STRANGE ARE THE WAYS OF THE WORLD

Businessmen, most often keep smiles of love, warmth, affection and sincerity. We feel their service-mindedness and the inviting smiles always attractive. You might have heard about the “business-mindedness” of most business persons in our villages, towns and cities and might have witnessed or experienced it also. Appreciative smiles and opinions are expected from most of the customers whenever you get in contact with other customers. You might feel elated on hearing such sweet words from your friends or relatives.

I was a bank-employee for about thirty years, when a VRS scheme was introduced by the management, I was one among hundreds of employees and seize the opportunity to bid a warm farewell to the institution which provided the livelihood for a long period. I didn’t want to be hypocrite anymore, actually I was fed up with wearing a mask of politeness, promises, delight, a lukewarm attitude and even rude behaviour sometimes to the customers depending upon the status of those coming to me.

All the employees from top to bottom- manger to peon- Chairman to other higher authorities- always tried to keep beaming smiles often forgetting our personal problems, provided service to those approaching us. It was and still is the norm. The Chairman through his frequent circulars reminded us all about “customer delight” and satisfaction, “customer is the king” attitude often preached by Mahatma Gandhi, and the often quoted words of business persons “ customer is always right”- attitude. Through his circulars he didn’t forget to warn the employees to follow his valuable advices or face necessary and severe actions like issuance of memos seeking explanations, suspension and even termination. The gentleman on some occasions exhorted us the magic of thinking big and inspired us always to work hard, learn hard and reach the top-ladder at the youthful age itself. I used to recall the book- “The Magic of Thinking Big” written by the great positive thinker and writer of our times David Schwartz. Books related to positive thinking have a huge market today and hence Dale Carnegie (he committed suicide later in his life is another wonderful fact), Robin Sharma (author of “The Monk Who Sold His Safari”), Stephen Covey(author of “Seven Good Habits”) , the world famous writer Paulo Coelho (the author of “Alchemist”, a really positive one and another one by him “Eleven Minutes” discovered by me “quite positive”!) and such writers. Inspite of all these the business as well as the moral atmosphere are in chaos in contemporary times…so what? Think positive…

Hope, I haven’t bored you to death.

While working in the bank, the authorities went to the extent of providing us with financial bonanza like exgratia amounting to thousands once in a year appreciating our service mentality and hardwork thus helping the bank to scale new heights. Similarly amounts involving large amounts- two or three lakhs- even though with high interest rates as personal loans, festival loans ( interest free!) and such other facilities.

Whenever we got lumpsum amounts, we used to go on a shopping spree to purchase jewels, clothes and other valuable electronic items. The next day ‘back to square one’ is another thing.

In my case, along with my family, we used to go to the jewellery to purchase some gold ornaments for my daughter and wife, valuable clothes and other items demanded by my son. Rare moments of luxury. An extravaganza in our case. You know, I am not an Ambani, Lakshmi Mittal, Bill Gates or Warren Buffet. Whenever we went to purchase the ornaments to my daughter and wife- we always made the purchases at the same jewellery from the very beginning- the young owner at the counter always gave us warm smiles and after we reveal our intention to purchase some ornaments, he would get delighted and would direct others behind the long glass boxes with glittering gold ornaments arranged in a beautiful and attractive way to provide us a good service. Really an affable, caring and loving smart young guy!
“Young men should be like him” - we used to comment.

After making all that we wanted for the moment (the amount in my pocket was the limit), they put each type of ornament in beautiful little attractive box and packed them in a costly bag along with a nice purse and would pass it to us. All in smiles, the young owner never forgot to give me a warm shake-hand with a beaming smile and gave us a good farewell with inviting eyes. Wow! What a great service!

But the life of people are not always a smooth journey through the plains filled with grass-carpet lined with colourful flowers on both sides with the beetles flying around them to enjoy the sweet nectar. Sometimes they have to tread a long path filled with thorns, gutters and “hump-like” hurdles. Those born with gold-spoon (or silver spoon) in their mouth are exceptional cases…
Once, due to acute emergency, I was badly in need of some money and was aware that by pledging the ornament at the bank, I wouldn’t get sufficient amount, I decided to sell the ornament to our beloved familiar jewellery. The other ornaments we had were already under pledge that also for an emergency case. Life is like that baba!

With my usual smile, I walked to my familiar jewellery, thank God, the young, charming and familiar owner was there and on seeing me, he extended his warm smile towards me. I heaved a sigh of relief.

“This time, I have not come for not making a purchase. I want to sell a bangle. Badly in need of some money. An unforeseen emergency.”

I was blushing actually.

The warm smile on his face vanished somewhere and with a grim face called an young man behind the long glass box and directed him to verify the quality, quantity and the eligible amount to be handed over to me after deducting their charges. The young man, who was also familiar to me, turned to be serious and strange.

Flabbergasted is the apt word! An incident never, never expected by me even in my wildest dreams.

After completing all the procedure, he gave me a smile and ordered me to pass it to the owner guy who was still in his serious and strange mood.


I blushed once more.

Meanwhile a man and his daughter-from their appearance I could make out they were from a low middle-class family- stood near me waiting for the jewellery purchased by the father for his daughter ( might be dowry for his daughter’s marriage purchased with his hard-earned money for years of hard labour or borrowed from somebody). The bag containing the ornaments handed over to him after making the bill-payment, the smart young owner was all smiles to them and extended a warm shake-hand to the man. Man and daughter got delighted and they bid farewell with polite smiles and with a ‘Namasthe’( an Indian way of expressing respect by holding together both palms placed close to the chest).

The young guy’s smile again vanished and I was made to wait for the amount for another ten minutes. Then he took out the notes,carefully counted and handed it over to me.

With a polite thanks, I left the jewellery thinking about the ways of the world.

He didn’t care to return even a single smile atleast for a single second.

Is he business-minded?
You may decide, please…