Epilogue

To all of you who have worked with Bakshi in London or have known him through a victim of his would surely appreciate the fact that there is no single incident in this blog that is an exaggeration and that it doesn't have any form of added flavour. Everything in this blog are incidents that have either occurred to me or have happened immediately around me. There might be quite a few other incidents that I have missed. I will keep adding them here as and when I remember.

A couple of guys who have never got this big exposure in such an environment asked me if I am being a sadist to convolute the incidents or too obtuse to grasp the actual implications of Bakshi's behaviour. To answer that, I would say neither because the people who asked me that question haven't met Bakshi yet. I will pray for them to get a chance to work with him.

To those of you who do not know Bakshi, he is a mistery and would remain so. I have no plans to reveal his identity. I hope that justifies it all. Rest of it was just for reading, hopefully a stress buster.

"As the Count leaned over me and his hands touched me... a horrible feeling of nausea came over me, which, do what I would, I could not conceal."

    - Bram Stoker, Chapter 2, Dracula

It's 11:58 PM in London;  too late to be in the office. You're in front of your computer struggling to meet a deadline. You can see through your window that the river Thames is unusually calm. The crescent of the moon is eaten up by fast approaching waves of clouds. A faded darkness falls across the London Bridge. And you have this horrible feeling that HE is still out there, a wanderer outside the darkness, thirsty to stitch up any associate. You are worried if this time it could be you; your hands tremble; you're restless; you're unable to look at the monitor and...

A man, short and stout, and fairly gloating gets up from his desk; picks up a pack of pan parag from the chest draw. He tears it open as a savage beast and he walks across the floor in search of an associate. The background music plays...

(I'm gonna thrill ya tonight)
Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
Creatures crawl in search of blood
To terrorize y'alls neighborhood
                                     [extract from The Thriller - MJ]

Haaaahaahaahahaha... Haahahahahaha...
Haaahahaahahaha... Haaaahaahaahahaha...
Haaaahaahaahahaha... Haahahahahaha...
Haaahahaahahaha... Haaahahaahahaha...
Haaaahaahaahahaha... Haahahahahaha...
Haaahahaahahaha... Cough cough cough... cough coh co co!!!  Heee heee heeeeeee...
Cough cough ough cough cough... cough coh co co!!!  Heee heee heeeeeee... Cough co co

:-)

Conclusion

As I conclude this blog, I would like tell you that I am pretty happy for not being a part of WRSC anymore. A few of the characters you may have read about like Venky, Ritesh etc are still with WRSC but are now working for other accounts. I'm sure it's not a Bakshi to whom they're reporting to. I used to ring them up occasionally and sometimes meet up for a drink or two.

A few guys who raised their voice against Bakshi and fought back were 'kicked out'. They lived happily ever after.

A few of them were still with the same account working for Bakshi when I left. I have no clue what has happened to them. Bakshi used to fuck them then and he should still be fucking them.

I am not a philosopher but these are some of my findings in so many years -

• Assholes do live for ever. They get a rating of 5 every time. No point being jealous about it. They're rated only for being an asshole.
• It's all about setting expectations. If you say 'Don't fuck with me' at the first instance, it remains that way all the time. The moment you allow anyone to fuck you, they will fuck you, your mother, your grandmother and your great grand mother. And eventually you would get used to it.
• Every dog who wags his tail for a promotion, a better rating or an onsite assignment, will have to keep wagging his tail all the time. If you stop wagging anytime, the master will strike down upon you with great vengeance and furious anger. You may loose everything you have gained wagging till date. You better be ready to have a healthy tail.
• If you are working with a WRSC moulding yourself to suit the best interests of that company for more than 2 years, remember, you are institutionalized and you're good for nothing else.
• Don't waste your time writing big essays on any online survey which claims to take actions as per the feedback from the employees. They don't even go to the recycle bin.
• Stop complaining. If you don't like something, make a plan to get out of it. There is no room for complaint boxes.
• 'The man who do not spend time with his family is not a man.' a quote from the movie Godfather. Work for a living do not live for working. It's not a bad idea to miss a promotion or a rating to spend time with your family or booze with a long lost friend.
• Invest in relationships. You may not know who would be willing to call 999 (or 911) when you get mugged. Make friends with all your associates, other vendors and third party resources. Keep in touch with all of them.
• Politricks (Politcal Tricks) is a part of the corporate world but vengeance and politricks do not go very well together. Do not waste your energy screwing up someone. You can always use your time, money and effort to buy a drink for the best mate in the account.
• Patience is something that you always need. Do not strike back in anger. It would do more harm to yourself than any good. Make a plan, churn it, execute and come out clean.
• Be in good terms with the bad company but don't get associated with them. People would hesitate to help you in a crisis not because they don't like you. They wouldn't want to get into trouble helping you because you're associated with the bad guys.

