his past… you could have told me at least…

But I don’t… I protested feebly….

Happy birthday professor Sukesh… said someone from their cabin to my astonishment….. I saw Ram coming in and many others even as I tried to retire to my pigeon hole cabin…. I saw a group of office boys from the HQ coming in and taking the centre table at the sitting place and putting a larger canteen type table there with a white cloth over it… it looked like a drama set scene to scene transformation, from garden to the palace interiors and from the palace to the market place.. within seconds flowers came in… the king size chairs arrived and so did the king and his court… a large cake appeared on which my name was written ….I was caught in the fanfare, where people smiled ,made noise and rejoiced.. I still didn’t come to terms with the happening inside the faculty room that afternoon…

Anand was seen here and there among the crowd and as Jesus and Manohar came in there was a sudden silence…

Every one stood around the cake… And the King spoke,,,,,

Our employees are our friends… he said looking into the cake and then to each of our faces for a second each… here there are no superiors and sub ordinates…

The VC , ED and the others in the top management team nodded.. When the king spoke, they were all by habit attuned to this nodding no matter what he said….

I switched off and instead kept scanning the crowd.. most of them were surprised and shocked like me, some looked and stared at me as if I was hosting the show, still others seemed jealous at my propulsion to the centre of fame …. I knew that this would be the new game floor and I wasn’t prepared for that….

When the speech was over, Jesus said a prayer and after which I was asked to cut the cake… the first piece was stuffed into my mouth and then the creamy sticky mass was cut into smaller pieces and send around …

We all had had birthdays ..said some one sarcastically ,making sure that the top had left the room… but some are more equal than others…

I was in a smolder …. Pain and agony ran untamed as I sat in my cabin …

The tit bits and residuals of the cake was spread all over but my worry was the grimy looks and the puny faces that the whole show had left as residue…

Happy birthday sir… people kept on saying the whole day... students , staff, colleagues and others… in the lift , at the canteen , in the library and even at the toilet… I just wanted the day to be over soon.. the day when I had told Anand that I do not celebrate birthdays…

Professor Ram was waiting for me, walking nervously up and down outside my pigeon hole when I returned from the loo …

Why do you think, the lot again fell on you? .....he asked the moment he saw me….

I didn’t know… I was worried as well why I am the chosen one always… why I am again the first outsider who had the honor to have the king arrive and sing songs on his birthday,,,,,

Be careful… said Ram… I smell a rat in this sudden celebrity status …

Cats always smell rats.. I said to myself but tried to look cool.... I didn’t want Ram to know of my anguish….

There is a talk among the folks… said Ram…. I don’t know how far that is true…

Now that was too much for my garb to fall… my habiliment worn off and I stood like a naked beggar… he could see me raw but I didn’t know how I looked like..

I am sure I would have looked shocked…my face would have gone pale and blank.. my lips would have dried up… I could see that in Ram’s face…. A sort of a dirty glee appeared there…

Ram had this… he knew how to spin a yarn of suspense and clasp one in it…I was for sure caught in curiosity …

Jhansi Williams appeared on the back ground….

Sir you are wanted by the chairman .. she said and disappeared…

I didn’t look into Ram’s face , I just walked off tongue-tied….

the home coming !!!

Anand and his home coming went unnoticed in the hullabaloo of the alumni meet. After the initial pleasantries, he went straight to the auditorium where he sat with the other teachers who were not seemingly perturbed by the scant attendance of the alumni in the alumni meet.

Prof Ram was seen walking in between the front rows cracking jokes and pulling legs and big laughter was heard. I preferred to stay out, not because I didn’t want to be part of the fun, but because I was in the reception team and my place was at the huge portico, where Dr Joy’s large photograph hung, with a smile. There was not a big turn around to receive and when my team told me that totally 6 people had registered it was ten minute past 9 30 and the prayer song could be heard.

Dr Joy had nothing much to say except the things which he says everywhere he has a captive audience and every time he is given a mike,,,,,,

No wonder why people don’t turn out…. Said some one in my team and the rest of them giggled… I feigned to be deaf and preferred to walk up and down the long corridors of GIM……

Unfettered and unafraid I was for I was sure that the cameras were'nt seeing me, with the top brass locked in the hall where the King was waxing eloquent on how and why alumni should maintain good relations with its alma matter. Nothing, I heard about the other way round… Nothing I heard about why for any B school, its alumni was one of its building blocks… He would have known it, but it was his trait, and that ran in the entire family …. Outdated and arcane they may be for the others, but sacred and hallowed for him.

Lucky you… said an SMS from Anand… you are saved from this ordeal…..

I didn’t reply, I smiled and returned to the reception table where the girls in my team started reading some film magazine which they produced from no where (GIM taught this- planning to perfection) and the guys cruised in their mobile phones and other gadgets which they could use inside the campus only for that day just because they are in the organizing team.

Is this the alumni meet reception? ....asked some one suddenly, whom none of us had noticed walking in…

There stood a guy, small and lean with top-heavy lanky legs, and outsized specs occupying a large part of his small face. He looked tense and looked here and there with fear, suspicion and angst …

He sure was an alumnus of GIM!!!

Welcome …. I said with a smile, which he would never have seen at GIM….

He shook hands quite diffidently ….

My team got into action as a team of starved hyenas has got its prey… He gave me his business card which read

Abhimanyu Raj Mishra
Vice President-Operations
Barclays bankPLC
1 Churchill Place, London, E14 5HP
United Kingdom

I looked again into his face, the large specs trying to hide his large sparkling eyes but I could see success, a sea roaring inside the small frame of the guy who looked more like a comedian than a hero.

