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.....

The begining of the end !!!

Vacation time was more than normal for me.. I was the only one senior (?) faculty in GIM who worked (??) through the two weeks when others stayed off and probably lived life…

I sat jaded with morons and oil faces instead…. Missed Anand and Sri Laxmi, Missed Ram (Strange but true!!!) and missed the cacophony that made the GIM faculty room….

Every day I would come, report to Jesus who will take me around for a walk, occasionally to the sea side where he will take a fag and then a walk to the canteen … we looked like lovers who had just got proposed some hours back, as we walked together, laughed and was seen blissful in the company of the other.. Jesus kept telling me the ‘you are like my brother’ thing, I knew it’s a lie and yet as the principle of Joseph Goebbels goes, the more he repeated it the more I fell in love with it.. I even saw a dream where I was driving a BMW X 5 and was received with a salute at the GIM portico .. (You should have seen my arrogance and pomp as I walked with a laugh )and suddenly a huge piece of meat roll, from nowhere, fell with a thud on to my proud and thus held high head …. I woke up violently and with a huge cry in my bed… The flesh mass had resemblance to the face of the KING….

Early morning dreams, they say will come true… HUH !

Prof Cherian called me to his cabin through the intercom as I sat in mine fighting darkness at the 3-I cell in the ground floor. HOD used to keep away from me for the last few months ever since the big quarrel with me and Anand and hence the call came as a shocker…

His cabin has this large HOD board ‘declaring’ that this guy didn’t expect it and when he got this bonus of a tag, he simply couldn’t resist but keep announcing it…

I visualized him moving around the campus with a huge tag around his neck with “HOD” written large and bold in it as I walked in and had a funny smile on my face..

So you didn’t get a vacation … he asked me as if he didn’t know of it…

And I guess you didn’t get one as well.. I asked poking him for the fact that he still came in every day in spite of 'being on vacation'…

He didn’t hang on that……. Did I want him to? I guess I did… huh….!. How I hoped that he did wage a war with me- the oil faced pseudo academic jerk!!!!

There are certain important changes that the management is envisaging … he told me without connecting to my eyes.. He looked every where except my eyes as if my face was something which he cannot tolerate..

If I could sit there seeing his horrible oily face, he very well could look into mine and talk….. HUH again!!!

There is an MBA course coming up.. he said… a university affiliated program unlike our current PGDM batches…

In GIM? … I asked cutting him short…

Would I talk to you about some neighbouring college? …….He kind of mocked me.. Since the bugger had a point there , I stayed put…… Stupid me !

There is a group of KEY faculty that the management is planning to allocate to form the core team of the new course.. Words fell off him, and a special emphasis on the KEY word…

I sensed trouble and could feel a rush of adrenalin on me.. drum beats and some sort of a wild roar…. I knew I shouldn’t panic…. Why should I ?......There was no reason to panic -I told a sweating myself and had to tell a bit loud as my heart beats grew large, like the growing sounds of the college band..

Come to the point you ass.. I kept repeating like a mantra (to myself) and he said…… Needless to say Sukesh, you are one among the key people who will set up the new GIM-SOB …

GIM what? …I dropped my jaws… more than the news of my moving to set up some new God damn enterprise under the GIM flag, its name pierced my ears..

GIM School of Business … Cherian clarified… that is what they would be calling the new entity.. they are starting it right across the garden, next to the canteen building..

Thanks sir.. Let me see what I can do…..I said and stood up abruptly, sending a shiver down the oil tanker…

If I could obey my mind, I would have spit on his board outside his cabin..

HOD - Head of all Dickheads……it trumpeted……

Ding… my chat box threw a pop up as I sat in the spruced up 3 I cell. (Did I tell you how I got rid of the grumpiness of the institute industry interaction cell by ordering….err  requesting….. for some lighting up, new painting and some new furniture…That was my major or  the only work during the vacation…. I wanted to throw away the morons (as well) who sat there supposedly to assist me but in real to eavesdrop and tittle-tattle. Now that is my plans for the second round of reforms in the 3 I cell…) ..

Now back to the chat box…..

Anand said…. Hey Suk … Congrats….

For what? … I typed some how even as the wild roar sounded to me again and drum beats went to an ugly crescendo …

Oh.... as if you don’t know…. Typed the ass^%&* and added a smiley …:)

I knew it was the SOB thing…. Now the world is going to laugh and I am going to SOB…  SOB?..... I asked

WTF? .. he replied….

