The Incredible Banker Read online

  Ronald showed no interest in what Karan was saying. Probably, the fact that Karan was an ex-employee added to his frustration. Ronald stood there stoically as Karan picked up his laptop and looked towards Ronald once again. It almost seemed like one last appeal.

  'You are committing a big mistake, Ronald. Your own people will mislead you to protect their skin. I know I am not experienced or capable enough to preach to you, sir, but this is larger than it looks. You might need an external party to set it right for you. That might not be us, the press, but you definitely need some help here. If you change your mind, please do call me. Sherlyn has my number.' Saying so, Karan stormed out of the room.

  'Bullshit!' barked Ronald, as he saw the back of Karan disappearing into the lift. 'I am glad he doesn't work for us anymore.'

  'Ronald, he was one of the better ones we had. One thing he had in abundance was integrity. He was not a manipulative or political guy, and that worked against him. He was honest, Ronald. If there was any guy I would put my money on in these times, it would be him. But you are the boss.' Sherlyn left Ronald in the conference room and walked towards her desk. Her emotional plea, too, fell on deaf ears.

  Back at work, Karan returned to polishing his report. He had a strong hunch – a very strong one. But it was not proven. He was feeling for his erstwhile employers and that's why he had spoken to Andy and Bhaskar. Only after getting them on the same page as he was had he tried to speak with Ronald. His conscience was now clear. He had made an attempt to forewarn GB2 but Ronald was not willing to hear.

  A knock on his cabin door woke him up from his thoughts. It was Andy.

  'How sure are you, Karan, about what you are saying? About your hypothesis?' Andy asked.

  'Andy, it can't be anything else.'

  'Do we have evidence ? We cannot go to town on this story without any evidence. It's something which has far-reaching implications. Apart from you, it has the potential to tear me to pieces, if we get this wrong,' Andy warned him.

  'I am aware of that, Andy, and I have thought this through. I have considered all the possibilities and I am reasonably confident.'

  'He is right, Andy. There can be no second possibility in this. If you disassociate yourself from GB2 and look at it dispassionately, you will realise what the real problem has been.' Bhaskar joined them.

  'Why isn't GB2 realising it then? They, too, have smart people' was Andy's reply

  'Maybe they, too, have found this out Andy, but they are not telling anyone. Ronald was extremely defensive today.. .just not willing to open up,' Karan explained.

  'Or they still have some people on the inside, who work with Deepak and cover their tracks pretty well,' added Bhaskar.

  'Hmm...but this time that's not going to be easy,' Karan added.

  Andy was not convinced. 'Look folks, if you guys want me to give you a front page positioning, which this story will get given its explosive nature, I want you guys to get me some evidence. Even if it is not documentary, get me any verbal, circumstantial evidence...or something which convinces me that what you are saying is 100 per cent correct. In this case even a 99.9 per cent won't do. I acknowledge that this is a possibility, a very very strong one at that, but it's too big a chance to take without any evidence.'

  'I understand, Andy. We will get you the data by the evening,' Karan promised.

  "That sounds more reasonable.' Andy left them.

  Bhaskar turned to Karan. 'How will we get evidence? This is more a gut feeling than a possibility. While we presented an extremely confident picture to Andy, we are ourselves not 100 per cent sure about this.'

  'Wrong, Bhaskar...I am 200 per cent sure. You are not. But do not worry. By the time we go to press, I will have enough to convince both you and Andy. I know how this place operates.'

  After Bhaskar left, Karan got to work. He picked up his phone and dialled a few numbers. He had to work his way through. The first few calls yielded no result. He didn't give up. He had to make sure that he had enough evidence by the end of the day to convince Andy to carry his piece in the paper the next morning. He tried to call Amit, the guy who had given him the documents in the first place.

  'Karan, am not too sure if I can help you right now. I told you, buddy. I am in the US now on a two-week holiday. I can try to help you once I am back. I am not even carrying my laptop or my remote access keys. Sorry mate, I can't help you out this time,' Amit said.