Please come in..................... I led him to the hall where Dr Joseph,the ED was behind the mike, laughing at his own joke and the audience as usual refusing to share his grubby giggle.

I took the guest to the two rows where the 6 or 7 alumni sat scattered and apparently jaded…

The programme had just started and yet!!! GIM was good at this again, to bore people to the core…

Seeing the guy, Dr Jesus came rushing from his seat, and hugged him as if he got back his long lost brother…
I saw the old guard of GIM hurrying to cuddle ,clasp and clinch the small frame of the visitor…
I noticed silence on the stage where Dr Joseph waited for the drama to be over to continue with his boring speech. Murmur spread in the crowd, largely students in their formal attire, blazers and ties and all the gear…..

I stood there unable to decide what to do next… leave the hapless guy to the merciless hugging crowd of GIM or take him to his seat so that moron on stage could resume his sermon….

It is his fate… I pacified myself as I walked out from the large intimidating hall to even large corridors of GIM …

The guys of my team joined me in my canteen trip while I asked the girls to stay back to receive some one incase they come…

Why is it sir, such a low turnout?..... One of the kids asked me in canteen…

I paused, took a break from my banana fry and hot tea… the question was simple but the answer was not… I mean, as a teacher at GIM I couldn’t and wouldn’t discuss with them the issues that really made people refuse to come back to their alma matter….

Would you come back if we call you..Say two years from now..? I asked him a counter question, in an attempt to pass the monkey….

He laughed and didn’t shrink as I thought he would… instead he chuckled…

To be frank Sukesh sir… said another guy …none of us want to…

I looked at the guys face where audacity ran amok… it was a rare sight in GIM …

We just want to leave this place, for whatever good that this place has done to us…said another one even as the first guy still cackled….

It wasn’t breaking news for me for sure… GIM was tough to its kids… discipline in a strange form ruled the place and was applied in disproportionate quantities among students… all were equal but some were more equal than others….

I guess, with me that day I had a group of just EQUAL guys;;;;

My mobile vibrated…

A message

Anand mohan

Suk… were ru… come and listen… alumni and their plain speak….

I didn’t want to sit and listen to discourses which had no sense of reality but now it seems the season of plain speaking had arrived…

Abhimanyu Raj Mishra was on stage when I went into the hall with my entire team….we stood at the darkness of the back rows… discipline and decorum largely never reached the dimness of the back rows…

I mean we hated this place so much so that we even had a count down calendar in our hostel rooms… the speaker said to a stunned audience… I didn’t know who all where there in the front rows but was sure shocked at the first sentence that fell on my ears. I could see sparkle in the eyes of the guys who had told me the same, in the canteen some five minutes back.

I mean the pressure that GIM put on us was so tremendous and so merciless that I was sure that GIM would never make it into my list of fond memories… he went on in a strange baritone that was a mix of all emotions… he choked, and yet he was smiling, he didn’t look the same weak frame that walked in to the GIM main building some time back….

My guys flashed a smile.. See- we- told- you grin, I must say …

But when we went on to face life, I must now admit that the pressures that we got used to here made life look simple… no bias was a bias, sleep less nights weren’t enough, no shouting was a shouting and surprises usually didn’t work with us…. and no waiting was waiting we have done it enough outside the directors rooms here,,,…. Thanks to GIM,,,,

............He said even as a half reluctant crowd semi applauded as if they didn’t quite knew what to do…

I have not come back to praise GIM… it could go a long way… this meet may be the first step…and with my appreciation let me also share my admiration to whoever has conceived this impossibility….

when I am back here I remember the old song which said....

You're that innocence
That serenity.....That long lost part of me
You're like a Sunday morning, pleasin' my eyes...
You're a mid-summer's dream under a star-soaked sky...
That peaceful, easy feelin' at the end of a long, long road..
Oh, you're like comin' home

The words were simple but had tremendous power.. it went around the hall, reverberated and landed like an atom bomb....

The crowd applauded, this time in full measure as I walked out and saw Anand in the corridor….

Appreciation, admiration… ahem ahem… I said as I hugged him…

How I hope..he said looking at the large smiling image of the king…. this guys realized that it is not brick and mortar that makes organizations…

The Sound of Silence !

Anand , called me when I came out of the Kings Chamber to inform of his plan to come back to GIM .I saluted the man for his spirit for I knew that he still had traces of the disease that dreaded him, left on his face and body. His hair had all gone, his skin lost its texture, but he was Anand, as gleeful and spirited as ever,,,, he still had time to recuperate but he wanted to join back.

Back in the faculty room when frowning faces flowed with a strange silence setting the tone as if announcing an impending disaster and I still smiling and walking around in confidence having defeated the other team in the first round, Sri Laxmi called me to the canteen….I could see ED and the HOD closeted, and regrouping as would a group of injured animals. I preferred not to see it when I walked out but the my eyes captured the image before I joined Sri Laxmi who was waiting…

She was looking too very feminine that day.. she always had it -the effeminate effulgence but her vibrancy often hid it… That day but she wore timidity over her beauty and stood in the garden waiting for me….

Your man is coming back… I said with glee… you should be jumping with joy….

She didn’t smile, instead she told me how sad she was for his new looks…

The charm of a man is in his character… I said as if I really believed it... I knew that for some one like her, his looks also mattered…Why her? Looks did matter….

I know that Sukesh sir… she said as we got into the canteen hall which was empty and lifeless.

We sat in a corner table after ordering our regular stuff.

Then what is it that you don’t know?... I asked…

My parents now want me to marry some one else… she said with a drop of tear oozing out of her eyes that spoke volumes…

And what do you want to do..? I didn’t wait to ask….

I value my relations more than anything else… she said…

I still didn’t get my answer… not that I didn’t know that when wanted, women had this unique ability to talk symbolisms but then I wanted her to tell me directly…

She didn’t….

