Selection @ IDBI Bank

Where do I start??? Everyone knows about the nervous, nail biting and hair pulling moments taking place when a company announces to visit for campus recruitment in an infant college that has its second batch of MBA students rolling out…That too in a year that has witnessed the biggest ever financial crunch, an atrocious terrorist strike on the financial capital, and emergence of war with a country that has nothing to lose and is raring to attack. The company, in question here, is IDBI…a semi-government firm that neither gives letter of regrets after selection nor does it issue pink slips after recruitments… “Oh My God, is that right??? Such job security in this absolutely insecure era of workmanship… I have to get this job of assistant manager anyhow”… this was the supposed secretive idea that was ping-ponging in the cerebrum of every single of the 44 MBA students that were appearing for the GD and subsequent interview to be taken by the IDBI big shots who were coming in from Mumbai to select we-don’t-know-how many people. The week prior to the D-day witnessed people getting paranoid to know almost everything related to MBA…which, I suppose, entails… err…almost the ENTIRE KNOWLEDGE OF THE BUSINESS WORLD…that too in a couple of days. Everyone, including myself, was woolgathering that somehow some genius, may be by mistake, invented a capsule that, on consumption, can give my otherwise dull brain an overview of EVERYTHING that has been happening EVERYWHERE in the past 20 years… rest all, I will manage myself. But alas, no such “self-updating general knowledge pill” was or will be there for our rescue. So, finally, after analyzing that we cannot become even the adopted children of the farthest relative of Philip Kotler in the time that we had for our preparations, we planned to hone our GD skills by indulging into discussions that would start sensibly with a sane, opinion based topic such as should India trade with China?, Are living-in relationships ethical?, T20 or test cricket? etc. But somewhere in the back of our minds we remembered that we are wearing bundies and not formals and that we are in our free-to-speak-anything hostel rooms and not in some GD hall… and may be that’s why all our sane GD sessions got their conclusions with jape and humorous endings such as “baba ji ka ghanta” and “GD ki batti bana ke andar lelo”….and hence there goes our honed up skills down the drains of an untimely but refreshing humor.. Finally, the D-day arrived. Every one of us got utmost formally dressed by applying every cosmetic that we had as if the Interviewers are not coming to select managers for IDBI but coming to organize a “swayamvar” for us to marry their pretty daughters with a promise to give dowry that would be sufficient enough to sustain our entire family for the rest of lifetime. Anyways, we were seated and then… the interviewers arrived… three of them… three MEN… three SERIOUS men… three serious, LEARNED men…three serious, learned and STRATEGIC men… strategic because they smartly divided 44 students in a batch of three and every one of the interviewers was to conduct a GD with one group, simultaneously… No wastage of time… Man!!! they were in for some serious recruitment… When I got to know the topic of discussion for my group, I thought I was doomed, most of us did. Our Moderator spoke in impeccable English… “Your topic of discussion is Good Governance and Polity”… Someone flinched… Silence followed… what was this??? I mean we have been preparing an opinion based topic, some yes/no kind of a deal all that while and what we have here is a f**king topic of debate… I thought… everyone did, their faces showed… Many people did not even understand if it was quality or polity… "Excuse me sir, is that quality or polity??" I heard my self blurting out; trying to come into notice but it was immediately followed by a feeling of regret… After that, the so-called discussion that took place seemed more of like the export market of Chawri bazaar where only the person having the maximum audibility can sell his item while others sit and watch… but I think we all gave a tough fight, even to ourselves. The results were announced after a while, I had cleared the GD. No surprise, 33 out of 44 did. The month was December, the day was 18th and it was supposed to be cold but thanks to global warming and then my GD clearance, that I was sweating like hell from inside… worst part, you cannot counter the itch because it will spoil the crease of clothes. The first interviewee went inside….23 minutes. The second one went in immediately after the first came out….19 minutes. A while later… 10 students through, the average time of an interview fell from 20 minutes to 12 minutes… I suppose they analyzed the caliber of the students of our class… Every tick that the second’s arm of the clock made after an interviewee went inside, every second that brought my turn closer, pushed my heart into the depths of haywire thoughts about the degree of subjective knowledge that my classmates are being asked. Someone discussed that they asked him about financial leverage…I did not know it… then someone said study capital budgeting… Never heard of it… then the sound of inventory control came… No idea goddamn!!! …isn’t there anything being asked that I know?? Then I overheard a girl telling that she was asked to tell about her family background… wow…this one I knew… that too not only mine, I knew her’s as well.. 25 students through and the average interview time had fallen to 6-7 minutes per interviewee… 8 students left… I was second last…ironically and coincidently, in perfect coordination with my position in class with respect to my marks. At last, my turn came… Quivering, I went towards the Interview room… reciting the broken verses of Hanuman Chalisa that I could remember… but carrying a smile on my face, as I had read in the interview guide… I opened the door. “Good Afternoon Sir, may I come in??”... … Err… did I forgot to say please? I was allowed to sit… nothing special!! The very first question came… “Dushyant, tell us something about yourself”… expected!! I told all the positive points… Confidently The second question came… “Tell us about your family background”… I smiled and explained… I could have told the entire family background of any pretty girl in my class… not a big deal!!

They listened carefully. Third Question came… “Dushyant, what would excite you the most, professionally, when you’ll enter the market?”… Pun came into my mind but this time I remembered where I was… I answered smartly… I know it. The Fourth… “Thank you Dushyant, You may leave; kindly send Surinder inside” … I opened my mouth to answer but nothing came out… It was not a question… My interview was over… I saw my watch… the duration was 2 minutes and 20 seconds… Only !!! I knew I had done well but with respect to the nature of questions that they asked me as compared to what they have asked others… there was nothing that I couldn’t have done well. Tension started to seep in again… I think I am out, but how could I be out? I told everything they asked… My cerebrum, cerebellum and medulla started a group discussion inside my skull on “Will they select Dushyant or not?”…and trust me, this was purely opinion based. Mithun, who was already placed in a reputed firm, was there for support. He told me something that helped the curls of my tension to straighten… not completely though. Just then, the three serious, learned and strategic men came into the waiting hall with a paper in hand… the paper that had our destinies written on it… our dreams… it contained the fruit of our two year long exile that we have subjected ourselves to in Kurukshetra…

They started calling out the names of selected candidates… I crossed my fingers so tightly that they looked like the danger sign… heart pounding… eyes closed… ears alert like sound sensors…

They called out 13 names…

Mine was 8th …!!!