  Karan had reached a dead end. How was he to get the information required to substantiate his story? He had no clue. His mind was like a completely blank screen. He couldn't even speak to anyone about how to get this data. People were just too scared to talk to him. Probably everyone in the cards team in GB2 had been told to stay away from him. There were only a couple of hours more for Andy to close the cover page for next day's edition. Andy would be on his head soon. He needed to think out of the box. If the 'Francisgate' didn't go up on the first page of The Times of India, Andy had to find an alternate story.

  Just to divert his mind, so that he could start afresh, he picked up his iPhone 3GS and logged onto Facebook. He would do that very often of late. Whenever work got a bit boring for him, or monotonous, he would just access Facebook for five minutes or so; surf around to see what his friends were doing around the world, post a few messages, refresh his mind and get back to work. Earlier he had an iPhone 2G, but ever since he upgraded to a 3GS, internet access had become a lot faster. Accessing Facebook on a 3GS was not as frustrating as it was on a 2G.

  'Totally mind-numbed and blank,' he wrote and pressed the 'share' button to update his status.

  He went to the washroom to freshen up, washed his face, rearranged his clothes and walked back to his cabin, stopping on the way to pick up a cup of coffee. Back at his desk, he logged into his PC, his mind still distracted and slightly distraught at not being able to find a solution to his problem. He needed some basic evidence on his hypothesis before he could get Andy to agree.

  He clicked on MS Oudook to open his mailbox. He was expecting a revert mail from Bhaskar on the wording of his article.

  '42 unread messages' claimed a pop-up when he opened the mail box. 'Oh shit!' he exclaimed. He had been into his new job for only a few days and he was beginning to get stressed. 'Who said banking is stressful and media isn't?' he thought. He scanned through the 42 unread mails in his inbox and moaned. Too many mails to read but none of substance! He minimised the window and blankly stared at the screen of his iPhone, lying next to his laptop, wondering what to do next. Suddenly it struck him. Something was wrong! Did he see it right? Or was he hallucinating?

  He quickly sat up straight, glanced back from the iPhone to the laptop and pressed the icon for opening MS Oudook, and it popped up in front of him. He hurriedly scrolled down and there it was. A completely unexpected message. Something which beat even his wildest imagination. He had forgotten her, knocked her out of his life. They were best of friends for three years, and were in a serious relationship in the last of those three years. But that had all been forgotten. In the last twelve months they had not even been in touch. This was the first message from her in a long long long time.

  The MS Oudook index page showed an unread message from Facebook. The subject line gave everything away. It said – 'Kavya Pereira sent you a message on Facebook.'

  A message from Kavya was always special. More so, if it came after one long year. He clicked and opened it. 'What happened, baby? Is everything ok? Just saw your Facebook status.'

  They had parted ways amicably, and even though they had not kept in touch, they had always tracked each other through common friends. They hadn't even removed each other from the friends list on Facebook.

  She had seen his status update and had got worried and pinged him. Karan had programmed his Facebook profile in such a way that in case someone sent him a message, an alert would pop up straight in his office email inbox, too.

  As he stared at the message, he wondered how this could have happened. Was this some kind of d
ivine intervention? He loved her a lot when they were together. It was a silly misunderstanding that had driven them apart. He was over with that.

  But strangely, it was not her getting in touch with him and reestablishing contact which he thought was 'divine'. Her message was a god-sent opportunity. Why didn't he think of her earlier? Could she be the answer that he had been searching for such a long time?

  He immediately took out his mobile and dialled her number. A popular Black-Eyed Peas song played on her cell. I gotta feeling that tonight's going to be a good night. He knew that she liked that song. Even the song told him that it was going to be a good night. Maybe she was indeed the answer.

  There was no response from the other side. 'Please pick up,' he pleaded. 'I need you now, more than ever,' he said as he disconnected the line and dialled again. His heart sank as he felt his last hope slipping away from him. He sank into his chair, wondering what he would do now. The morning's discussion with Ronald had pissed him off and this article was his way of getting back at Ronald, albeit in a very mild manner.