Don’t tell me that it’s your parents who decide… I said sarcastically

I do it … and Anand is mine..she said smiling even when her eyes drizzled…

Uffff … I sighed… then what is the problem….?

She went into silence again…I preferred to remain the same..

When I couldn’t understand her silence, what will I do with her words…?

I am the new alumni relationship co ordinator… she told me as I gobbled banana fries that was one of the very few experiences that people at GIM would love to come back for.


May be they know how much you VALUE your relations… I said with a laugh…. Right person for the right job....personality job fit theory…

She showed her naughty face…

And for the alumni meet next week they have made you the co coordinator now… I got amused… with just a week to go…?

And you didn’t ask why me?... she laughed… I haven’t completed even a batch of teaching and I am the chosen one,,,
May be the King and co thinks its good that way… you don’t know them and they don’t know you… it’s a great way to kick start a relation… I said…

She beamed ,her clean and well placed rows of teeth in display … She could have been in acting, I thought….

I kept wondering at this ability of women to swing their mood as they pleased…

I also kept thinking that if for the alumni meet, the former students didn’t turn up in expected numbers; will she be plotted against?

May be it was just a paradox that Anand came back to GIM, the day when GIM at last decided to hold its first Alumni meet. It was Anand’s brain child that the meet finally took shape and against all odds and 101 reasons that the eccentric management of GIM had against such an idea. I remember how tough it was for the guy with denim smell to go from cabin to cabin and convince every jug head as to how and why it is important for a B School to cultivate its alumni and have good relations with them…

Anand walked slowly from his car and I ran towards him at the first sight. I was in the reception committee of the alumni meet and our job was to stand at the portico and register the names of the alumnus who will grace the occasion. The guys and girls of my team were all well set, well dressed and well behaved… roses and incense were in place, sweets to honour the guests who came back to their alma matter hence nostalgic, and a lot of smiles glittered… Every one smiled, even the ED and the HOD (God knows WHY!!!!)

It looked perfect and every single element was there except the alumni… None of them turned up and it was about 9 30, just half an hour to the show where Dr Joy will light the lamp and tell the GATHERING how important for GIM its ALUMNUS were…

With no one to receive, garland and give sweets to, my team got tired, their smiles disappeared .. the girls in particular seemed regretting for all the efforts that they have taken in improving their looks, having gone vain…

That was the moment when I saw Anand, walking from the canteen side, after parking his car. He wasn’t the same in elegance, he walked frail, looked thinner than I saw him last at his home and wore a cap to keep away glaring eyes from his bald head. When he shook hands and when I hugged him but, I felt relieved… a lot of my pressure oozed out…. He still had the smell of denim and the smell of a winner…

How’s the operation applecart going? He asked me with a smile that had all the charm that was entirely his…

I guess I have upset the whole applecart.. I said even as we walked to the main building of GIM….

He stood there for a minute and said… hey Suk....the key to change,is to let go of your fear….

I stood there even as he walked, and by the time I realised that I was standing there alone, the music had begun ….

So much of sound and yet a lot of silence ....

The show had begun ….

Experiential Humbug- Part I

At GIM one could hear of reforms quite often and I was party to one of the programmes that aimed at changing the GIM system..but the problem at GIM was that it was peculiarly bureaucratic…. It all started with good intentions and began well but as the old saying goes, the smallest deed is better than the grandest intention and it often got screwed at various levels. The same happened with the EMEP show..

The great Experiential Management Education Programme- the brain child of the ice cool HQ chambers, which the likes of Prof Ram called as Humbug, which the audacity of Anand had prompted me to take up as the great opportunity, which fell on me as a result of God-knows-who’s – plot, which got to start with a lot of trumpet blast and display just to die a sudden death as corporate theatres and debate sessions gave way to the academic pressures … As Ram had put it “when we don’t have sufficient time to finish classes you should have known that this will become a burden for you….” Easier said than done… HUH!!!

When the day the top brass called me finally to announce the death of the EMEP programme which they put it as “shelving for the time being” and the outsider that I was, I was the last one to be formally told. Every one else discussed it, laughed at it (in secrecy of course) and passed stupid grins at me as if I was a criminal caught with illicit liquor.

Jesus and Manohar sat next to next in the King’s chamber where I was summoned. VC and his files were in attendance and so were a couple of senior Professors. Ram was missing but Dr Joseph the ED was there as the Snowy dog of the Tintin series, present in every frame.

Every time I stepped into the larger than life place, I shuddered and shivered for no reason.

After the intro and the shelving for the time being phraseology by the VC, all the faces looked at me seemingly expecting me to blurt out, react or at least respond. But I preferred to be silent. I knew the trap; I sensed it on every face. The large photograph of Jesus the lord was the only one which at GIM remained the same, the same compassion and solace beamed, the same comfort and serenity in display. All others either stared, or scowled, some looked confused, some at times bewildered, often amused, some smiled, and some kept gazing at the ceiling as if Pablo Picasso had painted it and just left. I could see the trouble in the Kings face that for all his verbosity now looked silent and it was strange…

It is a failure that we didn’t take the EMEP programme to its desired levels of success… said the VC … clearly in what to me looked like the GIM way of orchestrated accusation.

I just wanted to know who will make the WE sound YOU and point the finger at me..

Manohar? He had nothing to do with me.. virtually nothing…

Jesus..? Will he? After all I was like his younger brother… will he?

Or any other professors? ... who looked like odd men out in the gathering..

Or Dr Joseph?… he could be the chosen one and he could be happy to put the first nail on me…. I could see a dirty bunch of hairs that rose to the occasion, from his huge ears..

