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reluctance to go for further studies my father had no other go
but to support me in my quest for a suitable job. It was time that
I the eldest in the family started earning my elder sister having
married 10 years ago.

My first appointment.

I got response from Geological Survey of India to join as
Apprentice in their headquarter office on Chowringee in

Calcutta. Initially I was accommodated with my friend in his
uncle’s house on Mompas Road in South Calcutta. Within a
few days I could locate not far from my friend’s place a mess
where I would get food and breakfast as well as a bed to sleep
by sharing a room with two other employed bachelors. I had to
pay only Rs.forty for this princely style of boarding and lodging
!Coffee and Idlis or Uthappam in the morning and three course
meal before leaving for work and before going to bed.
Meanwhile I responded to an advertisement from Atomic
Energy Commission and applied for a Group B post of
Assistant Geologist on a pay scale of Rs.375-675.It was a
touring job wherein one had to camp for 10 or more days in
places selected from the Survey Map each year from October to
June. One was entitled to daily allowance besides contingent
allowance to engage a cook and field guide to accompany the
officer during trekking on the rocks in search of the atomic
mineral Uranium. The officer had to carry an instrument called
Geiger Muller counter which would detect and measure
radioactive material in the surrounding area and rocks,etc.

The Atomic Minerals Division had its office on Race course
road in Bangalore.The office was located in an an old palace
converted for the purpose and the building was called Patankar
Bhavan.Though in the first year after joining the department I
took a room in a hotel named Raj Mahal not far from Majestic
and City Railway station later I succeeded in locating a room in
a three storey building opposite Swastik Theatre. The rooms
were close to the hotel New Krishna Bhavan and I found it easy

to visit the hotel for breakfast before proceeding to office by
walk as the rooms were centrally located. My other room mates

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