LOOKING BACK

– Composed by Tamal Ghosal.

In my heart, I don’t know why, I hate to look back,

When all I see are obvious facts, no matter how I ransack.

The year that came a year ago, was only an infant fry,

And now I see it’s a year old, about to say goodbye.

Summer was hot; monsoon wet; the winter was bitterly cold,

The year was full of extremes, we saw, we felt, we told.

And now that the infant has grown old, and about to be our past,

A million memories flock my brain, I now look back at last.

The cup of life, India won, made us all so proud,

Tsunami sabotaged Japan, consequences were loud.

Laden killed, Gaddafi slayed, Kishenji the Maoist shot,

In memory of our dear Steve Jobs, iphone 4S we got.

F1 in India, oh what news! Made all our minds so keen!

34 years old red flag at last in West Bengal, made way for tender green.

2G scandal was one nuisance; nothing else in TV was then to be seen,

Tennis star Novak Djokovic, ate grass at Wimbledon’s win.

Shammi jee, Dev Anand sahab, you’ll always be missed,

Temptations of Jagjit jee’s songs we still wont resist.

Bhimsen, Chaurasia, Hazarika’s melody, always plucked the right chord,

SRK learnt from RA-One, Don 2, he isn’t no more the reigning LORD!

Mumbai blast, oh what tyranny! The doers deserve to burn in hell,

The fire that burnt AMRI, very few lived to tell the tale.

Sehwag breaking Sachin’s twin ton, a big news at last.

Anna still in hunger mode, to change the world with fast.

Prince William and Kate tie the knot, happily ever after to live,

Captain of India Pataudi, finally was held by death captive.

Peepli live, India sent to Oscars, which the academy drops,

Ash’s girl would call BigB grandpa, and Abhishek as pops.

13 hours debate in Parliament, Lokpal bill not passed.

Market swinging up and down, investors Aghast!

 Kolaveri di, the nation hummed, no language barrier music knows!

Egyptian protestors shed their blood, as their voices rose.

Baba Ramdev, scandals, uproar, so needless all was,

Earth quake in India, was no boon, the loss was enormous.

Petrol price rising high, Sachin’s 100^th ton yet to come.

Let’s see who makes century first, hope wait be less tiresome.

For all those who think 2011 was so full of loss,

I love to say I enjoyed one loss, at the transfer of my Hitler boss.

Celebrated all festivals with fun, nothing could subdue the joy hike,

Only to add a master’s finish stroke, “yes! I got myself a bike”.

No grief can stop us on our way; no blow can tear us all apart!

No calamity can conquer us, or reduce the love in our heart.

So looking back was far too long, but it taught me nothing is to fear.

I say, all keep 2011 in your heart, and wish you a “HAPPY NEW YEAR”.

An Experience Worth Sharing

A very reputed market name, HDFC. Or so was I told. A stupid looking thin and simple man named Prasenjit Dhar once told me. He was an agent of HDFC credit card division. I was very much in need of credit card those days since I was eager to buy few stuffs online from amazon.com which required me to have visa card. So I took the offer from Mr. Dhar and got myself a platinum visa card.

Frankly speaking, it was an amazing few months with the visa card. Life was much smoother. The card was universally accepted everywhere and there was hardly any need to carry more than few hundred cash with me. However, too much greed is bad. Little did I know what future awaited me then.

It was may 2011 last week. Prasenjit Dhar gave me a phone call in the afternoon saying my credit limit has been revised and upgraded. I’ll now be given a new visa world signature card. For that all I needed to do was send a photograph of the front side of my card and a scanned copy of self attested previous credit card statement. I did the same. However, few weeks passed by but I go no new card from HDFC. I almost forgot about this whole issue. When all of a sudden on June 17^th 2011 I got an SMS from HDFC thanking me for using my card for a transaction worth Rs. 34, 960 /- to TATA AIG Life insurance Co. I was taken by surprise. I was then on my way to Vadodra on an office tour so was not in a position to send a disute statement immediately. So I waited for 5 days till I came back to Haldia and then filed a transaction dispute statement immediately for that transaction. I had blocked the card from Vadodra itself. However, this was just the beginning of the harassment.