Will it be Prof .Mathew Cherian my HOD, the oil faced jerk who had a lot of axe to grind…

Jesus sat a bit forward and leaned on to his dad’s table. Silence ensued as Jesus has this unique ability to convey a lot when he spoke and a lot more when he didn’t…

You were the convenor of the EMEP programme Professor Sukesh Menon and when it has failed … he said in an outlandish direct assault which was so atypical of him…. you should be answering..

I didn’t react because I couldn’t react.

Was it because it was Jesus who was the aggressor? Or was it because the total aggression was unfounded and biased? Or a combination of both…?

I kept looking at Jesus in disbelief, guess I still had a feeling that it wasn’t he, or even if it was he it wasn’t he who was talking ..he was just reading out a dialogue from a script that some one had penned in this absurd drama….

I hated Anand for the confidence that he bestowed on me to take up the job, I hated Ram for praising the first outsider who got SUCH a task at GIM… I hated myself for being so gullible, for walking into this trap with such appalling naiveté ….

You could have said if you were not interested….said the ED, smiling and looking at the HOD… together they looked like Shakuni and Duryodhan ,the plotters in Mahabharata…. Hate fumed in their eyes and I suddenly saw myself as the hapless Draupadi who got trapped in the Kaurava court!

No one wanted the EMEP, may be no one except the management, the students didn’t take the spirit of it as it was seen as another programme which was planned and send down by the top, the faculty hated it for the same reason plus the extra work for no BENEFIT as they saw it , the management forgot it after the launch for they had better things to do and for me it was hot potato that I could neither swallow nor throw away ….

I guess you can give an answer … said the King in whose hands he had an egg shaped paperweight which was an antique piece that came with him after one of his travels. He played with it as if he didn’t want to look at my face even when he talked…

Yes sir… I said suddenly…. I can… the answer is simple…. Every time a programme like this is planned, its closure is planned as well. To my knowledge that is why here things don’t work the way it should be.

Eye brows went up and disbelief spelled with oil and anger… I wasn’t being valiant in the large room which threatened a simple being like me, but was just being an animal defending it self when driven to a corner….

Academic community is the worse when it comes to politics and back stabbing…. I said without doubt and with poise….. and here we have that in abundance.

You are deviating from the topic.. said the ED, annoyed and upset…

I raised my hands, disallowing him to finish, stared at his ugly face and pasted a firm look on his full to bursting eyes . Sure enough he went silent but not before looking into Prof Mathew his co plotter to take over.

I don’t know what they all tell you sir.. I said to the King and his son… outside the HQ its all a game.. whatever you plan they want it to fail and they will make sure that it is failed…

No one spoke….

I looked at Jesus, the real one who looked frozen like a child who forgot his next dialogue on stage…
I looked at Jesus, the one in the picture who still smiled at the dirty crowd with compassion….

Anything more sir? …. I asked

Nothing Sukesh.. Said the King, putting and end to the drama even as the crowd waited for an anti climax… you may go now….

I stood up with a smile which I never had the spine to smile, shook the big guy’s fatty hands, turned to my left , bowed at Jesus and Manohar and walked out.

My mobile vibrated….

Anand calling.. it said….

Strategic withdrawal !

It was the weekly counseling day. The students of the Finance specialisation had a very peculiar problem to rise in the counseling sessions.....(The new HOD had introduced this reform where each faculty was assigned a group of students whom they will spend a full session with inside the campus and COUNSEL them…. Often it ended up as complaint sessions where the faculty would just hear things that they could in no way control or change….. For me even that didn’t happen as there was a fear… after all I was the Management’s left hand man…

No faculty ever complained of this Tuglak style reform and no student too, for them it was like a paid holiday….

Very few of their faculty was permanent, said the kids of finance repeatedly ,and the core was mostly drawn from various companies locally and hence when others were in classes they dragged on in the awful canteen or in the students area and when others went back to hostels or with their girl/boy friends for some outing, they sat in classes pretending to be in love with all the jargons and high funda that flew left and right their heads but never into it...And those faculty who joined as full timers either didn’t knew what it meant when they joined and ran away in between( when they realised it) leaving their jobs ,leaving behind more names in the long list of faculty who quit GIM or simply continued defying all notions of a faculty's survival and existence being directly proportional to student likeability ........

The game went on and so did Dr Subhajit Agarwal ,who was with GIM for the past 7 months much to the chagrin of the 'being taught' students of the Finance stream but to the delight of the Management for having employed some one who had the right people in Delhi .....

When I was in the common area with Prof Ram and a host of others chatting about simple nothings in life he came in with a smile and joined us… Ram with his uncanny ability to drag unnecessary people into unnecessary conversation, pulled him into a debate about "why not all good researchers are good teachers or some crap like that".. Sensing danger, I escaped and was walking out when I could still hear loud debates as if at the end of this debate, the King will come down and reward the winner…. ...

For the students he and his like were a tragedy, and no debate could change it, they simply couldn’t understand what he was talking about, not the hard finance, but the simple English....

For the faculty colleagues of his he was a comedy,( me and Anand laughed like hell the first day we met him) .......they wanted some one to giggle at and about, and to prove their point that the HQ (of late) recruited with intentions other than teaching ability in mind....

For the business of business education he was a disgrace, for someone who has written 23 cases and published many a research papers, would look like an asset in paper but in practice he was an NPA... a non performing asset who soon, for GIM was becoming a liability....

