The Incredible Banker (6 page)

'S
O, Mr McCain, this is where we are,' the governor ended his monologue. All along Ronald McCain was just listening to the governor without saying anything.

'So what is the RBI planning to do about it?' Ronald finally asked.

'Mr McCain, you know RBI does not normally tolerate any interference nor does it take instructions from any department of the central or state government. But this is not a normal situation. The finance and the home ministries are after my life. Serious questions have been raised about the policies and procedures followed by foreign banks in general and your bank in particular. And this time I am at the receiving end. It is a serious breach and I can't afford to be seen not acting. I am sure you understand where I am coming from.' The governor was blunt and to the point.

'Yes, Mr Governor, but I am sure you realise these issues could happen in any other bank as well. It's not about Greater Boston Global Bank in particular, but the entire banking system. Why single out my bank for this?'

'It's because these irregularities have been discovered in your bank, Mr McCain,' and after a pause he added, 'all the others are clear as of now. We haven't found anything problematic with any other bank. When we find something, we will take appropriate action against them.'

Ronald couldn't argue further.

'So, Mr McCain, your bank needs to sort things out. Let's see how we can deal with it in the best possible manner.'

'What do you recommend, Mr Governor?'

The RBI governor turned his face towards the door for a brief moment and then left the room saying, 'I will be back in a moment.' He quickly disappeared behind the door that opened into his cabin. Within a few minutes, he was back in the meeting room with an envelope in his hand.

Placing the envelope on the table he looked at a visibly pained Ronald, who was trying to guess what was going on in the governor's mind.

'We have discussed the issue internally and we have no other choice. I will be grateful if you could acknowledge the copy of this letter and hand it over to us. Normally, I would not even have got involved in this, Mr McCain, I would have allowed the Additional Director of Banking affairs to manage this. But given the sensitivity of this case and the possible ramifications, I decided to handle this myself. After this meeting, I have to report to the finance ministry.'

Ronald extended his right hand and accepted the envelope. He pulled out the letter from inside the envelope and began to read it. What he read left him in a state of shock. The letter from the RBI was a warning he had not expected – a warning that could have far-reaching impact on shareholder value back home.

T
HE entire country was celebrating Raksha Bandhan which coincided with Ganesh Chaturthi that year – a festival when Hindus celebrate the birth of the elephant God Ganesh.

Anil Williams loved Ganesh Chaturthi even though he was not a Hindu. Not that he was particularly fond of Lord Ganesh or was deeply religious. In fact he had not even been to a church for quite a while. Anil and his wife Rimi had high-flying careers and they were seen as iconic professionals in their respective fields. It put tremendous pressure on them, something they enjoyed, but it also kept them out of home for long hours. They would leave early and come back late at least six days in the week. On any working day, the doorman would press the button of the motorised gate to open the barricade for Anil's car to glide into his residence's parking lot well past 10 p.m. If it was a crisis day, well, he would never make it before the early hours of the morning. The doorman would invariably open the door muttering a few obscenities, which Anil would have ignored, had he heard them. In any case, they were never loud enough.

Dhruv, the five-year-old son of Anil and Rimi, would be at home with his grandparents, waiting for his father to be back. After waiting till nine, he would be tucked into bed by his grandmother and patted to sleep, more often than not unwillingly. He would try to keep awake till the time sleep would overcome him.

Holidays like Ganesh Chaturthi gave Anil time to spend with his son. He would take him out to play cricket, go cycling with him, play with him in the Carter Road promenade and shop with him for all the boy stuff. Dhruv liked it, too. The time he spent with his father was quite exciting. He yearned for more such days.

'Dad!' Dhruv called out to Anil innocently. 'Why aren't there more gods like Lord Ganesh?'

'Because one Ganesh is capable of finishing all the modaks in this country, ' said Anil and when it didn't elicit a response from Dhruv and instead brought a puzzled look on his face, he shrugged his shoulders innocently and added, 'I guess so. '

'But then we only get one Ganesh Chaturthi in a year. Many more gods will mean many more holidays na, Dad?' Noticing the sad look on Dhruv's face, Anil walked up to him and took him in his arms and cuddled him tightly. 'Dad, why can't you be at home and play with me every day?' Anil had no answer to Dhruv's naive question. He hugged Dhruv even more tightly and the two of them fell on the bed playing with each other.

After a few minutes, Anil affectionately whacked Dhruv on his butt.

