Reborn In 17th century India with Black Technology-Chapter 822: Bhagat Shipyard (2/2)

Puducherry, in a luxurious hotel...

Agni let out a light groan as he got up with a groggy expression with his hair like a bird's nest. He lazily stretched his back, making a few crackling sounds, sending waves of comfort to his mind. He got up from the right side of the bed, and he did a namaskar to the idol of Ganpati in the king's suite of the hotel room he was renting.

"I'll have some coffee, please," he politely asked the room service lady who was outside his room.

In the meantime, he took a comfortable shower and freshened up. He wore a set of loose clothes similar to pyjamas and received the coffee along with a few newspapers, which he usually reads.

With his eyes now much brighter, clearer, and lively, he came to the balcony, looking around at the street of Puducherry, taking in all the scenery and atmosphere of this fast-developing urban city.

As businesses began to prosper in the Bharatiya Empire and emerged as one of the most profitable professions, especially with the liberalisation of trade, dedicated business cities started to take shape. Most of these cities are found along the coastal regions or in inland areas where multiple trade routes or rivers intersect. Puducherry is one such business city, located on the eastern coast of the Bharatiya Empire, in the state of Cholapuri. It lies in close proximity to the major port city of Chennai.

Logically, Puducherry should not have developed to its current stature, as the bulk of political and economic support from the government, the vital nutrients for development, has consistently flowed toward Chennai. Very little was left behind for Puducherry. This uneven distribution of resources is also why major ports are usually spaced hundreds of kilometres apart; it's almost unheard of to find two thriving ports so close together.

Yet Puducherry, through ingenious leadership, carved its own path. It based its growth on a niche model centred around offering convenience to merchants dealing in premium goods. Specialising in high-value, low-volume products, Puducherry rose to become the primary port for such trade. Today, on the empire's eastern coast, trade routes extend from Puducherry to Anuradha Puri and reach far into the countries and frontiers of Southeast Asia.

Driven by the profits brought by trade, the port continued to expand and became the closest medium-scale port in the Empire to reach the standards of a large-scale port. The volume of transactions and the capacity for draft tonnage have already matched those of a major port; it is only the policy support that remains lacking. Prosperous trade also led to the prosperity of the city. The panchayat was rebuilt into a large building covering several thousand square feet of land. A large unified water conservancy facility was constructed on high ground, supplying water to all residents of the city.

Roads were further widened, the port layout was expanded, and algorithms and management architectures were used to unify the management of the port as well as the city in the most effective way. Large artistic statues of various animals have been installed in different parts of the city. The cement footpath laid down a couple of years ago was ripped out and replaced by a high-quality cobblestone path, which not only looks more beautiful and gives a sense of satisfaction just looking at it, but also lasts longer.

With all these developments, it has become a special city—one where there are not many aspirational or lower-middle-class people, due to the absence of large-scale factories or industries, which usually act as population magnets. Instead, despite having a population of 300,000 to 500,000, the city's permanent residents are mostly middle-class, upper-middle-class, and high-class households, most of them engaged in high-value trade businesses, like certain spices, rare herbs, art, or even special medicines.

Agni leaned over the railing with the hot cup of coffee, which was emitting a fragrant aroma in his hands. He looked at the street, which had been engulfed by the silence of early morning. The cobblestone road, the picturesque statue of a leopard, the neat row of houses of different shapes, as well as the steam coming out of the copper milk container from the restaurant at the end of the road, brought him great spiritual satisfaction.

As time passed by, Agni finished his coffee, and the people started to be noticed on the street, and a few carriages started to pass by.

Agni went back inside and took out the newspapers to start reading. There wasn't much interesting news that interested him. But there was a small surprise in the fictional section of the newspaper from a story which he had been following for a few months, but that was all. However, when he closed the newspaper and was about to put it away, he suddenly noticed an ad at the corner of the last page. Usually, he ignores the advertisements, but this was an advertisement he could not ignore because it was from Indra Manju Private Limited, and it was advertising itself as the most premium human resources company, which even the royal family prefers.

'Tsk!'

Agni's brows immediately tightened. He was angry, however his anger was for a different reason altogether.

He immediately realised that he had been taken advantage of.

'Idiot, I shouldn't have invited only one company. Even if I have a favourable impression of Indra Manju, I should have called other companies as well so as to not be taken advantage of. This should not be repeated once again.'

He was very displeased and disappointed in himself due to his lack of further consideration. It looked like he had gotten in over his head. As soon as his father allowed him to start a business, he was so confident when he planned everything that he didn't even feel pride when everything went according to his plan. But now, it seemed like he had won too many times and hadn't realised that he should look at the ground while moving forward instead of always keeping his eyes on the sky. Now, due to his foolish mistake, not only will it appear that the royal family prefers a single human resources company over the majority of other companies, but it also gave way for Indra and Manju to take advantage of Agni's mistake by using the reputation of their royal family.

