The Interview

The short hair bobbed with each purposeful step. The pink floral shirt offset the coal black jacket and matching trousers. A well-dressed geek is an oxymoron but women rarely lose their social graces in the most unkempt of environments. Like a small IT company which is what we were.

I was employee number 15 in this pokey little company of 75. Given there were two founder directors, two office boys and a receptionist who were never likely to leave the company, I was pretty much the oldest “knowledge worker” in the company. And this had quite a few benefits when it came to getting computers replaced or getting a leave sanctioned or expenses approved. But it had its own downsides – one of them being that I had to sit in on just about any interview conducted in the company. Whatever the role or profile being evaluation, I had to be in. I have always suspected that I was being set-up, that the guys knew that if the candidate got my stamp of approval, the final round with the directors would be a breeze. So it made sense to use me as a filter. Whatever be the reasons, for once it did not look like it would be an ordeal.

Rohit Gore, my Project Manager for Deutsche Bank had taken position in the centre of the chairs arced around the oval conference room table. One chair was left on the other side and all others pushed against the wall to make it look like a meeting room. The candidate looked at each us resolutely in the eye before walking in and taking her seat in front us. Adrian Dinesh, my HR head sat to the right of Rohit and shook hands with her. “Ranjana, Sir”, she said, in a well modulated voice. “Adrian, just Adrian”, he said and turned around. “This is Rohit, from our Payments Team, and this is R_ from our Sales.”. We both held out our hands and the clasp was firm and confident. Rohit hastily pulled two print-outs of her resume from his sheaf of papers and put one each in front of Adrian and me.

“RANJANA GADGIL” the document proclaimed from the title. A quick scan revealed she was from Pune, the city of my education. A thrill of pleasure still and always runs through me when I meet someone from Pune. I cannot wait to drop names like Vaishali, Kayani Bakery and Jan Seva (the last only to hostelite students in Pune and not to the locals) and then wait for references like Coffee House or Egg Burjee at University circle (Alas no more now). And it seemed familiar now. The pale sharp features, the smallish face and body, and the chirpy confidence, all pointed out to the countless girls I had known in my own college days, the local Pune girls, arguably for over a 100 years now, the most progressive group of women in India.

As far as interviews go, it was not very different from what I was used to. In part more articulate, more confident than average and in part not enough technical depth is what it looked like to my decidedly non-technical mind. But on the balance, it looked like a sure shoo-in mainly because as a small company, we could not pick and choose too much. We were neither the best paymasters or nor could we provide a brand platform to launch a thousand career jumps from. At best, we could offer a challenging work environment (severe staff shortages) and to those that it mattered, a kind of reverse snobbery, of working out of a garage (it was actually nice office in a glass and steel building) peddling banking software to the capitals of the world. As the interview wound up, it was pretty clear we would make an offer. I was just worried that there not too many questions coming from the other side. That to me is not a bad thing at all, but it just seems to be so much the in thing now that when we meet someone who doesn’t ask these questions (usually inanities like what will do in the first 15 days after I come on board – Fill forms and get ignored, don’t you know, you moron), we get worried. Nevertheless, I was glad it was over and we could move on. And then Adrian asked the one question, it seems no interview panel can resist.

“If we make this offer, how soon can you join us?”

“Well, I wanted to say this myself. In a week, actually. I have already resigned from my present company and serving notice. Last one week now.”

“That is very confident of you, Ms.Gadgil”, said Adrian, looking around at us. Rohit was grinning with considerable less gravitas than his designation deserved.

“Actually, Ms. Ahmed, Sir. Ms.Ranjana Shabbir Ahmed. I got married a month back. This CV is an older version that I had mailed to the head hunter….”

She looked around at three of us, each gulping in the awkward silence. I was the first to react, shamefully slow at any rate. Congratulations, Ms.Ranjana……Shabbir Ahmed.”

“My husband and I work in the same company. They have a policy of no couples in the office. So I decided to leave since Shabbir is already doing quite well there. That is why I quit. Compulsion, not confidence, Adrian”, she smiled. It was a smile that said a lot. Rueful, resigned and yet in perspective given her larger happiness. I smiled back and stood up to shake hands. The same cool grip. Adrian was saying something but it was drowned in the conversation Rohit had struck up in his cellphone all of a sudden. Ranjana tried to catch his eye to say her byes but he was looking out of the window deep in conversation. We nodded her out and sat down again. An agreement on the salary, no starting date issues and quality as good as we could expect. For a change, it would be a simple decision.

Rohit sat back, his conversation over. I wanted to finish this quickly, “What do you think guys? I think we should move quickly because she will soon be jobless. I think she would want to minimize that period. Before some one else grabs her….”

