Rs 3,500 landed in her salary account on the eve of Diwali, and Kalpana Chaudhari knew exactly what it had to be.
"I got paid yesterday, and there was an extra 3500 in my salary. I thought maybe I'd gotten a Diwali bonus this time," she wrote on X.
Eager to be sure, she walked into her HR manager's office. "I asked HR sir: Sir, there's an extra 3500 this month. Is this the Diwali bonus?" she wrote. He pulled out her file and studied it for a while.
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कल मुझे सैलरी मिली उसमें 3500 फालतू थे मुझे लगा शायद दीपावली का बोनस मिला होगा है इस बार। मैं कंफर्म करने के लिए अपने HR से मिलने गई, मैंने HR sir से पूछा : सर इस महीने 3500 ज्यादा आए हैं क्या यह दीपावली बोनस है? उन्होंने मेरी file निकाली और कुछ देर तक चेक करते रहे फिर उन्होंने मेरी तरफ देखा और जो बताया उसने मुझे हैरान कर दिया 😥 उन्होंने कहा : यह कोई बोनस नहीं है, यह तो आपके पैसे हैं मैंने हैरानी से पूछा : मतलब?... 1/2
— कल्पना Chaudhari 👑 (@MogamboDon) November 8, 2026
Then came the line that she says stunned her: "This isn't a bonus. This is your own money."
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What followed, in a follow-up post, was the real twist. According to her, the manager explained that she had received an increment last year, but the company's records still listed her old designation. He had joined only this month, she wrote, and had assumed his predecessor would have told her.
The festive windfall, it turned out, was a pay rise that had apparently gone missing in the paperwork. She called it a serious case of negligence that had kept her from money that was hers all along.
That left her at a crossroads. She wrote: "Either I quietly keep that money, treating it as a Diwali bonus, or I ask the company for an account of the arrears from previous years, since this is my raised salary for one month."
She signed off by handing the dilemma to her followers: what would you do in my place?
Festive bonuses are a Diwali ritual in many Indian workplaces, though some companies fold them into the cost-to-company package.
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