Every alternate days I called up HDFC customer care for this dispute. They told, investigation is in progress. However, on September mid week I got a letter from HDFC that the payment has already been released and no dispute can be entertained now. That the sum has been utilized to open a Life Insurance policy at TATA AIG. The company policy has certain features for reputed companies like TATA AIG etc that transactions using HDFC card may be made in these banks without even requiring o produce pin code or even CVV number. I was told that the policy payment has been authorized by my signature and card number. Then I remembered I gave my self attested card statement and card front photograph (bearing just card number) to Prasenjit Dhar for card upgradation. I then called him up. To my utter surprise, he denied even knowing anything about card upgradation and that he never gave any such offer to me. It took me no more time to do 2+2=4.

I went to the nearest police station to lodge a diary or FIR against Prasenjit Dhar. I even managed to find his residential address and handed it over to the police. Police took 2 weeks just to file the diary, and about action, I got none whatsoever. Every alternate days I visited the police station only to listen to lame excuses like they are busy, or they forgot to look out for that man etc. In the meantime I also had filed a progressive dispute form with HDFC declining to own any responsibility of the transaction whatsoever since, on the day the policy was signed in Kolkata, I was in Haldia. However, they replied negative once again. It was then October. They declined to dispute the transaction and asked me repeatedly to make the payment. They also disclosed the policy number opened with my card in TATA AIG.

I cut my credit card into two and sent it to HDFC. In the mean time, I enquired directly with TATA AIG about my problem. They showed me the policy details. I learnt that somebody had used fake photos and sign forgery to get the policy done. TATA people, however, were most cooperative. They readily registered my complaint and within 3 weeks, refunded my Rs. 34,960/-

All this time, HDFC guys kept calling me everyday asking for the money back. I had lost mental peace due to this incessant harassment. I didn’t know how to react. The amount had summed up to Rs. 40,959 /- by the mounting interest of 4 months. I paid the original sum of Rs. 34,960/- as soon as I got the refund from TATA AIG. But HDFC people were not going to spare me so easily. For the balance Rs. 6,000 /- interest, they gathered my home phone number and began to threat my parents for the money. For a mere Rs. 6,000 /- , a reputed name like HDFC could go so low, was beyond my imagination. I had fought with the bank, insurance company, police, thug, everyone so long since it was I who was involved. Now I couldnot risk my family’s peace. So I paid the interest as well and closed the chapter finally on Nov 1^st week.

I had no need to share this silly experience of mine over here, but just to prevent others from ever falling into a similar trap I did. I wont go into the moral of the story. It is for you to infer and learn from whichever part of the story that has appealed to you most.

Thanks for reading till this point.

Transitions in career

Don’t know how far is this title of the blog a misnomer, but before one takes pain of reading it and deciphering the emotions behind writing it, I hereby admit that I’m frustrated, pissed off and under tremendous mental pressure as I pen this down.

I still remember those days when people looked up to me for help, for assignments, for cheating from in exams. I was the only guy who’d help all not only because he wanted to help but also because he only could. I was the merit guy, the uncrowned class representative, the topper, etc Shri. Tamal Ghosal. Didn’t know that topper would topple so easily when real life tested his true merit.

“True merit” is a really deceiving set of words indeed. What is true merit? Is it the art of saying “yes” to every single thing just to appear positive in life and approach? Is it the talent of coaxing or cajoling? Idealistic college chaps with good marks would say “of course not”. But there’s where they are so mistaken. A person’s knowledge, his efficiencies, his capabilities are all mere parameters that would help him clear a job interview and get into a place called “the real exam centre”. The place that recruits people based on excellence in those parameters which it itself teaches to be null and void subsequently in life. In our initial training, we were taught that work life is to learn, unlearn and relearn. I didn’t know the relevance of this line then. It actually means to learn academics in college unlearn it by mere exposure to frustrating and least technical works ever and finally relearn the art of flattery and buttery to get to the ultimate goal, promotion.

It was on a fine June summer when I went to join my company for the first day in Gurgaon. Hardly had I known anything about the future that awaits me there. A warm welcome and grand stay of 15 days did really boost me up morally. It was amazing a experience. I was in a company that surely would treat merit with its due reward. I loved it.