'Ouch, Dad! It hurts. '

'You are stinking, my boy. Get up! Time for a shower. '

Anil and Dhruv had just come back from a cycling trip to Carter Road, up and down Union Park, back to Bandstand and then to their house in Bandra. A nine-kilometre bicycle ride was bound to make them sweaty, especially at 4 p. m. when the sun is at its peak. Rimi was away in Bengaluru for a corporate interview and hence Anil was in charge.

Jumping excitedly at the suggestion, Dhruv removed all his clothes and dashed to the bathroom. The water in the jacuzzi came on with a whizz, gushing in from all sides, and Dhruv jumped into the water, squealing joyfully. Anil just smiled. Dhruv loved being with his father, and it was
his
day.

Dhruv was extremely possessive about Anil. He would not let Anil touch his mobile when he was with him. It was futile for Anil to even try. Dhruv would scream so hard whenever he picked up his phone that he would have no choice but to hang up. The phone would be confined to a corner of his work desk in the bedroom till Dhruv went to sleep. Anil gave in to Dhruv's desires simply because he suffered immense guilt at not being able to spend enough time with him.

After an early dinner, Dhruv, tired post a day filled with excitement, went off to sleep. Anil got up from the bed, switched on the television and began watching the replay of the historic India vs Australia test match played at Eden Gardens in 2001. Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman were launching an attack on the Aussies on the fourth day, and Anil was a huge Dravid fan. As he was sinking into his red automatic recliner, which Rimi had got for him on his thirty-sixth birthday, he remembered something and got up instantly. He walked out of the TV room. Ten steps and two doors later, he was in his bedroom standing by his cherry-hued study table. His eyes scanned the table but couldn't find what he was looking for. He looked around the room and still couldn't find it. Unfazed, he walked into the living room and looked around in vain. He returned to his bedroom, picked up the cordless phone and dialled a number.

A feeble, muzzled noise could be heard from the other room. He walked in the direction of the noise. It was emanating from the vicinity of Dhruv's room. He walked towards the room, cordless in hand. The sound was getting closer. It seemed to be coming from Dhruv's cupboard. Opening the door of the cupboard, he moved around some of Dhruv's clothes and there it was. Dhruv had carefully hidden away his mobile phone, obviously worried that a call would take Anil away from him. He turned to look back at Dhruv, smiled affectionately, walked up to him to give him a peck on his cheek and quietly walked out of the room.

On his way out, as he stretched his left hand to switch off the light in Dhruv's room, he glanced down at the large screen of his mobile phone – six missed calls and eleven unread messages were waiting for him.

Walking back to the confines of his room, he checked the calls he had missed. Two were from Rimi. Manageable. She would understand why he did not pick her calls. If it was urgent, she would have called on the landline or spoken to his parents. One was from Jacqueline, his secretary at work. 'She will call back if it's anything urgent; it is too late to return her call, ' he muttered to himself. One was from an unknown number and the other two were from Karan, his boss. He suddenly perked up. Why was Karan calling on a weekend? He normally did not disturb his colleagues on a holiday. But that day there were two calls from him. It had to be urgent. Thankfully the two calls were in the last thirty minutes. He pressed the dial button and lifted the phone to his ear. When he disconnected after five minutes, he was a relieved man. Karan just wanted some information for an early morning meeting the next day. He then went to his inbox to look at the unread messages.

The moment he opened his inbox, he let out a moan. 'What the hell is this? Nine promotional messages. Will the National Do Not Call (NDNC) list ever work?' He had dutifully registered for the NDNC Registry over a year back and despite that got at least eight to ten promotional messages on his mobile everyday. As he was about to keep his phone down, his eyes rolled over to a nondescript message from someone he knew very well. He was quite surprised because the person who had sent him the message was not someone who would usually engage with Anil and his team. He pressed the 'Open' button and the message was on his screen.

Anil read the message once. He did not understand it. He first dismissed it as a prank. Then he read it again. And again. And slowly it sunk in. He slumped back on the sofa, which cushioned his fall. His heart was beating faster. His pulse raced. A few drops of sweat appeared on his forehead despite the chilling impact of the AC.

