MISTER H
On confirmation as a Probationary Officer in SBI, I was
posted in a small village called “Umaria” in a backward district of Madhya
Pradesh. Despite being a native of MP, I had to search for the place on the
large map of the state hanging in the cabin of the Planning Manager in the
Local Head Office of SBI at Bhopal. Being a callow idealist at that time, I
went against the advice of almost everyone and decided not to ask for a change
of posting. My logic was simple. This was my first posting, the place was only
180 kms away from my native place Jabalpur; and our first born, a bonny
daughter, who was only 2 months old, would not be going to school for the next
3 years. Hence, there was no valid
reason for asking for a change. In addition, I would also get to complete my
mandatory rural posting.
I almost
regretted my quixotic decision when I landed at the place. I had gone ahead
alone to join and a fix up a house for our small family of three. The place was
a one street town. The town ended before I realised that I had arrived. My
heart sank when I got down at the dusty bus stand. It comprised an uneven plot
of land surrounded by a paan shop, a rickety hut which was a restaurant of
sorts, a lifeline for the bachelors; and some stray dogs and grazing cows.
There was no
hotel or lodge where one could stay. So, when I joined at the branch, the BM,
Mr. Satish Chandra Sharma, who appeared to be a fine gentleman to me (only goes
to show what a poor judge of men I am), promptly told one Mr. Shrikhande, a
bachelor who was staying alone, that I was going to stay with him till I found
a house. Shri, that’s what everyone called him, made no secret of the fact that
he was not overjoyed with the arrangement. But he was gracious enough not to
refuse point blank to accommodate me. I was thoroughly embarrassed but kept my
counsel as I had Hobson’s choice in the matter.
Shri had a
two room kitchen house. i.e. two small rooms and a kitchen of sorts, all in one
row. Beyond the kitchen was a communal open well shared by everyone living in
that compound. The bathroom was an open area surrounded by chest high tarpaulin
sheets and the latrine was in one corner of the common back yard. Shri went
with me to the market to help me in buying a folding cot made of steel pipes
and nylon strips (called Niwar in local parlance). After adding a plastic
bucket and a mug to it, I was all set to begin my life in room two of Shri
palace. Shri slept in room 1 which was more spacious and airy. I learnt to draw
water from an open well without the luxury of having an axle and pulley
mechanism. Shri’s kitchen had a kerosene stove on which we made our morning
tea. I found a convenient position for my blue folding mirror in the window
where I could shave in a standing position and I was all set to start my
innings in SBI.
House
hunting was no big deal as the three peons in the branch had up to date info on
the entire village. There was one kutcha house, a lime and clay affair, which
was readily available, probably because nobody else wanted it. There was one
row of 12 pucca houses, owned by one Mr. Ibrahim, which were in great demand
because it had flush latrines, a great luxury in those days and in that place.
The who’s who of Umaria stayed there. There was a waiting list in which I
promptly enrolled my name. The next vacancy was not coming up anytime soon. So
I decided to take up the aforementioned kutcha house as a stop gap arrangement.
It was a two storey 5 room affair with an open toilet on the side and a common
well in the backyard. The landlady was a very affectionate old Muslim lady who soon
taught my daughter her first words which were Alla alla. My wife arrived to
join me, with our daughter and our precious household goods packed in two large
steel trunks. My younger brother Chhotu and cousin Rajoo (now Padmashri awardee
Pandit Vijay Ghate) came with her to help setting up the house. As was the
usual state of affairs, there was no power when they landed up at midnight and
everyone was suitably disappointed with the place. We soon settled down to a
blissful domestic life and our daughter, who was a constant source of joy and
wonder, was the main reason for it. Like all parents, we thought she was the
most beautiful and precocious child in the world and forgot all about the
tedium and minor discomforts of the humdrum life of a bank officer in a dull
village.
As this
piece is about Shri Satish Chandra Sharma my first boss, I shall not delve into
the other aspects of our life in Umaria. We have a saying in SBI that howsoever
bad your current boss may be, the Bank never ceases to surprise you and the
next boss would soon make you realise what a great human being the earlier one
was, who seemed such a horrible monster at that time. Mister Sharma was,
however, an exception to this rule. As I soon realised, he was the most horrible boss one could have.
He was a bad leader who ran the branch with the help of a small clique which
consisted of three rotten characters; Suresh, a peon, Mr J K Gupta, the head
cashier and Mr Borkar the VLW (village level worker) who was on deputation from
the state government to assist in agri-business. Suresh was very powerful
because he alone knew where all the blank loan documents were kept. The main
business of the branch was giving gold loans. Hence, Suresh’s palms had to be
suitably greased by anyone and everyone wanting to avail a gold loan from the
branch. Mr Gupta certified the purity of gold, so he had to be fed a large meal
of two samosas and four gulab jamuns by every gold loan applicant. Mr Sharma sanctioned
the loan and took his cut in cash. Mr Borkar performed two important functions.
One, he took care of all the agriculture borrowers, their loan documents,
recovery etc; two, he lined up sex workers from nearby areas, for Mr Sharma.
Every Saturday afternoon, the entire branch witnessed the spectacle of Messrs
Borkar and Sharma driving away on Bank’s official motorbike, reportedly for
loan recovery; but their body language was akin to that of two boisterous and
naughty teenagers going to the village fair. They also furtively carried a
spare set of underwear rolled in an old newspaper which was disdainfully
pointed out to me by Shri several times till I started believing him. Mr
Sharma’s lecherousness did not stop there. He shamelessly flirted with every
lady who entered the branch. We, sitting in the banking hall, could easily
predict his rounds (the BM is
expected to take rounds of the banking hall at regular intervals to make sure
that the customers are being served promptly) which accidentally coincided with
the occasions whenever a lady entered the branch. He also had this extremely
annoying habit of inviting himself for tea
at the homes of married staff members, especially those with good looking
wives. We soon learned to dodge his unscheduled visits adroitly by inventing
all kinds of excuses.
