The day began on an unpleasant note, with my 10 minutes late arrival being frowned upon by Mr Sarkar and even his secretary. I quietly muttered an apology and proceeded to Bharadwaj's office, where the ever cheerful crowd of young and old men were waiting to welcome me. That immediately gladdened my heart and I knew the day could only get better from here. As I had been directed the previous day, I was wearing well covered shoes today, the sight of which pleased Bharadwaj no end. I couldn't wait to grab and wear my helmet too, and I kept it on even when it wasn't needed, just for the fun of it. With all but a shovel more in hand, I knew I would look just like one of the many labourers who toiled in their sweat and blood around me. Photographs should be ready very soon.
I commenced with a half hour session in the cool office room, making notes from the previous day's visit. After I was done, I helped Rajbeerji with the new samples that had arrived for analysis in the spectrometer. This happened to be the least taxing of jobs around the steel plant, and performed it with earnest steadfastness. That is when Bharadwaj arrived in the office after one of his customary rounds around the plant, and looked to be in full mood for bakar. The three of us talked for some time, during which Mr B made me promise him that I wouldn't ever drift away from my field, metallurgy, a sacrilege a million others were guilty of across the country. I gave him my word with a helpless smile, and he further advised me with unusually grave eyes to join only some public sector enterprise in the future. I made a mental note of this and all his other gospel wisdom.
A long chat with Sharmaji followed after lunch, wherein he explained to me in no short detail the entire working mechanism of the steel plant. Right from the arrival of the truck-loads of scrap iron to their chemical and spectroscopic analysis to the melting in the furnaces and finally to the casting and cooling into the desired shapes and sizes, the whole intricate circuitry revealed itself before me just as if an 8-folded piece of paper had opened itself. Sharmaji was in his elements while explaining stuff to me through available literature and recorded data, showing me how metallurgy could be highly interesting too at times.
I witnessed the functioning of the induction furnaces after that, a most fascinating sight made all the more grander by the spiteful flames and thick smoke that arose from the sides. Massive manned trolleys operated from high up in the sky, with a swinging magnetic end held by chains used to pick up the scrap iron and deliver it into deepest corners of the furnaces. An incredible amount of dust, smoke and heat later, the metal would be fuming in a thick molten mass inside, ready to be transported through ladles to the casting area.
Casting happened to be just as majestic a process too, if not more. The ladles would come swinging by from the terraced furnaces to the place where the molds were kept. After taking position, the melt would be poured into the molds and cooled for several hours to obtain the desired shapes. The whole process was a delight to watch, if one could survive the relentlessly furious heat blasts and keep breathing through the dark engulfing clouds of smoke. I further followed the path of the newly shaped but still hot metal pieces to the cooling area, where they were sent through a sliding machinery on wheels and cooled down with the help of flowing streams of water. Spellbound by the sight of this colossal apparatus with the most convoluted geometry I had ever seen in my life, I didn't notice the time fly. It was almost 4, time for me to leave.
Mr B seemed only too eager to give me his leave, and almost surprised that I would even ask before leaving. Now that really baffled me, but I turned to leave anyway and waved my goodbyes to everyone. Walking out through the gates without the visitor's pass for once, I bid farewell even to the security guard, with whom I seemed to have built a brilliant rapport in just a couple of days. He grinned a bonjour through his aging teeth and sent me on my way into the hot evening Delhi summer.
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