That's all my friends. Thank you very much for reading my blog. One last thing. Not all managers are like our Bakshi; most of them have brains. Please do not buckle up to screw your manager right away.

---------------------------X---------------------------X---------------------------

For people who're a little curious about what happened to me, Mr. 'Alex' - I am still in London. I have found another interesting job.

Recently, I was having a nice time with a few friends at an All Bar One at Canary Wharf. Clare, who knew me since the time I'd been in London, pulled me closer to her by my suit and whispered into my ear, 'I just remembered this quote from the movie Catch Me If You Can -
Two little mice fell into a bucket of cream. The first mouse quickly gave up and drowned, but the second mouse, he struggled so hard that he eventually churned that cream into butter and he walked out. '
'And I'm that second mouse?' I smiled with a frown of contempt.
'Yes!' She smiled and gave me a hug.

The Thames Keeps Flowing

Amir, a handsome, young bloke with a good personality, decided to get married. But he had a pretty weak backbone to stand against Bakshi's atrocities. Bakshi was generous enough to bless the wedding with two weeks of holidays. But when Amir left to India for his marriage, he was assigned the task to carry a bag weighing about 25 Kgs to India and leave it at Bakshi's ancestral home. The total weight allocated on Amir's international flight was 27Kgs. He only had 2Kgs of space left to carry anything from London for his wedding.

Arora, in the middle of all the late night and weekend works, managed to get his wife pregnant. But when she was in labour pain, Arora was working from home on his laptop attending conference calls. Bakshi was happily charging the client for his time. I'm not sure if he charged Arora's wife's time as well.

When Kunal came to London, he had the dreams to have a better life with his beautiful wife and his new born baby. But unfortunately, when he starts to office in the morning, his baby would be sleeping. When he reaches home, his baby would've already slept. He works on the weekends as well to contibute towards Bakshi's fund. Hence his baby hardly ever saw him. So one day, after a few months, he reached home early and met his kid at the door. The kid runs to his mom screaming 'Mummy! Mummy! There is somebody at the door ...looks like the garbage man.'

When he came to London, Dev rented a house in Illford to live with his family. When Bakshi came to know about this, he striked upon him in great fury. Bakshi harassed Dev to the core until Dev broke the lease and transferred the agreement to another associate of Bakshi's interest. Bakshi's point was that Dev will have to go back to India soon. If so, breaking rental agreement will have to be compensated and as per the protocol, WRSC will have to pay for the difference in the amount. This would have a negligible effect in Bakshi's target which he couldn't even think about tolerating. Dev, his wife and his kid lived in a shit-hole for the rest of their life in London.

Bakshi brought only two chappattis for lunch but he ate five. How? Because he ate his lunch with a few other associates. I avoided going anywhere near the dining area until Bakshi had left. If I had to eat peacefully I had to be more cautious than a tiger who protects his catch from vultures.

Bakshi called most of his associates with a snap of his fingers followed by a 'to n fro motion' of his forefinger 'Oye Ritesh! Idhar aaa (Hey Ritesh! Come here)'. Some clients started learning this technique because it was very effective with a couple of Bakshi's pindams.

