Corporate Carnival by P. G. Bhaskar Read Free Book Online Page A

Day in and day out, the official machinery has to be greased. We are businessmen who have to work hard for our money. But don’t worry, next year I will have more money.’
    ‘Becaujh of the new school?’
    ‘That is one reason. But I am also planning to raise the fees sharply for the existing ones. I have created a good name, so now I can squeeze the parents. Every government says school fees should be reasonable. I say, let them put their money where their mouth is. I will be happy to retain the same fees if we get a subsidy. Talk is cheap, you know. But this is business like any other business. We also have a real estate business in India. Have you heard of Milk Builders? M-I-L-K?’
    What a ridiculous name, I thought. I furrowed my forehead and shook my head.
    ‘We are still somewhat new,’ he said defensively. ‘We have completed two projects in Rajkot and one in Baroda. We have taken up one project each in Baroda and Ahmedabad. My two sons are taking care of the whole thing.’
    ‘Why “Milk”?’ I asked.
    He smiled a clever smile. ‘My elder son is Mehul, my wife’s name is Indu. My second son is Lalit and my name is Kanti. M-I-L-K,’ he said, simpering. ‘And that’s not all. Milk contains protein to build the body, to make it big and strong. My company MILK has all the things needed to construct buildings, to make them big and strong.’ By now he was bursting with pride.
    I was appalled. Milk builders? Like protein for the body? How tacky can one get? But he was a prospect. And he seemed like a nice guy. I forced my facial features into an approving smile, hoping to convey admiration. It worked.
    ‘Yes,’ he said with a hideous smirk, ‘I thought of it myself. And very soon we will be constructing a hundred-storey building in one of the major Indian cities.’
    ‘A hundred floors!’ I exclaimed. ‘But will the infrastructure in our cities take such buildings? I mean, power, water, parking, roads… and what about the fire brigade? Can they reach such heights if needed?’
    ‘Jai bhai, we are builders,’ he said. ‘The municipality gives specifications for construction. We will meet them, no problem. But if the fire brigade cannot reach the top floor, that is not my problem, it is their problem. I can do my work but I cannot think for others. If I start worrying about roads, fire brigade and everything else, I will not have time for construction.’
    I got Kanti’s account forms completed and then realized this was going to be my lucky day. Kanti put me onto a friend of his in Mombasa, who had recently sold his hardware business. Ramesh Doshi was a gentleman who looked every inch a Gujarati and spoke every bit like one too. ‘My name Ramays,’ he told me. ‘You pleajh come home for the deener, Jai bhai, I want to make the wheel.’
    ‘ Make a wheel? Why?’ I asked, not unreasonably.
    ‘Because to geeve thees thees thees things to the dhikra and thees thees thees things to the dhikri. After my dayth, you understand, geeving to the faymeely. Making the wheel. The Kantibhai said you wheel haylp me make the wheel. Wheel you?’
    Now I understood. ‘Oh, a will! Yes, of course I wheel, er… will.’
    ‘I am saventy-ate,’ he told me, changing the subject. ‘Steel I am speaking the Englees. Bayter than my dhikra also. Good, na?’
    ‘Very good,’ I said, wondering how his dhikra, his son, would speak.
    ‘I am speaking the good Englees becaujh my teacher raped me.’
    My heart sank. I didn’t want to hear a sad story from this sweet old man. This was one problem with meeting people in places like Kenya. Stories about crime were in abundance. They tended to depress me. And worse, when you met people in a group, they would try to outdo each other, with the result that within half an hour, your ears were filled with half a dozen appalling crime stories.
    ‘Yays,’ he continued. ‘Every time I am speaking the wrong Englees, my teacher, he is raping me on my knuckles. With foot rule. Like