Confessions of an Engineer

Remember the “Tamperman” series which got a huge reads response? Post that I was approached by a NGO based out of Indore which wanted to do the survey about the corruption in different Government bodies and the employees’ mindset working in such organisations. Since I am having a better connect with State Electricity Distribution Company (SEDCL), they wanted me to throw a light on the amount of corruption prevailing in State Electricity Distribution Company and what provokes the employees to be a part of such unscrupulous mindset. I tried approaching many of my known sources across various regions like Pune, Mumbai, Nagpur, Navi Mumbai & many other divisions of State Electricity Distribution Company. Most of them agreed to open up but not to the extent which I wanted.

Finally, I got one honest (or dishonest!) who became ready to tell everything which I wanted to know but on condition of anonymity. Not to mention but I approached this guy through the Tamperman. I was amused to listen to this guy’s true story. I was so tempted to write all the details about him but unlike other social networking media, LinkedIn has a policy about not publish any hate speech or defame any individual, I decided to abide by the terms of service. So just for the name sake, let’s call this person as Mr. DISINGENUOUS. Apparently he was in Pune on “same” mission, he agreed to meet me in person on Saturday, nearby the same spot where I first met Tamperman. When I met him, I was surprised to see him since I thought him to be fairly aged person to be in 40’s since I was told that he is an Assistant Engineer in SEDCL but I was wrong. He just seemed to be younger than I thought who was wearing a Ray-Ban goggle (Average age of AEs in SEDCL is 40 years!) So here is our conversation.

I: “How old are you, Sir?”

Disingenuous: “Please don’t call me, Sir. Call me XXXX, by the way I am 25 years old”.

I: “Oh, but you don’t seem to be that younger, I thought that you must be around 40s since I got to know that you are an Assistant Engineer in Naldurg Urban section of SEDC’s Osmanabad division.” “I know some engineers in SEDCL who have joined SEDCL as JE (Junior Engineer) post their graduation and still struggling to get promoted as AE (despite of passing the relevant exams).” “I have even seen some retiring as JE or AE.”

Disingenuous: (with a cunning smile on his face) “You see, not all know how to manage this.” “Well, you see, I am 1992 born in Latur district, done my schooling from there itself and I did my electrical engineering from Technical University in Raigad district in 2015”.

I: “Oh, that’s great! But why did you say that NOT ALL KNOWS HOW TO MANAGE.”

Disingenuous: “You see, I hail from the poor family. I scored average marks in engineering and was struggling to get the job in outside word”. “I, then, appeared for entrance examination of SEDCL’s JE post and by some means scored marks just above cutoff in “XYZ” category.” “The main hurdle was to come hell or high water the oral cracked.” “That time I was well-heeled to discern about the interviewing panel and paid an amount to pass the interview and get posted as JE in SEDCL.”

I: “I am sorry, but is it not immoral to pay bribe when you were about to start the carrier”.

Disingenuous: “What’s wrong in that? I already mentioned you that I belong to poor family and wanted to earn money and lead a peaceful life with less work, so grabbing the position in SEDCL was just like dream came true for me.” “For that I didn’t mind paying a bribe of Rs. 500000 (Rs. 5 Lakh) way back in 2015 since I was pretty sure that I may recover this within a year”.

I: “Okay, so you joined Latur Zone in 2015 as JE but then how did you become AE so early?”

Disingenuous: (smiling that astute way again!) “Yes, I was initially posted as JE in Latur zone. I then appeared for internal exams conducted by SEDCL and also passed just on border. There were a list of candidates but this time also I reached out with higher ups through my immediate boss, made them “HAPPY” and I got promoted to AE in early months of 2017 wherein I was posted in Osmanabad office’”

I: “But are you guys not afraid of doing these malpractices?”

Disingenuous: “Scared of and about whom?” “I am a big fan of Nana Patekar, have you watched that movie “YESHWANT” of 1997 wherein he says Sou Me Se Assi Be-Imman Bhir Bhi Mera Desh Mahan” (meaning there are 80 % corrupt out there but still my country is great!), it is like that only.” “But that may be the case then, now I would say 99 out of 100 in our league are corrupt which makes people like us immune from getting caught.”

I: “That’s fine, I got it. Let me come straight to the point. How much money you earned through corruption/malpractices through your day to day work?”

Disingenuous: “Do you really want to hear that?” Well, people like me earn so much money that we hardly visit a bank or ATM to withdraw any money for day to day expenses.” “I am not sure how much bank balance I do have ever since I joined SEDCL in 2015.” “Being the AE of my area, I get all the groceries, food items, vegetables, meat items delivered to my home on need basis.” “Releasing the new supply connections, relocation, awarding outsourcing contracts, tampering are just like a boon for us since we get more than what we desire.”

I: “But what is the modus operandi? Did you guys not get trapped in or get caught at any point of time?”

Disingenuous: (This time with a MONSTROUS smile on his ray-Ban worn face) “Ha Ha Ha Ha….in which era you are living, Sir?” “I don’t know if Tamperman told you about me.” “In fact, I was caught by Anti-Corruption Bureau of Osmanabad this February.” “There was that irritating farmer who wanted to have electricity connection for his well pump and there was no transformer installed in nearby premises.” “So I asked him to pay me through contractor Rs. 100000 for installation of transformer as a first installation out of agreed 3 lakh rupees.” “But that idiot farmer informed ACB and all three of us along with technician got trapped in the net.”

I: “Then how did you come out of that?”

Disingenuous: “Well, we do have a resilient inner bonding and I share a good repo with my superiors.” “Normally, such cases don’t stand in court due to dearth of concrete evidence and the next day I was out.” “I was also given a clean cheat by my department head as internal inquiry, is it not sufficient?”

I: “What’s your further goal?”

Disingenuous: “Goal?” Ha Ha Ha Ha…..! “You see, I will continue like this till retirement in SEDCL along with progression.” “Now I have one farm house, a car, a bike and 6 acres farm land owned and earned by me out of poverty and my sharp brain.” “Till retirement, I aim to earn so much so that it should not be lesser to anyone in my family.” “You know, Osmanabad is not a typical industrial or commercial area but mainly a drought ridden area where farmers are in desperate need of electricity and reliable water supply to their crops, people like me ensure that their need should be kept alive through intermittent work done by us and whenever needed we “EARN” extra income out of that.” Oh, and for your information, I won’t be there in Osmanabad for rest of my lifetime, I will ensure that I may get posted in areas where there in more JUICE.”

I was stunned by this conversation. Mr. Disingenuous surely clean bowled me! While leaving he threw one more bouncer at me. He mentioned me that his actual date of birth falls in December but for records purpose he had shown it as 1st March of next year of born just to get one more extra year out of retirement so that his earnings would be more by a year’s salary from SEDCL. After this chat, I paid the bill at counter and returned back with a thought how people like Disingenuous do not get any punishment at the hands of law. What Mr. Disingenuous is going to do with the procurement of 200 acres of land which he has planned to buy in next 5 years? As a matter of fact, one just need a size of pit larger than his/hers’ to bury post demise depending upon whether one is being buried or burnt.