Well ... guess he hadn’t heard of SOB and I had no intention to discuss it with him until I met Jesus….

GIM becomes the first ever Business school to have provided a car each to its teachers… said Anand…

A car each? When ? where? … for a moment I thought that Joy and co had decided to go liberal and gift a car each as loyalty bonus to the academic herd of GIM…

I forgot SOB; now that I was getting a free car I was ready to SOB or even to be taken for any God damn ride!!!

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…

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 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?

Taste of indifference!

Sri Laxmi came and sat opposite to me the next afternoon disturbing my nap…
I was in deep slumber, first with head oscillating left and right and then later half of my huge body on the table and my head on the extended left arm..

I woke up hearing the big laugh… the gal sat there with more chuckles than I could afford at that point of time…

But I am what I am and she was what she was…. elegant as ever or even more, more pompous, more beautiful and more smiling…. like a dream which came descending down with all the heavenly charm..

Yes Madam … I said half awake… how can I help you?

If you remember … she said with her eyes firmly pasted on mine…we are co coordinators of the upcoming seminar… and you seem to be keeping away..

She had become bold… she was no longer the shy damsel who once was lost in the huge interiors of GIM.. she was no longer the same old scared little lass who cried and ran away from the class room unable to bear the kids of GIM…

Her curls of long hairs on both sides of her smooth face moved in tune with the soft breeze and with eyes of such an unsure bluish brown that seemed to have mixed with their whites by mistake, she sat there expecting an answer…

I had nothing much to say… It was a problem of getting the right words and the right content.. being politically right was important… I wanted to keep away from the seminar..My ego didn’t want to play second fiddle to an inexperienced junior girl but my chivalry wouldn’t allow me to be blunt to her with that fact….

May be I should have been an evangelist..…!!!

The phone rang…

Sukesh Menon here… I said

Hey dude… what’s that babe saying… asked Anand on the other side with a dirty laugh…

Huh… I just gasped…

Lucky guy dude…. Got the best babe in town…. he said suggestively...

I didn’t dare to tell him to behave like a professor… Mind your own business.. I whispered instead and kept the phone…

I am into so many other things Sri Laxmi… I murmered without allowing her eyes to lock in mine …. They seemed to be hiding more than what they revealed… or was it just because I saw it that way?

I took it up because they said you will be with me… she said … now I am lost… I don’t know what to do and what next......

Her paradigm shift seminar was none of my worry for sure but she was, her presence was… I wanted to send her off diplomatically…

THEY? Who is that THEY? ......I shot a query to take the discussion to my channel

The management… who else? And you thought I played a game with you to be a coordinator of a stupid seminar…her face blushed with rage….

It is not yet a stupid seminar my dear… I said to myself… if you are going to do it you will for sure make it one…

A smile did bloom in my face which (may be) for her stare appeared like a scorn…

I never knew that you can be so indifferent… she said as she stood up to go but added… Big people have big ego’s I know but I always felt that you are different…

Oh yeah… different and indifferent…. I mumbled as she walked away…

Indifferent? ….

Did she say that?

INDIFFERENT?

That is what Jesus too had told me in the lift the other day…

That was the management’s view point but how did she knew that??

I saw Suhail Khan outside the HQ that evening.. he had a sad look, and agony was looming over it…he looked stressed out and almost about to crumble… If I ask something I was sure he will succumb… wanting to avoid that I tried to walk away without recognising his presence…

He wasn’t ready for that but….

Sir…… Prof Anand is talking to Dr Jesus …. He announced… I guess I will be relieved ....

I tried to smile…

Anand?

The omnipresent James Bond was there every where... he was like snowy dog in tintin series... in every frame... HUH !!!!!…

Why is it that he had no sense of what to do where and what not to do where…? Next time when I get him free I should teach him the serenity prayer.. I kept planning ans that was when Anand Mohan came out of the HQ, cheery and beaming, tapped the guys shoulder and said…. Now you can go and meet him…and let it be the last time ok…

Suhail Khan admiringly looked into the Hunk’s big eyes… He caught the prof’s hands and started crying…

Come on man… Anand said holding him in a tight embrace… be bold… just go in….

I stood there as a silent spectator… This was one rare scene in GIM…. As Suhail went inside, Anand walked away not even acknowledging my being there…

Wasn’t that indifference?

