Jagtani's consultancy

Our Zonal Manager or ZM in short or The Baldy in affectionate terms, is a religious & God fearing person. This could be seen & construed from a number of photos under the office table glass like those of Lakshmi, Vaishno Devi Temple & Shiv-Parvati. As soon as he enters the cabin he would take off his shoes, offer namaskar three times to each of the photos, touch their feet & from there take his fingers to his head. This ritual is performed by him without fail irrespective of any visitor present there.

Call him to an exclusive evening party where his juniors are not present, he would head for the bar. Scotch on the rocks with a little soda opens him up a bit. Here also he begins with a ritual. He would hold his peg of scotch in his left hand &  dip his sun-finger of the right hand in scotch, take out  & spray in the air. He would simultaneously mutter some or the other mantra also. This is  performed thrice. Cheers is declared only thereafter. 

Corporate borrowers are usually present in such parties. They are fully updated as to the amount of loaning power of The Baldy, his hobbies & such like things. They have their own systems of intelligence gathering about such officials as The Baldy. Their diaries have full details of previous postings, likely tenure in this assignment, likely service left etc. Family details such as kids of the Saab, madam of the Saab, driver of the Saab, taste buds of the Saab, style of the Saab are carefully collected as soon as any Saab arrives on new posting. His flexibility in business &  'sewa bhav' are quietly checked from various sources.

Mr. Jagtani happened to be in such a party with The Baldy. Jagtani is a big gun Auditor of big corporates.  He has wide contacts with EDs, MDs, CMDs of banks etc. He is one of those who can make or mar the careers of bank officers. There he got introduced with The Baldy. Discussion inter-alia turned to faith & belief in super power the God. Jagtani extolled the virtues & 'kirpa' of Ma Vaishno Devi. Of late one or two tough jobs were done by the grace of Ma & for which he was grateful. He dropped a hint that he was about  to go on a visit there shortly &  if Saab so wishes a joint yatra could be organised. On return journey they would have a flying visit of Srinagar as well. In both the places his company has good liaison & contacts. Mighty pleased The Baldy nodded his bald head in agreement.

Next day Jagtani saw to it that Johnny Walker walked into the house of The Baldy with adequate stock.

Soon thereafter The Baldy & the madam hopped on to the plane. Jagtani & his wife were  excellent hosts & took all the care in the world to see that  they were comfortable in the flight. Jagtani had booked their stay in a 5 star hotel & also arranged for sight seeing etc.

A few packets of classy handicrafts, shawls, dry fruits & sweets were handed over to madam by Jagtani as these were not available back home & they cost 'peanuts'. They had 'khule' darshan at the temple courtesy Jagtani who managed to jump the q of devotees. 

Next on agenda was sight seeing which also was very well managed. It turned out to be memorable journey.

The Baldy joined back the office on Monday. On his table was a loan proposal with compliments from Jagtani.