From there, we were dispatched to our respective locations for on the job training of approximately 3 months duration during which we shall be able to avail all facilities and earnings of a full time officer. We were sent to Haldia, a remote place, so called industrial hub of West Bengal. We had a 3 months pleasant stay there amidst other trainee friends. Time did go by like a storm. Then suddenly, on fine evening, our final postings came. Turns out most of the people were transferred away and I was to continue in Haldia only. I was no disappointed then since it was near my hometown Kolkata. So it was more or less good news. But alas! I was wrong.

I was given an office order, henceforth, to report to an Inspection Manager. I shall not disclose his name in my blog due to obvious reasons. He was a tyrant in saintly camouflage of divine spiritualism. A God fearing person, who, I now know, must’ve feared God for his own tyranny and shrewd politics. I was made full time in charge of LPG mounded bullet inspection. Our HOD seemed to have a special something for this mounded bullet project, for reasons yet unconfirmed. He made me find flaws in the construction of the bullets and report them on daily basis. It was sort of disturbing intention towards the contractors. However, I obeyed his instructions and found new checklist points every single day. This was to the utter dislike of my boss who often expressed his irritation by tearing and throwing my reports right on my face. I do not exaggerate. Things went on like this until I was given new offsite piping job under me too. I had to work day and night at site for this and hence didn’t have to face boss a lot. So I was happy and my efficiency rose to a great extent. I used to work from 7:30 hrs to 21:30 hrs every day along with frequent night shifts included. I had spent more than 4 sleepless 24 hours for my work sometimes but never regretted one bit of it since I loved to work hard. Pleased with my work, at least I thought so then, I was added the additional responsibility of the upcoming Hydro cracker and Hydrogen generation projects. I was boosted further and worked even harder. My HOD was apparently very impressed and promised me, after commissioning I was to take charge of the inspection of the running hydrocracker and hydrogen generation plants. That would be high profile indeed. So I was very happy and did put my 150% in job. The hard phase went on for another 6 months almost. I had gained confidence of the top people from production, project, maintenance, process departments as well as those of top managements including ED, GMs. Little did I know of the fact that my boss was such a jealous politician who was so jealous of my growing popularity. He thought I was overshadowing him too. Two days after the plant was commissioned, I was withdrawn from it and sent to fuel oil block for a major revamp shutdown. And that time, Hydrocracker and Hydrogen block was handed over to his favourite good boy, let’s call him Mr. X. And henceforth I was out of it. My boss also succeeded in ear poisoning my HOD against me which was evident from the evaluation he ended up giving me.

Revamp shutdown lasted for another 2 ½ months. Surprisingly I found my enthusiasm back and worked hard here too. It felt good to see, even here, other department people were really looking up to me. I was enjoying the reputation as well as praising from top management. This plant was smoothly started up too. Things were in great shape. Then one day, my boss played his role again. I was withdrawn from fuel oil block as well. Then I was handed over to Lube Oil Block (LOB) and new sulphur recovery block.

LOB is often considered very dirty and low profile zone. But to my favour, in three months from my joining, there were two major parallel M&I shutdowns in LOB. Again it was my chance to show my efficiency. I kept working hard and harder. People from all departments in this block also took special fondness for me seeing my work. I got accustomed to this block as well. Then finally comes the shutdown. My new HOD (former transferred) and boss were both becoming more and more insane and irritating. 3 people already had quit the company out of frustration and dislike for them and one senior person took his transfer by all sorts of pleadings. I was asked to check the alloy composition of each and every pipe components of the entire 2 units within a week along with regular shutdown jobs. The first time I denied a job considering it was impossible. I didn’t know that all I had to do was to say “yes”, and after that even if I didn’t do it nobody would remember. All a person here has to do is say “yes”. I was mistaken and so was thrown to nightshift for 7 days considering I was having a negative attitude towards job. However, here also I didn’t lose my enthusiasm. The systematic way in which I did night shift coordination and prepared daily reports turned out to be exemplary and got my reputation even higher among people around me.

