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A few days before Deepawali, I was cleaning my cupboard containing all my files, letters, photographs accumulated for nearly forty years of my employment in the bank. The files contained various communications received from the bank in respect of my appointment in the bank in April 1978 till the superannuation in March 2018 spanning nearly 40 years, including salary slips, transfer orders issued (twenty in number) posting me to various branches and offices across India, increment letters, promotion letters to various cadres in the hierarchy, appreciation letters, merit certificates, awards, photographs taken on various occasions with staff members, executives, including Executive Directors, CMDs and customers of the bank. The correspondence also included explanations called for the lapses, an inevitable baggage of being in the credit department and being decisive, in a system which heavily favours the dodgers.
All these would bring in a lot of fond memories of a walk down memory lane but also look so worthless post retirement. These achievements played a significant part in shaping my career in the bank but now lay like demonetised notes without any value.
There were a lot of personal photographs with family and friends, taken on functions like marriages, birthdays, get-togethers, and unforgettable trips to various destinations like beaches, temples, monuments, desert, mountains, valleys, dams, jungle resorts, historical places, rock caves across the country.
The grim reality is that the next generation may not even remember you, let alone your achievements and may simply consign all that were treasured by you to flames or sell to a scrap dealer when you leave this world.
I still remember the daily newspapers, which extensively reported the death of a world-famous celebrity a few years ago with a full-page, life-size portrait covering his life and accomplishments, were thrown into dustbins a day after his death. Such is the irony and transitory nature of our lives.
Ultimately, what you leave behind is the love, kindness, affection, goodwill, generosity, and the lasting memories as an individual during your short stay here.
GOD knew that carrying these memories accumulated over all these years would be a very burdensome experience for travel, so he blessed us all with baggage free travel without security checks while entering the world and also while exiting it.
Also read: SubscriberWrites: Adhering to tradition does not indicate weakness. It is a mark of respect
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