Country's Most Elite Institute Falters Big Time...

At this very moment i should have probably been flexing my neurons trying to predict the right option to some obscure seeming question put across to me by a glistening white screen..Instead I sit here writing this..
I travelled four hours down to Mumbai to appear for the most talked about exam in the town..the exam which if cracked is known to lead you to the heavenly portals of one of the best management schools of the world..and then ultimately to a prospering and satisfying career one always dreams of..
Well these institutes decided to raise their standards a notch higher by shifting from the outdated paper and pen test to embracing the technology..to make it a computer based common admission test..Roped in the leading company which designs such technology enabled exams in the world to design one sophisticated system for them too..and the consequences are for all of us to see...
How can the best brains from these reputed and world renowned institutes effortlessly neglect testing the systems before engaging them to such a gargantuan task..And also a point to be noted is that it was not an 'Online' but just a computer based task which according to my technical knowledge (which i normally don't brag about much) ain't really a difficult task..considering the fact that all the coaching institutes have been successful in conducting the former form of exam throughout the country..
The company has designed systems to conduct exams like the GRE and the GMAT all over the world..then why is that the systems failed so terribly here..it was not like this was the first time this kind of an exam was being conducted..
The company stated that the affected candidates would be contacted by mail or sms..well..i haven't received anything like that till now.. and its not like a few centres have been affected..about 50 centres in the country suffered causing inconvenience to about more than 2000 students..now that's quite a number..and it goes on to prove that this is fatal problem and not just some minor issue..
To add to the above problem..even matters like the dis functional mouse..the non functional biometric systems..uninitiated submission of test after a few questions..absence of figures related to the questions were also reported thus pulling the levels of the institutes even lower..
Lastly, the organizing committee don't even have a Plan B..or a damage control strategy..just in case...Boy!! They've got high levels of overflowing confidence [:P]..The IIM's should have probably stuck to the old fashioned paper and pen form of the test..till they are actually cent percent ready to undertake such a task..
I just ended up having a refreshing weekend back home..though they did disturb my sleep on a Sunday morning by getting me to acknowledge the fact that they wanted the candidates to be present about 2 hrs before the actual start of the exam..

The Economic Plague

Driving a vehicle..especially a four-wheeler is a task which requires a high degree of discipline and responsibility according to my parents.. How elated was I when according to them I had finally gained the maturity to get a driver’s license this year..little did I know that the level of maturity I had achieved was only the level required to get the license and use it as an identity card for various ‘ID card requirement’ purposes..the level required to actually drive a car..well..apparently I’ve still not reached that point..as conveyed to me by them..

And I don’t really blame them for such a decision..not after I ‘accidently’ pressed the acceleration instead of the intended ‘brake’ thus ramming our car right into the wall in front of me and causing the front part of it to get contorted..and yea..ofcourse it was followed by me getting downgraded to the status of sitting behind the driver’s seat from sitting on it for a few more years..huh!!..talk abt blowing away an opportunity..

Anyways the process of getting a license is something I am sure everyone of us is aware of..we need to go to the RTO for the ‘Driving-test’ so as to prove that we are capable of driving on the roads..and so after finishing the compulsory 21 days of training I went ahead for my test..you achieve a different level of independence when you get to drive yourself to where you want to go.. and so I really wanted this.. I sat there nervously waiting for my turn..it was during this time I witnessed a man who had applied for a two wheelers driving license riding a bike for his test..he started the bike went about 10 mts straight and then fell down while taking a simple turn..me and my fellow students from the driving school which I had joined surely felt that there was no way this man was getting his license..at that moment our driving school representative was quick to inform us that the man and all of us sitting there were bound to get their licenses..and then promptly asked us for 200rs each with a wicked smile on his face..

Is'nt it astounding to see the amount of corruption which exists in such government organizations..just a petty amount of cash would grant you the legal permission to drive heedlessly on the roads..isn’t this organization the one to be charged for the increasing number of accidents in our country some even leading to the loss of human life..?!?

Needless to say this is just one little example..corruption exists in each and every strata of our economy..its is like this indomitable and an unrelenting weed in a farmland..you have to extract and discard the root for it to die out..unfortunately the roots of the widespread corruption have gained such a strong foothold here that it has become virtually impossible to even think that we can ever eliminate it completely..even people who do feel that is it morally incorrect feel helpless and ultimately give into the rotten system..

In one of the recent issues of ‘The Week’ magazine I read that at present the Right to Information Act passed on October 12^th ,2005 is the best method to fight corruption..its been 4yrs and this right lacks India’s most common problem-‘implementation’…

This right basically empowers the common man by providing them the ability to question and demand answers from all the organizations which come under the central and the state government as to whether the taxes that we pay are being utilised in the rightful way..we have the right to inspect their files..and even take copies of these government documents..thus making the whole system transparent to the public..

