On a team meting one evening we were told that our organization is planning to raise it’s security levels.  Henceforth the entire office would be under camera surveillance and there would be cameras activated at night too to report unexpected movements. As a part of such an enhanced security campaign was there a proposal to appoint a Gunman. He would be the first level of check to the entrance of our office. With a fully loaded gun would he keep standing near the gate, we were told. The very thought excited us. “Gunman with a fully loaded machine.  Wow!”

Finally one Monday when we were entering our office, we saw the gunman on his job. He was a huge fellow, tall, stout and pitch dark, holding a huge rifle in his back. The first thought that came across after having a glimpse at the Gunman was that he didn’t really need a gun. Had he not wore a uniform and had worn a dhoti and “angrakha”, with a black tilak on his forehead, he would have looked a perfect dacoit from Chambal. His looks were enough to scare, he didn’t need a rifle. To match his looks he had a rough and heavy voice.

One morning as I was hurriedly getting into  office,  the Gunman stopped me. He looked at me in my eyes. His eyes were red and he said, ” Madam, where is your ID card? I have been asked not to let anyone in without the card displayed.”, he said in his heavy voice.  As I stood facing him, I realised how he overpowered me with his dacoit like looks and huge built.

With this minimal conversation he managed to scare me enough. Had it been some other security guard, I would have snapped back saying,” you are a newcommer here and you better know people who work here“, but to what the gun man said, I simply nodded my head and wore the ID card before entering the office.

Soon the Gunman became the talk of the office. Everyone discussed how he managed to scare them with his looks.

Within few months, we however noticed a change. The Gunman had become quite settled and  probably easy going in his job hence he decided that it is too strenous an activity to keep standing the entire day. He managed a table and a chair and started sitting there. Then in another couple of days we noticed, that the Gunman did not keep his Rifle hanging on his back. He sat with the rifle laid on his lap like his sleeping baby.

Slowly he got tired of that too, and decided to fold the rifle and keep it on his table.  He kept seated at his table and folded his rifle in two parts. He kept the handle of the rifle at one side and the nose of the rifle at the other end of the table. The bullets were taken out and kept in the middle of the table.  This became the Gunman’s comfort zone.  With the rifle folded into parts and  the bullets in the middle he kept on seated in his table throughout the entire work hours in his so called duty of ‘protecting’ us.

The Gunman’s easy going approach and lack of sincerity in duty didn’t go unreported and soon his details got escallated to Senior Managers. When he was questioned, the Gunman said that he had arthritis, so it pains his limbs to keep standing for a long time.

“The rifle is too heavy hence I keep it on the table rather than holding it all throughout the day. “, explained the gunman. He was given a warning and left by the Senior Management, however he didn’t even try an inch to come out of his comfort zone.

The warning left him unmoved totally and he sat the entire day as he sat earlier with the rifle folded.  We had become quite friendly with him by then and after work hours or on lunch hours he used to tell us stories of his village. Slowly his desk became the entertainment desk of the office.  We used to sit there for sometime to chat with him. Whoever was interested to know what a real rifle felt like was given a free display of the rifle by him. The Gunman let me hold his rifle, showed me different parts of it and it was not only me but many of us who had befriended him and benefitted in his Rifle knowledge sessions.  Some of our colleagues also got their kids on saturdays to show them how a real rifle looks like. The Gunman enjoyed his popularity and did not object to anything. His only objection was to stand as a “Gunman”with the fully loaded Gun at his back.

He kept on getting warnings and everytime he complained of backpain, arthritis etc.

Things however didn’t go great much further and one day he was fired from his job.

” We want a real Gunman. Do you even understand what that means? Not that you can come up with excuses like pain and whatever nonsense and keep sitting like a cartoon on the table with your gun folded in parts. We don’t need you. YOU ARE FIRED!!!!”

The Gunman lost his job and there was no means by which he could saved it, he was never good at being a Gunman.  However we had become quite fond of him by then and felt sad at his job loss.

He came to all of us and requested to use our contacts and place him in a job.

“But, I can’t do a Gunman’s job. Standing whole day with that heavy rifle is just not done!”, he would say.

People did try to place him. Arranged interviews for him in known offices for the post of peon, facility guy, courier but he was rejected everywhere. The reason of rejection wasn’t unnown to anyone of us, his looks of course. With such a scary face, red eyes, huge built and rough voice, none of the offices were keen on taking him up as a resource.

The Gunman was almost disheartened and prepared himself to pack his bags and leave for his village, when one among us found a job for him.  One of our clients owned a huge shopping Mall in the city and to attract crowd and increase footfall they were coming up with a concept of Ghost Bungalow. It would be a pitch dark scarry house and he needed two people to be there as ghosts. The GunMan was sent for an interview and he cracked it.

The last I heard about him was that he was doing very good in his  new job and he was happy doing it too.

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