  He was busy cursing Kavya for not picking up the phone when a strange noise filled the room. It was the noise of a phone ringing -a strange ring tone. He looked around. There was no phone in the room except his.

  And then he suddenly remembered. 'Oh shit! It's my phone,' he said to himself and pulled it out from his pocket. It was Kavya. He hadn't changed the ring tone that he had set on his phone to identify Kavya's call. So much time had passed since he had last spoken to her! No wonder he had even forgotten the ring tone he had specially set for her. Hurriedly, he picked up the phone.

  'Hi, babes.'

  'Hi, Karan.' Her sweet voice reverberated on the phone.

  'How are you doing, Kavya?'

  'I am good. You tell me what happened? For the first time I found your Facebook status very cryptic and negative. Something had to be dramatically wrong. I got worried.'

  'You still love me?' Karan took a chance.

  'Shut up, Karan! Not all over again...we will leave this topic for some other day. Tell me what happened?'

  'Are you still in office?'

  'Yes...was packing up to leave when I saw your call'.

  'So when did you move out of your phone banking role?' Karan asked.

  'Over a year now, Karan. Why?'

  'You had access to the core banking system then.'

  'Yes...'.

  'Core banking as in banking accounts, loans and cards,' Karan reiterated.

  'Yes, Karan. But why are you asking?'

  The core banking system was the system GB2 used for maintaining customer accounts and records. Kavya was a supervisor in phone banking and was called upon to answer customer queries regarding all products. Hence she was given a system access to customer accounts relating to all the banking products. A year back, Kavya left the phone banking team in retail bank and moved to the commercial banking business. It was a move upwards with a significant increase in money and position. Her role was still the same, though she was now accountable for customers in the small and medium enterprise (SME) and mid-market space. Hence her system access had not been modified.

  'Do you have access to the cards system even now?'

  'Well, I haven't checked it in a while, if you want I can check once and get back to you.'

  'Can you check now, I will hold.' Karan was being very mean. He was speaking to her after a year, and he had already moved onto what he wanted from her. Thankfully, Kavya didn't seem to mind.

  'Karan, what is the issue?' she asked. 'What is the hurry?'

  'There is a problem. I had come to meet Ronald about it today.' Karan narrated the entire episode to her.

  'Ok, I have understood. I had heard about Deepak's arrest. Poor guy! But if he is involved, it suits him fine.' She, too, hated Deepak. All the games that Deepak was playing with Karan were on when she was dating him. That impacted her, too. 'So what do you want me to do?'

  'Kavya, I want some help, and the only person who can help me is you.'

  'Tell me...I will help you only if you promise me that if I lose my job you will give me a monthly salary till you are alive,' she said laughingly.

  'Haha...of course, why not ? I am sure you know that I am willing to keep giving you my salary till the day I am alive, even if you don't help me,' Karan, too, laughed, making a clumsy effort at flirting.

  'Look, the Francis D'Silva I told you about worked for a company called Symbiotic Technologies. I have observed a strange pattern of spending and payments in his card. I want you to check and tell me if a similar pattern is seen in other cards in Symbiotic.'

  'And how do you think I can do that?' she asked, a bit surprised.

  'You need to run a query and find out the number of cards in which the office address is mentioned as "Symbiotic Technologies'? Karan guided her.

  'Ok then.'

  'Do this quickly please, I will hold,' Karan requested her.

  'No, I will call you back the moment it is done.'

  Within five minutes Kavya called back. 'Karan, I am through. There are 968 cards with Symbiotic Technologies as their office address.'

  'Do you see any delinquent card? How are the cards performing?'

  'Let me see...,' Kavya quickly went through the report to see if there was any card which had defaulted on payments.

  'No, Karan, not even a single card is delinquent. Each of the 968 cards is active. It's a great portfolio.'

  'Hold your horses, Kavya. This is not normal. In any portfolio there would be a few cards which slip payments once in a while. Symbiotic credit cards are very clean. There is not a single delinquent card. And normally when things are way far from normal, there has to be something more to it. It raises eyebrows.'

  'Hmm...Karan, you are right. Now what?'

