Unexpectedly, Tapas became an integral part of Flipkart for the next four years. He performed the widest range of duties out of all its employees. He helped set up new offices, wrote Flipkart’s blog, oversaw social media marketing and became the most important member of the customer support team. Most of all, along with Sachin, he was the strongest advocate of the customer at Flipkart, ensuring that the company never veered from its motto of keeping shoppers happy. Whenever there was a prickly user issue or a call from an angry shopper, Tapas would handle it, pacifying them with apologies, jokes, conversation. He spoke to Flipkart users in an informal, friendly, almost-irreverent manner and wrote blogs and Twitter posts that charmed them. He handed out free books and offered additional discounts. While within Flipkart, employees in charge of any mishandled order would be treated with swear words, scorn and contempt. In these moments, the funny, friendly Tapas would transform into a raging bully. Without an official role, Tapas was simply seen as Flipkart’s conscience-keeper in the early years, ready to help wherever there was a crisis.
Tapas’ presence diminished quickly after 2011 as Flipkart exploded into a mid-sized firm and then into a huge company. During the company’s first three years, however, Tapas played a crucial role in building Flipkart’s cult-like brand. He also became a confidant to the Bansals, who found it easy to trust Tapas as he was singularly uninterested in acquiring power. In Flipkart’s final years of independence, he was perhaps the only employee, out of all former or existing Flipkart employees, who was close to both Sachin and Binny.
BY THE TIME Tapas joined Flipkart, the company had completed a year. It was handling a few dozen orders every day and word about the website was spreading. Flipkart needed more employees; there was a lot of work to be done. The website itself had to be upgraded. Until then, Flipkart’s use of technology had been rudimentary. Now, it needed engineers who could build sophisticated tech systems. But more importantly, it needed someone to do the dirty work of dealing with suppliers and courier partners whose cooperation was vital for the company’s survival. Binny had a knack for designing supply chain processes, not so much for the daily grind of negotiations with stubborn partners.
Despite the multiple rejections from his friends, Sachin had kept in touch with some of his former IIT-mates. One of these people was Sujeet Kumar, Sachin’s senior at the Jwala hostel whose ‘interviews’ Sachin had resented when he had first started at IIT. After some initial awkwardness, Sujeet and Sachin had become friends. Like Sachin, Sujeet had also not secured passing grades in the first attempt and had to stay back on campus to obtain his degree. During those six additional months in 2003, the two of them spent a considerable amount of time with each other over teen patti and chai–sutta.
The youngest of three children, Sujeet was born into a land-owning family in Bhabua, a small city in Bihar. His father and grandfather were lawyers. In college, Sujeet had been a mediocre civil engineering student, but his boisterous personality had made him one of the best-known people on campus. Sujeet was dark, of average height, his hair was always dishevelled, and he wielded an earthy, raucous sense of humour. He immersed himself in college life, participating in cultural events and joining several clubs. At once, he was on the committee to prevent ragging as well as the organizer-in-chief of the ragging at Jwala. Sujeet was the big bully of the hostel but also its most popular resident. He also organized hostel activities and was an energetic participant in hostel politics. He lost an election for the post of the college’s cultural secretary but played a key canvassing role in the victory of a Jwala candidate.
Ankit Agarwal, Sujeet’s junior and a resident of Jwala, confirms that Sujeet was ‘really good at managing people’, but both he and his hostel were notorious as every year Jwala would ‘ditch other hostels and try and win all the elections for itself’.
After graduating from IIT, Sujeet wanted to join the Indian Administrative Service. But two failed attempts later, he gave up and started working for an offshoring firm in Delhi in 2006. In 2008, the company went out of business owing to the global financial crisis following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers in the US.
Sujeet had kept in touch with Sachin after college. In the period when the offshoring business was unravelling, Sujeet noticed that Sachin’s status message on an internet messaging service indicated that he was hiring engineers at Flipkart. Sujeet wasn’t interested in a tech job, nor was he equipped for it, but he offered to help Sachin find coders. A few weeks later, Sachin told Sujeet that Flipkart wanted someone to run operations, inviting him to join them. This piqued Sujeet, as in this