He left a trace of the denim smell and it disturbed me a lot, but the unanswered questions that he left behind was more worrying......

No words in literature can express it fully… you should meet this guy once to know what I mean..

Daggers and sheaths...part I

It was the D day for GIM…

Never before, had I seen so much of activity and bustle in the campus in my 4 years subsistence there. The team from Delhi would arrive and all was set to receive the guests who for GIM, for that day at least, was important than GOD. People were called back at war footing… It was like Pakistan had suddenly attacked and the border had to be refilled … The jawans were all geared up with guns and barrels,,, the Nags and Arjuns were deployed.. the formations were finalized.. the battle fronts were drawn and the weak links were identified…

When we walk, when we talk and when we smile… we had to be careful that day… It could be wrongly interpreted… It was not the life and death game for GIM but yes more seats for its MBA programme and more money… Even thoughts were monitored, I felt…. The cameras were always a cause of worry but that day it made everyone nervous and an uneasy calm prevailed….

The team had three people…

A fat middle aged man who looked like Eddie Murphy in the nutty professor, emerged from the Merc which was send for them specifically but the GIM management. He laughed with a roar seeing Dr Joy at the portico with his team… Jesus, the ED, the VC, Manohar and all their pen pullers and palanquin bearers. This man was not new to GIM; he was a regular and formed part of every team that came to GIM for Delhi, for INSPECTION…

The king knew how to play his card… I told myself as we all stood behind to greet the Gods who had just arrived in a Mercedes, with salvation in their bags…

Two other men also jumped out, but Eddie Murphy made them insignificant by his sheer size, the laugh and his familiarity with the place and its owners…Greets , smiles, bouquets, it looked like communist China and the Olympics they hosted… plastic smiles galore and all the down trodden were swept away to oblivion….

I would say it was a long wait for me and Prof Ram...

For me because I wanted the ritual to be over ..the customary meeting where we were counted for numbers like cattle’s are before they are taken to the butcher, asked questions- half of which they themselves answered and the other half no one could and did… it was all assumed..

For Prof Ram because he wanted to speak out (as usual)…

I don’t expect any support..he told me during the tea session, when the team was with the top brass of GIM locked in the comfort zones of the HQ…

I didn’t give and exact reply, I knew he didn’t expect one either.....I guess they have made up for the numbers… with this new guy Anand Mohan its now a perfect score board…. I said instead…

He is a close friend of Jesus… Ram whispered, leaning precariously close to me…one more spy …

I got a sudden smell of denim, from no where… Inspired from the new fellow and his charm, I had bought a bottle of denim the last evening, and had splashed it all over, but this one was different..

Oh …come on.... sir… I disagreed.. I mean, I couldn’t accept that version fully… a charming spy.. ? a secret agent… ? why not..? he had all the ingredients to be a James bond .. the allure, the physique , the style and…but sir… he is like .. he did his
MBA from UK… and a lot of international exposure…how can??

Hey Sukesh.. Prof Ram had a disbelief in his face… You are not that idiotic I know.. today, I guess you are making special efforts…

I laughed at that, but still couldn’t get the full meaning of that expression in his face…

What is your doubt? A well learned sophisticated man cannot be a friend of Jesus? Or is it that such a person cannot be a spy? Ram posed it to my startled eyes…

I just nodded my head… both were possible… in fact in GIM everything was possible…

Thank you ladies and gentle men… Eddie Murphy announced after the introduction of his own greatness as well as his team mates … he almost drew a halo on the white board and stood in front of it.. I mean.... he didn’t do it literally but could have and that would have been better…

From your faces, it is clear that all of you are happy… he took it on… but this is a formality and has to be recorded… so let us…

Another face reader... HUH...

It is an amazing campus, excellent infra structure, canteen, labs libraries and a management who has clear vision and a road map to reach that vision.. Strategically aligned to the needs of the day and………I switched of there … the jargons was unbearable for sure but more than that the one sided tirade was more horrendous ..

No complaints… I wrote in my note pad with disdain … it is going as expected…Perfect Precision...

But that is an assumption… a voice broke the silence that reigned in the other side of the room where the audience sat…

Prof Ram?.... I woke up in search of the voice ..

The whole crowd looked back, Jesus and ED including, Yes…they were also there in their capacity as faculty members…a murmur broke the silence and it took the team by awe…

Eddie Murphy looked upset and disconcerted, for being cut into during his intended lecture and also for the game plan being thwarted..