Prem, a fresher who got a chance to work in London, shivers and looks very troubled when Bakshi walks into the floor. He was not able to concentrate on his work if Bakshi was around. The only mistake Prem did was that one day he didn't notice when Bakshi walked into the floor and missed to greet him. Bakshi claims that Prem showed him his ass when Bakshi looked at him. Bakshi started his usual harassment techniques on this guy who was only half his age. Prem was later diagnosed with Anxiety Disorder and is living on anti-depressents.

A handful of guys who're technically very strong and professionally so good lives on Bakshi's blessings. Bakshi decides where they need to live, how they need to come to office and when they should take their wifes out for dinner. They don't know what they're missing because they're too blind to see what is life outside Bakshi's cocoon. One good thing is that they don't complain. Would you eventually get used to burning in hell forever?

There are many more troubled souls and their troubles never end. Let's hope all of them rest in peace. Please close your eyes for a moment. Let's pray for them and their families. Let the rain of happiness shower upon them and the clouds of darkness fade away from their lives.
Amen!!!

My Best Friend's Wedding

I used to walk around with an age-old cell phone that had a broken case and a pale display. I was against the idea of wasting money on flashy gadgets. But Bakshi proved me wrong; keep up with the times, don't stay in the dark. After all he used to remind me that he's my friend and sometimes I used to feel that he's my best friend.

I was fed up with him and I wanted some way to get out of it. I didn’t want to leave the project half-way through and quit WRSC. The Recession was at it's peak. The first thing that I had to do was to get some evidence that would help me prove Bakshi an asshole. I bought a flashy phone with a voice recording facility. It had a one-touch recording capability and was perfect for the requirement. Every time Bakshi opened his mouth I casually put a finger into my pocket as if to scratch my nipple.

I recorded dozens of conversations. I got all the words that I wanted – ‘chootiya, asshole, fucking disaster, biggest mistake, pain in the ass, lick his balls, mother fucker…‘and many many more. I walked around with this shit load of recordings in my pocket for about 6 months without knowing what to do with it.

One day an English lady, Julian, showed up in the client office. She said that she was the new HR manager for our account.  The previous HR, a sexy Indian female who used to sit inside Bakshi’s pocket, was now being replaced by Julian.

Julian was addressing the WRSC associates in a meeting room. She was discussing the problems of long working hours and the work pressure. She showed pity on us with a smile on her face. I found that smile similar to the one a butcher shows before he cuts the neck of a baby chicken.

‘The client puts across tough deadlines; there is a lot of work pressure; we’re working on it; hopefully the client will approve more resources next month... blah blah blah’ Bakshi’s voice faded away like the routine traffic honking n humming at the Outer Ring Road at Bangalore.

‘Anybody have any questions?’ Julian was concluding the meeting.
One hand was raised, only one from the entire crowd and that was mine.
‘I need to talk to you personally.’ I said. Everyone’s face turned towards me. All looked as if I have said something terribly wrong. Bakshi gave me a I-will-surely-fuck-you-if-you-screw-me kind of look.

I had a long chat with Julian in a closed meeting room about the issues we all were facing. Julian seemed to listen like a school teacher listening to a 5 year old kid. She was just doing her job and I soon got frustrated. Finally, I said, ‘Look Julian. Forget about whatever I have told you till now. Recession has affected everyone and we had to cling on to the last floating debris and that’s why I’m still in WRSC. I have something that you need to listen to. I’m not sure if it’s legal in The United Kingdom.’ I placed my phone on the table. ‘Listen to this and let me know your thoughts.’

Julian listened to the first record for about a minute before she stopped. Her face reddened. ‘Is this real?’
‘Yes, very much.’ I smiled.
‘What the hell?’ She was surprised at the words coming out of the phone.
‘That’s only one in a hundred conversations.’
‘Oh! My god!!! I can’t believe it.’
‘You have to. I don’t know what to do with these recordings. But I’m not planning to give it to you as of now.’ I said. I gave her a few minutes to think that there were quite a few options in front of me - senior management, media, court, employment tribunal etc.

‘I’m so sorry, Alex. I didn’t know that this is what is happening here. Leave it to me. I’ll take care of this.’ She assured me that she’s going to fix all our problems forever before she returned to her office.

