A Bachelor in Madras ( 1974-1976)

I landed in Madras on 23rd March 1974.It was a saturday morning and the blast of heat that hit me as I came out of Madras Central was a foretaste of the famous Madras heat.

I took a cycle rickshaw and went straight to Udipi Home in Egmore which was just 200 Metres away from our Office.

After freshening up, I walked over to the Office. This was in a residential locality and the carpenters were still giving the final touches in the ground floor. The first floor was to be the residence of the Branch Manager, Mr.N.P Shah.
The interiors were done up very well and my first impression of the lounge was that it looked like the lobby of a 5 star hotel. My fellow Sales Engineer was V.Kalyansundar whom I had known when he had come for training to Hubli.

I soon went back to the hotel (Rs.17 per day), had my lunch and then went to visit Venu. Venu was the Finance Director of Binny's and had a bungalow opposite to the Madras Boat Club.I took a bus to Adyar Gate ( now Park Sheraton) and walked up to his house.Venu was at home and I met Jaya Chikkamma as well as the children Vagdevi, Abhaya and Prasad.

I was to spend many pleasant weekends at their home over the next 2 years.

I got back to Udipi Home and then got ready to attend the Branch Office Inauguration Event at Hotel Connemara.
One of the Directors had driven down in a yellow Ford Mustang and this was creating waves at Connemara where it was parked.

The function was a grand success and I was introduced to many customers whom I would be regularly seeing later.

After I went back to the hotel, I realized that my Rs.100 would not last long if I continued to stay at Udipi Home. Next day ( 24th Mar), I shifted to Roseland Lodge ( Rs.10 per day) which was just opposite Egmore Railway Station.

When 1st Apr came, I did not get my salary because the Accounts people were not aware of my transfer to Madras!!
I had to borrow Rs.200 from Mr.Shah.

The 2 stenographers, Monica Kurup and Jennifer Satur, joined on 7th Apr 1974 and all 5 of us ( NPS,Kalyan, Jenny, Monica and me) went to Woodlands Drive-In for lunch.

In May 1974, Kalyan resigned since he had got admission to IIM,Calcutta so it was just me and NP Shah to do the Sales work.

My first Sales visit was to Bangalore and there was this customer in Peenya who had a problem with one of our pumps.
I visited his factory and had no clue of how to solve the problem. I finally told him that he should change the equipment.The poor guy dropped me back to Saraswathi's house in Maleswaram where I was staying and Gayathri gave him Khas Khas ( opium seed)payasa since it was Rama Navami or some such festival.He actully felt very woozy after this and he went off never to contact us again.

In Apr 1974, I shifted to another lodge in Saidapet ( very close to Saidapet railway Station) which offered a room with attached bath for Rs.110 per month.

Commuting by electric train between Egmore and Saidapet was easy and I would have my breakfast consisting of curd rice at Egmore Station after coming in from Saidapet.

For lunch, I would get the office boy to bring Masala Dosa or some other stuff from Udipi Home.

I stayed in Saidapet for just a month. In May 1974, I was able to move in to YMCA at Parry's Corner. I shared a room with two other boys--- Sudarsanam who was working asa Service Engineer at Ashok Leyland and Kamaluddin who was working in ITDC.These were nice guys who kept to themselves and did not interfere much.The room was very large and spacious and every evening a delightful breeze would blow in from the sea which was less than 500 metres away.

I would take Bus No 9 or 10 from Parry's Corner to casa Major Road and come back in the evening in the same bus route.

The office atmosphere was excellent.N P Shah's parents were staying with him and his wife had just returned with their second child from her Gujarat hometown.Every now and then, she would send down some delicacy like dhokla .There was a TV available, so if there was some Test Match going on, I would go up and watch the match.

The Madras heat was terrible but I was slowly getting used to it.I made my first visit to Kerala in June 1974and the first thing that hit me when I landed in Cochin wasthe smell of fish and then that of coconut oil.I travelled extensively in the interiors from Calicut in the north down to Trivandrum in the south.Trichur, Chalakudy, Shertallay, Kottayam,Udyogamandal,Quilon,Alwaye,Ambalamedu,Cannanore---- I've been everywhere.Kerala has a very good bus network and getting around isn't difficult at all.Ernakulam was the commercial centre and Cochin situated on Vypeen Island was the quieter area where the Navy establishment was located.

During my trips, I always took care to visit the local places of interest, be it Guruvayur near Trichur or Kanyakumari near Trivandrum.Mattancherry near Cochin had a quiet ambience and some areas nearby reminded me of KGF.

Boiled rice in the food was a major problem and it was difficult to find hotels that prepared meals with raw rice.

I made similar extensive trips in Andhra Pradesh. Guntur, Eluru,Vijayawada, Tadepalligudem, Bhimavaram,Rajamundry, Kakinada, Kovvur, Tanuku, Sirpur Kaghaznagar, Warangal, Bhadrachalam were some of the areas I visited.

The land was very fertile but the people were very poor.I travelled in many places by Cycle-rikshaw and the poor rikshawallah would accept whatever money I gave him.

