The Emergency Man

All my life I was the emergency man, family problems, labour, Steel Plant, factory, anything.

My emergency career started from D Group in Ajanta House, Colvin. When I used to come out of the library for going home, I would be called to fill in, football, hockey, the vacancy in A,B,C groups as needed. Then my demand went up and I was preferred. In football I was playing at back, and my kick was strong. Some seniors always told me to go otherwise they will not get a chance. But I was always spotted and called.

One day some senior asked me to get marks for Ajanta House. I asked what is that, I did not know as I was a day scholar, and had many friends to play with in Lucknow University, he told me that you have to participate in all sports , if you come first , second, third, you house will get points. I participated and won all the athletics. Then the Ajanta House Captain asked me if I knew swimming. I did and then he asked me to go. The teachers there were so worried they walked along the swimming pool side with me all the time and I completed 10 lengths, getting maximum points. I am a Gangaji swimmer. That year I got the most improved athlete of the year award, the prize I got was 3 books, one of them Nona, showing sense of humour of the people concerned. I got transferred to C group, who were much bigger, thus ending my athletic career.

Another year there was an emergency when the Governor was to come for Annual day, with us it was mostly Kanhaiyalal Maniklal Munshi, I used to call him Kanhaiyalal Maniklal Munshilal Munshi. Two very smart boys were trained to receive the Governor, in NCC dress, slow march in front of him and do Flag Hoisting with him and then march out. In my class 2 kids were trained, one was my good  friend, Anand Pal, son of novelist and freedom fighter  Yashpal. On the day The Governor was to visit, the second chap did not come. Anand Pal came running to me and told me to wear the band on the shoulder and march with him. I did not know, but followed him and followed his actions and did the job successfully.

I joined NCC and we went to camp in Kanpur. My senior colleagues, the same evening, went out of the camp for something, were caught and were stripped of their rank. I was given the charge of NCC Colvin Group, although I had joined recently. I handled it all very well but was removed just before the final parade. Well that’s me!

Colvin Special- How I met Vijay Shahi in Eden Garden

I think it was 1964, I was completing Mech Engineering in Sindri, and I had gone to Calcutta to watch a Test Match. Last Test Match I had seen was in Lucknow ,1952-53, India Vs. Pakistan. Dattu Phatkar, GS Ramchand, Fazal Mahmood, Mahmood Hussain et all.

Pataudi was the Captain here in Eden Gardens, Calcutta.

It was impossible to get tickets. Using IT Department contacts and managed to get one. Later I learnt for a space of 30,000, they sold tickets for 70 thousand. I went early, was not easy to reach anywhere, underground train finally solved the problem 4 decades later, and all roads lead to Eden Garden. I found my gate and seat no, the width of the seat was 6 inches, I somehow managed to sit. When other people came there was no space. Fights ensued. I noted that if you get up, there will be sound like “POP” but you will not be able to find your seat no again. So I did not get up till evening.

Reached in time next day as usual. I went up but found there was hue and cry everywhere with people running helter skelter. The fielders came to the ground and batsmen followed, and just when bowling was to start, people ran into the field followed by more and the players started running out. Someone started digging the pitch. People started running in the entire stadium, people crying bhago bhago. In my area also violence started and with people running all directions, coming back and running again. I could not make up my mind was standing confused, when some nice anarchist came and told me to run away. In Lucknowi style I asked him to please also tell me the direction to run. He said first go there, you will find a staircase, when you come out run towards the big lawn and go towards burning cars, vehicles. I followed instructions, reached a huge maidan, very familiar to visitors and started walking towards the New Market. Many vehicles were on fire on the main road but out of curiosity, was walking and observing. I did not know then that violence was going to be the hall mark of my career and nothing ever worried me. I saw a stainless steel thing falling in front of me, it stared emitting smoke, I knew then it was a tear gas shell. I was curious and watched it with interest, but better sense prevailed and while looking back at it I started moving back ward till I bumped into some one.