In the end, Agni's fist, which left a few dents in his skin, slowly relaxed. After a few minutes of self-reflection, Agni's expression returned to normal.

If it were any other prince with actual power, they would have already made preparations to cause trouble to the company that offended them. But Agni could not do the same because, even though he could cause trouble to Indra Manju Pvt. Ltd. without much effort, he knew that his father would be very disappointed in him and might restrict some of his privileges. Agni could clearly remember how he was beaten by his father when he tried to have a coffee shop closed down when the waiter spilt coffee on his clothes, which made him have to wear the same coffee-stained clothes for the whole day.

From then on, he understood that if he acted like anyone other than a citizen of the Bharatiya Empire who is relatively rich and influential, he would not get any favour or approval from his father. Rather, it might incur his wrath and make his career harder.

Agni dressed up quickly and went to the office, where he had an appointment to meet with Indra from Indra Manju Private Limited. And as expected, as soon as he reached the office, his assistant informed him that Mr. Indra had arrived.

"Invite him in."

Agni only waited for a few seconds, and a well-dressed middle-aged man came through the door with a bunch of documents in his hand. Looking at Indra, there was no displeasure on Agni's face for taking advantage of him; instead, he put on a smile and motioned him to sit down.

"Your Highness, here is the list. Over 500 people have agreed to join the company, all of whom are experienced professionals with several years of experience in various major shipyards, and they are also willing to stay in Puducherry."

Agni curiously took over the document and perused through it. Still, by the end, he noticed something incredible.

"Over 150 engineers are actually from Raya Shipyard? How can that be?"

There was disbelief on his face. You have to know that the shipyard of his father pays a lot of money to its engineers—it is over 50% premium compared to other shipyards—and all the people who have joined his father's shipyard are elites. How could more than 100 of them agree to join his company?

'Did father arrange it?' he thought in his heart. But he immediately shook his head. He soon denied the possibility almost immediately.

'No, that is not possible. He didn't even invest money in the company. I had to use my pocket money. How can it be that he's suddenly sent so many of his hard-trained engineers to me?'

' It's already good that he did not have the Raya shipyard suppress my budding Company '

"Mr. Indra, is there an explanation for it?"

Indra nodded immediately and showed an eager look as if he was waiting for Agni to ask the question. "In fact, Your Highness, even I was surprised when so many people from Raya Shipyard agreed to join your company... um, it's not that anything is wrong with Bhagat Shipyard, it's just that these people are usually hesitant and, in some cases, even disdainful to join a new company which has not proven itself — no offense, Your Highness."

"None taken, go on." This wasn't something Agni did not know; moreover, it was the main reason why he was not going to recruit all the engineers for the shipyard at the same time. Instead, he was going to recruit a couple of hundred engineers who would be enough to support the operations of the company and provide a relatively solid foundation for it to be expanded in the future.

Indra had a mischievous look on his face. "But when we dug deeper, we came to know why such a thing happened. In fact, Your Highness, all the people who agreed from the Raya Shipyard are second-line engineers and technicians. These people can be considered as core and backbone professionals in other shipyards, but there are too many talents in Raya Shipyard, making them stuck at the second line for a long time."

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"Given that the first-line engineers and core engineers are still young and healthy, they are very unlikely to have changes in structure anytime soon, and Raya Shipyard has already expanded to a very large scale, making it harder to expand it further, thus reducing their chances of promotion even more."

"So when the recruitment offer came from Your Highness' Bhagat Shipyard, with salary not being any less than what they were already being paid, they were already moved, as not only will they have a chance to go further in the future, but also most of them said that it would not be considered like they were betraying His Majesty."

Agni suddenly felt enlightened, "Oh, so that's how it is."

He didn't realise that things could also work like this. 'Well, Father, since you have too many talents, you wouldn't mind your son taking a chunk of them, would you?' A gloating smile flashed across his face very briefly before he directly ordered for all 150 engineers from Raya Shipyard to be recruited, and another hundred from other shipyards.

After Indra collected two-thirds of his payment, he left the office, while Agni immediately invited a few construction companies famous in the local area. Agni actually had a favourite among the construction companies, but learning from his last mistake, he did not choose to publicise his bias.

It turned out he had really made the right decision, because after receiving quotes from the construction company representatives, the company he had preferred did offer a reasonable quote according to his requirements. However, a new construction company in Cholapuri called Pillarajan Developers presented a completely different plan, by expanding on his original vision and showing him a bigger and more ambitious goal.

The owner of Pillarajan Developers, Mr. Suresh Pillarajan, who came to the negotiation himself, not only proposed a reasonable construction plan for the employee quarters—capable of housing up to 500 people—but also provided a detailed plan for a future community layout, where all the necessities for living would be available in one place.

This idea greatly interested Agni. After ensuring there was no history of quality problems in Pillarajan Developers, he agreed to the deal and put down a deposit for the first phase of the project—that is, the living quarters for the employees.