The next day morning, I found Bakshi resting his mighty ass on my desk.
‘What is that you had to talk to Julian so personally?’ He stared into my eyes.
‘Nothing!!! I was enquiring about some HR stuff.’ I arranged my coat and made myself comfortable on the chair.
‘What HR stuff?’
‘It’s personal.’
‘Why is that only you have to go the HR to discuss your problems? In this account, you are the only person who has problems.’
‘Not really. I am the only person who has a backbone.’
‘What?’
‘Everyone in this account is afraid of you; I am not. They’re afraid because they know that you would screw up their ratings, promotion, appraisals or whatever they think is more important to them than their personal life. I didn’t take up this profession seeing WRSC as the only software company. So please stop wasting my time. I have some work to finish by end of day today. I’ll catch you sometime in the evening if you want to discuss.’
‘No’ Bakshi smiled and went back to his desk.

Bakshi was asked to report at the WRSC regional office in London that afternoon. The HR team had pulled out various other dormant cases of complaints that were reported against him. My best guess is that there was an enquiry. Julian called me in evening to assure that I wouldn’t face anymore issues from Bakshi.  Bombs were dropped into Bakshi’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the war ended. I'm not aware of the extend of the damage it caused but Bakshi was now sane and normal.

He hardly talked to anyone for a few days but no dog’s tail would remain straight for ever. He made sure that he gave me enough respect and that I was always kept happy. He sometimes called me ‘beta (son)’ before he talked to me and occasionally I was reminded that I was his best friend. I lived the life of a prince for the remaining time I was with WRSC but everyone else in the account used to have a horror-story every day to put their kids to sleep.

Adam Never Jokes Again

One day, I was enlightened to find that it was not just WRSC associates who fall victim to Bakshi. Even the clients sometimes do.

Adam, a client manager who handles the data migration team, sits opposite to Bakshi. They both had shared the same phone for about a month until Adam threatened that he would resign his job if he is not assigned a separate phone. The reason was that Bakshi's phone was too dirty with pan (aka pan parag, supari, gutka, kaini) and it smelled like shit.

Adam got a new phone and was happy. Infact, he was too happy that he started cracking jokes every 10 minutes. Bakshi was initially not paying attention. He was busy reading the Tin Tin comics online. In between he had managed to stuff his lower lips with pan and was gigling at the Tin Tin comics every now and then.

Later Bakshi heard what Adam was joking about. I don't know what the joke was all about. The fact is I never want to. All I know was Bakshi laughed. He laughed the hell out of himself. The pan in Bakshi's mouth splashed across the desk. The red liquid, a mixure of fine grained pan, tobacco and saliva, was sprayed on to Adam's face.

There was laughter everywhere. I saw the red liquid dripping off Adam's nose. There were droplets on his light blue shirt, on his pants, on his suit, his keyboard, his table and of course his new phone as well.

'Sorry sorry sorry.... I am really sorry.' Bakshi ran across the table with a pack of tissues to comfort him. Bakshi and a couple of his WRSC tails* cleaned up everything in less than a minute. Adam didn't thank them; Adam didn't smile. Adam didn't even move a finger. He sat there contemplating. Bakshi even bent down on his knees to clean his shoes with a tissue. 'What a pity!! Shame for WRSC, shame for any Indian.' I thought.

Adam was not angry, I know what exactly went through his mind, 'That joke was damn good but I am the only guy who couldn't enjoy it.' Adam has never ever cracked any joke in office after that.

*A WRSC tail is an associate same as pindam. See the ‘Wetherspoon Speech.’

The Offer He Couldn't Refuse

The client location had a handful of vendors and WRSC held a major share as the contributor of manpower. But unlike WRSC, these vendors did host some parties and evening drinks and they did invite everyone including us.

WRSC do not usually host any such parties because there is hardly any fund allocated for it. But once, in my knowledge, there came a day when WRSC allocated £4.75 per person for team lunch. That meant only one drink per person.

