My days in Calcutta
May 28, 2012
During the course of my career
with Reserve Bank of India commencing on 11May 1973, I had my first promotion
in 1987 when I was transferred to Calcutta office (now Kolkata) from Mumbai. I
observed a paradigm shift in terms of attitude and work culture at this new
centre. While in Mumbai it was a busy and fast moving life while Calcutta was more
laid back and relaxed. Nevertheless, for any one with an open mind who believed
in the 3 A mantras---- Accept, Adjust and Appreciate, every work place is an
heaven on the earth.
However, before I was taught the
above said 3 A mantras, I was appalled by the lack of work culture and an
attitude to make the most of filthy surroundings in general by the people of Calcutta. A typical
working day (non working day to be precise) in the Reserve Bank of India,
Calcutta would start with late coming by many a staff for one reason or another
and end with early going for a similar
variety of reasons. In between there will 2 to 3 tea breaks and a major lunch
break and not to mention about gossip breaks during which time
there will be debates on current political happenings, football, cricket etc.
Needless to emphasize genuine and quality jobs will be executed in between the
above mentioned breaks.
I do vividly remember my early
times in the year 1987 (August) when I had just joined the office in Kolkata
when my superiors posted me to Enquiry desk of Exchange Control department
(ECD).Public often came to this desk for various forms (pre liberalization
days).I pointed out to my seniors that people who approach this desk invariably
speak in Bengali and I was unable to follow them which defeated the purpose of
my sitting in the said desk. However, the department had other ideas which
enabled me to pick up Bengali on account of continuous bombardment on my audio
systems so to speak. One more episode comes to my mind during my early days in
Kolkata when I was taken to task by one of the communist dominated trade unions
for taking photo copy of a few documents since this according to them was anti
labour .I was then instructed to get the documents typed and get it compared
with the original and certify the typed document as “true copy”. I was amused
to learn that taking photo copy of any document was anti labour. Be that as it
may, I took this in my stride and had a hearty laugh. More fun was in the
offing outside the Bank when I walked down from Reserve Bank Building at BBD Baug
to Esplanade to catch the underground metro rail to my residence. From a
distance I was able to observe a motely crowd of people surrounding a small
portion of the park near the Metro station. As I reached close to them I was
astonished and a bit disturbed to find that the crowd was amusing itself by feeding
hundreds of rats with peanuts in the corner of the park which had many rat
holes. Some of the men in the crowd took the rats in their palm and fed them
with the other hand. Brave men indeed. Peanut vendors around this place were
doing brisk business.
The above experiences remain
etched in my memory to this day in view of the initial shock and awe with which
I received these in my mind. Nevertheless and again thanks to Kolkata that I
learnt the principles of three “A” mantras among many other valuable HR inputs from Shri Aporesh Acharaya, a trainer of great repute, who taught me values
of Human Relations when I did one of the HR courses from MILT (Macgreth Institute
of leadership Training). I made use of these three A mantras in the office as
also in the market place with great success. It is better to ACCEPT a person as
he is and ADJUST yourself according to his personality and shower genuine
APPRECIATION on him when required. This policy worked wonders for me during my
tenure in Reserve Bank of India , Kolkata and helped come out unscathed during
a period when left militancy in the trade unions was at its peak and the then Manager
of Kolkata office was keen to suspend and dismiss as many activists as
possible.
I had a memorable, pleasant and
enjoyable time in Kolkata. Further, learning their language(Bengali) helped me
considerably in understanding an average employee better and in turn they
started appreciating me for making efforts to learn their language. I did not
also make any issue about their attending office late or leaving office early
as long as they completed the tasks assigned to them. Thus my attitudinal shift
in understanding them with the three “A” mantras was indeed magical and created
bonding of quality all through.
K V VAIDYALINGAM