Yes, you must’ve guessed by now. I was thrown out of LOB as well. I was then handed over to thermal power plant of our refinery. I daresay it’s the worst zone of the refinery. People here are all bloody politicians and nobody gives a damn about what work is to be done. Everybody is an arse here. And now, situation is that, I have learnt to say “yes” no matter what. I say “yes” and then do not do the work but I am always undisturbed. I butter people above me and they tend to stay happy. I do not try to get reputation out of the way and so nobody is jealous. But I realized it too late. These things may prevent further downfall but cannot get me back high ever again. As I stand today, I see a few old rusted boilers, fire water pipes and fire extinguishers. The sovereign eagle had his wings chopped off and sabotaged. All he can do now is limp and pick grains scattered on the floor.

Thus, a guy of merit and a topper has toppled in life and just trying to find one hand which can pull him up and say “move on buddy, you can still do it”. But that hand seems to be fictitious since it never comes. Even after my boss’s recent transfer, the situations didn’t improve. Nobody still thought to give me back what I truly deserved. I think, may be, I deserved this only.

Micro Observer Duty:

2^nd May 2011; a Monday to be accurate. It’s usually so irritating to wake up early on Mondays after a lazy Sunday. But this Monday was different, and so was the preceding Sunday. That’s because I had to go for my election duty and so the Sunday was busy mostly gathering and packing stuffs of utility.

I kept lying on the bed till 10 and then got up to get finally ready since the car was asked to pick us up at 12:00 hrs. At precisely quarter to 12:00 hrs I left my quarter for the officers club where the vehicle was asked to come. Eight friends including me were to start off together from our place to Contai. After we all assembled, we kept waiting for another half an hour or so till the vehicle finally arrived at 12:30 hrs. With irritation in heart and prayers in mind, we set off on our journey. The roads were known yet destination unknown so far.

At around 14:30 hrs we arrived at our designated assembly place i.e. P. K. College Contai. There were so many other people over there that we could hardly make out where to go ourselves. Following signboards we separated to our respective meeting points from where we were supposed to be sent to our assigned locations. We first had to submit our i.cards for lamination. Don’t know why’s that for considering it’s going to be used for just a day. Still, rules are rules. After, say 2 hours or more of waiting, there entered a messenger with laminated i.cards and asked us to go to the bus stand to take buses to our respective regional offices. The list of our assigned offices was displayed on some notice board, which, needless to say, required more of our endeavor to check while crossing oceans of other interested officers on similar duty.

Then, finally at evening we walked to the bus stand to witness yet another confused scenario. The transport in charge their, knew nothing whatsoever about which bus will go where. Moreover, confusion remained about where exactly were we posted, when different people started asserting different statements. It took almost 2 – 2 ½ hours there to finally ascertain our postings from the block development officer and finally get on the right bus. We reached our designated centre in few minutes after that. This, they called their regional office. Here, we were given names of our respective sector officers who’ll escort us to the sector office. We were all given different sector officers to go with.

It was pouring heavily outside and so we waited inside the regional office for the sector officer. My sector officer came at last. He took me with him and in a maruti omni along with 3 other micro observers from other places. We were taken to a most remote location I’ve ever seen in my life. It was a so called secondary school with not even a drinking water facility. Mosquitoes abandoned the place and flies and grasshoppers were plenty. It was already 23 hrs so we decided to retire to sleep. But where do we sleep. There were only narrow benches in a class room, nothing else at all. Finally we decided to join benches and sleep on them. Mosquitoes were taken care of repellant lotion that I was carrying with me. About grasshoppers, we left them to chance. Let’s see what happens.

Next morning, we had to wake up at 04:00 hrs. On freshening up beside a pond nearby, we were picked up again by our plump sector officer. He then dropped us to our respective polling stations at exactly 05:30 hrs. He dropped me in a primary school. The school was only to be called so. There were hardly 2 5x5 sq m rooms. It had corrugated tin roofs on bamboo framework, bamboo bathrooms with tin plates as doors. Electricity hasn’t reached this part of the remote world. Drinking water was no where to be found except for a hand pump which oozed saline water only. From inside this so called school was emitting some hurricane lamp light. Inside the room was sitting 4 people. Sector officer introduced them to me.  The short mustached man was the presiding officer, the tall bald man was polling officer 1, and the others were polling officer 2 and 3. Outside were four gun men with automatic rifles. They were expected to ensure security of the polling booth.