Anyway, to utilize the fund, Bakshi got someone to order some doughnuts instead. As soon as the doughnuts reached the floor, Bakshi rushed across the workstations to grab one whole pack for himself. If I remember correctly, he stumbled over the chairs at least twice and almost pushed a young lad on to the floor before he got hold of the box.

Bakshi had a great appetite for free food and drinks but has never shown any pride in that. The stories are slightly different on other occasions. He usually crashes in without being invited, gets drunk and screws up the party royally. Client managers sometimes ask Bakshi's tails to make sure that Bakshi do not get drunk.

I remember this open-air party that was hosted near Barbican. It was late night and was pretty cold. Everyone cuddled on to their coats as they were having their drinks. But Bakshi decided to cuddle up a beautiful young sexy female consultant called Angela.

Bakshi was pushed away by two other girls before he ended up with her. She was pretty afraid to find a Frankenstein clinging on to her. 'Mr. Bakshi! I guess I need to go to the loo.' She stammered.

'You can be my friend but only on one condition.' Bakshi was making an offer.

'Yes Yes! But let me come back from the loo.'

'Yes, but don't you want to be my friend?' He replied without taking his hands that were wrapped around her.

'Of course, I do. But not right now.'

'Why not?'

'Coz I need to go to the loo.' She struggled to get his hands off her.

Bakshi didn't seem to have any plan to let her go. I was least interested to interfere and left him to hell with it. But this guy Nathan who was drinking with us took a step forward. He asked me to hold his drink.

'What are you going to do?' I was curious.

'I am going to fix him.'

'Don't create a scene. Don't forget that you need to see him again in the office tomorrow.' I said.

He gave me a naughty smile and walked across to Bakshi. We held our breaths as we watched him.

Nathan walked towards Bakshi with his hands in his pocket. Without taking them out he bent down and whispered a few words into Bakshi's ears. Bakshi didn't make a move for a few seconds. Then he took his hands off Angela and put them around Nathan and smiled. Nathan did smile as well. Angela took a deep breath to have some fresh air (without that stinking smell of pan (aka gutka, kaini, supari)) and rushed away into the toilet.

Nathan pushed Bakshi away and walked back to us. He took his drink back and took a big sip and gave me a frown of triumph.

'What did you tell him?' I asked.

'I gave him an offer he couldn't refuse.' He replied but never told me what.

Months later I came to know what Nathan's offer was. Nathan seems to have told Bakshi something like this. 'I will kick your balls up your head if you don't let her go. You will have to wear your underwear on your head like a hat to cover them up ever after.'

Don Corleone

Ritesh surprised me on a Saturday afternoon by paying a visit to my room. He discussed a few general official matters and a little casually about life in London before hitting the subject.

'Listen Alex, I need help.' He was making himself comfortable on the bed. 'I know, I don't talk to you much in office or haven't tried to befriend you.'

'What is it Ritesh?' I asked.

'You know what is happening in office these days. It's not just these days. It has been like that since I came onsite. I had big dreams when I came to London. But Bakshi shouts at me for every small move I make. He's not looking at who is around. He's not worried if he would embarrass me in front of them.'

'I know. It's the same story with every one, not just you.' I tried to calm him.

'No Alex. I have tried my best to keep him happy. I have been working late hours every day. For this delivery cycle, I have already done the documentation. I am trying to finish all regression testing well ahead of the schedule but there are quite a few P1 (critical) defects that stop my team from proceeding. If I raise any P1s or High priority defects, Bakshi would shout at me ...[Bakshi] says it would reflect the quality of our deliverables in the matrix graph and the clients would question it. If I do not raise them, the developers do not fix it. It's a kind of deadlock situation. And now the delivery is affected because of this. Bakshi blames me for that. I tried to explain but he don't want to listen.'

'No point wasting your energy on that.' I kept my laptop aside and stretched my legs.

'He acts like I have raped his wife. Now I am a fool in front of everyone. I look like an idiot. ...[Bakshi] says I'm an 34 year old kid [and] that I am not even worth the rating of 1.'