Anand Mohan stood up with a glow in his face and a smile, a fresh one in semi bloom in his lips … he looked like Moses leading the hapless people of Israel and the other side suddenly looked like the Egyptians, chasing to death an ill-fated crowd that was cornered and badly bruised …

The room was charged up suddenly … I saw a lot of electrified faces… shock ran across…

Sacrilege … I scribbled hastily in my note pad, even as I looked into Prof Ram’s face..

The first thing after this meeting, I thought was to ask for an apology… Ram had to do it…

The Red sea was roaring… Moses but, stood there- valiant and strong…….

Intellectual Orgasm >> Part II

The toilet episode as told by Sri Laxmi affected me badly. Not that I had any reverence for Dr Joseph the ED which got a stun or any fondness for her which left some sting...

But it some how disturbed me…

That hard feeling inflated when the ED called me to tell me his pronouncement that I will take over the Sales Management classes for MBA and Sri Laxmi will assist me.

Assist me? I expressed wonder

Yes.. the ED said… You can use her for assignments, paper correction etc…

But she is here to teach… I protested … how can I?

But she should learn the tricks of the trade and it is the management’s decision that she will be assisting one of the existing professors till she does…... a grin was shown in the ED’s face

Oh yeah… I said to myself.. it is the management's decision… how dare can I even think it as something which has to be opposed? Blasphemy!!!

WHY ME? Was my question again but it refused to come out.. ( as usual ) and it stayed there in my eyes, my lips and may be even in my nerve endings… As if he had read it, seen it and felt it Dr Joseph continued…

And between you…. I know… he smiled yet again… there is a chemistry.. it is good ..Together I assume that you can produce good synergy… the students will love your pairing up…

I started sweating…

Chemistry and Physics?

ASSUME?

or

ASS U ME?

Synergy…? What the fuck?

What was he? Executive director of a B school or a bloody pimp?

What was he trying to say??

What the hell? Why the students will love our pair? Was it a film discussion that was happening between Dr Joseph, the Director and Sukesh Menon the Hero..…?

Think about it.. Dr Joseph said in a tone that signaled an intended wrapping up of the meeting….

He knows that I have told you that… bloody womanizer … Srilaxmi told me in the canteen later when the decision was made known to her…

Its funny .. she laughed and said… its like…. She kept on laughing…

Stop it… I said… and what’s there to laugh… we are not bloody students here.. and listen I don’t want to be part of a gossip and rumour here…

She sat flabbergasted and staggering for words…

Let us take it up.. the challenge ..she said finally.. than trying to wriggle out… what u say? ….I will also feel comfortable that way….

But I cannot have a third person sitting in my class… I mean I never had that… it’s like… I will become conscious… I will loose myself… I argued…

At GIM but, things were all predictated …

It will happen if it was desired by the TOP… As did the toilet incident when the ED saw her in the faculty room alone by 8 in the morning, called her for a discussion to his cabin, left to the toilet in between where he slipped and fell and when she rushed in to see, hearing the clamor, he clasped hold of her hands with lust oozing out like he had an orgasm by the mere touch and when she ran out, he pleaded SORRY with a sheepish face and apology written large over his wrinkled face…

These old men…. she had lamented… he is like my father for me… huh…

Walking back to the faculty room, I made sure that I walked alone, now determined not to be seen together with the girl who from then was going to be my teaching assistant.

Why do you see me as a third person? she had asked me as I stood up, with a stare...

Chemistry !!!

The old horse had called it…
He has seen it… Many would have seen it…the colleagues, the students, the canteen staff, the garden keepers, the spies, the cameras, the walls...

OOF !!!

Why I did not see it…?

I kept asking, as the hot sun over the GIM sky burned my skin and I almost ran to reach the main building….

And who the bloody hell named it Chemistry?

Go to Hell !

A professor resigned and wanted to be relieved the next day.

Why? You ask? Well.. at GIM no one did since long back….The intellectual capital that forms one of the pillars in a B school was for ever floating here .Ever since I joined GIM, I was amazed at the number of people who have left the place. After a point of time I stopped counting heads, of who came and who left…stopped crying at farewells and almost closed building relations with my co prof’s as it did not make any sense, not any more,,,…

This one, the new exit also taught Strategy and Business policy at MBA ,like Prof Ram. He was a learned prof, a silent and humble man, a researcher, a prolific writer and voted as a good teacher but unhappy at the way GIM was treating him….