So it is now our duty to exercise this right provided to us by the government..and stop being mere mute spectators..instead we must unite as a force of concerned citizens and try to improve the inefficiency and the ineffectivety of these organizations..

A Visit To Remember.....

My term as a sojourner in this city of Surat finishes in about 8 more months..and though I am absolutely and completely in love with the simplicity and the mellowness of this city and its people..there is no denying the fact that it is utterly miserable in terms of the number of good 'Hang-out' places..after straining my brain thoroughly, the places which register to me are 'The ONGC bridge'..'Dumas'..'Iskon temple'..'The Surat Zoo..(For all the animal/bird lovers [:P])..'Iskon Mall !?!...and all the other malls..Valentine..raj empire..'..a few fantasy parks..and last but not the least Lake view...I am familiar with the general conception about the latter..but just found out this semester that the boating there is worth a visit..Having said that I must admit that it is a humble effort made by me to expand the size of the list as much as possible..

Now there is this one place I visited about two days back at a distance of about five to seven minutes from our college..which I guess was probably the best place I got to 'Hangout' at in the past three years..It is this school for the physically handicapped, courtesy 'Reliance' where two of my friends had some work regarding the 'Joy of Giving' Day our college will be celebrating this coming tuesday..I accompanied them for sheer curiosity...All through the Auto ride, one thought which loomed in my head was that it would probably be dejecting and disheartening to meet and get to know these the young kids with disabilities dwelling within the school premises..

Well..how wrong was I...!!A Little cut on our hands or legs makes us crave for sympathy from our loved-ones..and here I was about to meet a host of children..all living with some improper functioning of one or the other part of their body..fending for their own lives..

I met this tiny tot..7 yrs of age and there was'nt a moment when I saw the smile off her face..her liveliness truly made it unnoticeable that the there was something not right about her legs..Then there was this twelve year old girl..with non-functional hands..and was she great or what...!! She writes with her legs..and can put peerless 'Mehendi' on people's hands..all with her legs..Tell her to dance and she'll jump to her feet and make you wonder how magnificently exceptional she really is...

13 girls live in a room..with the slightly elder ones looking after the younger ones..all of them do their chores themselves rite from washing their clothes to sweeping their rooms and some of them even lend a helping hand in the mess to cook food..

Looking at everyone of them is so inspiring..an inspiration to live our own lives to the fullest..their disability is just a perception..a perception of people like us..while in reality they are remarkably special individuals surpassing all obstacles in the path of their lives..not once lamenting over the fact that it could have been easier..

When it was time for us to leave..these children held our hands and told us to stay for some more time..we told them we could'nt and they insisted that we return the next day...their unreasonable affection and warm-heartedness increased our already overflowing fondness for them..and we knew we'd surely be going back again sometime soon..

Refreshing!!! That's the word that would perfectly describe my visit to this school..

And in the end a lil' piece of info..there is a floral garden that exists in the same lane..just one more place to add to the list !!!

The treasured prerogative....

Okay..What's the one most sought-after privilege we are granted when we upgrade ourselves from going to a school to going to college ...??..Ofcourse..the privilege of 'BUNKING'..and to put it in an even better form..'MASS BUNKING'..Gone are the days when we used to attend school everyday for a compulsory fixed period of 6-7hrs...atleast I thought they were...
Well..first year in college was fine..I mean we did have adequate amount of bunks..and were anticipating happier times..afterall that's what we were all told by our seniors..count of the bunks increase with the count of the years in college..and what they said was quite right..atleast for them...we barely saw our seniors in our departments!!!..And the reason why I am almost cent percent certain about it is because we were attending classes..everyone of them..all our labs...even all the lectures..!!..real testing times they were!!!...the enunciation we had recieved from our seniors..was apparently working the opposite way..
The same situaton..second year passed...then the third year... a single class we dared to bunk..the next day we'd be reprimanded by our H.O.D...we were forced to sign this paper..an apology that we would never repeat it again..coz we were threatened we'd not be allowed to sit for our placements...yea i kno...we were a dumb lot..or maybe some of us did find classes too interesting to bunk..!?!!..the human brain..sure is intricate..
Then we finally descended to the final year..not really expecting any change..we continued our same routine..dragged ourselves for every 8:30 classes..sat through the whole ordeal till the 'Lunch break' came to our rescue..it lasted for only a short duration..but it was surely a respite before we again got ready for our practicals...
We were being heralded for being the cream of all the previous batches..by every professor..every lecturer...even the adhocs ....though I do have this feeling that the latter did detest us for acting nerdish to such an extent...
And one day it was ultimately too much to take..and in one lecture devoted for a 'CLASS TEST'..there was a sudden rising..the frustration unleashed[;)]..everyone wanted to run out the class..Ah!!! wait...everyone but the occasionally whimsical few...So the rest of the class with their bags were standing out in front of the department waiting for them to come out..but they stayed put..no amount of reasoning made them change their minds...
The students standing outside started having second thoughts about the plan..their 'brains' on the threshold of whether to go back to the hostels..or to attend the class anyway..But we had probably reached a point of no return..all of us turned our backs and walked back to our hostels..
Though now...times seem to have changed..we've got our new C.R..its funny how someone you don't expect from surprises you completely...we've already had four straight days of bunk in the past 2 weeks..All hail our new CR!!..
I hope i've not jinxed it..although I know my father would undoubtedly be doing it if he reads this ..Yea dad!! awaiting your call...[:)]..

