The problem of scale was a hungry animal, and it was eating through Harsh's carefully sorted piles of components at an alarming rate. Meena's steady supply, once a lifeline, was now a trickle feeding a river. The railway auctions loomed in his mind—a promised land of limitless scrap, but one that required an army to process, not a trio. Raju and Vijay were invaluable for sorting, but they were kids. The next phase required something different. It required loyalty.
He found them not in the market, but on its ragged edges. Their names were Deepak and Sanjay. They weren't like the other street urchins who hustled for loose change. They worked. Deepak, the older one at maybe sixteen, had the weary eyes of a man twice his age and a calm, methodical efficiency. He cleaned dishes at a roadside dhaba, his movements economical, never wasting a motion. Sanjay, younger and skinnier, was a bundle of nervous energy, ferrying stacks of freshly pressed clothes from an ironing wallah to various shops, his legs a blur, never dropping a single piece.
Harsh watched them for two days. He saw how Deepak handled a cracked ceramic plate with the same care as a whole one. He saw how Sanjay memorized complex delivery routes without ever writing them down. They weren't just workers; they were craftsmen of survival. And they were ripe for a better offer.
He approached them at the end of their grueling shifts, when the fatigue was rawest and the pay was a few measly coins. He didn't offer them a job. He offered them a proposition.
"The work is harder than what you do now," Harsh said, cutting straight to the point. He stood with them in a narrow, quiet gully away from the main thoroughfare. "Your hands will ache. You'll smell of solder and grease, not soap and starch. You'll have to think, not just run."
Deepak eyed him, his expression unreadable. "What work?"
"Electronics. Repair. I'll teach you. Not just sorting parts. How to actually fix things." Harsh let the words hang in the air. He wasn't offering wages; he was offering a skill. A trade. In the economy of the streets, it was a fortune.
"Why us?" Sanjay asked, his voice quick, bird-like.
"Because you don't look for shortcuts," Harsh replied. "I see how you work. You finish what you start."
He named his terms. A base wage, slightly more than what they earned now. But on top of that, a percentage. A share of the profit from every device they helped repair and sell. He was not hiring employees; he was recruiting partners. He was building a vested interest.
Their skepticism was a physical presence. Offers this good didn't exist in their world. They were used to exploitation, not empowerment.
"What's the catch?" Deepak asked, his voice low.
"The catch is you answer to me. Only me. You do things my way. You learn what I teach you. And you never, ever talk about our business to anyone." Harsh's gaze was level, leaving no room for doubt. "You break that rule, and it's over. For good."
It was a gamble. He was investing precious capital and, more importantly, time into two unknowns. But his future knowledge screamed that talent was the best investment, and loyalty was the only currency that wouldn't depreciate.
They agreed. The next morning, they showed up at the alcove behind the dyeing shop. The first day was a lesson in controlled chaos. Harsh started with the absolute basics: how to hold a soldering iron without burning themselves or the components. How to identify a resistor from a capacitor. The mystical art of reading a simple circuit diagram he drew in the dirt.
Deepak was a natural. His large, calloused hands, so adept at scrubbing dishes, proved surprisingly delicate with the tiny tools. He had a preternatural patience, repeating a solder joint until it was a perfect, shiny bead. Sanjay was faster, more impulsive. His first few attempts were messy, but he learned at a breathtaking speed, his quick mind absorbing concepts like a sponge.
Harsh didn't just teach them how to do it; he taught them why. He explained how the current flowed, why a specific resistor was needed, what happened when a connection was weak. He was building not just technicians, but problem-solvers.
He divided the labor. Deepak, with his steady hands, took over all soldering work. Sanjay, with his speed and memory, became the runner and the quality control tester, ensuring every device was perfectly functional before it was sold. Raju and Vijay, seeing the new, serious additions, straightened up, their own work becoming more focused under the unspoken new hierarchy.
Within a week, the tiny operation transformed. It was no longer a one-man show with helpers. It was a unit. A production line. Harsh was the foreman and lead engineer, diagnosing the most complex faults and handling the final approvals. Deepak's soldering iron was a constant, reliable hiss. Sanjay was a darting presence, fetching components, testing devices, his sharp eyes catching errors the others missed.
The increase in output was staggering. They were repairing and flipping devices at a pace Harsh could never have achieved alone. The profit share model worked exactly as he'd hoped. Deepak and Sanjay weren't just working for a wage; they were building their own small stake in the enterprise. They cared about the quality because it directly impacted their earnings.
One evening, as Harsh was counting out their share of the day's profits, Deepak spoke, his voice quieter than usual.
"My mother… she asked where the extra money is coming from."
Harsh's head snapped up, his body going tense. This was the test.
"What did you tell her?" he asked, his voice carefully neutral.
"I told her I got a better job. Cleaning at a new shop." Deepak met his gaze. "I did not tell her about the soldering. Or the money. I said the shop owner was generous."
Harsh held his look for a long moment, then gave a single, slow nod. The unbreakable rule had been upheld. Trust had been validated.
He handed them their money. It was more than they had ever held in their lives.
As they left, Harsh looked around the small, grimy workspace. It was still just a shadowed alcove, but it now hummed with purpose and potential. He had done it. He had built the first cell of his organization. He had two loyal, skilled lieutenants.
The hungry animal of scale was still there, but now he had the hands to feed it. The railway auctions were no longer a distant dream. They were the next logical, inevitable step. But to take that step, he would need more than a skilled team. He would need to navigate a world far more dangerous and cutthroat than the familiar lanes of Bhuleshwar. He would need to learn a new kind of street smarts.