This post is inspired by Kanish Mitra's post # 857227 and recounts the incident of a young man employed in the bank's canteen at one of the branches of SBI in Jhargram sub-division in Paschim Medinipur Dist. of West Bengal .
As a Chief Manager posted at the Bank's Regional Office at Kharagpur in 2007 , I was on a visit to the branch, which fell under the span of our control at that regional office .
During the course of my visit to that branch , the branch staff narrated the tale...
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of an episode , during the previous week ,involving the canteen boy at that branch , whom we shall refer to as X . Now X was a resident of Tatanagar and every Saturday after the bank closed , he would board the 18030 Shalimar LTT Express at Jhargram at say 6.30 pm and reach Tatanagar at 8 pm . Only to return to Jhargram at 8.45 am on Monday mornings by the return train leaving Tatanagar at 7 AM .
On one such Saturday, X was targeted by some miscreants , who offered him sweets during the journey home , and after he became unconscious , made off with his salary , mobile and other belongings . The impact of the drugs administered to him was so severe that X had to be jolted out of his stupor by the railway staff after the train reached LTT on Monday morning at say 5 am . Now that implies that he must have slept for a stretch of nearly 34 hours without food and water . Naturally that Monday X did not turn up for his duties at the branch .
Penniless, in what was an alien city to him, X was wandering on the roads near Kurla totally lost in the metropolis of Mumbai and not knowing what to do .His problem was further compounded by the fact that he could speak only Bengali and a smattering of Hindi . As he kept roaming in the lanes at Kurla , famished and dispirited , he spotted the SBI LOGO at a distance . He sat at the entrance of that branch of SBI waiting for the staff to turn up at 10 am .
Once he took shelter there he was at least in safe hands despite a massive language and communication problem . The union leader at that branch ( I later telephoned him to convey my thanks for his initiative ) just about managed to make out the name of the SBI Branch were X worked , after his interaction with him . That branch was then contacted and the identity of X ascertained beyond doubt .
The staff at the branch in Mumbai took care of X and arranged for his breakfast and lunch at the branch canteen . Two of them took him to LTT in the night and after dinner ensured that he boarded a sleeper class coach of 18029 LTT - Shalimar Express with a valid reservation to Jhargram. They also gave him some money to defray his expenses till he reached home .
THE GESTURE BY THE SBI STAFF I MUMBAI WAS INDEED MAGNANIMOUS AND MADE ME FEEL PROUD TO BE A MEMBER OF THE SBI FAMILY .