Nimesh Advani

[The writer describes his friend's suffering at his job; his talents are ridiculed and his youth is held against him]

 My friend Sid at his job

Mr. Gupta threw the file, smirked and promptly indulged in digging his nose. Then he started rambling about how competitive the world is and how people are treated in the film industry and how experienced he is and how Sid needs to follow him. Sid didn’t say much after this outburst. This had become a routine. Come to office and get fired.

It’s not that Sid is not efficient. Mr. Gupta has the habit to vent out his frustration regularly; sometimes every twenty minutes. What made Gupta behave irresponsibly? Sid often wondered if his wife beat him at home. But having a woman must be an achievement for Gupta. Misogynist.

Sid had thought that his dreams of becoming a movie director would be realized soon when he started working in a popular production house. However, when Gupta replaced his first boss, Sid found himself busy with tasks like buying samosas in the evening and contacting air-conditioner repairing service centres.

According to Gupta, people have to face flak and “take shit” in the early part of their career and he wanted Sid to join the bandwagon …

My Take

I hate such intentions and ideas (Gupta’s) … I asked Sid to leave the place but the pressure of economic recession and a nagging father were enough to over-power my advice.

I wonder why people behave like Gupta. Is he rude to others just because he has been dealt with in a similar manner?

Let me analyze a bit. Just because Gupta was treated cruelly, it means he will treat everyone who is junior to him, very cruelly.

We do not like it if someone is living comfortably because when we were in their position, we were treated badly…This sounds absurd to me. Why can’t we encourage a newcomer …?

If people were not encouraged during their youth, then should they discourage newcomers or simply avoid the mistake? It is against the ego to let somebody younger do better than them.

The mindset: “We were not given an opportunity at that point of time so why should these guys start early…why don’t they suffer like us?”

We have heard so much about healthy competition but the competition is anything but healthy. The moment somebody gets ahead of us, instead of us trying to overtake them with our own capabilities we try to pull them back.

Instead of thinking how we can get better we start thinking how the other person can get worse.

Can a newcomer start his career with the hope of being treated with dignity? Will this vicious 360 circle of life ever come to an end for him?