Email dated 7/3/2010

Email dated 7/3/2010 in Public domain addressed to all concerned.

Third global conference on Emotional Intelligence by TISS and HPCL.

This email is about Emotional Intelligence being practiced by a whistle blower, sender of this email, who has worked as an Officer in HPCL, a Fortunate 500 company, for 22 years and has been nominated for Manjunath Shanmugam Integrity award consecutively for three years. (It will not be out of context to mention that no other Officer from Oil Industry has ever been nominated for the award since its beginning though the award is in the name of the Indian Oil Sales Officer Late Shri Manjunath Shanmugam who sacrificed his life fighting against corruption in Oil Industry). 

It is the Emotional Intelligence that has really helped me to survive brutal and recurring emotional attacks sponsored by the unscrupulous Management of HPCL headed by the CMD – HPCL Shri Arun Balakrishnan who has recently emerged as a self styled ‘Indian doyen’ of Emotional Intelligence by blowing Public Money in his venture known as Forum for Emotional Intelligence Limited (FEIL), having the website address www.ifeil.org.

The scheduled Speech on 5^th and 6^th March 2010, from a callous, insensitive but extremely powerful person Shri Arun Balakrishnan on the subject of Emotional Intelligence is like a lecture on morality by a SPS Rathore! Unfortunately, I will not be there to tell the world about his double standards as I am not allowed to participate in the conference. Hence, this email to let you all know the other side of the story of ‘Emotional Intransigence’ perpetrated by Shri Arun Balakrishnan in the matters of Safety and Corruption in HPCL.  

Having belief in the adage ‘Practise what you preach’; I too wanted to participate in this Global Conference and accordingly had requested the FEIL for registration. The FEIL team acknowledged the request on 8/1/2010 and assured to revert back with more details.

Later on, I also sent two write ups for Paper Presentations , under the theme of ‘Action of non-profits for creating a healthy and productive society’ on the subjects of: (a) Using Emotional Intelligence to ensure Safety of Oil Installations (b) Practice of emotional Intelligence to eradicate corruption from Oil Industry.

As expected, no further reply was received from the HPCL owned FEIL as, such efforts would only remove the mask of ‘emotional literacy’ and ‘compassionate leadership’ put on by Shri Arun Balakrishnan so deliberately and ceremoniously at the cost of Public Money.

The ideal behind sending the first paper was simply an attempt by an ex Safety Engineer of HPCL to reveal the ‘mind of state’ suggesting remedial actions to ensure that tragedies like Bhopal and Jaipur do not occur again in our Country. The motive behind sending the second paper was just a humble attempt by an individual who is pained every year to see 80+ ranking awarded to our Country in the matter of Corruption by the Transparency International.

What good are such global conferences organised by a government  Oil Company   when the CMD of the Company himself does not wish to act locally to  ensure safety in the  Oil installations and when he himself regards the corrupt practices as the protocol of the day.

The whole purpose behind sending this letter to all the founder members of FEIL, all Indian experts in the field of Emotional Intelligence, the Director / Professors of TISS (the Organizer of the event), Prime Minister’s Office, Secretary- Ministry of Petroleum, Board of Directors of HPCL, Internationally acknowledged EI Gurus, a few selected academicians, a large number of well meaning friends and several Cyber activists, is to request them to pray or prevail upon Shri Arun Balakrishnan to finally use Emotional Intelligence to ensure Safety of Installations, to eradicate Corruption and to ensure good corporate governance in a transparent manner. It will be in larger public Interest for him to act on the following parameters rather than preaching what he does not practise:

(1)   Formulate Transfer Policy: HPCL is the only Fortunate 500 Company and the only PSU which does not have any written Transfer Policy facilitating the bosses make huge money by transferring Officers to preferred/earmarked locations at their whim and fancy. Years after years.

(2)   The organised local Oil Mafia around almost all the Depots in the Country: It is a well known fact that Petroleum Products worth hundreds of Crores are pilfered/ stolen from the tankers/Pipelines outside the Terminals/Depots/Oil Installations every year. While Shri Arun Balakrishnan has all the time in the world to deliver lectures on Emotional Intelligence, he has not spared even an hour for such a perennial problem. Addressing this problem itself will generate hundreds of Crores for HPCL and for the Country every year. This action will also rule out probable causes of fire making the Oil Installations much safer. If he wishes, I volunteer to help HPCL as an advisor in this regard, free of cost.

