The Bankster (Ravi Subramanian) (3 page)

‘So, what are you trying to prove here?’

‘We got to know about it only three days after the elephant had died. When we exhumed the carcass, we didn’t find its tusks. So son, unless you guys tell us where the ivory is, your father will rot here in jail.’

Arvind took the lawyer aside and asked, ‘Is there a way out?’

‘No. Ivory smuggling is a non-bailable offence, but. . .’ he paused

‘But what?’

‘They haven’t charged him yet. They haven’t filed a First Information Report—the FIR. Moinuddin has so far only brought him in for questioning. We will only be in trouble if they book him for smuggling.’

‘Then what do we do? He’s a heart patient. If he doesn’t get his medicines on time, he will have serious health issues.’

‘Let’s try talking to them,’ was all that the advocate could say at that time.

Arvind walked up to the duo again. ‘Can I meet my father?’

‘No,’ the Sub Inspector said firmly.

‘Sir, please. It’s important for you to hear his side of the story. Only then can you know the whole truth.’

‘You will tell us. . .you. . .a kid. . .will tell us what the truth is? Why don’t you just get out of the police station? You can go to a judge with your truth.’ At the same time a door in the far right of the main hall opened and out walked a constable with a cruel smirk on his face. Trudging behind the constable was the frail frame of Appachen, his vest soaked in blood and his eyes swollen beyond recognition. Appachen looked at them pleadingly through tear-stained eyes, as he was led away. It sent shivers up their spines. Had the same fate befallen Krishna too? He would not be able to withstand it.

Arvind’s demeanour completely changed after he saw Appachen’s plight. He approached the cop again, this time with folded hands, literally pleading with him to let his father go.

‘Once we get the tusks, we’ll let your father go. Not before that.’ Moinuddin was heartless. He and the chief warden got up to leave. Just as they crossed Arvind, Moinuddin tapped him on his shoulder. ‘Go home. Wait for someone to come and talk to you.’ The two of them then walked out of the police station, into a parked jeep and drove off, nearly knocking a constable down on the way.

Within the next three hours, a motorcade of three cars drove into the Menon’s resort and came to a screeching halt in the portico. Arvind and Sulochana were waiting at the reception. They had been standing there ever since they got back from the police station.

A tall dark man, clad in a veshti and angavastram, stepped out of the lead car and stood in front of them. He looked familiar. When the person folded his hands in front of them and offered them his salutations, Arvind recognized him. This was the same pose he had seen on umpteen posters. The man in front of them was the local MLA, Madan Mohan.

What was he doing there? Even in the days of general elections in Devikulam, he had never ever visited them.

‘I believe there is some problem here?’ the MLA seemed concerned and asked Sulochana.

‘No sir, no problem,’ Arvind stammered. He didn’t want the local MLA to blow the issue out of proportion.

‘But Moinuddin was telling me a different story?’

‘Moinuddin?’ Arvind was momentarily surprised before he realised why the MLA was there. He was a part of the scam and wanted his pound of flesh. A deal was struck for twenty-five thousand rupees to exchange hands for the release of Arvind’s father.

Krishna came back the same evening along with Appachen. The scars on Appachen’s body healed over a period of time. But the deep wound it left in Arvind’s mind refused to heal. That was the day he decided to leave India for good. Eight years after the incident, Arvind married the daughter of a Russian scientist and settled in Ukraine, where, a few years later, the world saw the worst ever nuclear disaster.

1

Greater Boston Global Bank

Head Office

Fort, Mumbai

February 2011

‘Arre Vikram,’ shouted Tanuja, waving her hand frantically as she sprinted casually across the passage between rows of workstations enroute to the conference room, trying to grab the attention of the Retail Banking Head of Greater Boston Global Bank (GB2). Vikram had just walked out of the core strategy meet the CEO had called in preparation for the high profile visit of seniors from the Global Headquarters (GHQ) of GB2. The flamboyant Vikram Bahl had been the Head of Branch banking, a role in which he spent about three years, before being promoted to head Retail Banking in the middle of 2010. He had stayed away from hiring his replacement in the branch banking business and managed it directly, despite having moved on to a more senior role. Many thought it was because of his hands-on approach to business, though many skeptics also said he was scared of skeletons tumbling out of the closet if someone else stepped into that role. In order to keep Guneet Chandra, the Head of Credit Cards and Vikram’s professional rival happy, the cards business was not made to report to Vikram. It reported directly to the CEO of the bank, pending Guneet’s elevation to the next level at an appropriate time.

