86 Frightening bells of a kind heart

General Manager, Mr Philip Thomas used an electronic alarm bell to call his attendance outside his cabin : the bell would produce a loud shrill noice that would pearce through the years of practically all the managers and dy manager in the cabin and all other employees in their work stations in the entire floor of the department. On many occasion after the bell has rung, the toll and hafty young attendant of Mr Thomas would knock my cabin door and inform me that your boss wants to meet me. Some work would flow directly from him to me and some other work flow through Dr S.H. Patil to me. On the first few days one of the assignments he gave to me was preparing a reply to the government on a subject that was earlier handled by Mr Srinivasan, Dy Manager. I discussed with him the subject based on the papers in the file. He gave me a draft reply. I worked on that reply with lot of care and then sent the draft reply to Mr Thomas. After three days the papers along with the file came back to me. Mr Thomas commented on the top of my draft “a very good draft” what I found, however, was that except for about 25% of the content of my draft, he had deleted rest. I was little confused but later realized after going through his modification that he was happy that my draft contained all that he needed to be satisfied. I have observed that in general Mr Philip Thomas would call a Manager to his cabin for discussion about any work once in five days. Sometime he call a meeting of Managers and Dy Managers. In such meetings he would be blunt for failure of anyone in meeting the dead-lines on completion of assignments. Those days office ends by 5 P.M. but Mr Thomas would be in the office at least upto 6.30 P.M. One evening I was in the office late until 6.30 P.M. because of some personal work and I was not in a hurry because I live about twenty minutes distance from office. Suddenly I noticed somebody in the front of my cabin, shadow falling on the glass door. I looked up and then Mr Philip Thomas opened the door with a very satisfied smile. He observed “Oh you are busy you are working… ok…ok … fine” and he left. I understood that he was very satisfied that at least one Manager was working on that evening. In October the Durga Puja was scheduled, I wanted to go to Kolkata and visit my family. But I was entitled to only five days casual leave because I have worked only for five months. So I applied for leave for five days compining with a Sunday to make a Kolkata trip : almost sixty hours of which would be in the train journey. Three days after I submitted my application, Mr Thomas called me to his cabin. He asked why I wanted to take all my casual leave and go to Kolkata. I explained to him my position. He immediately called Mr Venkat Saralu , the Manager for Market Research and told him “Dr Sen will be going to Kolkata. There is some information to be collected from the Industry Association in Kolkata with regard to our market study – one glass, ceramics, and other items. Please tell Dr Sen what are the information required. He will visit the concerned industry association in Kolkata and interview their officials and give us his report.” Three days before the Pujas I went an official trip to Kolkata on a Tuesday and came back next Monday morning to resume office. My journey time was five hours by Indian Airlines flight. I spent all the four days of the puja holidays in Kolkata as also did my official business during my trip. Mr Thomas was such a kind hearted leader.