 That someone was my old friend, Colvinian, Vijay Shahi. Sports, Seven Tiles, Gend Tadi were our common passion. He had become tall, was short and shy like me earlier. What a meeting it was, chaos all around and we were talking about the years that we missed. He was in BHU. After a long time we remembered where we were. He said he has to go and meet his friends and we parted. I later visited him in his hostel in BHU. We talked endlessly till a classmate of his came to ask if I am a hold-all. It is a code name for new people for ragging purposes. He told them that I am senior to all there and am in the final year. But we had to soon part. I had to report to my Nanihal!

Please help me contact him, or Kamal Shahi, his younger brother!

School days are when the iron is hot, anything engraved lasts forever. And do not forget, I am a steel plant man!

Fire Fighting in HR Practices

To know about fire prevention we should know about starting it. Basically you need 3 things

1. Something which will burn- solid, liquid or gas

2. Oxygen

3. Something to start the fire

In case you want to start a fire , first decide some reason e.g. heat or cooking. You have to first collect right type of wood, easy to burn, dry. Then you need something which can easily catch fire, select something which is simple, throwable after use, like a news paper, for taking the fire to the right place. And of course oxygen or air must be there. Then you need a spark or a match stick. The paper will catch fire, you can put it under the wood and slowly it will start burning depending upon the type and quantity.

Fire prevention is keeping the three ingredients separate all the time. In case you have a fire then to extinguish it you can remove one of the elements. This is the basic fire fighting.

Good HR Management Practice is similar to a fire prevention system. Let’s have a look from the other end.

Now, if you want to start a strike, gherao, violence in hospitals or with police, burning a public service or transport system, protest against something etc you have to take the same steps depending upon the situation……..

1. Find a good reason with USP. People find various reasons; competitive unions, leader wants to develop into a politician, revenge, discrediting an senior person, taking credit (personnel department), and last in priority, concern for the people.
2. Collect the right type of material . Good efficient people generally do not like to go on strike or be violent. So collect a group who is not good at work, are violent in nature, easily aroused, people not having enough work, some like to cause problems for management and co workers etc. Also get some experts in burning vehicles, it is a must these days.
3. Find some inflammable material. This can be things like grievance, imagined or otherwise, work stress , racism, perceived partiality, pay( it is seen that it is the well paid people who want more) etc.,
4. Make sure of availability of Oxygen without which no fire can start. It can be Poor Management practices(eg Non participative type, top has no time, middle not interested, juniors are clerical), Non Governance, VIP System, Law without Order, no participation or feedback system, poor communication, accident prone, family uncared for, health and safety ignored etc.
5. Now things are ready to explode. Just provide a spark. It generally comes from bloated ego’s of incompetent managers and can be anything, insult, words like get out, wrong language.(In one factory I greeted a foreman “ how are you ol’ chap” and he went away fuming , I had called him "old", almost called a strike till workers told him to shut up!). Another factory had a history that one personnel manager, ex Army, belonging to a superior group took out his gun and shot a worker while discussing their problem. Many managers got killed that day and the matter was hushed up.

An important thing to remember that fire, or strike, is universal, it starts in the same way in overdeveloped countries, under developed countries, whatever their dress, language etc. But the effectiveness of Fire Prevention principle applied to people has to take into account the Organization, Culture, History, Traditions, Management Practices etc

How I Met a Great Manager !

Residential Accommodation Problem
We had joined Rourkela Steel in 1965. After two years when our training was supposed to have been completed, we were asked to leave the hostel. There were no houses etc available, but the new batch was expected and every one was trying to push us out.
There was a junior engineers forum and we asked the GM for an appointment to make him aware of our problems. We got the date and time. Four people were selected to go for the meeting. As was going to happen regularly, on the appointed time only I reached. I was asked to wait in a room. Within a few minutes the GM walked in , followed by a person with a note book, I learnt later that he was the DGM(P).
He asked me what the problem was. I told him that there is no place to go after leaving hostel, even in old Rourkela. That was all I ever said in that meeting. He turned to the DGM(P) and started taking decisions.

