If God Was A Banker (21 page)

This move upset Karuna a bit, but she couldn't complain. Sundeep had promised to move Nitin to Mumbai at the first available opportunity. Karuna bought that. Hadn't Sundeep kept his promise of giving him the AVP title?

She became a core member of Sundeep's coterie. Sundeep involved her in every decision, every meeting. She started enjoying the power and adulation that came with being in Sundeep's team. This was almost becoming an addiction. Working with Sundeep meant regular parties and frequent night-outs with Sundeep. She was having a ball and Sundeep had his arm-candy to tout all over the town.

'I am going to Chennai for a branch banking offsite tomorrow. Do you want to come with me?' Sundeep asked her and she said yes. In Chennai, their work got over by 6.00 p.m and they hit the bar at seven. They were drinking till about nine when they realised they had a dinner to attend. The dinner was being hosted for the participants of the offsite. Sundeep and Karuna went in late and were partly sloshed by the time they reached. The music was heavy. They started drinking again. Sundeep and Karuna were the first ones to hit the dance floor. He held her by her arm and she was willingly sticking to him. He didn't leave her for a moment. Even when he was not dancing, he didn't let go of her hand. Karuna was enjoying it too.

The bhangra beats brought out a different animal in Sundeep. Then the music changed to a slow number, and Sundeep turned to Karuna, one arm on her waist and the other on her shoulder, and began a languorous dance. Karuna also had one arm on his waist and the other on his shoulder. Sundeep's arm moved from her waist to her back and pulled her closer to him. She could feel the bulge in his pants. A month had passed since Nitin moved to Delhi. She hadn't had a guy for thirty days and was partly drunk too. The wind was chilly. Sundeep could see that she was getting turned on. Not one to ever miss an opportunity, he suggested a walk on the beach.

They quietly disappeared from the crowd. While they were walking on the sand, Sundeep pulled her towards him and kissed her. She didn't react. Sundeep held her face in his hands and kissed her once more on her lips even as his hands wandered from her face to her back and then down the elastic band of her skirt.

'This is not right. I am married.' She desperately tried to free herself, even though a part of her wanted to be held. She was terribly confused, scared of turning down her CEO and, at the same time, afraid of violating her own sense of morals.

Sundeep was a smart cookie. He didn't want to force himself on her completely. He wanted her to yearn for him. 'Sex is fun if the other partner wants you. Else you can always buy it.' That was his philosophy.

She finally managed to set herself free and started walking away from him towards the hotel room. Sundeep followed her. 'Karuna, I could feel it. I know that you want me, desire me. I could sense it when we were dancing. I could see it in your eyes.'

She didn't turn back.

'Come back, Karuna! I will not say a word about it to anyone. I want you.'

Still no response.

'I promise you, if you do what I say, I will move Nitin back to Mumbai within the next one week.'

Now she slowed down. Why not? The Head of Retail was pleading with her. She can now call the shots. She can extract whatever she wanted from him. Now was the time.

'I will do whatever you want me to, Karuna. You know I can work wonders for your career. I will also move you to an AVP position.'

Now Karuna stopped. Her back was towards Sundeep. The deal now looked good.

Sundeep quietly moved from behind and hugged her from the back. His hands caressed the bare neck and came to rest on her breasts. She could feel his dick growing against her ass. She closed her eyes in pleasure. She didn't want to miss this opportunity and neither did Sundeep.

She woke up the next day in Sundeep's room. 'You were wonderful last night,' said Sundeep as he made her a cup of coffee. She looked at him and smiled. The smile told Sundeep that he was wonderful too.

Her mobile phone was on the table. It showed three missed calls. All of them from Nitin. She looked at her watch. It was six in the morning. She wanted to get out of Sundeep's room before the others got up. She got dressed and was about to leave the room when Sundeep held her hand and pulled her back. She kissed him on his lips.

'You were wonderful. I will see you tonight. I have got to go before the others see us.' She tiptoed out of the room.

