Asked to Leave

  “No brother, but I don’t have a lot of choices like you, what do you think my age is?” He let me know his compulsion to stay with that organisation.

  “It must be 30.” I said assuming him 35 years in mind.

  “You are kidding me. I am 38.” I heard him saying it with a request to listen to his complete story.

  “How about your family?” Honey asked me a personal question. It was generally not expected by a colleague asking about family. With that question, he was entering into the world of friendship, but before digesting someone’s friendship, irrespective of a guy or a girl, a lot of the facts were remaining to understand, especially after being fed the poison-mixed water and biscuits in September 2010.

  “I have my mother, who stays in the hometown in the hill stations in far-Western part of Nepal, brothers have own business, father was died fighting with the world’s dreadful enemy, cancer. I stay here with my wife Devika, and three of my beautiful daughters.” I let him know everything in a minute.

  “Why to hesitate to say that you are from different country?” He asked me as he noticed me uncomfortable while telling him that my hometown is in Nepal.

  “Because people have different point of views with outsiders, they hate globalisation, they love localism. Though this country is as lovely as my motherland. People are mostly nice, but you can’t trust anyone assuming that they would be nice.” I told him and tried to reveal that poisoning accident, but I didn’t find that time right to tell him that story.

  “How about your family members?” I asked him.

  “I, me, and myself.” He said and smiled.

  “This is not fair. I told you everything. You also let me know about your near and dear ones.” I asked him.

  “My near and dear ones keep on changing brother.” He said. I thought either he was trying to beat around the bush or the answer of the question I asked was more dangerous than my poison story.

  “How?” I asked and looked towards him waiting for an answer.

  “I had met with an accident, when my father was taking us to the trip in Jaipur. I and my sister survived, father and mother couldn’t. After staying in the hospital for 10 weeks of accident, they were declared as dead. We were all alone; I had my sister who had got recently married. Fortunately, she was hurt very less, as result she is happy in her life.” He said.

  “How about your marriage?” I asked.

  “I was married to a wonderful lady, who did the wonder to me.” He was respecting her or disrespecting her, he made me confused.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “We broke up. It broke me more than her. She found the new boyfriend within a week of the break-up; and you look at me, alone from past 7 years.” I didn’t see him so upset ever. We were sitting in the corner table of the cafeteria.

  “I am sorry to know about that brother. I am making a wish now and you will be blessed with a beautiful life partner within this year itself.”

  “Oh friend! Don’t give me false commitments of your wishes.” He said.

  “What was the reason behind?” I wanted to know more about that and that was the right time to ask him as I didn’t want to discuss about that topic again that would hurt him.

  “I was not able to overcome the demise of my parents, demise of mine and my sister’s career, as a result, I had started drinking (alcohol), and she started staying away from me. Now she is as away as my parents are.” He told me the long story in short.

  “Ohhk. Don’t worry brother, anything that bothers you, you can discuss it with me any time.” I took a long breath and said.

  I used to miss the company of Shamim and Jai Singh, but now I had a true friend. After spending about a month together with him in the office, I was happy and thanking God for the gift in the form of that friend.

  We were sitting together one Sunday, both doing night shift. As we had very less manpower on Sundays, people from technical sales team used to come there and work.

  “How do you manage alone at home?” I asked him showing her beautiful girls.

  “You want me to propose them or what?” He was awesome personality, means after seeing such a sorrowful phase of life; he was trying to live his normal life.

  “You say that so easily, do you know any of them?” I asked.

  “Yes, one of them is your sister.” He said.

  “What do you mean?” I was shocked and trying to understand what he was trying to tell me.

  “She is Priya Bhatt.” He said.

  “Ok. So every teenager girl with ‘Bhatt’ surname is my sister. Is that what you mean?” I asked him to counter-attack.

  “Yes, why not.” He said.

  “Then every teenager girl with ‘Kaur’ surname is your sister, okay?”

  “Oyee, don’t you want me to marry in my life. Leave at least one ‘Kaur’ for me. I want to give one more chance to my life.” He said.

  “Hmm, give it a chance. All the best. Mr. Kaur.” I said.

  “Oyee Saal*, Mr. Is always Singh, Ms. and Mrs. are Kaur. Learn some Punjabi from me apart from this fake process.” We were comfortable with each other, talking about people, and gossiping.

  Apart from Honey Singh, I was surrounded by wonderful people like HR executive Reva Chaudhary, an admiring lady; was also pleasant and polite who used to sit behind our bay, in the upper bay. Sometimes, I used to look behind and seek her focused-to-work head not moving, with the fear of being caught. Although, I had no any other feelings for her, except an extraordinary and extremely beautiful human being getting admired by common personalities as me.

  She used to give me her hand every time she saw me or passed by our bay, invited me in every Fun Friday activity. We had spent quality time together talking about social issues, career, life, and my daughters. I, at times used to forget that I was there for job and to login in time and not to exceed break talking to her. She was that nice.

  “Put this headset on and listen to the call which he is taking.” Mr. Wilson asked.

  “Ok.” I took headset and started waiting for the call.