-- How many flats in G Block Sector 2 are vacant? Allot two '65 batch people per flat.

-- The Iranian flats, are they still vacant? Iranians are not coming, allot these flats to '66 batch people.

-- How many houses in different sectors are not functional? Get them repaired immediately and start allotting them as they get ready.

-- Start the allotment by seniority tomorrow, and ask the concerned department to start the repairs also.

We started getting flats the next day, we spent a great time with friends in G Block, and then I got allotted in Sector 20.

This was clarity of priorities, decision making etc. This was the then GM, Shri RP Sinha. We would be learning much more in times to come, specially how to involve people of all levels.

Rourkela Steel- How My Morning Tea Got Resolved!

Sector 20 - How My Morning Tea Problem Got Resolved
I was maintaining Coke Ovens in Rourkela, a very tough job, used to come back with coal powder from head to toe, if I came back at all.
To get an idea let me tell you about my colleague Mr. Bhopatkar, a couple of years my senior, looking after Coal Yard and Wagon Tippler. Once he reached home to find the house locked. No one was there. Then a neighbor came out and told him that his family has gone home to Pune, as you were hardly coming home, here is the key.

My job was even tougher. That night I reached late, was alone as my wife had gone home, went as usual to have a bath first, came out looking human and had something to eat and conked off to sleep. My milk wala came at 5 am us usual, I took it and put it on gas and just then the phone rang. I shouted and fired the shift chap, I cannot even get sleep on Sunday, told him what has to be done and waited for the progress report. Decided again to go early, and in disgust fell off to sleep. I must have been in deep sleep, then I heard tapping on my window, and people talking to each other. One lady, my neighbor, was telling the other that I knew he would commit suicide one day and something like this would happen! I jumped out of bed having overslept and found the house full of black smoke. I opened the window , then one lady said "are you ok mr. Misra?" I opened all the doors and windows and all my neighbors, much relieved that I was alive, came in and inspected how I was doing it. Then one of them entered the kitchen and found the cause, burnt milk, and put off the gas. By that time some smoke was flowing out and after making sure that I won't try suicide again, started going back for their Sunday work. Then the nice lady , Mrs Sawhney, just behind my house , came back. What time do you take tea? Till your wife comes back I will send you your cup. I was so grateful, thanked her. Then my next door lady came, they were Telgu and very nice people, she said please tell the milkman to give the milk in my house, I will boil it and send it to you ! Just managed to hide my happiness and thanked her.

I love Rourkela, all the people and best neighbors in the world! Have lost touch with my next door neighbor, they visited us in Ahmedabad, and always try to meet Sawhney Saheb when I am in Delhi!