Though it was only six in the morning, there were a few branch managers, the early risers, who were out for a jog. They saw her coming out of Sundeep's room and it didn't take them much to put one and one together, given Sundeep's reputation. The news spread like wildfire. But it didn't matter, because no one told Nitin.

True to his word, Sundeep moved Nitin back to Mumbai as Mumbai Sales Head for Personal Loans within the next one week. He had, however, tasted the forbidden fruit, and now he wanted it more. Karuna was anyway in his team and would stay in his vicinity, day in and day out. She would be in his room almost all the while. He would take her with him on all his branch visits.

On days she was not chatting with him in person, she would be chatting with him on SMS.

All the employees of NYB started treating Karuna with respect. A respect derived out of fear, on account of her closeness with Sundeep. The addiction was getting into her head. She was hooked on the attention she was getting from everyone else in the bank.

Karuna was also beginning to get emotionally involved with Sundeep now. Sex with a powerful guy was a huge turn on. Making love in weird places, by taking risks and hoodwinking people, became a favourite pastime for both of them. They even made love in Sundeep's office at 12.45 a.m., after covering the security camera with Karuna's jeans.

Nitin noticed his wife's rising influence, but was blinded by his love for her. He thought that his wife was capable and hence was rising up the system.

For Sundeep, this was nothing but pure, unalloyed pleasure. He was in it solely for the kick of it. The fun of feeling big and powerful. He felt no emotional connect with Karuna, just the massive ego kick of bedding a lovely, married woman. Making love to her made him feel like God—the God of Banking.

T
he first few days that Swami spent at BOCA were uneventful. He was trying to learn the tricks of the trade. He had never worked in a BPO earlier.

The environment at BOCA was a lot different from the bank. The average employee age here was less than twenty-five years, while at NYB it was closer to thirty-five. The way the employees were treated and their aspirations were totally different. Swami had to struggle hard in order to associate himself with the employees of BOCA.

The business model of BOCA was completely different from the way businesses at NYB were run. Despite being a financial wizard, Swami couldn't figure out the ways and means of making a significant profit at BOCA, large enough to justify his posting there.

'An MNC manager is only as good as the money he makes,' Aditya had once told him. He had also said, 'if ever you get stuck in a business that does not make large profits, either change your job or work hard at making money in the same business. More often than not, the latter is the easier option.'

Swami was getting stuck in the BPO. He somehow pulled through the first three months, trying to understand operations, financials and process flows, but soon started getting frustrated.

God came to his rescue. In the form of Aditya.

After quitting the bank, Aditya himself had started a BPO. His experience came in handy.

'Don't just depend on Sundeep for your business. Make it an independent profit centre,' Aditya advised Swami.

Swami sat down with all the business managers in the bank and individually worked out all the processes that could be migrated to BOCA. He also went and spoke to such outfits of competing banks. He went and personally visited the Citibank Operations and Processing Enterprise in Chennai to figure out how they managed their processes and made money. He made every effort to understand the financial dynamics. He finally realised that he will not make enough money by migrating bank processes alone. The core intention of banks in migrating these processes was saving of cost and they would never pay him enough to make a decent profit. If he had to make money, he had to bring in business from overseas and transition processes to BOCA from various other countries where New York International Bank operated.

For that he needed resources. He needed people who would go and sell the outsourcing concept to various other countries. He needed a guy who would be 'his guy.' Someone he could trust. He went back to Sundeep and asked him to move Vivek to BOCA. Sundeep was only too happy to oblige and so was Vivek.

Vivek became Swami's hit man for selling the India BPO proposition to other New York International Bank countries. Vivek and Swami went together to make presentations to the CEOs of various countries. They put their heart and soul into it. They would travel for over twenty days a month. Kalpana lost track of Swami and which part of the world he was in.

In the next three months they were able to convince people from across the globe to transition to India two back office operations and one outbound calling activity from UK, four processes from the US and three more from Argentina. They were in business. They delivered these transitions within ninety days of getting the orders. Revenues started flowing in.