  “Could you tell me what Mr. Wilson is famous for?” I asked Honey Singh.

  “Spend some time here and you will get to know. By the way his dialogue ‘you haven’t seen my anger, you have just seen my calmness’ is famous among us.” Honey Singh said and pulled his Avaya phone closer to him..

  “Good morning, my name is Honey, from eYogi In-Ground Support, may I know the account ID please.” Honey told to a stranger caller.

  “Hi Honey, my name is Priya, I am from Tech-sales. I need an appointment with your technician. I hope you would support me.” I recognised her voice, so did Honey.

  “Of course! It would be the honour of mine. But as it is Sunday today, you need to ask your manager to forward the details by emailing us.” Honey looked towards me and smiled.

  “Here comes your sister.” Honey put his Avaya phone on mute, and told me.

  “Please hold on for a minute.” Priya put the call on hold.

  The lady was not more than 10-15 meters away, sitting 3 bays ahead on the same floor. I looked towards her and found looking towards us; she smiled when she saw me looking at her.

  “What happened?” Honey asked me.

  “She is expecting us to create work order for her. Let’s do it.” I requested Honey to do her a favour, which wasn’t so hard to do.

  “So can we send the technician Honey?” Priya asked retrieving the call with an expectation of creating Work Order.

  “I like her calling me by my name.” Honey said.

  “Yes, what is the issue on customer’s computer?” Honey asked to probe.

  “It is No Boot issue; customer has got the product key with him. Computer is under warranty.”

  “Alright. Please transfer the case ID before transferring the call please.” Honey showed me his ri
ght hand thumb.

  “Here you go Honey. Thank you very much. This is my first sale for the day. Let me bring the customer on the line.” She said.

  “Ok Priya.” Honey said and put mute and speaker-on active.

  “She cracked the first sale of the night and is telling me it is first sale of the day.” Honey told me.

  Thank you for your patience, Anthony; I have my technician on the line with me, who will help you further.

  “Hello Anthony, my name is Honey, from the In-Ground Support, I will assist you further. Priya, you may please disconnect the call.” Honey was on conference, I was listening the conversation among Honey, Anthony and Priya.

  “Alright Honey. Alright Anthony, thank you very much.” Priya got disappeared from the call.

  “Anthony, your computer is not booting up. That’s the issue. Isn’t it?” Honey asked to confirm.

  “What?” Anthony was in the state of Alaska.

  “Anthony, your computer is not booting up. That’s the issue. Isn’t it?” This time the same question was asked, however with American accent, just to make it easier for Anthony to understand.

  “Yes, it is not booting up.”

  “The technician will visit this Saturday the 21st December 2014. Are you good with that?” Honey asked to fix an appointment.

  “Yes. So are you the one who is coming to see my computer?” Anthony asked him in confusion.

  “No, I will call you one more time once I find the best technician for you and give you his name and phone number.” Honey said.

  “That sounds better.” Anthony was happy about it.

  “Also, once he reaches there he will call us to check in, and call us once he fixes your computer. Then only we will check him out.”

  “That sounds good. And how to contact you?” Anthony was looking for the two way communication.

  “Yes, please note down my phone number which is 1855 420 420.”

  “Is it 1855 420 420?” Anthony asked to confirm. As soon as Honey gave that number to him, I could not stop my laugh; it became worse once Honey accompanied me.

  “Are you guys drunk or what?” Mr. Wilson asked us if everything was okay.

  “He is always drunk.” I said.

  “He was born drunk.” Mr. Wilson added coming to our workstations to see what was going on.

  “Learn the process first. I need skilled people going-live like you as soon as possible.” Mr. Wilson was in hurry. I was not in hurry as I wanted to learn everything that was required to be best there.

  “How did you come to know about eYogi?” Honey asked me.

  “I came here through Marks Makers consultancy in Delhi.” I replied.

  “How was your journey so far?” he asked.

  “My journey so far? I was trained by Mr. Adel Farooq Dar.” I said in poetry style.

  “I am famous for jokes. You tell me after that.” He asked.

  “It was good as I got the offer letter. The first day was awesome. With new people around; knowing about the organisation, free meal, free pick up and drop. I was happy until I faced the worst people in the training. I was awarded ‘The Soul of the Batch’; and saw people passing on comments on the ‘Team Leader’ lady. When I asked the trainer to do something, he said “well, I can’t take any action, however I can ask them not to do it.”

  The training becomes hell if people don’t respect each other, especially innocent ones. I had witnessed an incident, a horrible incident. I thought to throw him out of 10th floor, but the victim was quiet even after listening those dirty comments, so I thought it is better not to get involved and decided to keep silent as she didn’t ask for help. She would have called the police, or anyone could have helped her. But she was quiet like she was waiting for the dog to come and bite her.