He wasn’t an exception for the discontent factor… it was there in everyone except the loyals…

Some lived with it… some just left it….

What next? Who will take over?..... The question loomed over the faculty room as did it over Dr Joseph -the ED’s table where an emergency meeting of senior professors was going on...

I am fed up with this ..... lamented the ED....I am doing a magicians job here with no one to teach and....

I guess you have to do it and only you can….. I heard some one commenting as I sat in the common area with a news paper but most of the time listening to the gathering (dirty me !!)…

Classes are already in trouble... the new ones are making a royal mess and now this... Jesus my lord.... cried ED

You are right ...laughed one of the professors…only Jesus can save..not the real one... the one here... our lord and saviour......

Ha...... scorned the ED.....he will say the same thing... new ads are released.. new people are joining... we will be flooded with intellect...ha...

The evangelist that he is.. He is good in selling pain... drawing beautiful pictures out of blood even....came another remark.

Still I think what you suggest is true ......he is the only option...confessed ED ....and anyways I am meeting him this afternoon... I guess if you can join me we can jointly put it forward... he pleaded with the dean, another senior pseudo loyal in the GIM faculty room..

Oh I would love to but I am on leave this afternoon....said the Dean with a genuine regret appearing on his face but a smile hiding behind it......he knew that it was a trap and he also knew to keep himself safe, to keep away from it.... after all he has survived the darkness and deluge of GIM for ten long years now...

Dr Jesus didn’t appear that afternoon either and Dr Joseph wandered here and there, in search of the man whom the kids nick named as Samrat Natvardhan or Nuts…Nuts that he is ..
He abruptly vanished and suddenly came back.. Would never tell it to his sub ordinates for evident reasons, and superiors...well… no one of that category ever existed in GIM.... And when he left things accumulated, meetings, decisions, files, even petty and paltry things like timetable revisions and which class room for what specialisation type decisions (HUH!), were put on hold...he enjoyed it with a sadistic pleasure and seemed to have got instant nirvana .... it was his way of telling every one that he is the boss, but the more he did it, the more looked like an ass...

Prof Ram seemed to be the only option before Dr Joseph, to hand over the subject that was left unattended like an orphan...

No way.... Prof Ram as usual didn’t mince words... I am already fully loaded with the same course in two sessions … not any more of the same subject...

But there is no one else who can take it over at this critical juncture... almost cried ED... you have to Prof Ram..

That is not my headache ....thundered Prof Ram... when you recruit faculty you should recruit based on what we need, not on what is available cheap and in bulk...

Now that should not be told to me...stood up Dr Joseph , visibly angry at the sudden development, and the anxious faces that gathered around.....you should be telling the VC and the top management....

I would sir.... no doubt... I call a spade a spade and now I am telling you since you called me. I will tell him if he does.. Have no doubt...Prof Ram retorted

I don’t want to talk to you.... go to hell .... Dr Joseph couldn’t control his emotion as he fell back into his chair...

Prof Ram scorned and smiled in sarcasm as he walked out of the ED’s cabin to the common area of the faulty room....

hahahahahaha….He roared as he came precariously close to me in my cabin ,as I almost fell off in the shock and reverberation.... go to hell? Did you hear that Sukesh ?….He asked a flabbergasted me…. Is’nt that funny? As if we are already not in one...

Ya it is true... I said to my self... But sir why me???

Intellectual orgasm>> part I

I drove late to office that day. Home pressures and the traffic took a toll and the GIM fortress was the last hurdle. GIM had huge gates that will put even the Buckingham palace to shame manned by security guards, who scan the visitor with their eyes and then with strange tools and equipments .Even the regular staff was not spared from this daily sacrament and people like me who often drove in the last minute to flash the swipe cards at the machine installed at the main entrance were the usual victims of this security drama. I often felt that Dr Joy & co suffered from a bizarre insecurity and a sort of strange diffidence which makes them put up this farce, which made an educational institution look like the main office of the Reserve bank of India.

The incessant banging of horns told me that it was 9 and panic was at its pinnacle. Students rushed in from all corners, the ones with early morning classes from the canteen, others from their hostels, with semi worn ties, a shoe in hand and the lap top bags clinging precariously from their weak shoulders running to reach the main gate..