In no time the gross monthly revenues of the BPO started crossing ten million dollars. The business was operating at a margin of thirty percent. BOCA became a star, the biggest and the best performing business for New York International Bank in India. Swami was again a hero.

The phenomenal run of BOCA left Sundeep wondering what went wrong in his assessment. He had sent Swami there to make life miserable for him, but Swami had actually turned it into a golden opportunity.

When he saw BOCA taking centre stage in the India business, he wanted his share of the pie. He started interfering in the day to day running of BOCA. Swami was not one to get into a direct conflict and tolerated this interference for some time, till he received this e-mail from Sundeep's secretary.

Swami,

Sundeep has scheduled a full review of BOCA, this Saturday from 9.00 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. He has asked me to request you to be present with the BOCA management team at the conference room #2 on the third floor of NYB HQ.

Regards,

Reena

Two things about this mail pissed off Swami. First, it came from Sundeep's secretary. If Sundeep felt that it was important, he should have called himself. Secondly, the least Sundeep could have done was to check with him if he was free on that day for a review. He decided to take Sundeep head on. He decided to send this e-mail to Sundeep.

Sundeep,

The senior management team of BOCA would be glad to discuss their progress and success with you on Saturday. Any inputs for running this business or improving its current traction will be really appreciated. However, I would like to make one thing amply clear: BOCA is an independent business and, in this company, I am the boss. The final word rests with me. If you keep that in mind when you meet my team, that will help. Look forward to seeing you on Saturday.

Regards,

Swami

B
OCA became one of the largest BPOs in the country and Swami one of the most sought after individuals in this space. His turnaround experience was worth its weight in gold. Swami was inundated with offers from other BPOs, and at times he contemplated starting his own, but he was wedded to the bank. He would not and could not leave it under any circumstance, irrespective of whether it was Suneel Dutt or Sundeep who tried to push him out.

Sundeep didn't like it one bit. But he was the one who had moved Swami to BOCA. And Swami had made a mockery of him. The business grew to such an extent that the NYB board under Kailash Advani decided to divorce it from Sundeep and spun it off into an independent business unit. Swami now reported directly to Kailash. Sundeep went crying to Naresh, but in this case even Naresh couldn't do a thing.

Aditya watched the game from the sidelines. It was he who had taught Swami the tricks of the trade and had worked closely with him. He was the prime driver in Swami's getting all the overseas contracts that had come BOCA's way. He had leveraged his contacts with seniors in NYB to get those deals for Swami. He had worked behind the scenes for Swami's success. He was spurred on by Sundeep's nasty conversation with him, when he had called him about Swami's move. Sundeep might just have lost a friend for life.

T
he sleaze fest between Sundeep and Karuna showed no signs of abating. Whenever Sundeep was travelling and Karuna was not with him, he would send her an SMS from the airport. Once he was off on a two-day trip to Delhi. He was at the airport, waiting to board the flight.

Beep. Beep. Karuna's phone woke her up. She reached out for it. 'Miss U honey.' This was the SMS Sundeep had sent her from the airport. She quietly deleted the message, worried that Nitin might see it.

Beep. Beep. It was Sundeep again. Another SMS: 'I am HOT and waiting.'

Karuna replied: 'Go jerk off.'

They would exchange twenty or more such messages, almost on a daily basis.

Karuna had finished her work at office by lunchtime and was feeling very bored. She dialled Sundeep's number. 'Hey sweetheart, missing me?'

'Was feeling bored! Have nothing to do. Should I come over? I'll do some shopping in Delhi and wait for you at the hotel.'

'No, honey. I have a dinner with the branch managers and Anindyo Roy at the hotel tonight. I will be very late. I'll try and come back early tomorrow. Send Nitin off on some training and we will have some fun.' He spoke to her for a while and disconnected.

At about seven in the evening, she got a call. It was from Anindyo Roy.