(3)   Recovery of almost 1000 Crores is pending for years: It is again a well known fact that the amount recoverable from the Industrial and Aviation Customers is more than 1000 Crores due to reckless violation of Payment Terms by the big bosses of HPCL but the money is not being received, nor the responsibility is being fixed for such goof ups for the obvious reasons.

(4)   GMR scam:  A famous South Indian company known as GMR has been given special favours resulting in a loss of scores of Crores to HPCL but Shri Arun Balakrishnan is purposely not taking any action on this, waiting for his retirement to take place this year to protect himself and his fellow directors.

(5)   Undersized Storage tanks in the Retail Outlets in the North zone: Shri Arun Balakrishnan is very much aware that a large number of undersized Storage tanks were installed in many Retail Outlets in North zone from 2001 to 2004 causing a safety hazard apart from other Irregularities in the Engineering jobs. (The matter was brought to the notice of Shri Arun Balakrishnan and other bosses verbally and then through various representations and CD’s sent to them. The management of HPCL condoned all the guilty in this regard and openly issued filthy and defamatory hate emails from the Corporation’s E- Mail messaging system against me for the ‘crime’ of whistle blowing. For details, please see the email dated 29/12/09 sent to Prime Minister’s Office and all concerned including the Indian Founder members of FEIL. You may wish to ask me also for the email dated 29/12/09.  If all the details are required, I can send an exhaustive and interactive CD which may be used by TISS or other academicians, in India or abroad, as a Case study on whistle blowing, perils of whistle blowing, Emotional Intelligence, Social Intelligence, Corporate Governance and the scourge of Corruption in HPCL. )

(6)   The absence of Corporate Disaster Management Plan: Shri Arun Balakrishnan has all the time in the world to deliver the lecture on Emotional Intelligence but had no time to participate--- even once in his tenure as Director –HR or as CMD- HPCL--- in at least one yearly mock drill in association with Civil Authorities of any of the hundreds of the Oil Installations under his control. Further, there is no Corporate Disaster Management Plan detailing the Role of Top Management of HPCL or Ministry of Petroleum Officials in case of disasters. After all, Safety is considered such a menial job in the Oil Industry.

(7)   The scotch culture and wasteful expenditure: Having been an Officer in HPCL for more than two decades, I know how Public money in Crores is spent every year to please the bosses of HPCL and Ministry of Petroleum Officials. Popularly known as scotch culture in HPCL, it has only intensified in the last few years. It does not require the knowledge of an abstruse subject like Emotional Intelligence to reduce the wasteful expenses especially when the goings are tough for the Oil Industry and the country.  The meagre profit of less than 0.8% on the Turn over for the past several years does reflect extent of wasteful expenditure in HPCL.

(8)    Non settlement of dues and non issuance of Experience Certificate: The whistle blowing done from 2001 to 2004 in the Public interest cost me very dearly. (However, no regrets for the same.) The Management of HPCL defamed me openly, removed me from the job with effect from October 2006 against an entirely fabricated charge of unauthorised absenteeism, withheld my payments to the tune of Rs 9 lacs and has not even issued the experience Certificate till date despite my requesting for it for the last three years. (Whenever I have contacted the HR Department in Mumbai, they have shamelessly informed me that the decision about clearing the dues and issuance of the certificate will be made by only Shri Arun Balakrishnan. It is below the ‘dignity’ of Shri Arun Balakrishnan to inform which Rule of the Corporation is preventing him to release the pending payments and issue the Experience Certificate to me even after passage of three years. He is law   onto himself, having created most insensitive corporate bureaucracy which functions like an affluent autocracy in a poor democracy known as India.)


AND SUCH A PERSON IN INDIA IS BEING HAILED AS THE DOYEN OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE.


Pankaj Khanna
303-B, Sukhsagar Apartments
26/2, Race Course Road, Indore 452003 Phone No. 0731-2537721
Mobile No. 9424810575