At 9 the main gate of GIM offers a unique spectacle.. no one recognizes the other fellow… it’s a mad rush… just get in before the time…

As I swiped the card I saw three guys, senior students whom I also taught, with tonsured heads and funny looks, like the three proverbial monkeys standing there with notice boards hung around their necks.

I AM A JOKER, LAUGH AT ME……

It announced piercingly….

I did laugh and so did all and sundry who was rushing in. Hurry didn’t forbid them from stopping for a second to chuckle and then rush to life. I saw Prof Ram talking to them as one of them was sobbing like a kid. I was curious for sure but it was GIM and with Prof Ram investigating I was sure that it was a recipe for trouble. I walked away to the lift to carry myself to my second floor office where the tasks of the day were in waiting for me, with annoyance.

The crowds swell to see the spectacle and the amusement grew with every passing minute as I walked into the lift with drag steps.

I was their teacher and the three guys were good students at MBA, at least in my class.....

WHY?
Why do they have to stand with tonsured head and the funny board?
And why am I so impassionate about them?

I saw Manohar at the second floor when the lift opened, waiting with his gadgets in both the hands, wired and otherwise, earphones and Bluetooth devices dangling from everywhere and he looking like a robot who had escaped from the sets of a techno-psycho thriller….

I knew that he was going down, and in spite of the fact that he was not in charge of students and their affairs, he also did the shouting show, once a while with the students and others( even faculty) just to convey a message that he was also a boss, if not THE boss. This seems to be such a day, I assumed as I ran to my cabin, left my bag there and was decided to scuttle down to see the culmination of the episode, when Sri laxmi walked in.

You know sir… she was coming in with some news…

Ya I know I saw the jamboree downstairs...... I said with a smile…

Oh what happened downstairs..? she blinked and fluttered her eyes.. Yes! the same set of beautiful eyes…

Ohh what are you then talking about… ? I exclaimed

ED … what is your opinion about the ED…? She posed a question…

This time I blinked …with my dull eyes… the question was tricky and my verbosity wasn’t helping me much….

Dr Joseph , the ED , was the point of discussion . For me he represented the loyal group, who saw the king as God and his son as God’s gift to man kind, and his son in law as a wizard and saviour, adored the family dispensation that ran the place, accredited the fact that here management and ownership was the same and blissfully confused between both…he was the living face of the management hegemony or whatever you call it.. a smart ass who knew to lick the right ones and grease the accurate points… . He was a stooge as per critics, but for me a survivor, and OK OK teacher but who cared for teaching skills at GIM, if you knew how to endure….!!!

You didn’t give me a reply… she persisted…

I don’t know ..I fumbled.. in what context are you asking?…

Do you think he has this special ..you know… this … attraction to women?

WHAT? I reacted quite loud and it didn’t matter.. we were the only people in the faculty room…

Do you think so? She insisted.. she wasn’t any longer the innocent girl who ran from the MBA class room unable to manage the subject and its subjects…

You want me to say yes or no? I asked with a smile, disguising my confusion as to why she was quizzing me on something about which I had no clue about…

Your choice.. she retorted…

If he has... you think you can woo him and survive here? I asked with a wicked smile that came easily in my miserable face

How dare you ..she almost shouted at my suggestiveness …

Then why the hell? You think I don’t have any work here than this…?

There is a reason sir… she said in a unruffled calm voice…he is not all that good,,,

Well I had no disputes… no disputes at all… no one said, I never said.. not even he would have claimed that he is good.. he was not an angel… no one was ..to survive everyone played games and for them they were right… ethics and morality was subject to the theory of relativity ..yet again and… always!!! but then women... I was'nt sure...

He tried to grab my hand today.. inside his toilet… she said as my eyes popped out, and mouth remained open for a long long minute…

Obviously first question was “what were you doing in his toilet?” but before opening that I needed to close my mouth….

Teach the teacher !!!

Srilaxmi walked around in GIM dawdling & dragging, as if she was a new bride lost at the newness of her groom's house….

The large place threatened her.... a topper in her MBA
which she passed just a year back, she had no clue of what her career should be… May be teach at a business school, she had thought somewhere.. but neither for the admiration for the profession nor for the ardor to contribute to the development of it, but simply because her tradition bound parents would not allow her to work otherwise.
She send an application with a one page CV attached, when GIM had called last time for faculty recruitments (another regular drama that GIM undertook, foolish as per the critics but a smart way of Brand building as per Dr Joy), the VC called her for interview and because she looked good and could speak english, was appointed as a faculty in the Marketing area of GIM....