You know something… Asked Sri Laxmi who came opposite in the long corridor.. as I was walking out and my destination was the library…

I looked her enquiringly…

Library? .. she asked

I nodded in affirmation, and waited for her to open the news bulletin…

She kept mum as we walked down the stairs…. The classes were all in full swing and it reverberated in the quadrangles…

Demand and supply.. Inflation and deflation… Strategy and blue oceans…. The lessons echoed and created a funny ensemble

I feel hungry ..Sri Laxmy said with an unusual smile…. Heard that our canteen has some real good Chicken curry…

WTF?.............. I mumbled even while staring at her…

Library at GIM was a huge place…… partly HUGE by design but partly also because it was empty all the time, except when they took photos for the college brochure or promotion material when the kids in blazers were made to sit like robots and pretend to read from gigantic books that they never knew ever existed and would never again come in tryst with in life…

Will you listen to me if I tell you something?… she asked as I dragged a chair to sit and as she was already seated…

Women had this; they knew to ask the most unanswerable questions and yet asked them with all the innocence in their faces… How I hoped I could locate the FAQ genes in their brain and crush it…

I smiled, hoping she would understand that better than my spoken words…

Will you.. ? she insisted…

Depends… I said with anger brewed in apathy

Then I will not say…. She acted like a kid who was in her pre school…

Get lost..!!! I almost said but swallowed it when I saw the flutter in her eyes.. I could ignore her tantrums in exchange for the info that she seems to be having and was dying to divulge to me…

I will ..I said… You can trust me…

She didn’t buy it …. It wasn’t her fault.. it always happened.. my eyes defeated my intentions too often than even I could imagine,,,,,

HOD thinks that you need to be axed… she said suddenly even while I was wondering what it would be…I heard him talking to Dr Jesus….

Ever since the enquiry report , which tried to shoot the suspected en masse, went back from my table to the HOD’s with a strong rejoinder and with no signature of mine, he hated me…

But axe?....... I sat bewildered…

I was with Jesus when this call came … she told me in a hush tone…. I grasped the major part of the conversation from the way Jesus responded… it was you… your name… your behaviour….your arrogance.... your…

Excuse me… I stopped her… enough!!!…

Hello.. she laughed.. I’m not saying this… I’m just saying what I heard…

But how you know it was Prof Mathew Cherian… it could be any one… after all it’s the world of academics… every one hates everyone else… I argued

Oh no… Jesus hung the phone and asked me… How is Prof Mathew Cherian? Isn’t that proof enough…? ... she said as her eyes sparkled...

I had a larger than usual opening in place where till the other moment I had my mouth….

Exactly..she laughed… I had the same feeling....I also kept my mouth open… I didn’t know what to say…..

PLOTS… I garbled…. Bloody conspirators ….

Now the promise part… Will you? ..........She asked me nonchalantly and why not.. It was least of her problems that all this was happening to me….

Just play it cool… be normal… if you react this guys can smoke you out…. She advised. of course she didnt care whether I liked the advise....

I flashed a smile… It was competition and I taught Marketing …..

Strategic withdrawal is definitely and option!!!

I had to “give up weaker territories and reassign my resources to stronger territories” as per Kotler…

For me ,the next stop was Jesus… in crisis and in war who else but the good shepherd himself?

Ghost of the past !!!

I was sitting unoccupied at the faculty common area when Jesus called me via Jansi William, the faculty assistant. It would have been the last thing I would have liked to do at that point of time, meeting up with the bosses and listen to their pointless brouhaha… But choice was always a question and at GIM, was never available in abundance.

Enroute to the HQ ,I passed Sri Laxmi’s cabin where she sat, looking into some book but not reading from it…. she was probably posing to work for the benefit of the cameras hung from all the nook and corners…..but then how did I know it ?

… I didn’t know.. I just assumed… I was trying to draw pictures as to what would be going through her mind ….as I walked I saw Prof Mathew Cherian coming opposite to me with a smile which I saw but didn’t acknowledge as Anand and Sri Laxmi ruled my mind….…that was the case ever since I got back from the canteen to the main building of GIM and the comforts, to the centralized AC, the music and the soothing peace that it offered, as compared to the dust and din of a ruthless outside world. I didn’t know how I walked back but I remember the blurred vision with which I did, I know for sure that water drops clogged my eyes refusing to fall down but refusing to be taken back either… I knew that I became weak and the large frame that I had wasn’t balancing with the small and feeble mind that I seemed to possess… Anand was a pleasure and then a pain, and when I was trying to forget him as the past, at that hot summer afternoon he suddenly woke me up and never left me to sleep thereafter…..

Professor Sukesh… Professor Mathew called me and I crash landed….He was standing hazardously close to me…

HQ? .. he asked me ….

Yeah Sir… Dr Jesus has called me… I said dryly…

For what ?.. he asked me with inquisitiveness oozing out of his oily face….

Well… I stood there searching for words… I couldn’t tell him that for Jesus that was a preoccupation that when he gets bored of all the women of his harem, he will invite men… for small talks, tea and biscuits, forced humor and a lot of talk about Jesus(the real one!) and his miracles… Father, Son and the Holy Spirit….

Don’t know sir….I said instead…

I have heard that you are a pet of the bosses.. especially the director…but that is past…he said with a scorn even as my eyes bulged out…hope hereafter at least you will learn to respect hierarchies….

He just walked after vomiting that filth, which God knows originated where… I was least interested in the source and even the content…. I knew one thing…another enemy is here at GIM for me and that too just above me in the hierarchy…. As if the ghosts of the past weren’t enough, this new one from the present just walked past me….

I stood there for a while, wondering whether to proceed to meet Jesus or get back and work as per the HOD’s command…… at GIM the question seemingly had no alternative answers… After so many years of teaching management, if I do not know the difference between the boss and an ass, what the heck was me good for…?