Thereafter I was left with them for the rest of the day. Polling agents representing different polling parties arrived at 6:00 hrs. In front of them, mock poll was carried out first for checking the authenticity of the ballot machine. Then at 07:00 hrs, actual poll began. It’s hard to believe how oldest of the old citizens show up with such enthusiasm and in such high numbers. Presiding officer had tough time dealing with the crowd flow and polling agent 2 was a jerk, didn’t know a bit of the job he was assigned. It was a nightmare dealing with such high number of people arriving. I was relaxed considering I was only to observe and not execute. Hourly I was to compare total nos. of votes so far. This continued till 12:30 hrs. Then I went for lunch. The lunch consisted of plain rice, salt less lentils and a very poorly prepared fish. But amidst such hunger I ate these food hungrily since I had no rice since last 1 ½ days. The hunger was literally killing me. After lunch, the presiding officer and polling officers took turns to have their lunch too while others still taking care of the poll. After that, the crowd rush was much less. People kept coming in ones and twos till almost 15:30 hrs. After that, till 17:00 hrs, no one showed up and finally, in presence of polling agents and me, the poll was officially closed. Then, I was instructed to follow all formalities till the end. The polling officers were loose indeed. They kept filling forms and submission documents for almost another 2 hrs. The polling agents had all left. It was dark around and the officers just finished their job. I too had finished filling my documents long ago. But even after 19:00 hrs, no escort van showed up. We started walking along pitch black darkness with torches in hand and walking along meandering soil roads amidst rice farms. Finally, after walking almost 2 kms, we reached a tea stall where we saw the escort van of election commission arriving.

We got on to the van with enthusiasm which finally took us to a bus stop. We were asked to get down the van and board the bus. We did accordingly and then came to know that we’ve to wait for three other polling groups to board the bus before we could move back to main centre. So we’d to wait another 1 hr until finally the bus set off for its destination. It took almost half an hour till we finally reached contai main bus stand. There we came to know that bus wont go any ahead since there’s traffic rush ahead. So we had to walk another 20 mins among rushing crowds till we finally reached our initial assembly point i.e. P. K. College.

There I found a huge crowd waiting to submit their ballot machines. Luckily separate booth was maintained for submission of micro observer report. I submitted my report after duly sealing the envelop with sealing wax. Then I communicated with my remaining seven friends from the group to assemble there. They also took their time to come and meet up. Finally we were together again. Then we decided to take dinner in a nearby hotel and this followed by our final departure homeward.

It took around another 2 hrs to reach home at around midnight. We bid ourselves farewell and finally got into my quarter only to sit down and relax. Then I freshened up to retire on bed. Next day has been declared holiday for us which definitely is good news. Sleeping and closing my eyes I began to reflect all that had happened in past few days. Considering political turmoil in Bengal, this duty was indeed a near miss but at the end of the day I’m safe though tired. This experience one can never forget in a lifetime. An achievement worth remembering. An experience worth sharing. I don’t know when I felt asleep.

Election Duty Training Day

It’s a wonderful spring morning. Getting up from bed early had never felt this sweet. Something must be terribly wrong somewhere. That’s the only thing that can explain such a strange behavior from me being happy to wake early. It’s more unusual than a cat enjoying the first monsoon drizzle.

Wondering about these, I began yet another day of my office life. Brushing, bathing, freshening, dressing and finally getting off for office. I had hardly started my pc in office when my phone rang. I answered with utmost carelessness and ease. What I heard made me alert and disbelieve my ears. Jesus! Is it possible? The said, “you have been selected, for the duty of micro observer in the state election phase of your district.”

It hit me like a bolt of lightning. “Election duty amidst such political turmoil going on in my state!” thought I. “Could my HOD not resist this much pressure from top?” All these thoughts made me go crazy but there was nothing I could possibly do. The list of selected officers has come from the election commission and district magistrate. There’s no changing it. In brief, there’s no escape.

The schedule handed over to me was as below:

·         Day 1: training at P.K. College Contai.

·         Day 2, 3: micro observer duty at south Contai.