Water Diviner in Hyderabad

It was my first visit to our Chicken Feed Factory. It was mid eighties and Hyderabad was just getting into news for leader in supply of poultry. I had learnt a little bit about feed, poultry farms from our Nutritionist, Operations Head and Marketing guys. I was new to all this, being a vegetarian.
The important thing that stuck to my mind was that the key ingredient is dried fish and when stored in gunny bags more than six high in the godown, can automatically catch fire.
After going around the factory and other routine things I inspected the godown. They were stored properly. Then I asked them in case there is fire how do you tackle it? Their reply shocked me. There is no water. They had tried to put bore well at many places but no water was there. I too looked around pretending to be an expert, HO guys are supposed to know everything. Then I talked of getting a water diviner but they all were very skeptical . I was too but our job is to find solutions and be ready for emergencies. In the office I took out a news paper cutting from my file. I had read about it in a newspaper and had kept it out of curiosity. I had seen many unusual things in South , including Sai Baba, Vastu Shastra etc and I was learning.
I gave the water diviner a ring and told him our problems. He said come at 6am tomorrow, and I will come with you after I complete my morning Pooja. He was a Brahmin with horizontal teeka and as a very special gesture, allowed me to go into his Pooja room. On the roof they showed me a complete om sign formed by a reflected light but I could not see any source even after much scrutiny. I was told it has been there for a long time, they had no idea how it came about.
The diviner walked around in the factory. Then he opened his bag and took out a pair of leather gloves. My suspicions took a jump, a great Brahmin wearing leather gloves! Then he took out a one inch diameter copper rod bent in U shape with extended ends to hold by hand. He held in in his gloved hand started walking. I watched his hand very carefully, he would pretend to have felt some thing, then he will say something, collect his few hundred rupees and go off. Suddenly the copper rod started rotating furiously, as if a 40 HP motor has been switched on! He immediately stepped back, sweating profusely. I knew then about the leather gloves, his hand would have got burnt!
He rested for a few minutes, wiped his sweat and went to the same spot. The rod again whirled violently and he stepped back. He then checked other places and finally came to the same place. Then he took out a plastic bottle filled with ganges water, tied it to the copper rod and it again it whirled, he tried several times with more bottles, wrote something down and finally told me the depth at which the water is available.
I tried to do that but nothing happened! I went and dropped him home, he invited me to come again. Wish I had the time. Later, water was found there on second drilling, to my great relief.
I had read about water divining in Wild West novels where some take a Y shaped dried branch of a tree and walk in the same way holding two sides and the third gets pulled by gravity where water may be there. Later I met an expert in Bangalore who used to hang a rudraksh on a string, and if water is there it's starts rotating clock wise fairly fast. I tried that too. It worked.
I belong to the category of people who do more than just talk, how do I set an example to youngsters, that there are people who solve problems.
My juniors had a great regard for me, the seniors went against me. They had not been taught all that!

How I Made Floating Fish Feed

One morning while coming to office, I got out of the lift and was walking towards our main entrance when I felt a hand on my shoulder. It could Only be the chairman of the Company, coming out of the other lift. He did that when he wanted something urgently, and would give all the help needed. This time he asked me to come to his office.

There he told me that there was a great demand for a bigger fish, farmed in the coastal Andhra and Tamil Nadu.They were active type and jumped out and ate floating things. We wanted to make floating fish feed suitable for them. They had received quotations from UK for equipment to produce them for 20 crores and more. This was just not feasible. Can you do something about this?

My Company had a sense of humour, giving a vegetarian chap like me charge of animal feeds among other things. We took the feeds from about 50,000 tons per annum to around 3 lakh tons. I invented cow feed with 45% molasses, which made the cows love that, chicken feed, Hyderabad had just started coming into news, feed for shrimps which has to lie at the bottom of the pond for a long time without dissolving etc

Now it was floating fish feed.

I looked around, talked to experts, but they knew about feed but not much about the equipment. That night I was cooking nutri nuggets, something that had come recently in the market, I had bought a packet out of curiosity. I put it in pressure cooker with some vegetables and went for my bath etc. When I opened the cooker, it was floating on the surface. I took one nugget out and checked. It was soft and It was still a nugget. I thought it will break up if I kept it under pressure for more time. After several attempts it remained the same. Then I had my dinner. The nutri nugget was chewy and tasty. I looked at the packet to see the ingredients. It was mostly protein. At around 2 am the thought came to me , is this what we are looking for?

In the morning, I went to my nutrition and fish feed expert. He checked the ingredients he said the floating fish feed will also be high protein like this one. I went to see the chairman and asked him about the makers of this product. He said I know the chaps and will talk to him, and after talking to them that he asked me to visit the factory. I took a car and went and saw the process of high pressure extrusion, how it pops out at a high temperature. The factory head told me that their capacity is under ulilized and carry out our trial any time.

I consulted our feed specialist and got the our factory to mix a bag of the required ingredients. Next morning I took the bag to the factory and got our nuggets made. We just fed the mix in the high pressure screw extractor and watched the floating fish feed popping out . We tested it in water. It did not melt, it always floated.

Next morning I kept a sample packet of fish feed on the chairman's table.

It was a stunning cost saving job, but it looked so simple, very few appreciated me.