Within Madras, I used to go to places as far away as Manali, Avadi, Ambattur, Madhavaram etc.I'm not exaggerating when I say that I worked really, really hard.But this was work that I enjoyed and I felt that I was making a real contribution to the organization.

Whenever I wanted to go to KGF or Bangalore for some function, I would plan a tour.During one such tour, Shankara and I went for a movie in Plaza Theater in Bangalore. During the interval, I slipped across to a customer's Office next door, finalized an order and came back within 20 minutes and resumed watching the movie.Shankara was amazed when I told him that my work for the day was over.

In May 1974, I attend the wedding of Vijayasimha ( Venu's brother) in Bangalore.

1974 was a year of unrest.The famous Railway strike led by George Fernandes took place in May 1974 and events had already started that would culminate in the declaration of Emergency in June 1975.

Our working hours were 9.30 AM to 5.30 AM with Saturdays being half-day. Sometime in July 1974, there was a power cut in Maharashtra because of which the lifts were not working on Saturdays in our Bombay Head Office.As a result, all Branch sales were ordered to be closed on Saturdays and we had a 5 day week.

From then on, I spent practically every week end at Venu's house.I would come on Saturday morning at around 10 AM and pick up a bunch of comics that Abhaya or Prasad had.I would then head back on Saturday evening.Sometimes, I would stay over and leave on Sunday morning or afternoon after lunch.

Prasad was a great lover of Billy Bunter books and had a stack of them.Many years later, when my son Sachin got married, Prasad sent me a Billy Bunter book all the way from USA .He inscribed it " To the Father of the Groom". Very thoughtful of him and a gift that I greatly treasured.

I used to travel a lot within Madras by auto and taxi and now the company decided to offer me a loan to buy a two-wheeler.I quickly went to KGF and took a crash course in scooter and motorbike riding at the Gymkhana Grounds with the vehicles being lent by my dad's colleagues.

I then went to Bangalore and bought a second hand lambretta with the help of B S Nagaraj and brought it by train to Madras.

I was now really mobile and used the opportunity to go places like Marina Beach etc.

Money was still tight and made worse by the fact that my full salary was not being credited to me.Here's why. Inflation was soaring at more than 12% at that time and the Government passed a law that an employee could not get more than one increment.If he did get more, the additional emoluments was to be stored in a separate account and given later.

I got 5 increments in August 1974, but I was given only one increment as part of my salary and the balance was kept in a separate account. Crazy but true!!

In November 1974, I suffered another tragedy. I had gone on a tour to Andhra Pradesh and had got off at Warangal in the night.I tried for a retiring room but it was not available. I then slept in the waiting room. When I got up in the morning, my suitcase was gone!! Fortunately, I had my wallet with me and the office briefcase was intact.

I lodged a complaint and then cut short my tour and returned to Madras.I then spent around Rs.1500 ( a lot of money those days) on refurbishing my wardrobe.

My company was extremely understnding about this and refunded the money back to me.

Life went on in this vein till April 1975 and that is when a series of events happened that severely tested my ability to cope with crises.

One of our office assistants had sent off an anonymous letter to our Head Office with complaints against my Branch Manager.As soon as they got it, they went through the contents and decided that the charges were baseless and decided to sack the employee. On the day I got the call, my BM was travelling.I was told to prepare a letter of dismissal and send the employee home immediately.This was a person with a family and I was sharing the same office room with him for over a year. But what had to be done had to be done. So I got the letter prepared, called him into the BM's chamber, asked him to sign the duplicate copy and asked him to clear his belongings immediately. Mind you, I was just 24 and this was a new experience for me.

Jenny resigned in May 1975 to join Qantas and only Monica was left to do the stenography. My BM went on long leave in June 1975 and suddenly Monica also stopped coming for work.

I didn't know what to do since work was piling up and the only people left in the Office were the Office car driver who also doubled up as an Office Assistant and me.

Jenny was still in Madras and so I spoke to her and explained the problem and asked her if she could help out by doing the typing work for me.She was a real sport and agreed.

Every day, I would send the typewriter, the office stationery like letterheads, envelopes, inter-office memo pads, carbon paper, stapler etc along with my handwritten notes along with the car driver. He would deposit the fresh set and bring back the typewritten letters etc that had been sent on the previous day.This went on for more than 10 days before a new girl joined.

By this time, my boss had also returned from his leave and he really appreciated the fact that I had not allowed work to pile up.

By now, I had started getting getting feelers from my mom and dad whether I was ready for marriage. A couple of proposals had come in but it had not yet got to the stage of exchanging photos etc.

In Aug 1975, my mom wrote to me that Mr.B.V.Nagaraj and his wife and daughter were coming down to Bangalore and were interested in a possible alliance. Since I was in Madras, they wanted to meet me with my parents in Madras on 30th Aug 1975 on their way back to Bhopal.30th Aug 1975 was a Saturday, so dad and mom duly booked their ticket to Madras and informed Venu that they would be staying in his house.

I happened to be in the office on 23rd Aug even though it was a Saturday.A call came through and it was from Mr.B.V.Nagaraj.He said that he was speaking from Madras and wanted to know whether I could meet them at his newphew Bhagavan's house in Raja Annamalaipuram. I had no clue where the house but said I would be there.

( To be Continued)