Why was this sent to him? Had the sender really intended to send the message to him? Worse still, if he was not the intended recipient, who was the message intended for? What should he do? Should he share it with someone? Or should he keep quiet about it? He didn't know the answer. The phone loomed back into his line of sight. He read the message again:

'We must plot some dirty, manipulative stuff on shitface. Savitha hates him, Gopal hates him. We should somehow get Richard, Anil and Ganesh to hate him as well. Kuch kar yaar... we r so close to getting him bumped off!!!'

What worried Anil was that all the four names mentioned in the SMS – Savitha, Gopal, Richard and Ganesh – reported to Karan. So the shitface in the SMS was Karan. Even an idiot could figure that out. Karan was the only common factor that linked all the names in the SMS. What shocked him more was the source of the SMS.

The sender was Deepak Sarup. And it was sent at 4. 45 a. m. in the morning. He had missed the message since he was occupied with Dhruv the entire day and had not been able to check his phone.

Why did Deepak send the SMS to him? Was it a mistake? Was it sent to him intentionally? Was there something else behind this? Was there a sinister plan to derail Karan's team? He didn't know.

He picked up his phone and read the message several times. He was shocked. The vicious tone of the SMS was too appalling for his comfort. And, more importantly why was it sent to him? It had to be a mistake. Should he send it to Karan? Should he call back Deepak and ask? He didn't know what to do.

And then as he read it for the umpteenth time he figured it out. Deepak had wanted to send the SMS to Amit Sharma, the credit head for mortgages. And instead of typing AMI' on his mobile, he typed 'ANI and carelessly clicked 'send' on the first name that showed up from his mobile's phone book.

It dawned on Anil that both Deepak and the mortgages credit head were hand in glove. They were conspiring to get rid of Karan, his boss, who was a nice man and a rigorous sales manager.

He kept the phone on the side and decided to think about it the next day.

A
NIL reached office the next day wondering what he should do about the SMS he received on Ganesh Chaturthi. He was a bit confused, not knowing if it was sent to him by mistake, intentionally or if someone was playing a prank. Even if it was a prank, he didn't know if was directed at him or Karan. Not only confused, he was also a bit nervous. Was this a racket he was about to expose?

He was in early that day. Savitha, too, had reached by then. Their seats were quite close by. However, he did not go to her directly. After logging into his laptop, he pinged her, on the intra office chat messenger.

'Hi. '

The message popped up on Savitha's screen. She turned and looked behind. She knew where Anil would normally sit. His eyes were glued to his screen. Wondering why he would ping her when she was sitting right in front of him, she began the chat. 'Hi?'

'What are you doing?'

'Responding to some mails. Some pricing requests. Why?'

'See me in the conference room in the next two minutes. Want to show you something. ' She saw Anil get up and walk towards the conference room.

Savitha was in the conference room in the next two minutes where Anil was waiting for her.

'Did you get any SMS from Deepak yesterday?' He seemed to be in a hurry.

'Deepak? Why?' Savitha was surprised. Had someone seen them together? Her guilty mind walked a different track.

'Because I got this SMS from Deepak yesterday. Did you get this, too?' he asked her.

Savitha took the phone from his hands and read through the message. She couldn't understand what was written. Why would Deepak send such a stupid message to Anil? She couldn't understand. 'No, Anil. I didn't get this message. But why would Deepak send this message to you? I am sure there is some kind of misunderstanding here. Why don't you check with Deepak?'

'No, I will talk to Karan first. Let him deal with it the way he thinks appropriate. '

"That might be the right thing to do. ' And Savitha walked away from the conference room. The fact that she disliked Karan was known to everyone, including Karan himself. If anything, the sender of the message had got his facts right.

That evening Bhisham called Deepak.

'Deepak, Vikram Solanki just spoke with me. ' Vikram was GB2's Head of HR

'Yes, Bhisham. What is it about?'

'Apparently there is an SMS that has gone out from you yesterday to someone in Karan's team, which seems to raise a finger at your personal integrity. '

'What? What SMS are you talking about, Bhisham? I am not aware of any such message' Deepak seemed shocked and surprised at this allegation.

'Look, ' said Bhisham and showed him an email. It was written by Karan to the head of HR and copied to the CEO and even to the head of retail banking.

Dear Vikram,

I am extremely disturbed by this incident. This has wider ramifications as we go about building our loans business and that's the reason why I am raising this to you.