  Then I thought, I can’t tolerate this, she is someone’s daughter too. It was my misfortune to see those guys abusing her, and keeping hands tied, mouth shut. It was called professionalism, and we had to follow it to survive there in the company. Had I fought for her rights to be respected; I would have lost that job, and you wouldn’t have been talking to me now. I was extremely annoyed, about to get up and hit him hard on the most sensitive part of his body and keep on kicking till his last breath. I was shaking in anger, I decided to take his eyes out of his face, as soon as I stood, a senior manager came, they stopped abusing her, backbiting her. I was cursing her as well, as she was quiet. It was horrible time, very bad time……” I took a glass of water pausing to explain to Honey Singh.

  “Are you feeling bad while talking about Priya Bhatt?” Honey asked.

  “Here is the different situation. Neither we are disrespecting nor abusing her.” I said.

  “I know brother, it happens everywhere. Though I have no female family member at home, I was born to a mother. And we should respect a Mother, who gives a birth to mankind.” He said.

  The story of that ‘Team leader’ made us serious to talk about any girl; Honey Singh had stopped joking about girls.

  “Why don’t you crack jokes these days?” I asked Honey one evening, seeing him after 2 days as I was on leave.

  “It is very bad cracking jokes. People have the right to get respect; they have the right to live in peace. I would appreciate you would also not crack any jokes on Priya or some other girls.” I was shocked by his changed behaviour.

  “Okay, but tell me why are you upset. It doesn’t suit on you.” I asked him to tell me the problem which had made him upset.

  “The girl you were talking about had tried to commit suicide yesterday night here.” He said.

  “What do you mean? And how is she? Where is she? Do you know her name?” I asked him a lot of questions as I was shocked.

  “Yes, you heard it right. The gang of three guys was asked to leave the previous company as they were involved in teasing girls. People don’t have blacklisting system, they just know threatening us, but in real term, they don’t blacklist the accused. One day, this entire city will burn in the fire, hate, debate, riot and war. Her name is Ms. Kaur. She is at Fortis Hospital, out of danger.

  “And how about those guys?” I asked.

  “They are still absconding. Our law is not very fast enough to chase accused criminals to provide justice to the victims, being it to administration, being it to justice system.” His statements were absolutely right. I had never seen him so serious.

  That seriousness brought both of us closer and we became best friends.

  Apart from Honey Singh, I had come in contact with Diva and Deepak, who had their own gang as a furious couple.

  At times, we had to make them keep calm, time changed his behaviour suddenly, and good time started going back to its way.

  The Demise Of Brotherhood,

  After a few days;

  “Where are you?” Mr. Wilson asked.

  “Brother, I am still stuck in traffic in Khanpur market.” I reported. It was already 9:00 PM and I was scheduled for 8:30 PM IST. People were concerned about themselves, rushing towards their respective residences, running the cat-race.

  “Okay. How many people are yet to be picked up?” He asked.

  “One more ‘pick up’ is there from Saket and then we will come to the office.” I said.

  He was my reporting manager, but we had a friendly understanding with each other.

  “Come as soon as possible then. I need to talk to you today.” He said and disconnected the call.

  After 2 hours; eYogi Gurgaon office

  “Ram and Diva. Put yourself in ‘Not ready’ and follow me.” Mr. Wilson said.

  He took us in the meeting room, visible to 100 people sitting outside and started pulling up the system; remained silent.

  “Guys, what is your problem and why are you forcing me to behave as a Manager?” The computer and conversation started together.

  �
��What is wrong sir? I don’t know.” I asked. Diva was still quiet as I asked Mr. Wilson to let me know what he was talking about.

  “That’s the problem that we make mistake and we say that we don’t know when asked.”

  He started finding some cases in the Work market dashboard.

  “When was this work order supposed to be closed?” He asked me pointing out a case in computer.

  “Yesterday.” I said.

  “Why any of you not called the customer and asked if the issue was fixed to forward this case to payment processing team?”

  “It was my Week off and I asked Ram to do it before I go home that day.” Diva said.

  “What is your excuse on this sir?” He gave a deadly look and asked me.

  “Could not manage to call this customer, will call today.” I said.

  “What was the reason that you didn’t call this customer?” He made me to remember his statement ‘you don’t know how scary I am, you haven’t seen that face’ and asked me about the reason.

  “Actually, there was huge call volume yesterday, and I was busy with inbound calls, apart from that I had created 15 work orders and checked 22 people in, checked 12 people out. It was the reason I could not work on her post-check in cases. I worked on pre-check in cases though.” I gave him the data in the details as I had my homework ready.

  If one keeps track of his tasks, remembers what has been done, however it is also one of the facts that people tend to forget what they have done if they work with honesty, dedication and rely on the database and think that their manager trusts them.

  “Then why didn’t give this account to someone else? Do you know about the email I got from my manager? He had sent me something which he never did. I work here as a manager, but be with you guys as friend, never deny anything like leave, late comings. Give me one example, when you asked for something and I denied.” He was yelling as people outside the cabin started looking inside what was wrong there.

  “If you guys can’t work as a team, I will ask everyone to work individually and then all of you have to be responsible for your own cases. But tell me what stops you from working as a team? Tell me what stops you to work?” He asked me this time slapping on the table. It was very painful for me to be a part of that meeting; his anger was above the ozone level in the space. Oh My God, he pulled an attention of the whole floor.