THE ONE RUPEE COIN

An unexpected act of assistance from a stranger in a phone booth turned into a life-changing miracle for this IT professional from Mumbai

- Tejinder Kaur Sethi

I belong to a middle-class Sikh family living in Kalyan, a central suburb of Mumbai. Right from childhood, I have seen my parents spiritually connected with utmost faith in Waheguruji (God). I have seen my father reciting daily prayers and have witnessed a complete transformation in his life. It made me believe in miracles.

I too was blessed to have experienced such a miracle.

The incident happened in 1995 when I was working as a senior developer in Mumbai. Most of my colleagues had found their fortunes in the US. While I was not keen to move out of India, the financial situation at home pushed me to explore the option.

In October that year, I came across a full-page advertisement by Blue Star in The Times of India seeking an experienced programmer in two countries. The requirement perfectly matched my experience, so I applied with my first option of location being Singapore and second USA.

I was called for an in-person interview at the Blue Star office in Mumbai. I cleared the technical and functional interviews, and was asked to wait for one final round of discussion. It was noon and I was asked to come back after lunch. I had applied for only half-day leave at my workplace and had to inform my office that I needed full-day leave. I called my office using the phone booth (in those days, the only way to communicate was by using the ₹1 coin phone booth).