A Day in the Job of Bunty, Chief Teekha Officer (A Work of Fiction)
Playful fiction in the voice of our mascot. Bunty is a cartoon, and nothing in this story is a real event, test or person.
First, the legal department in my head
This is fiction. I am Bunty, a mascot. I am a drawing with an excellent attitude and a job title I gave myself. Everything below is invented for fun, down to the last meeting. It tells you nothing true about how Sunder makes, checks or buys anything. If you came for facts, go and read the Teja article. If you came for the truth about my feelings, sit down, this will take a while.
5:58 am. Awake before the alarm
A Chief Teekha Officer does not wake up. He ignites. My alarm is set for six and I have never once heard it, because at 5:58 I am already standing in the dark with my mouth slightly open, breathing in to find out if anyone in a five-kilometre radius has started a tadka. Someone always has. Today it is jeera, with a little too much confidence. I make a note. I do not know whom I will send the note to. I have never had an assistant, since every applicant so far has resigned during the handshake.
7:30 am. Breakfast with management
Breakfast is poha, as the constitution of Indore requires. Pihu has already covered hers in jeeravan and is crunching sev directly at me. "Chatkaara? Mera department," she says, which is what she says to everything, including good morning. I add a pinch of Red Chilli Powder to my plate. She looks at the pinch and then at me. I add one more pinch to show I have not been influenced by her look. This is what is known in business as leadership.
10:00 am. Performance review
My quarterly review takes place with Rameshji, Chief Swaad Inspector, who has one sentence and has been getting away with it for as long as anyone can draw. I present my achievements: seventeen warnings issued, four grown men advised to reduce quantities, one chilli stared at until it apologised. Rameshji sniffs my presentation. "Chakha. Sungha. Pass," he says. Then he leaves. I consider this the warmest conversation we have ever had, and I have had it framed in my imagination.
1:00 pm. The incident
Sudhaji has made dal. I go to her kitchen to offer my expertise. I want this recorded: I offered it politely, standing well back from the flame and holding my own spoon. I suggest a second helping of mirch. She does not look up. "Namak chakha?" she asks. I have no idea why this works on me, but I leave. Sudhaji holds the title of Chief Rasoi Officer, and I have come to understand that in this family the word "Chief" is doing very different amounts of work in different rooms.
3:15 pm. Field work
The afternoon is customer outreach. By customer outreach I mean that I hover near imaginary shoppers and panic. Today a young man in my imagination is holding a pack of Kuti Teja Mirch Powder and a teaspoon, and he has the face of somebody who watched a video. I go red. I am already red, so nobody notices. "Ek chutki kaafi hai," I tell him. "Thoda aur?" says my own traitorous mouth a second later, because I am a professional with two sides, and they do not speak to each other. He leaves with a sachet. I call this my greatest victory of the quarter.
6:00 pm. The Pure Spices shelf
People forget that I also look after the Pure Spices shelf. Turmeric, coriander, amchur and pepper all report to me, which is a heavy burden for a man of my temperament, because none of them will fight anyone. I ask Turmeric to be more aggressive. Turmeric stays yellow and says nothing. White Pepper, at least, has some spirit, and once made me sneeze during a speech. I have recommended it for promotion. There is no promotion, only an org chart I drew on a wall.
9:40 pm. The thing they do not put in the job description
Dinner is over, the kitchens are going quiet, and all over this imaginary town someone is sitting down with a plate that is slightly too hot and pretending otherwise. I think of them often. I raise a glass of chaas in their general direction. Mirchi hai Mazaak Nahi, I whisper to the window, and the window, being a window, has no comment. Then I check the lid on the Red Chilli Powder, because steam is the enemy and I trust nobody. Tomorrow I must ask Rameshji whether a person can be Chief of something if nobody has ever told him to stop. I already know what he will say. He will sniff the question first.