The characters in the faculty office tried their level best to make her uncomfortable, as they did with every new entrant.....telling her spiced tales of how the ever-over expecting crowd, whom they call 'students', in GIM would behave with you......how this piece of paper which the student gets to fill at the end of every course, which they call 'faculty feed back' would behead you....how thankless the deadly devils, whom everyone called 'the management' would suck your blood out and leave you empty and alone in the vast sea where everyone was a pirate or a sea wasp ...

I for one didn’t enjoy torturing her but to confess- was never very comfortable at the idea of a 20 something girl teaching Marketing to a set of over zealous 20 something’s…

Can you give me some tips..? She asked me one day while I was in the library trying to make sense of some heavy article in some international marketing journal…(those really help me when I was in deep problem.. I sit with one of them, try to read it and then get some peace of mind that my problems are far simple…. at least explicable and hence dealable) …

That was the first time she talked to me, that is after the formal introduction round where I was the chosen one… She rarely looked pleasant, when she moved around ,smiled once a while and that too faintly as if there was some thorn stuck to her permanently, somewhere …and I was surprised when she came and sat opposite to me and asked for TIPS…

Tips? …I cried… for what??

The Vice chairman told me that you are one popular teacher in Marketing… As you know I am new … I mean… I have no teaching experience… I mean I have no experience at all…so ..you know… I mean… She mumbled in inarticulate stream of utterances where words came out in an asymmetrical chain, the tone went up and down, the pitch was less than discernable but her eyes said it all….

she was petrified and needed help…

Well Madam… I said with humility that I wore as a decoration, when I felt elated…

Elated for what ?( later I kept wondering)…

The VC has told her that I AM popular as a teacher”……Hmmmm…. so he has noted it…
So…
So what ? nothing ….I knew the answer but the fact that the second top man in the GIM management knew it and has in fact recommended some one to take tips from me was worth to be jubilant…

I told her things which I was in no doubt that she didn’t understand… she was impervious not because she was arrogant but because she was ignorant… I felt pity at her plight, as I knew that her evident gullibility may turn expensive for her…

Never use the text book in the class, for instance… I said with her mouth open, suggesting to me that she was planning that, exactly that…

Cases, deep analysis of brands and issues, updated information about Markets and marketing…the sites, the blogs... the books that I read... I went on and she sat there showing me mixed expressions of fear, angst, loath, scorn and disbelief … her beautiful face was in radiance, her big eyes glittered like blue diamonds in spite of her dreary expressions ….

Come back you bloody flirt… my mind warned my wandering self…... Hey Sukesh you are a professor….

She smiled at me the next day and the comfort, for me looked like the handiwork of my TIPS….That was the day when she had to launch herself….the prospect of walking into a class which is a semi theatre with almost 100 young boys and girls sitting there with skepticism freely circulated along with the cold air from the Air Conditioners made her upset but her new friend was there to boost her morale… who else..? ME…only me....!!!......

The moment she introduced herself and Sales Management-the course which she was to 'teach them’, hands went up in the air.....

Mam do you have experience in sales..?
Mam you are just one year senior to us, how can you teach us the complexities of sales as a subject and practice..?
Mam.. Mam…Mam do you...
how?
what? Mam...

It was a semi dark room, and even other wise she wouldn’t be able to see anything.......She wanted to tell them that the VC of GIM has prejudiced her that as long as she is beautiful (which she is) and she has the command over the language, she could teach anything.....

She, but didn’t want to tell them that for her this was a stop gap arrangement, when someone comes asking for her hand in marriage, this job will make her more saleable....

Sales management was the issue, selling her in the marriage market to be precise and alas I had no TIPS to offer in that domain !!!

Shoot the messenger !!!

