1994 was a good and bad year

By the time 1994 came around, the magazine and the compilation of short stories had begun to pay dividends. The first two volumes of short stories had stories of the three of us but, the next one was a selection of stories contributed by other writers of little magazines of Bengal. They had submitted their stories in our stall at the Kolkata Book Fair in 1993.

Yes, we had attended the Kolkata Book Fair in 1992 and 1993 but could not do so in 1994 because it was a year when I ran into trouble in my professional life. It was directly related to my boss. He was a Bengali but his wife was a non-Bengali who loved to try out her hand at writing in Bengali.
It was OK so long as her literary exploits were restricted to the local get-togethers where the audience loved to applaud her efforts but, when it came to writing for a magazine that was going places, we had to take care to ensure that the quality of the writings did not deteriorate. Obviously, someone would have to sit with the handwritten manuscript, decode the squiggles to make sense and then get it into the magazine.
Unfortunately, none of us had that much time at our disposal and the result was that her stories continued to lie in waiting and, she did not like that.
And, my boss, God bless him, decided that I was not fit for promotion.
Why he took such a decision is not nown but, he graded me as ‘below average’ in the Annual Confidential Report and I was transferred out to another department.
The worst part is that I came to know about my ‘below average’ rating only after joining the new department. As per rules, any officer who is assessed as ‘below average’ is not eligible for promotion for 3-years. I had already lost 6-years waiting for my promotion and this ‘below average’ rating meant I would have to wait for some more time. It was akin to hitting below the belt.
Well – I took it in my stride as I have always taken the good with the bad. And, in the new department, I came across a totally new set of bosses who helped me to change my outlook on life. I realized that there are always some good men among a whole lot of bad ones. (to be continued …)

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