Jesus was surrounded by women, who were laughing in mirth as if he was Mr Bean and a show was going on…

I stood there outside his cabin, seeing the fun gun sprouting across the room through the large glass door…. Jesus gestured me to get in, and I went in to be standing there as all the seats were full with women…… Madam Secretary was still laughing quite animatedly, but when she saw my ugly face popping into the cabin she suddenly stopped, as if she was some heroine and I was the rapist villain…

Jesus understood my predicament when I said…. Should I come back later sir…if you are busy,,,,,

Did I add a bit of sarcasm in that…? Did that sound genuine enough,,,??

No no….. he said… please you sit…. And that was indication enough for the women’s society to push off….

Have you read the monk…. He asked me when finally the cabin was left to us… me and Jesus…

The what…? I exclaimed…

The Monk who sold his Ferrari…or Think and grow rich… said Jesus… by Napoleon hill….

I was wondering at his motive… is this going to be an afternoon session on books that he read and I didn’t, and hence I should… or just a free display of gyan, or another evangelist session…? Or was there something else which for my mortal eyes wasn’t visible…….?

Yeah have read…. I said, looking into his eyes with suspicion that wasn’t easy to hide especially when one faced Jesus the evangelist….but why now?

Before you make assumptions you should think… you tend to hyper react… which is not good… Said the man with a smile… I know you wouldn’t agree now, but if you sit and think you will know…

I was cornered… I couldn’t connect… Jesus was often like women,,,, he saw things which others never did, he heard things which others never did, and he talked things which others never did and never did understood….

Can I know the context sir…. I pleaded as I was genuinely worried…

The oily face of my new HOD from where hatred mixed with jealousy and oil poured out in an interesting mixure,who threatened me unabashedly, suddenly ran amok in my mind ….

It is simple Sukesh.. you are like my brother…. Said Jesus, for a millionth time, which meant nothing to me and to him… I knew that, probably he knew that as well…

I sat straight and alert to hear him… when was the last when I assumed things..? I wanted to know…

This is not fair…. Came a voice first and then shouting and grumbling Prof Ram suddenly and with no warning… He could have knocked at least, I thought…

Jesus didn’t panic as I did… I was taken aback but he had a smile as if he knew the advent of the old war horse…

What sir.. asked Jesus even as he gestured Ram to sit, in a chair next to me…

He threw a piece of paper into the table and said… please read this….

Jesus took it and read for a second and then gave it to me…

Read it Sukesh,please.... I forgot my glasses…. He said…

I took it and glanced through the paper for a minute.. it was a printout from GIM’s official webpage… it read….

We don’t follow the crowd, instead follow a different methodology. Theory, we do teach but not like what others do. GIM believes in practical learning and we….

Jesus gestured me to stop and so did I.…

Now what about that…? Asked Jesus impatiently…

Will you tell your executive director also to read this stuff…? ... demanded Ram with matching impatience…

I sensed danger and wanted to escape… Jesus read my wriggling in uneasiness and allowed me to go…..

Ram and his problems least bothered me…. When I reached back to my cabin, Sri Laxmi was sitting there waiting….

Now what was that..?

Another ghost from the past?

New and Improved !!!

The post exam holidays came to an end so very soon that the kids who came back had the hangover so visibly written over their worried faces. They started coming in one by one and group after group, slowly trickling in to various hostels, some a day in advance and many in the last minute. Notices and instructions appeared at all the notice boards about the does and don’ts that GIM followed as rules and classes got spruced up and all the maintenance work was done. The building just needed its life blood, the kids of GIM to flow in and begin life.

The first day first class fell upon me.. in theory one would get them fresh but after a weeks holiday they were all clearly in no mood for a class- a week was too much for them to get tired and to little to get refreshed…

I had made the lesson plan, the list of readings, the list of assignments and evaluation plan, three days in advance and gave it to the ED( it was mandatory to submit the plan for his approval before the faculty proceeded with it to the first class) who sat over it and analysed it as pig would scan shit…. The ones whom he hated got the bulk of such scrutiny and needless to say Advertising management and sales promotion – my paper took a hell lot of time to get cleared….

Why is this syllabus different from that of this text book? ......He asked me like a police officer, pointing to a relic of a text book on his table…

What is this text book? ......I asked while taking it carefully, and slowly turning its pages afraid of the fact that it was as old as my grand dad and can collapse if I were harsh with it…

It is a classic book, the ideal syllabus and I was surprised that you haven’t included this in your course plan… he said, still the COP like echo added to his questions…

I guess you did study from this at your MBA days… I said with a tint of disdain, which he didn’t get. Instead he beamed and became even more eloquent on why THAT was a reason why I should be teaching from it…

Come on sir… its all gone.. I said with a smile that clearly spilled a can of red paint over his ugly face… your times were different, now it is all changed…

What you mean?..... He asked….

I mean that I have designed the course with my 7 years experience in the industry and with constant up gradation that is done with my corporate connections….....I said and remained silent

Dr Joseph didn’t speak.. Neither did he make any gestures.. I knew I had ill-treated his ego, but he called for it…he was one languorous jackass who never taught a course in the recent past but sat over everyone’s course plan as if he knew every thing of every subject.. Some one some where had to tell him to fuck off and in any case I was not in his good books…

As I left his room, I knew what he will do next … I sat in my cabin expecting a call from the lord of the rings, Dr Jesus, but which never happened…instead called me the King himself in what was literally a jolt…..

The King…? Calling a lesser mortal….?

When I passed through the HQ where the bosses sat in adjacent chambers deciding on the future of management education,Jesus was not there in his cabin… Manohar was there in his but watching some thing in his large LCD TV.. may be some third rate Tamil film which was his passion and probably from where he got inspiration for his funny hair style and his colorful attire, the VC’s chamber was dark- it seemed he didn’t turn up to office that day…and Madam secretary was there, as usual, proud and displaying vanity as if she was the kings wife and not his secretary.