Background

On Wednesday (24 August), 'Anil Williams' received a message on his phone from Deepak Sarup, which, I presume, was sent to him erroneously. I would like to believe, looking at the contents, that the message was meant for someone else but was sent to Anil by mistake. Anil too was extremely shaken up and showed it to me this morning. He showed it to me a day late because the day he received the message was a bank holiday. I am reproducing the contents of the SMS below.

We must plot some dirty, manipulative stuff on shitface. Savitha hates him, Gopal hates him. We should somehow get Richard, Anil and Ganesh to hate him as well. Kuch kar yaar. We r so close to getting him bumped off!!

I am concerned about the contents of this message because it speaks about me and I feel reasonably threatened by this malicious effort to plot against me. It also affects my ability to deliver on my job. Such behaviour by the seemingly responsible people of this organisation will be detrimental to organisational goals.

Anil and I can come across and show you the message he received on his phone.

Given that the message is manipulative, personal and against the collaborative spirit that all of us are working in, I would request you to take appropriate action.

Regards,

Karan

'Would you like to say anything about this, Deepak?'

Deepak did not know what to say. He definitely seemed to be searching for words in his defense.

'What time was it sent?' Deepak asked.

'Sometime yesterday morning, though the mail doesn't state that. That's what Vikram told me when he called. '

'Hmm, now I understand. ' Deepak pretended to have suddenly discovered something

'What?'

'Wait, ' said Deepak as he pulled out a phone from his pocket. It was a new Iphone. 'Remember I had a different phone earlier. That one got stolen the night before. I bought this one yesterday. It's not even active. I have asked for a duplicate SIM which will come today. I have been using my Blackberry for making calls all day. If only someone had spoken to me before making it so big, I would have clarified. '

'What exactly do you mean?' Bhisham looked perplexed by Deepak's explanation.

'Obviously someone has found my phone in office, someone who knows about the issues Karan and his team have with my team, and he has exploited the situation. Or maybe someone just wanted to create some nuisance. Or wait a minute... '

'What?' Bhisham was incredulous.

'Could it be that Karan has an inkling of what's coming his way in the audit report? Maybe he is just trying to be aggressive here so that he can blunt the blow of the audit report by diverting attention, ' Deepak said, making an attempt at rationalizing Karan not approaching him prior to shooting out a mail to the CEO.

'As in?'

'By using this SMS he will claim that I am vindictive towards him and thus have been deliberately unfair in the audit report. Yes, yes... now I understand his game plan. What a mastermind he is!'

'Hmm... possibly, Deepak. I always thought he was a clean guy. Anyway, now that you speak of this angle... ' he paused for a few seconds and then said, 'anything is possible in this world. Listen, why don't you draft a formal message for me to send to Vikram? Since he called me to discuss this, I will have to go back to him formally. ' Bhisham was not interested in the Deepak-Karan politics. He just wanted to make sure he responded to Vikram as early as possible and got the matter off his back.

'Right away, Bhisham. '

The moment he got out of Bhishams room he took out his Blackberry and called on a number. 'Hi. '

"Thanks, baby. Good that you told me about the chaos. Helped me weave a story and they bought into it. I didn't even know that the SMS had gone to Anil till you told me. All this while I was wondering why Amit didn't respond to my message. Thank God I got to know about this on time. And, babes, you are the one because of whom I missed all the calls on my other mobile yesterday. That's what saved me today. ' Deepak felt relieved.

'But how? How am I responsible for that?'

'Dumbo, the whole day we were in touch na... on Facebook. And I spoke to you for hours on my Blackberry. I ignored all the calls that came on my other phone. And I never returned those calls because yesterday was a holiday. In case someone checks my phone records, it will show that no calls have been made or received yesterday. ' The previous day, Deepak had spoken to Savitha only from his official Blackberry and never on his personal phone so that his wife would not suspect anything fishy. Whenever Radhika saw him on his Blackberry, she would assume that he was on some official call.

'Haha... smart boy. Now Karan has no story to tell. '

'Yes, babes. Now see how I hit back at him. Watch out for the report. It's based on what you told me yesterday. And one more thing before I forget, just be careful this month-end. Even if you don't meet your targets this month, it's fine. You will have enough excuses once the month gets over. But I assure you, there will be no one to whom you will need to make those excuses. ' Clearly indicating that Karan would be history soon, Deepak added, 'My SMS might have gone to the wrong person but there is no let down in the intent. '

'Yes, I know that. ' Savitha laughed. 'But be careful about what?'

