I HAVE READ THIS; HAVE YOU?
Indomitable by Arundhati Bhattacharya.
Daughter of an electrical engineer working with the Steel Authority of India, and a practising homeopath mother, she spent her childhood in Bhilai and Bokaro in a typical public sector undertaking's township with a pan-Indian neighbourhood. She has described an interesting incidence. At the age of 8, she had a naughty playmate who broke his leg while playing. When his plaster was removed, he jumped with joy, slipped over a pool of water and fractured the other leg. Arundhati had commented, tongue in cheek, that he must be the only child who went to the hospital to get the plaster on one leg removed and came back with it on the other.
She has described how her writing skills were nurtured and encouraged by a missionary school father, as also her journey to graduation in a women's college in Kolkata. It is interesting to note that she got selected as probationary officer while doing her M.A. in English literature and in fact gave the final exam while working in the bank.
In the next part of the book Ms. Bhattacharya has described her progress from Accountant to the top management of SBI as also her stint in Kharagpur branch, where her husband was in the faculty of I.I.T Kharagpur, and in rural branches in West Bengal too. An amusing tidbit of the working of the bank in pre-computerisation era, was the size and the number of ledgers. They used to be so thick that she would place a couple of them on her chair, so that she can write in the open ledger while sitting. What is more interesting is her posting to New York and how she struck the right work-life balance, even with a husband in India and a small daughter with her. She has been gracious enough to acknowledge her aunt's help in looking after her daughter in a foreign country.
In fact in the later part of the book, she has candidly confessed that she would not have reached the top if she did not have an efficient house-maid, as caring as a family member. But the most poignant part of this segment is the touching way she has described the condition of her mind when she had to leave her young daughter in India and go back to the U.S. She rightfully takes the credit of striving for/introducing, two measures to help in balancing the work and domestic life, namely, two years sabbatical for women and full holiday to the bank on two Saturdays, so that outstation staff can spend time with their families.
In the final parts of the book the author has described her journey
along the top management, from the deputy MD to the Chairman. Yes, even when she
wanted to, she could not change her designation to Chairperson, as there
was no such provision in the article of association of the bank.
Interestingly, she enjoyed two perks on becoming the chairman. One was having a
personal wash room, as only the C.E.O had that privilege at the headquarters of
the bank and the other was, ordering the thermostat of the board-room air
conditioner to be raised. Earlier it used to be kept at a temperature found
comfortable by the coat and tie wearing men, and she being the only sari
wearing woman used to find it too cold. Thus, she got her revenge and saw her
male colleagues shedding off their extra coverings.
Ms. Arundhati takes the reader through the process of financial
inclusion of the poor and the downtrodden, who had not seen the inside of a
bank in 70 years. She has described in greater details how the trinity of
J.A.M i.e., JAN DHAN accounts, AADHAR and mobiles has plugged the leakage in
the pipeline of governmental subsidies. The various other improvements she
had made in the SBI are, partly, too technical for a lay reader. However, her
description of handling the Demonetisation is worth reading.
One afternoon in November 2016, out of the blue, she was asked by a
deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India, to attend a meeting at 6 pm. When
she reached the RBI she found C.E.Os of other public sector banks too.
Everybody was ignorant of the agenda. At 8 pm, to the assembled top bankers'
surprise, they heard the Prime minister announcing Demonetisation. It fell like
a tonne of bricks on the audience. That the entire lot, including the
chairman of the largest bank in the country, who were going to be responsible
for smooth implementation of the decision, were out of the loop of such a
momentous decision, DOES NOT speak well of the political leadership's attitude.
The next number of pages describe vividly how the banking sector rose to the occasion. It reminds us the hard times we underwent in the following months.
The closing pages record the feelings of a well- contented person who
is satisfied about her life and career.
ALL IN ALL AN ABSORBING READ.
Dilip Kanade
Publishers : Harper Collins
Price: kindle : 199,
Hard cover : 482
Available as audio book too.
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