So like an old devil fearing approaching doom, I waited for day 1 until it finally approached. It was a splendid April morning. Eight friends including me had hired an innova car for the trip. We started off at 9:30 hrs sharp from our estate. The journey began quite casually except that the driver was a roadside biker boy who hardly knew the difference between a gearless scooter and a big car like innova. He was keener on overtaking bumpers from sideways than on slowing down at speed breakers and indeed got us into a very uncomfortable ride. That aside, we didn’t have much problem in reaching the destination.

On reaching there, we knew what crowd could be like. There was no place to put foot on and they said we’re supposed to cross this crowd and reach the stage in the centre for getting the ids stamped. Cross the crowd! I mean come on; we’d be in a stampede our selves before getting ids stamped. But again, listeners are so few indeed. So we, with loads of efforts, managed to cross this ocean of people to reach the central stage and got our ids stamped. So far I felt proud of the huge population of my country. But now, all of a sudden I so regretted that huge number and disregarded them like my worst enemies. “What are so many people doing here? Who knows?”

Finally, the jostle ended and we were asked to assemble in different class rooms for training. We did so. A trainer approached and started shooting his entire election knowledge data base at us. I don’t know what we were supposed to do with so much knowledge. What does he think? We’re to continue in administrative service and election process forever! But the exasperation was interrupted by the intrusion of a very hot tempered IAS officer who’ supposed to be heading the procedure. He was seemingly very dissatisfied with the training imparted to us by the instructors and hence decided, instead of training us himself, to rebuke and yell at the instructors for half an hour. Apart from wasting time, this gesture had other ill effects too. After the training was over, the instructors were afraid and reluctant to release us, thinking the man would return again and yell back. So this wasted even more time.

Finally, after all this hustle bustle and its and bits, the training program ended. And it was lunch time. Such an amazing place we were in, at 13:30 hours, all local shops and hotels had closed and after about an hour and half of wandering all around, all we could locate was a small stall with few chapattis and lentils. We had that and set off for a nearby sea tourist spot about 30 kms away, more out of frustration and disgust than for excitement. The place is called mandarmani (although there’s nothing mani or money about that place).

It took us about 40 minutes to reach mandarmani from Contai. One unique thing about this place is that, there’s road only up to the point we reach there. After that there’s only beach and car needs to drive on the beach for few kms to get to the hotel. Now, for all people who managed to find free time to read this blog of mine, any place with any peculiarity has people finding ways to exploit that peculiarity for selfish gains or profit (in professional language). Mandarmani is no exception. There are a whole bunch of local people who dig considerable portion of the beach sand and fill them with loose sand, so that it isn’t recognizable as a pit or trap unless scrutinized carefully. When passing vehicles fall into these created pits they charge huge amounts of money to pull the heavy vehicles out of the pits and thus make a handsome profit. So we carefully drove across the beach to avoid such traps and managed to reach a nearby restaurant.

The restaurant was a decent one. We sat in the lawn and had chicken fry, mutton kabab, fried pomfret and other snacks for the evening. We were so full. Finally, it was post twilight, darkness fell. And thus we headed back home. Oh no. Not so fast. We first must drive back safely across the beach and what’s that? Roll, slip and thud. There we were, in our innova, fallen in one of those trick pits on the beach. Now what? What the hell now? Eight of us, with all our might and toil, pushed the vehicle as hard as we could but only to see it wouldn’t move an inch. And to add to our honour, we were head to toe in mud and beach sand.

Head to toe in mud and knee deep into trouble and to add to the situation, it was high tide. So we had to negotiate with local people. They asked for 5000 bucks. Helpless, we pretended being college students on picnic. I understand their difficulty in believing that but we could make them drop down to 2000 after 1 hr of negotiation. Then about 20 people pulled the innova out and we got into it, all laden and battered with mud. This way we headed home. Only to realize few mins later that our driver had drunk and his driving skills showed new colours every second.

With our eyes closed and prayers for survival in mind, finally, we reached our place at about 9:30 at night. We were not hungry and so directly headed to our quarters. On reaching there, I was in no mood for doing anything else. It was a hard day and I retired on bed. Tired and tensed about day 2 and 3. Lets see what they have in store for us.