It was a long wait for Prof Ram…

First the admission process which kept the management quite busy and the HQ section of the GIM main building a hot bed of activities, and then came the schedule for the AICTE visit that was long pending. A lot of work had to be done before the Delhi team arrived ,with their greed packed in suitcases, pretending to be a group conscious about quality of higher education in this country and Ram never got any gap to squeeze in with his letter and discuss it with the king…

I was the prime victim of the delay, ostensibly as I sat next to him…

He edited it, modified it, tailored it even more, add more quotes and instances, cut off flab but added more, thought about it, rambled incessantly and worse -suddenly walked into my cabin or even showed up his head through the half partition to ask for my opinion on adding something or taking off something from the letter, knowing fully well that my opinion by and large remains the same…

It was discussed by others for some days and later forgotten mercilessly in the admission jamboree and the AICTE visit preparation… Women started worrying about their attire and how disgusting and deplorable it is that the AICTE team is coming on a month end and how good it would have been had it been scheduled for the next month to facilitate better sarees and matching accessories ….In the melee it seemed that only two people were bothered about the letter and its reaching its designated target.. the Kings table !!!

Me and Prof Ram….

Prof Ram was in utopia, or that is what I believed at least … I for sure knew that Dr Joy knew most of the things that was so ornately described in the letter..
May be the quotes and examples from the industry would be new but the facts wouldn’t be and if things were in the shape as they were , it was either because he intended it that way , or because he was helpless…

For me, either ways we couldn’t help it but I stopped saying that to Prof Ram, for not wanting to bicker and squabble over something which was like the classical chicken or the egg issue…

At last the day came when Madam Secretary called Prof Ram in his intercom and announced that the King is now ready and he may come to the HQ in 5 minutes if he still wanted to see the man…

I saw the Prof running out of his cabin in sheer ecstasy as did Archimedes when he ran yelling eureka eureka… Ram of course wasn’t wet and naked and wasn’t yelling, but as he ran, I could see his bliss as if he was a teenager who got an appointment to date Mallika Sherawat….

When Prof Ram walked into the palatial comforts of Dr Joy’s seven star cabin, there was a guest sitting opposite to Dr Joy..... It was not expected, and worse he expected the king to be alone to facilitate a discussion. Wedged for a moment as to what to do, Prof Ram took the seat which was offered to him.

Meet Prof Ram... Dr Joy introduced him to the guest... he teaches strategy at MBA and is a renowned expert.... in fact the back bone of intellect in GIM....

Ram smiled at the praise, knowing very well that it was diplomacy- Joy style and in utter discomfort caused by the presence of a stranger …

And he is Sam Harris... an NRI... Dr Joy introduced the guest to Prof Ram.... we are planning of starting a joint business....fish culture and export...

Prof Ram was taken aback and sat as if a lightning struck him... even the vivacious him couldn’t speak ...

The strategy that he taught wouldn’t agree to this "diversification plans " of the boss.. from education to fish… Goodness gracious!

His brain stopped thinking and as he handed over the envelope with the letter told Dr Joy in a faint mutter....

Please give a reply.... I think I have written down something very important... he muttered in an incoherent tone as if the king will realize his discontentment…

When he was gone, Dr Joy opened the letter ,read that for a minute and with contempt threw it into the dust bin...

What is that ?... asked the curious NRI...

He wants to tell me that he is unhappy and I should do something to make him happy... laughed Dr Joy...

Like...?

Give him a raise and he will shut his mouth for while, then again a letter.....grumbled the king... Teaching me... huh...?

And this stupid teachers..This is the bloody problem with them.. they think they can teach every one… I have reached so far and I god damn know how to take it further….. he went on as the NRI sat there amused and annoyed at the same time.. he had come there for fish business and now was caught in something fishy..

Oh I am sure you can handle it Joy… he said reassuringly….

Hahahahaha… the King laughed in mirth…. You bet… It’s the least of my problems…. I have dealt with such trouble makers often… one thing they don’t understand is that for me I know the art of making money and for that I don’t need an MBA…

Thank God we don’t have an MBA ….laughed the guest as Dr Joy walked up to his refrigerator and poured vodka in two glasses… Now that Prof Ram had ignited it, his interns began to blaze…

Cheers!!! they said and clang the glasses…

They talked business but Dr Joy had an eye set in the dust bin… he wanted the NRI to go to clasp the cover that he had dumped into it with disdain and disgust…

He knew that it was important…
He knew that it WAS NOT the least of his problems…
He knew it could tell him things that he never knew…
He knew that GIM could be saved if he could read it without derision.. once ..
He also knew that it could tell him things that he knew but thought to himself that others didn’t know….

Bastard!!! he still muttered even as the NRI talked fish to an inattentive king….