Dr Joy called me… I said with a kind of arrogance and pride which I purposefully and momentarily crafted and oozed out to poke her ego balloon.

She fell for it and stared at me as if it was impossible...... I had a smirk which irritated her even more…

What is it regarding? She asked me….

How would I know,??,, you should ask your boss.. I said with a scorn even as I saw disbelief on her face which bloomed and then erupted… she would never have seen me like that.. why she?… No one had seen this me.. This new me…

In my heart of hearts I thanked just one guy…….who had injected this new found impunity into my blood.. no matter he wasn’t around, I still thought he is seeing me.. and when he is seeing me could I be looking the same old crouching and miserable academic potato?

New and improved Sukesh Menon, walked into the grand doors of the kings chamber mercilessly over a burst balloon which didn’t protest , not even for namesake….

Change the world !!

It was like Mumbai after terror… GIM after the rains looked shattered like and it had to bounce back to life….Anand was more than devastated and kept a low profile. To confess it, at first I felt good, my foul ego was finally satisfied, the one which always felt small when he was around, the one which always felt inferior when he walked, the one which always felt worthless when he talked, the one which always felt no where when he reached his targets in gun shot precision…

Later but, as a couple of days passed and when he stayed back in his cabin and I did in mine, as mobiles never rang and SMS never vibrated out, as intercoms stayed silent and as chat boxes maintained a strange silence, I got disturbed…it was for sure heeding to the fact that he has the spell, a sort of magic in him that changed the world around him.

To hell with my ego…. I mumbled as I walked to his cabin where he sat reading Change the world….and the moment I saw his book I started laughing…

Anand smiled in sadness as if he was sitting on a bed of thorns…

What is happening dear fellow… I asked him as I dragged a chair and sat opposite to him…

He didn’t reply…

Anand… what is your problem? ....I put it directly, as I saw no point in being polite and wandering around…

You really think that I created the havoc…?.... He asked me… I mean by catching the ones who copied???

I had a big chuckle…..

They would have done it the way they did it in any case my dear friend… I said taking his hands in mine and reassuring him….

But here, they have done nothing like that before…. Have they?

But here there was never such a situation before… I said with a smile… did you think about it that way?

He looked as if I was a puzzle and he was a kid trying to unravel it…

I mean… the rains, the power off, it all came together…. and hey in any case you are not the first faculty to catch kids copying… I said with confidence…

But I guess I am the first one to get them to the HQ and preside over their debarring… Anand said and there .... there I got stuck…

He was.. he was the first one to do so… he was right as well… students who copy in exams had to be send out… but to where…?

At GIM that was a big riddle….

I don’t know Suk…. He said with sheer condescension…. I don’t know what next…

I know … I said, half convinced as I had to tell something to cheer up the guy… the savior… the chosen one… the commander in chief of Operation Apple cart…

Right then Jhansi Williams came in with hesitating steps…

Dr Joy wants to meet you… she said with agony dripping from her face as if it was a bad news.. Well it was, but how would she or we know that then unless we had Nostradamus like abilities to predict…

Hmmm Anand… I told him as I got up and prepared to leave… you meet the king and come back… I shall wait …

I was wondering what it could be and why Dr Joy was the caller directly and that was when Jhansi said to me with more anguish in her face and voice…. You too sir.. Both of you in fact…

Did Anand have a flash of smile …? I don’t remember but yes, he felt comfortable at that news… he apparently felt that he was in company ..good or bad better left to time ,to decide….a calm look appeared in his face..

Manohar sat first in the King’s cabin, then the VC who was followed by Dr Joseph the ED .Dr Joy sat in the central chair and they all looked grim and gloomy. I got tense seeing them all together and the actuality that it was for us that the TOP of GIM was waiting for… Dr Jesus was notably absent and that made me uptight even more… Anand sat next to the VC and now the only two chairs that were left were one near Manohar and another one near Dr Joy. I didn’t had much of a choice as Dr Joy signaled me to the one near Manohar….

When is the EMEP programme starting? Dr Joy asked me even before I was settled in my chair…

Well … I formed an answer quickly and tried to present it but words simply refused to move out like a line of cars wedged in a traffic jam….

Whenever you are…. Said the VC…. Please present to us a plan… a detailed item to item proposal… we have planned it meticulously now the execution has to match it….

Sure sir… I said with a smile, reading between the lines of the chanakya… I knew this old man and could conjecture the countless meanings that he would imply for each word he uttered and a smile was my response….

Professor Anand and Professor Sukesh… said Dr Joy when I was about to assume that they had called us for a discussion on EMEP and its implementation…. You are two brilliant teachers at GIM and we need your help at this juncture…

I smiled at the eulogy even as I doubted its authenticity that it came from a man who did it quite often to get his work done… Anand sat with a stoic silence, and no smiles as if he didn’t want the brilliance that was just bestowed upon him….

You know the incidences that happened the other day… said the VC… it is highly condemnable that in a B school like ours, such unruly mob behaviour did happen….

He sounded plain and insincere…. He should have been India’s home minister.. I wrote in my mind as the note pad wasn’t a good idea in such a meeting…

The management but do not want to look hasty.. said Manohar…. We want to go to the roots…. and find out what is the problem….

Now this was getting interesting… this pattern that unfolded… this sequence that looked well rehearsed… this carefully worded mumbo jumbo….

What is the ED going to say? .....that was my worry ..... in any case his is the turn next….

The management has decided to form a faculty panel which will investigate into the happenings and recommend corrective action .. said the ED putting an almost end to the suspense that I had…

Now Anand and me looked left and right as the baton was passed from player one to player two. We looked like viewers in a tennis match….

