The Hope Factory A Novel - By Lavanya Sankaran Page 0,1

not beyond the obligatory: small gold earrings at her lobes, a thin gold chain with her marriage mangalsutra at the end. No rings, no bangles, all her accessorial energies seemed to revolve around the enormous handbag that accompanied her to every meeting, a bag so capacious that awed male colleagues had witnessed the emergence of infinite objects from within, from wallets to a laptop, magazines, a present for a colleague, and, improbably, a tiny videogame console that Mrs. Padmavati claimed belonged to her nine-year-old son but in fact was spotted feverishly attacking on the commute home on the factory bus. She had worked with the company for five years, gaining seniority, and this was the first time Anand had invited her to a senior-level management meeting.

If he was honest, it hadn’t been very often that he had had a management meeting. Until recently, “senior management” had consisted of just himself and Ananthamurthy, each of them undertaking a variety of tasks.

But it was time to change all that. He had broached the idea with Ananthamurthy a few weeks previously, and Ananthamurthy, who had recently been gifted a management book by his son-in-law and was reading it in his spare time, had agreed with him: “We must professionalize, sir. That is the key.”

Accordingly, Anand, who had kept the company finances under his strict control, was now toying with the idea of making Mrs. Padmavati his CFO. She was pleased to be included in the meeting and, Anand could tell, was both nervous and eager to prove herself. She placed her handbag on the floor and sat erect, holding a notepad, a pen, and a calculator at the ready. In addition, they had hired a new HR person, who trailed into the meeting after her.

“Okay then,” said Anand, after they had liberally partaken of Ananthamurthy’s box of sweet prasadam. “Let’s review our preparations, so we know exactly where we stand.” He hesitated, pushed his glasses up his nose, and then stated what everybody in the room already knew. “Tomorrow can be the most important day for our company, I think.”

The sheet moldings and pressings made by Cauvery Auto were sold to automotive companies that assembled passenger cars and other vehicles out of them for the Indian market. They had built the business painstakingly over the years, chasing after orders, waiting for hours, sometimes days, for meetings with purchasing managers, godlike beings in sanctified inner offices who were seemingly unaware of Anand in the waiting room, his 9:00 A.M. appointment ticking past lunch and through the afternoon until he was asked, sweaty, hungry, angry, but still patient, to come back the next day. Yes, so sorry, sir is very busy, hopefully he will be able to see you tomorrow.

But now, finally, they were on the cusp of a different phase. The following morning, their largest customers would arrive, bringing with them representatives of the Japanese parent company. They would tour the facilities, scrutinize, inspect, and have endless discussions on production capabilities and future scope. If the day went well, Cauvery Auto could end up supplying the international market as well. The thought of that was unbelievably heady. Anand could not fool himself; this was a rare prize; there would be plenty of other companies competing for it, many of them (he feared) better positioned than Cauvery Auto.

If they won the order, it would transform all their lives. It would spell stability, growth, profits, not just for the company but for all of them—him, Ananthamurthy, Mrs. Padmavati, everyone—easing the financial struggles of their lives and allowing very different futures to bloom for their families.

IN THE LATE MORNING, Anand went on a tour of inspection. The production floor was always kept in good working condition, but some of the workers’ uniforms had been replaced, and the accounts department had used the occasion to purchase new ergonomic chairs in a bright orange for their workstations. Anand did not mind; these things contributed to workplace efficiency, ease, and bonhomie, and he had overridden Ananthamurthy’s muttered objections to the expense. “After all,” the operations manager had said, “we are not one of those American-style call centers, is it not?” His own daughter worked in one such call center in the city, and Mr. Ananthamurthy had visited her workplace one day and come away slightly scandalized. “Too much waste,” he said. “And all for what? For answering a few phone calls. Where is the skill in that?”

Neat flower beds lined the outside walls of the factory buildings; the gardeners were