Mr Sharma
brazenly took bribes on every conceivable transaction. One could see him
negotiating openly with all kinds of shady loan seekers. His famous, oft
repeated motto was “you are at risk only for the split second when you are
actually taking the money. After that nobody can touch you.”
Mr Sharma
was a compulsive gambler. Every day he went to a local club, where he played teen patti (a variation of three card
poker popular in India) with the rogues’ gallery of the town; a corrupt police
inspector, a slimy civil contractor,
SBI’s good for nothing landlord, some local politicians and sundry government
officials. These worthies, when they were not gambling with their ill gotten
money, were trying to drink each other under the table. For all his wild
living, Mr Sharma was a fine athletic looking man who kept himself in shape by
playing badminton every morning. Only catch being the matches were played at
high bets. He was quite a character. All these things I learned slowly and
reluctantly as I was naïve and refused to believe everything that was whispered
about him in the branch. I was, however, soon disabused of all my innocence.
The clerical staff of the branch comprised young boys who
were always joking and teasing each other while working. Some standard jokes
were referring to the Head Cashier Mr Gupta’s moustache which had a habit of
drooping suddenly at weird angles, in terms of the time of the day. On some day
he was “quarter to three”, i.e. moustache parallel to the ground; sometimes it
was “seven fifteen” i.e. left side drooping and right side parallel; and so on.
Mr Sharma was always referred to as ‘Mister H’ in his absence, by everyone in
the branch including his cronies Suresh, Mr Gupta and Borkar. I was curious to
know the reason/story behind this strange sobriquet and asked everyone in the
branch what it meant. Initially, my queries were met with chuckles, snickers
and guffaws but no explanation. Gradually, one thing was pointed out to me that
Mr Sharma had to take a dump 4-5 times during the day. The reason given by a
sheepish Mr Sharma himself one day was chronic amoebiosis. One welcome fallout
of this habit of Mr Sharma was the cleanliness of the branch rest room. He saw
to it that it was always kept Swachh (clean). In Hindi, the verb Hagna means
taking a dump. So I deducted that this had something to do with the nick name
‘Mr H’. When I shared my discovery with Shri, he smiled indulgently and
mysteriously. It appeared there was more to ‘Mister H’ than the frequent trips
to the toilet. The mystery was finally accidentally solved by me when the
administrative officer from our regional office Mr Sonecha visited the branch.
He was an elderly wizened man with a wry sense of humour. He was a compulsive
gossip and a chatterbox and had an interesting anecdote for every
occasion/person. “So! How do you find Mr H?” was the first question he asked me
with a twinkle in his eye. After that I became his shadow and kept pestering
him at every opportunity with persistent questions about the story behind the
name ‘Mr H’. At last, in the evening,
over a chilled beer, he relented and narrated the entire story of ‘Mr H’.
Before being
posted to Umaria as a branch manager, Mr Sharma was a head cashier in one of
the big branches in Jabalpur, the zonal headquarters of the Bank. Everyone was
familiar with his lecherous ways and his 5 dumps a day toilet routine. The
entire female population of the branch staff detested him for his leering
manners and his double-entendres. The male members of the staff were also
annoyed with him for his roving eye and his shady behaviour in cash
transactions. In short, he would not have won any popularity contest in the
branch. Power outages were a common occurrence during the sweltering summer
months. One day, during a longish power outage, the branch ran out of water
supply and the toilets had gone dry. Knowing his daily routine, everyone was
curious to see how Mr Sharma would conclude his noon visit to the loo (in
India, unlike the western world, water is used in place of toilet paper after
doing the deed. So without water, the act cannot be completed. Also, one has to
wash the hands with soap afterwards. Hence, water is an essential ingredient
for a visit to the loo.) Mr Sharma was smart enough to carry a bottle of water
to the loo. But, when he came out, he started looking for some water to wash
his hands. Unknown to him, many of his well-wishers
were watching him surreptitiously. Since he had no other option, Mr Sharma went
to the large steel drum in which drinking was stored for the entire branch
staff of over 200 people. The moment he opened the tap of the drinking water tank,
all hell broke loose. People started
shouting that he had contaminated the drinking water of the entire branch. Mr
Sharma, usually a very quick witted and resourceful person, was caught like a
hyena in full glare of the headlights of a truck (you obviously cannot call him
a deer or a hare) and was not in a position to defend himself adequately. With
an empty water bottle in one hand and with his sacred thread wound around his
right ear (old fashioned Brahmins are required to do this every time they go
the toilet), he was caught with his pants down. Soon, the chants of Hagda!
Hagda! (Pejorative for a man who
craps a lot) were reverberating in the branch premises. All the customers were
asking about the reason for the commotion. Chanting of slogans by union
activists was not uncommon those days. The branch managers had sweeping powers to
deal with local disturbances. Mr Rathnam, a very tough administrator, was the
branch manager then. But against the constant roar of staff outrage, for a
reason over which he had little control, he had to sanction half a day’s leave
and some overtime to the entire branch staff to quell the uprising that day.
From that day Mr Sharma became a laughing stock of the entire branch, entire
city rather. Wherever he went, the H word was hurled at him. Finally he asked for
a transfer to a distant place and was sent as Branch Manager of Umaria branch.
By the time Mr Sonecha finished his narrative, in his inimitable style,
interspersed with many choice unprintable adjectives, I was literally rolling
on the floor. After that day, I could not look at Mr Sharma without remembering
the story and smiling a little. From that day, he was Mr H for me also.