'Just be careful that you don't do anything stupid this month-end. Follow the process. Control your sales force. Targets are secondary. Don't get caught doing anything which is not acceptable from a sales process perspective. After this month-end Karan won't exist. ' Deepak was confident of Karan's downfall.

'Be careful, baby. ' This was the first time Savitha had called him like that. And Deepak liked it. He wanted to hear it again.

'What, babes? What did you just say?'

'I said be careful, baby. Now go. I have work to finish. '

That was the end of their conversation.

Deepak couldn't wait for the end of that month. He spoke with Bhisham and extended the audit by a few more days so that it would include month-end. Bhisham, too, quietly agreed. He had time and again proved to be a spineless boss who could not take a stance. He had to be pushed at all times. Deepak always had his way with him.

August was turning out to be an extremely bad month for Karan. Against a target of 110 crore of home loan disbursals for the month, he was at 52 crore on the twenty-seventh of August. With four days to go, he had to get another 58 crore of disbursals. The same month-end jinx was catching up. In July, Deepak's histrionics had made them miss their targets. The hangover seemed to continue in August.

In desperation he called for a meeting of all his sales managers. Everyone came in at 9. 00 a. m. Karan was already there. The numbers didn't look good. They were not stacking up. The best-case scenario for everyone added up to 115 crore and as anyone in sales would know, the best-case scenarios seldom worked out for everyone at the same time. Someone or the other would screw up. And the final numbers would always fall short of the cumulative best-case scenarios. He was most likely to end the month at around 80-85 crore of home loan disbursals – a shortfall of approximately 20 per cent on his target. For a second month in a row he would be below his target and this made him nervous.

'Get the loans. At any cost! Give whatever pricing the customer wants and make sure we don't lose a single case, ' he thundered to his team.

It always paid to take loans from banks on a month-end because suddenly the banks would become a lot more flexible, more willing to take risks and they also offered significant discount on interest rates. A customer always gained in this desperation that banks demonstrated on a month-end.

'Let's meet up in the evening at eight after all your teams return from their respective calls. I want to personally meet every one of your executives. So make sure no one goes home till I have spoken to them. ' Karan gave strict orders to his sales managers.

The same evening twenty sales officers of the Mumbai mortgage team assembled in the conference room on the third floor, eagerly awaiting Karan's lashing. They were initially very quiet. The poor numbers were reflecting in their drooping shoulders and weak body language. Their confidence was low and they seemed quite nervous. The nervous silence slowly changed into whispers as they confided their fears to each other, which then transformed into an incessant chatter.

Soon everyone began to laugh and gossip when the door was flung open all of a sudden. Most of them expected Karan to come in and impulsively stood up. But it was not Karan who entered the room.

'Good evening everyone, ' thundered Deepak as he walked into the room unannounced. Behind him were three other members of his team. And standing with him was Amit Sharma – the mortgage credit head. All the guys in the room were wondering why Deepak was there, especially when they were expecting Karan.

As if he knew what they were thinking, Deepak began to talk, 'I am sure you must be wondering why I am here. '

'What's going on? Why are you here?' Karan had just walked into the room where he was supposed to do a sales review, only to find Deepak already there.

'I am glad you are also here. We are here to do a quick audit of the sales process. We need to check the bags of all your sales RMs. This is our standard operating procedure and we have a sanction from Bhisham. Hope you will not have no problem with it, Karan?'

'Why wasn't I told earlier? Aren't you supposed to show the basic courtesy of informing me about the audit, investigation or witch-hunt, whatever you call it?' Karan was frustrated with this new development.

'Oh yes, Karan. We would have done it. However, in this case it is supposed to be a surprise check and even the channel heads are not informed about such surprise checks. '

'What??' Karan had an annoyed look on his face. He knew he did not have a choice. His entire team was present in that room and all of them were to be subjected to the random audit. They could be exposed in case something problematic was detected. He prayed everything was in order.

Savitha, too, was in the room. She looked at Deepak and smiled. She knew she was safe. Hadn't Deepak warned her to be careful?

Karan tried to protest but no one listened. He could have asked his team to leave the room immediately but that would have upset his credibility. He could also be held guilty of obstructing an audit, which in GB2 was viewed very seriously. He could even be sacked for something like this.

He went out of the room and called his boss, Rajneesh Chatterjee, the business head of mortgages.

'Rajneesh, there seems to be a witch-hunt on, ' he said and explained the whole episode.