MISBEHAVIOR AND LOST CONTRACT - A

CASE ON EMPLOYEE TRAINING

T.Narayana Rao R.Baskar

It's 10:30 pm on Monday night when Mr. Ram came home from office. He was tired and
worried. Trying to hide his feelings, he asked his son Mr.Nani who was busy in watching a
reality show about his dinner. Mr. Nani observed an unusual worry on the face of his father.
After few minutes Nani asked his father about the reason for being late for dinner and the anxiety
on his face. Mr.Ram replied, “I am tired now. I will talk to you in the morning”. But Nani
wanted to know the reason immediately so that he can help his father. Seeing his son’s eagerness
to help him, Mr. Ram replied, “An incident happened at the work place”. Then he started telling
about the incident.

Mr.Nagu (Boat owner) is owning two wooden boats at Visakhapatnam Port Trust (VPT)
with the help of crew (generally illiterates and untrained) he runs his daily business activities.
Along with him there are 14 owners who own 43 wooden boats at VPT. On June 24th 2018,
Mr.Nagu’s boat official engaged in external harbors for a jetty construction along with his crew.
When work is in progress, all of a sudden a big wind came with heavy rain in the external
harbor. The crew becomes alert and they started to travel to reach to a safe place.

The uncontrollable wind made a khalsi to fall in to the sea. Because of heavy wind and
high current in the sea the khalsi’s head was hit by a rock and died. The other crew members
observed that he is dead. Immediately the crew passed the information to the respective
authorities. Within a fraction of minutes the message circulated to the entire department of the
port, Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Naval and Local police station. Instantly VPT
stop all its official port operations at external harbor. Port chairman ordered their subordinates to
take the dead body out of the sea. After few hours with the help of local police and CISF the
dead body was taken from the external harbor. Police officials and CISF ordered them to take
this body to King George Hospital (KGH) for postmortem.
 When the ambulance is ready to start, few khalsi’s working in various boats gathered
near the ambulance, and stopped it from moving further. They raised voice against Mr.Nagu
(boat owner) to do justice for his co-worker who is dead. The illiterate crew demanded five lakhs
rupees for the death compensation to the family, though there is no such agreement at the time of
employment. Subsequently a heated argument held between owners and crew. The owner
compromised to pay the said amount five lakhs. But he wanted five months of time to settle in
five instalments, i.e., every month the family will get one lakh rupees for the next five months.
After listening to Mr.Nagu, the crew accepted the proposal and allowed the ambulance to move..
After a couple of days Mr. Madhu (Khalasi) instigated the other crew members stating that we
should not believe these boat owners words. Let us fight for it to get the five lakh rupees
immediately to the dead family. Instantaneously the entire VPT wooden boat crew stopped their
operations and they started a Dharna nearer the Port jetty. All major transportation, Surveys and
sea patrol everything got stopped. When dharna is in process one of the CISF commanders who
came recently from Mumbai for his official work at VPT wants to go for a visit to the external
harbor for security check and approached a boat. With lot of frustration and anger the wooden
boat crew shouted on CISF commander. Straightaway the commander passed this information to
the respective authorities to call for an explanation to the boat owner on his crew behavior
towards the commander.

The innocent boat owner attended for an explanation in his part of his own defense. The
CISF officers decided to cancel his contract because of abusive language and misbehavior by the
crew. The owner cum contractor sought apologies to the higher official on behalf of his crew.
The CISF authorities opened the contract agreement and showed point number 24, which states
that any form of abusive language or misbehavior towards CISF staff, the contract stands
cancelled. After understanding that statement he returned back and shared the incident with other
boat owners with tears in his eyes for losing the contract worth of 36 lakhs.

Question:
1. How Mr.Nagu could have avoided the situation. Please suggest.
Glossary:
 Jetty: a landing stage or small pier at which boats can dock
 Dharna: a mode of complaining.
 Khalasi: a manual worker, especially a docker, porter, or sailor