Rohit breathed out loudly, “Ranjana Shabbir Ahmed. What kind of a name is that? I mean, why does she have to go get married to a Shabbir. Yaar, Hum sab Gore, Kelkar were dead or what? This is so,…so frustrating.”

Adrian interrupted sharply, “You are talking as if she betrayed you and ran away. What the f*** are you frustrated for over a woman you did not even know 45 minutes back.”

All I could think of was the dozen emails that needed responding, “Guys, listen, we need to close this. If we cannot agree now, let us meet in the evening. I really got to go, y’know.”

“Stop playing the secular saint for god’sake”, cried Rohit. “You were as much stricken as we were. I am just honest enough to say my thoughts. You were sucking air like a preoccupied pearl diver. Tell me truly R_, what were your thoughts when you heard Ranjana Shabbir Ahmed.”

“I didn’t give shit, honestly. I thought she was smart and good though a bit flaky. I wanted to confirm with you guys and them make the offer.”

Adrian chipped in, “What is wrong with you, Rohit. Why are you so upset? Because she married a Muslim. I don’t understand what is it that you have lost to get so frustrated about?”

Rohit snapped back, “You won’t understand Adrian. Your sister has married a Hindu and so will you, in probably. But this Shabbir. It is different with him. His parents have given him a liberal western education while his sister probably went to an Islamic girl’s school till 6th standard and then went off to do some henna classes and cooking classes. So Shabbir is an educated smart young professional. And if he wants to get married, what are his choices? Some semi-literate, unrelatable and awkward woman with who he can’t have a single satisfying conversation, even if he tried.”

I had tried long enough to be polite, “And your point is, assuming there is one.”

Rohit replied, “R___, you are being blind or naïve. This is the great Muslim middle class happening in India. Every educated Muslim in the country is invariably male.”

“What rubbish?”, said Adrian.
“Adrian, you worked for KCS, 25000 people. Tell me how many Muslim women did you see there?”
For Adrian, this was a topic close to his heart, “The problem is not the Muslim women. You tell me how many Muslim men are there in the IT industry. Who gives them jobs? Who gives them the opportunities that are so easily available to you and me?”

“OK, let us examine your point”, combated Rohit. “How many Muslims you reckon were there in KCS, as a percentage?”. “Thanks for asking, Rohit. Because I happen to know the answer. 5% in a country. In a country where 18% is Muslim. So now you know where the problem is”, replied Adrian.

“Wait, I am not done yet”, said Rohit, “And out of these 5% Muslims, how many where women”. Adrian saw the trap now but it was too late, “I should guess around 5%.”

“Right”, said Rohit, the glee betrayed in his voice. “5% of Muslim employees in KCS are women, whereas 32% of employees in KCS are women. Is that right?” He looked around to silence from Adrian and myself.” So unless you are suggesting there is an additional religio-gender bias against Muslim women, 32% of the Muslim employees in KCS should be women but only 5% are women. That is 1/6th of the national average.”

“This is not a stray statistic. Muslim men will marry Hindu women not because of ulterior motives or because they are more attractive but because they will simply not find women of their background or education in their society. So they will look elsewhere and in a country where 82% is Hindu, that elsewhere will always be Hindu women.”

“And why is that a bad thing”, asked Adrian, lost in the labyrinthine argument.

“It is not a bad thing honestly. This how the Muslim middle-class will be forged. It will be educated Muslim men marrying Hindu women and then having far more open attitudes about their offspring especially their girls compared to their parents. In this way, will the Muslim middle-class integrate into our society. The first Muslim women who marry outside their community will be those whose at least one parent was Hindu. There are already dozens of such examples in our society. And our people understand this. This is why people so dread having Muslim neighbours even in a cosmopolitan city like Bombay. Because they know that their neighbour’s daughters will marry a steel trader in Muzzafarpur or Azamgarh while their sons will do their engineering and then marry their Hindu neighbours’ daughters.”

“Honestly, Rohit this is all a bit far-fetched, like a typical communal conspiracy theory.”

“Adrian, I don’t care whether you agree with me or not. I just offer my theory to anyone who will listen, for them evaluate for what it is worth. But look around you and think about what people think. At best, the Muslims come across as misogynistic hypocrites and at best as sexual predators. And in our country, in such matters, our people always prefer to believe the worst.”

Rohit stormed out and Adrian looked out of the window. I went back to my seat wondering all this had to do with hiring a smart young lady who was deserving of the role she had applied for. Two days later, I checked with HR. Rohit had sent a rejection notice and given our veto rules, one person naysaying could nix the candidate. My salary was too good otherwise I would have fought for Ranjana.