So my dear friends….said the King with some drama added… We have decided based on various factors that it will be you two under the able guidance of Dr Joseph who will do the job… I wanted you to know this before we announce it.

I didn’t smile, but this time Anand, to my horror was doing it.. he looked as if he had been conferred with the Bharat Ratna and was waiting at the Ashoka hall to get it pinned to his coat…

Stupid fellow… I muttered…..

Wouldn’t you be glad to help GIM in this endeavor?… asked the VC with his eyebrows up, arched in suspicion….

Oh yeah… shouted Anand… it is a privilege…

I didn’t shout but felt the quagmire that we were walking into… Anand with a smile dancing on his blushing face and me with fear flowing out, no matter how hard I tried to control it…

When it Rained....

Some times grave and serious, rarely hilarious, timid for most of the time when I am not certain, a little jealous when I am not philosophical, cheerless when a little worried, and in high spirits when inspired… that was me according to me ……. In the class room I became a different person and did theatrics and histrionics which elevated me to a different level… It was fun… the markets, the market cake, the market share pie of the cake, competition…. But when it came to exams it was always sad to see the guys sitting blank counting stars and drawing pictures on air …
All the teaching wouldn’t be of much help and it was miserable when they wrote the paper you taught and you are in the exam hall as the supervisor…The exam season at GIM was generally not turbulent but this year it was…The rains, the copying, the suspension, the debarring, and above all the enquiry constituted by Dr Jesus for the mess that the kids made of GIM when the power went off…the enquiry is a different story but this is what happened which lead to the enquiry…

Anand Mohan was at Jesus’ cabin when the power went off and the kids rained mayhem and reigned the GIM building like the cave men of some bye gone era….papers ,plastic, coke bottles, glass and whatever they could get hold of came flying from here and there.. I had ran out choosing the more dependable rain than the chaos inside but some who were running in from the heavy rain outside got hurt from the UFO’s that came from the floors above and hit their unintended targets without clemency…

The ruckus that the guys and gals formed and the confusion that some small group in some class began for fun when the power went off, flew to the neighbouring classes with ferocity, and when power refused to come back added with rain and thunder which formed the back ground score, the chorus and fun spelt over to the corridors, the staircases and it ran shock through the system… Fun had vanished.. it was revenge, plain frustration which splurged like hot lava from a fresh volcano… the darkness gave them the excuse….

Power supply was reestablished by the GIM technicians after a war like struggle for about 20 minutes but then that was a hell lot of time needed for 250 odd men and women trapped in 5 floors of the GIM building to redefine havoc… they had no strategy, it was not planned, organized, staffed, controlled and coordinated, no one marketed the darkness and din and yet it was so perfectly choreographed bedlam……

When again the lights were on and the pandemonium died down, I went inside the building to see litter and trash everywhere, faces with blood from the flying objects and with expressions that at best could be termed as disbelief … People slowly started coming out from their rooms and shelters…

Thank God I ran out… I said to myself as I sat near the lift at the reception unable to decide what to do. I knew that the top will emerge, enquire and execute orders…

But this would be appalling even for them and may be they will axe some scapegoats but the real ones…?
Were there any real ones for that matter?

Anand came out with Jesus and a host of others who emerged from the lift which opened. The reception area which was the centre point of the attack as it opened to all the 5 floors above looked like a garbage yard and the soil and stink appeared in the lines that appeared in the top management’s face. Jesus didn’t utter a word and so did Dr Joseph the ED…The VC picked up one or two coke bottles and inspected them as if he was a finger print expert… Anand stood with them silently and with his eyes pasted at mine, clearly questioning my presence there .there was logic, some one like me, at the reception there at that point of time….?

The team walked around, inspected the receptionist whose head was bleeding, ordering for a doctor, and inspecting the damage… Physical damage that is… emotional damage was in tones and gallons and it showed in all the faces… discipline in the most rigid for was practiced in GIM and it was one of the pillars which the HQ touted as the secret of GIM’s popularity among the corporate and the parents and here it lay badly raped and bruised….

When the team went up stairs to inspect floor after floor, Anand came to me and caught my hands….

He looked dazed but still had a very peculiar smile…

Now what was that Suk??? He asked me …

Rain … I said

What are you doing here? He inquired again….

What were you doing in Jesus’ room ?… I posed a counter question…

I had gone to hand over a couple of guys whom I caught copying… he said…

Great work man… I said with sarcasm…. You would be delighted that they are debarred… for a year.. that means they will have a 3 year MBA…

Anand had a so what look in his face but didn’t respond…He was possibly surprised that I knew the news, already …

This guys were writing from a piece of paper when I was there.. I mean I can pretend to be ignorant of small tricks but …. He defended…

He had a point there but still…..

You are new but you know the system right… you could have settled it inside the class room… you should have… I said with anger…

He didn’t speak…

Can we sit some where? He asked after a long minute…

Canteen…? I gestured…

The rain had subsided but the dusk continued. It was but refreshing to walk out of the building only until we reached the garden… the garden was strewn with dirt and filth… the roses had all fallen, trees uprooted, the lawns had more clay than green and climbers lay astray and helpless like wounded soldiers….

You have created this havoc… I said while Anand still looked embittered … I was sure he regretted the decision….

He believed that piece even though that was just my postulation…the guys would in any case have done what they did even if Anand hadn’t caught some of them for copying… all the charm of the hunk had disappeared…the change agent that he was, looked a changed man himself.. the chosen one choose to remain silent, and sit there looking to the horizon like a pathetic looking hero of an art film….

I smiled …..Operation apple cart has begun…..I said to myself….