  'Kavya, I want you to pick out ten of these cards and check their transactions. Tell me if you notice any trends...specifically the one I told you.'

  Kavya took some time in going through ten randomly selected accounts. She kept mumbling something on the phone all through. Karan didn't respond. This went on for over fifteen minutes, after which she came back on the phone.

  'Karan, this is rubbish.'

  'Why, what happened?' he asked.

  'Everything that you were implying is correct. The problem is a lot bigger than what everyone thinks it is.'

  'You mean to say that my inference can be correct?' Karan asked her, positive she would say yes.

  'You are bang on, Karan! It cannot be anything but what you are saying. Wait...let me check ten more accounts.' Kavya hurriedly checked ten more random accounts from the lot of 968 Symbiotic Technologies employees.

  'It's the same story, Karan. Just the same! You must tell Ronald about this.'

  'I tried, babes. I did tell you that I came to GB2 this morning to tell him about it. He refused to entertain me.' Karan felt angry with Ronald yet again.

  'That's really bad, Karan.'

  'Hmm...but who will tell him? I had all the intent to help him. He didn't listen. Sherlyn told him, too. I guess this is the problem with these goras. They think we Indians are a bunch of incompetent idiots,' he grumbled.

  'Haha...you are telling me, Karan? I still work for a gora bank.'

  Karan was happy that she laughed candidly. It meant she was still comfortable in his company. He, too, had realised that going away from her was a mistake. Maybe this was an opportunity to set things right.

  'Kavya...?' he asked with the coyness of a newly-wed.

  'Yes, Karan.'

  'What are you doing this Friday?'

  'Nothing.. .why ?'

  'It's been ages since we went out for a drink. Let's catch up on the lost time. If you need to get home fast, let's meet early. What do you say?'

  'Friiiiiiddddaaaayyyyyyyyy...we will see how it goes.' Kavya started thinking.

  'Please don't say no...pleasssseeeee!' Karan fervently requested.

  'Haha...ok, we can meet on Friday.'

  "Ihanks, babes. Will
catch you soon,' a thrilled Karan literally kissed the phone as he kept it down. He still loved Kavya and pined for her. He always cared for her. That day he got to know that she, too, cared for him. He went back to Facebook and checked his account. Hers was the only message based on his Facebook status update.

  Once the phone was back on the cradle, life swung back to the present. Andy, Bhaskar and the convincing remained on his mind. But now Karan had a better story to tell. He rushed to Andy's room, almost knocking a few people on the way. He was already ten minutes over the scheduled deadline. Andy was in his room, finalising the pagination of the front page. With him were a couple of others who had come to him for his sign-offs for the stories to be carried the next day.

  'Andy, I need five minutes. I have juice for you,' Karan said hurriedly.

  Andy nodded and the rest of the people left the room. Bhaskar joined them in a few seconds. The five minutes that Karan had asked for extended to a good forty-five minutes. Andy was shocked. Bhaskar was not. After all, hadn't Bhaskar needled Karan about the real problem last night? At the end of the conversation, Andy picked up the intercom, dialed an extension and waited patiently for it to be picked up.

  'Hello,'

  'Hey, Sharma. Andy here. No change. We go with the old front page layout,' he gave staccato instructions.

  'Yes, sir...just in time. We were about to go ahead with the changed format.'

  "Thanks, old man.' He kept the phone down and looked at Karan and Bhaskar. 'Well done! We will rock tomorrow.' Then he looked at Karan and asked, 'Are you scared, son?' Karan was stumped for a minute, wondering if he should really have been in the first place.

  16 December 2009

  Mumbai

  'Global Bank of Greater Boston involved in massive money laundering scam. Over 100 crore of money routed to fond Naxalite operations'

  This headline on the front page of the country's most widely circulated daily really woke everyone in GB2 to a threatening reality. Ronald was shocked out of his wits when he saw the morninger. It was the same guy – Karan Panjabi – at work. He was now ruing those five minutes the previous morning when he had been extremely rude to him. Maybe this was what Karan had wanted to tell him about. But Ronald didn't allow him to speak.