‘Kya hua? Anything interesting?’ Tanuja asked when she caught up with him.

‘Nothing yaar. Just the same old bakwas. These meetings are now beginning to get on my nerves. Indrani is just the same as Ronald McCain.’

‘Who said things would change once Ronald moves and Indrani takes over?’

‘Haan yaar. It’s been close to a year that he moved back and Indrani became CEO. We were hoping that once an Indian takes over as CEO, things would improve. But it’s still the same old crap, same old meetings, same old discussions. When will we get over this nonsense ya?’

‘Okay okay. . . Dheere dheere. . . Keep your voice low. Someone might hear you.’ Tanuja didn’t want to get into trouble because of Vikram’s antics. Being the head of HR she had to maintain decorum, which Vikram didn’t quite care about, at least in her presence. The last thing she wanted was to be heard bitching about the CEO.

‘Oh. Don’t worry Tanuja. No one will hear us. And who wants to listen to whatever we say? They do their own thing anyway.’

‘Well, aren’t you in a good mood today,’ Tanuja remarked sarcastically.

‘What do I say? Had to go and see a property in Lokhandwala this morning. Indrani called for this meeting and screwed up my schedule.’

‘What property?’

‘Somebody brought a deal to me. Thought I would check it out and see if it’s worth investing in.’

‘Arre, how come you’re looking for property without me?’

‘Oh, ho. Let me see it first. If it is worth it, I will tell you na. Anyway what’re you doing now? Come, let’s go for chai.’

Tanuja glanced at her watch, and simultaneously opened the calendar on her BlackBerry to check her schedule for the remaining part of the day. Hurriedly, she typed out a message and in a matter of forty-five seconds she pressed ‘send’ and walked out of the bank premises with Vikram to a stall about two hundred metres away for a cup of cutting chai.

‘Did you have a meeting?’ asked Vikram, pointing to her BlackBerry.

‘Haan, yaar. Nikhil wanted to see me.’

‘Why?’

‘Some issues with his performance rating that he wants to discuss with me.’

‘What crap? Let him speak to Guneet Chandra first. Who is his boss? Guneet or you?’

‘Of course Guneet. . . He tried to do that. But apparently Guneet couldn’t convince him. Nikhil feels he deserves a rating better than the 3+ he’s got. Now he wants to chew my brains about it.’

‘When is he coming to meet you?’

‘In the next fifteen minutes. I was just not in a mood to meet him. In any case what could I have done—only given him the satisfaction that he raised this issue with the head of HR. I would have given him some gyan and sent him away. But I’ve just told my secretary to tell him that I’m going to Delhi tomorrow and won’t be back till the end of the week,’ and she started laughing.

Vikram laughed too. ‘You are now saved the trauma and harassment that Nikhil would have subjected you to,’ he said, giving her a high five.

After the tea with Vikram, Tanuja was back at her desk in forty minutes. Her secretary came in to tell her that Nikhil had come and left.

‘Oh, something very critical came up. I couldn’t skip it. So had to cancel it.’ Her secretary nodded and left Tanuja’s cabin, quietly closing the door behind her.

A few hours later the intercom on Tanuja’s desk rang. Her secretary had left for the day and hence all the calls landed directly on her extension.

‘Yes sir. . .ready to leave?’

‘No, no. . .not yet. I suddenly remembered something. In the meeting today, Indrani talked about a directive from GHQ to start private banking in India.’

‘I know. Indrani mentioned this to me yesterday,’ Tanuja confirmed.

‘You knew this? Why didn’t you tell me?’ She could sense some irritation in his voice.

‘I didn’t? Strange. It must’ve slipped my mind. But in any case, how does it matter? It’s a different business; in fact it’s going to be set up as a different company, a different legal entity.’

‘That’s exactly my point, Tanuja. It’s going to be a different business. And that’s why we need to be prepared.’

‘Prepared? As in?’ Tanuja asked, confused.

‘Look Tanuja, private banking is a business targeted at the crème de la crème customers. It will compete with the top end of my branch banking business. They will end up targeting the same customers, that too with better services and more flexible products.’

