Hari Kunzru - Transmission

‘Mummy? Mummy?’ He bounded into the hall, almost knocking over Malini the maid, who was carrying a glass of tea.

‘Oh, sorry, Malini. Ma, are you there?’

‘Yes, Beta. Come through. I’m only resting.’

He flung open the door to his mother’s bedroom and gave her the news.

‘Mummy, I’m going to America!’

He might as well have said prison or be trampled by horses. Letting out a groan, she buried her head in her hands and burst into tears.

It was to be expected. As an Indian mother, Mrs Mehta’s prime directive was to ensure that her first-born son was never more than ten feet away from a source of clean clothes, second helpings and moral guidance. She expected to have to release her child eventually, but only into the hands of another woman, whose family tree had been thoroughly vetted and whose housekeeping could be easily monitored from the vantage point of a chair in the living room of No. 18 Gleneagle House, into which the girl would naturally move. America, unhandily located several thousand miles away, was known to be populated by females who would never dream of starching a collar, and whose well-documented predilection for exposing flesh, drinking alcohol and feeding ground beef to unwitting Hindu boys was nothing short of an international scandal. Hardly the place for her beta, her unmarried 23-year-old baby.

Arjun, who felt he did not really understand emotions as well as he might, made the gestures you make when you are trying to comfort someone. Disconcertingly, when his father came back from the office he started to cry as well. ‘My son,’ sobbed Mr Mehta, ‘America? Oh, my son.’ Even Malini was at it. At least Priti, his younger sister, seemed unmoved. She was hopping up and down behind her father’s shoulder with impatience. ‘What about my news? Is no one even vaguely interested in what happened to me today?’

For a long time Mr Mehta had been unable to feel altogether optimistic about his son. Something about the boy emanated muddle, and if thirty-five years of line management had taught him anything, it was that muddle is prejudicial to career success. News of a job in America was most affecting. His joy was augmented by the thought that finally he had got one back on his brother-in-law. Arvind, the sala in question, was the owner of an aggregates firm, with a contract to supply gravel to the Gujarat State government. He and his preening wife lived in what could only be described as a mansion in one of Ahmadabad’s most exclusive colonies. They had dedicated a statue at a local mandir; there was a photo of them standing next to it, with some sadhus and a minister. Their unappealing son Hitesh had for some years been employed by an artificial-flavourings company near Boston. For as long as Mr Mehta could remember it had been Hitesh this, Hitesh that. Hits is topping fifty k. Hits is team-leading a push for a new minty-fresh aroma. And all the while his own fool of a boy never seemed able to keep his head out of filmi magazines. But now Amrika! God be praised!

Of all the Mehtas, the one with the best excuse for crying was Priti. She loved Arjun dearly. It was good he had finally stopped being such an idiot, but her parents were only going bananas over him because he was a boy. Why should he get chucked on the cheek for every fart and belch, while she made her way in the world with the bare minimum of encouragement? Since she had passed her communications degree, all her parents appeared to want was to marry her off to the first all-four-limbs-possessing boy who wandered through the door.

As it happened, Arjun was not the only one to have a new job. But did anyone care? Did anyone even notice? Finally, after her parents had phoned almost everyone they knew with her brother’s news and her father had put the receiver down at the end of a particularly gratifying call to Ahmadabad, she got to tell them.

‘What do you mean you’ve never heard of DilliTel? They’re only the most dynamic call centre in the city!’

She explained the New South Wales connection, how she would be ‘in the hot seat’, providing service and support to customers of one of Australia’s biggest power companies. Her mother asked why she needed a job at all. Wouldn’t she rather stay at home? Her father frowned over his spectacles, grappling ineptly with the fundamentals of modern telecoms.

‘What?’ he asked. ‘You mean they call on the telephone here, all the way from Australia?’

‘Exactly. These big companies find it cost-effective.’

‘Cost-effective? It must be like throwing money down the drain!’

‘Daddy, they buy capacity. The customers don’t pay. They don’t even know they are calling abroad. It’s such a great job, Daddy I’ll receive training in Australian language and culture. We all have to be proficient in vernacular slang and accent, and keep day-to-day items of trivia at our fingertips.’

‘Trivia?’

‘Sporting scores. Weather. The names of TV celebrities. It adds value by helping build customer trust and empathy. As operators, we even have to take on new Australian identities. A nom de guerre, the manager calls it. What do you think of Hayley?’

‘Namda-what?’ spluttered Mr Mehta. ‘Now look here, young lady, what all is wrong with your own good name?’

Her mother nodded in agreement. ‘Beti, I don’t like the sound of this at all. It doesn’t seem decent. Why can’t you tell these Australian fellows to call you Priti or, better still, Miss Mehta? That would be so much nicer.’

Priti had been trying her best. The tears would not stay in any longer.

‘I don’t believe it. I do something good and you throw it in my face. I hate you! I hate all of you!’

‘Don’t you talk to your father like that,’ snapped Mrs Mehta, but she was chastising her daughter’s departing back.

Mr Mehta looked towards God and the ceiling. ‘This is what comes of too many TV channels. MTV, lady fashion TV, this, that and what all TV. No daughter would have spoken to her father in such a way when we were having Doordarshan only.’

‘She’s turning into one of these cosmopolitan girls,’ said his wife. ‘I think we should find a boy for her sooner rather than later.’

Mrs Mehta went off to poke a ladle into Malini’s dal. Mr Mehta turned back to the business section of the Times of India. Arjun quietly slipped into the corridor and knocked on his sister’s door. When Priti did not reply, he turned the handle and went in. She was lying on her bed, her face buried in a pile of pillows. He perched beside her, trying to devise a strategy to cheer her up.

‘There there,’ he said, and patted her shoulder. A muffled voice told him to go away. Obediently he stood up and was about to leave when the voice changed its mind. Priti’s face was red and there was a string of snot hanging from her nose.

‘Well done, Bro,’ she said.

‘Well done, Sis,’ he replied. She swung her legs off the bed and for a long time they sat together in silence. At the beginning this was comfortable, but questions were preying on Arjun’s mind, and finally he felt compelled to speak.

‘Do you think you’ll have to acquire facts about surfing or is it restricted to team sports?’

Priti looked at him. It was the kind of look which usually meant he was wearing mismatching clothes.

According to Guy Swift: The Mission, a summary of aims and ideals which its author had sometimes found occasion to distribute as an A5 spiral-bound document, ‘The future is happening today, and in today’s fast-moving future the worst place to do business is the past. I strive to add value by surfing the wave of innovation. I will succeed.’ He had always liked the Skywalkeresque note of the last sentence, and the Force had indeed been with Guy Swift: The Mission. As a written text it had helped its author win contracts and assert his authority with new clients. As a seminar it had once even led to sex, with a McKinsey analyst who had a thing about PowerPoint presentations. In three short years Guy had grown Tomorrow * into an agency with an international profile. GS: TM had undoubtedly played a role in that success.