It didn't surprise me. Bakshi is an asshole and he would do what he says. WRSC has this scheme of rating an associate on a scale of 1 to 5 based on his performance. Associate's immediate supervisor judges his quality. Obviously, the associate can escalate it if he is not happy with the ratings but it is as good as barking up the wrong tree.

'I am lost. I have struggled all the time just to make sure that he would at least give me a rating of 3. ...so that I will have my job.' Ritesh continued

'I see.' I wanted to laugh at his foolishness but I pretended to be serious.

'See Alex, I have a family. I married the girl I loved although my parents were against it. If I get a rating of 1 or 2... it's Recession, I'll loose my job. I can't go back to my parents. They will spit on my face.'

'Huh?'

'You know, Alex? My wife was 7 months pregnant when I came here. I haven't even seen the face of my baby yet. It's been 9 months now. I have been working like hell for this asshole who is not even ready to listen to me. I thought to suicide yesterday night. But I didn't know how. I drank a lot and I kept drinking and then I dozed off.' I could see the tears crawling down his cheeks. I knew I was not dealing with a regular friend's regular problem now.

'But today morning when I woke up, I thought, why should I die?' Ritesh now sounded angry. 'Why should my family suffer? Why should my wife live a widow supporting my kid all through her life? My own people would definitely spit on my face. I would look like a real fool in my home town.' He cried... he cried like a kid. I stood up and hugged him. For a moment, I felt like I was dealing with a 5-year-old kid. I felt uncomfortable when Ritesh's moustache rubbed against my naked tummy. I waited until the sobbing stopped. I went back and sat down in my chair.

'I need help, Alex.' He wiped his tears and looked at me.

'What is it that I can do for you?'

'I understand that you have made some good friends here in London. Probably, one of them could help me out.'

'Good friends? In what way?' I was surprised.

He stood up and walked to my desk and whispered in my ears 'I trust you Alex, with all my senses. I don't have a choice. I want Bakshi dead. I would love to do it myself but I want my job, I want my family. He's not worth living in this beautiful world.' He went back to the bed and made himself comfortable leaving me to deal with my shock. I blinked at him from where I sat. The first thing that came to my mind was to throw him out of my house.

'Are you crazy? You have any clue what you're talking about?' I screamed.

'Yes, I do.' He gave me a firm but calm reply ’Tell me yes or no. I would expect a yes, because this is not something I can go and ask everyone I know in London.'

'You are talking about assassinating a WRSC manager and that too here in London.'

'I know. I thought of getting it done in India which would be much more easier for me. But this fucker is not going back there in the near future. By the time he decides to go on a vacation, my fate would have already been written.' He stared at me; a stubborn dark masculine figure. He almost looked like an assassin.

He has gone out of his mind, I thought. There was no reason I could give to persuade him out of this because, as a matter of fact, Bakshi was as good as a crocodile; very cunning and dangerous. I felt like Don Corleone listening to people's problems and fixing it for them. I had to take care of this very carefully. I sat there blinking at him for a few minutes.

'It's true, my friend,' I started, 'that I know a few guys who can do dodgy things. But I'm not sure if they would be ready to take up this job.' I struggled not to shiver my voice.

'Listen Alex, Mahesh and I together can pay them a big cut from our savings.'
Wow!! It's is not just one associate who wants him killed, I thought.

'There is one guy I know. You need to give me some time to check with him. It's not something I can ring up and ask, you understand?' I said.

'Agreed!!! Let me know the price.' He stood up.

'But you still have your job, your family. Wouldn't it be too early to take a fair decision now?'

'I don't care. I can't take a chance. There is no point taking a chance with a guy of his character.' He waved good-bye and walked out.

After he had left, I ran down to the kitchen to drink some water. 'What the fuck', I thought. 'Bloody Bakshi!!! He doesn't even know what he's doing.'

In the next few months, Ritesh reminded me about the "Job" a couple of times but luckily the ratings came out a little earlier than expected. Bakshi had given him a rating of 3.77 and that meant Ritesh had his job and probably Bakshi, his life.