‘So?’

‘We have to make sure they don’t steal our thunder.’ Tanuja didn’t understand what Vikram meant.

Under Vikram, branch banking had become a very glamorous business. The stock market was on fire for the better part of the previous year, mutual funds were selling as if they were soon going out of fashion and gullible customers were very happy investing in mutual funds and other structured products, as advised by the extremely aggressive relationship managers in Vikram’s branch network. A new private banking business set up on similar lines, albeit targeting only the high-end consumers, was sure to create turmoil. In the relationship management world, a private banking RM was seen as belonging to a superior breed as compared to the normal branch RM. It was but natural for Vikram to be worried that most of his RMs would want to move to private banking roles. Anybody in his place would have been worried that the arrival of Private Banking would create discontent and unrest in his team.

‘Are you worried that your guys would want to move to them? If so, don’t bother too much. We will mandate that no branch RM will move to the private banking jobs as and when they come up,’ Tanuja tried to comfort Vikram.

‘Arre, nahin yaar. That’s not what I am worried about. On the contrary, I would want my guys to move to bigger and better roles. Let them take people from my team. Let them hire my RMs.’

‘What!’ Tanuja was surprised.

‘Yes, of course. In fact if my RMs have good careers, I will be extremely happy.’ Conviction was completely missing from what he said. There was silence at the other end. Then Tanuja burst out into a guffaw. ‘Hahahaha.’ She continued laughing for a while. ‘Now I understand!’

‘What?’

‘Bahut kamina hai tu! You’re too smart. . .just too smart.’

‘Arre, why?’

‘You want to fill in the new business with your own people. I know you too well, Vikram. If you pack the private banking team with RMs from your branch banking network who owe their allegiance to you, the business will be
de facto
in your control. And you, smart ass Vikram Bahl, will run that business remotely.’

‘Hehe. . .no no.’ Vikram was a bit embarrassed that Tanuja had called his bluff. ‘That’s not what I had in mind.’

‘Sure. Sure. If that’s not what you had in mind, then I am the Queen of England.’

‘No Tanuja.That isn’t my intention at all. But now that you say it, it might not be a bad idea. What’s the harm in getting one of our own guys to head private banking? I will release one of my best cluster managers for the job.’

‘Who? Rahul? Your brother-in-law?’ Tanuja was the only one who knew that one of the senior-most cluster managers in Vikram’s team was his wife’s first cousin. It was one of the few closely held secrets at GB2.

‘No yaar. That we will figure out later. But it will be someone from inside the team.’

‘Not possible, Vikram. The mandate is that for the head of private banking, we have to get talent from outside the group. They want a fresh perspective for this role.’

‘Is that so?’

‘Hmm. Start hunting for the Head of private banking, Mr Bahl. . .and that too from outside GB2.’

‘It won’t be difficult. I’ll send you a couple of guys. You speak to them directly. If you like them, I’ll ask Yogesh Bhargav to send you their CVs. We can then put them up to Indrani to hire.’

‘Good idea. The money Yogesh Bhargav will pass back to us if we hire through him will pay for our next Maldives holiday.’

‘Not on the intercom, babes. . . Anyway, I’m done. Ready to leave?’

‘Ten minutes. See you in the parking lot,’ and Tanuja hung up.

As promised, in ten minutes Vikram and Tanuja drove out of the basement car park in a steel grey Mitsubishi Lancer. They were neighbours and would often come to work and leave together.

‘I’m going to tell Abhishek to start preparing for the Maldives trip,’ said Tanuja as they crossed Ambassador hotel and turned right into Marine drive. ‘Tell Yogesh Bhargav we’ll pay him only ten per cent of the actual commission due on this deal. We’ll keep the rest.’

‘He will quietly take what we give him. In any case, he is an old man with one foot in the grave. What will he do with more than that?’ He looked at her and smiled. Tanuja smiled back. They crossed Haji Ali and were driving towards Parel where both of them stayed.

Vikram’s phone rang. It was lying on the dashboard of the car. Vikram’s hands were glued to the steering and the slow-moving traffic made it difficult for him to move his left hand away from the gear shaft. Tanuja picked it up. She saw the name flashing on the screen and looked at Vikram.