Part II

Vijay was chosen to work in this organization by Mr. Basu himself three years back. Over the years he has been able to win the confidence of his seniors out of his good work and responsible persona and shared a good rapport with them. Arindam, an young man in his late twenties, had joined in a year later.

Arindam had given an interesting introduction of himself to Neha, another colleague of Vijay on the first day they met one another.

“….I possess a keen observation skill.”

“Probably you are not getting me… ?” continued Arindam with a mysterious smile on his face, “suppose I notice a girl passing by, I will not just notice the girl pass by. I would also notice what costume is she in, what is her hair style, what type of footwear she is wearing, whether she is wearing nail enamel on her nails, and if at all whether it is still intact or the edges have chipped!”

Not quite impressed with such an unique first day introduction by a young man Vijay and Neha simply observed that the young man was clumsily smart.

“Hope we’ll get to see some exceptional productivity out of such penetrating observation skills. All the best to you”, is all that Vijay could say with some irritation expressed on his face. Arindam did not seem to be expecting such a reaction from another young man of his age who, he didn’t know then, would turn out to be his one level senior colleague!

Just two days after he had joined the organization, Arindam made the first complaint against Vijay to Mr. Basu stating he is not co-operative enough. The ground was– Vijay took some time to respond to some of his queries owing to some other engagements. The incident did not have any adverse impact on Vijay, for the guy was just two days old in the company and Mr. Basu simply observed the young man to be a little impatient. But within, Vijay felt for the second time that the guy was smart enough to create trouble! He chose to remain silent, as it was a first incidence.

Days passed by. Vijay observed that there was a continuous attempt from Arindam to magnify himself and to subdue Vijay in front of other colleagues in the office rather than playing a co-operative team member. He would keep declaring to Vijay about the head-hunters calling him up thus trying to prove to Vijay that there is enough job opportunities available for him in the market. Vijay, being a quiet and reserved person, simply ignored Arindam’s such claims intended for show-off.  In their bilateral relation he demonstrated effusive friendship to him. But when it came to taking responsibilities, he was not as prominent. After a year Vijay got promotion. Arindam aired views like he was not given proper attention by management. Neither he congratulated Vijay. However, post this he turned out to be somewhat polite and respectful towards him. Vijay was curiously surprised.

It did not take long for his speculation to come across a ground reality. He had left his computer accessible to Arindam one day for him to work on some files while he was away for couple of hours. He hoped the machine would be duly utilised. Alas! When he returned he found not much to his utter surprise that several other items in the machine had been tampered with! He took it up with him straightforward as this was no more a first incidence of creating trouble.

“Could you finish your work, Arindam?”  Vijay enquired.

“Yes. Long time back”, Arindam replied with a smile.

“What about the changes in these files?”

“Which changes? Which files?”

“These… here!”

“I don’t know. I worked only on the required one”, he replied with an effusive assertion.

“But somebody has tampered with these. Who else used the machine? A power point presentation has been deleted too!”

“I didn’t notice Vijay. I had gone out after finishing my job.” Arindam replied showing least concern about the episode.

Helpless, frustrated and red with rage he couldn’t control and blurted out, “Too much of smartness is not desirable!”

Arindam remained silent. But Vijay’s convictions about this man being a hypocrite and that too a harmful one, got stronger with this incident. He treaded very carefully after that. It wasn’t easy to dwell in a state of constant suspicion in absence of trust with a co-worker. He just had the confidence that since he was always true to his job, no hypocrite can ever cause any substantial harm to him.

Though both of them were well aware as to who did what, Vijay had no proper evidence. And therefore chose not to complain to his boss and over time forgave Arindam too. Probably that was a wrong decision he took which he realized much later. He continued to remain an efficient contributor and was conferred upon with more responsibilities, while Arindam got few in spite of all the tricks he played to subdue Vijay. Gradually it became obvious that Vijay would become his reporting boss the next year.

Arindam started slandering Vijay in the office gossips to which Vijay remained quite oblivious. At the same time he kept looking for other jobs demonstrating resentment which but, to Vijay was quite obvious.

------------------------------------------------

To be continued