Ethics withheld...

As the story goes...A girl was once helping out her mother in the kitchen preparing 'dosas' for breakfast...suddenly the girl pointed out.."Ma, why is it that you make dosas this size...I mean technically the radius of the pan is larger, so the size of dosas can be increased"..to this the mother replied.."My mother taught me to do it like this...unconsciously I make them of the same radius"..the girl then went on to ask her grandmother and apparently even her grandmother was taught the same by her mother. Finally the little girl approached her great grandmother who pointed to the pan lying on the shelf and said.."That's the largest size of dosas for my pan"..
Evidently both the grandmother and the mother are so comfortable in their adapted way of life that they are unwilling to make even the slightest transformations even though they know it is more appropriate and ethical.. The point to where I am getting is about the age old Social Evils which have literally held our country in shackles..the society is haunted by the immoralities of something that was set centuries ago by our ancestors.. Our country claims to be producing one of the smartest people in the world..boasts of a high rate of economic development..dreams of being a world superpower.. and still in a small little corner it harbours this wicked spell of doom... So to start with..Inter-religion marriages..Actually Inter-caste marriages are itself considered so dreadful that Inter-religion marriages are unimaginable..A young widow is forbidden to re-marry and barred from majority of the social and communal activities.. Child marriages and Dowry are still very much alive in our country..Daughters are being sold like cattles..!!! And yea..BREAKING NEWS!!!..Gender inequality wins the race..In every sphere of life..women are being treated as second class citizens.. An exemplary example lies in our very own campus..Internet and LAN were provided to the boys in their hostels when they reached 2nd year..but apparently providing such facilities to the girls of the same college were not really high on the priority list ..because??..well..ah!!..coz they are girls..!! Though after 2 years of continuous coercing..in final year we the girls of NIT,Surat finally saw how the "LAN" actually works..and how it feels like to access the internet from our hostels.. Also why is it that only boys get to have the privileges of a night canteen while girls are made to sleep enduring their hungera pangs..?? Even in a family..involuntarily a girl it expected to wipe off a stain or to make tea for guests or to set the table for dinner..
One more form of social evil predominant in our country is the superstitious notion. This shows the glaring ignorance that exists in our country. And it is vacuous as to how not just the illiterate lot but even people who boasts about their innumerable degrees think that if a person sneezes before starting some work something inauspicious is bound to occur..the years spent in imparting knowledge to a new born feels like a total waste when a reflex action by a human body to get rid of irritants by expelling a more than normal quantity of air through the nose is treated as a bad omen..
Numerous such beliefs exist..a black cat crossing your path..the breaking of a mirror in the house..is considered to be a premonition..the even funnier ones I've actually heard from people..if you catch a butterfly, you'll not get married..the darker the colour of mehendi on the girl's hands determines the strength of the bond she will share with her husband..!!..Absolute trash..isn't it..??
Well..apparently the size of the pan has increased and so must we broaden our horizon..otherwise the walls of sound ethical principles and codes which build up our society will undoubtedly come crumbling down..

Bollywood bowled out...

About 2 weeks ago on one not really fine weekend when half the rooms in the hostel had locked doors and time seemed to be ticking away at the slowest possible speed, we the left over hostel inmates had found a dwelling place on our beds cursing the damn humidity (wondering if the speed of the fan was always that slow)...whiling away time in this lethargic fashion ultimately brought us to half past one..and we made our way through the portals of the unwelcoming MESS..

Suddenly someone at the mess table enunciated..”Hey.. let have a bit of fun...lets go watch a movie…..” and everyone else’s head started rolling around the dinning room searching for some bakra who could treat us…sensing the failure of the probe the next question..”Which movie??”..and “Love aaj kal”….pat came the reply…

Paid bloody 115rs to get seats in the third row from the screen…and not to forget the highly highly overpriced café outside the movie hall filled with the irresistible aroma of junk food!!.. and to add to all this..damn the movie..and damn the person who suggested “Love aaj kal”…

Well..l actually I did not write this article to quetch about my hapless Sunday…but to express my extreme displeasure to the highly degrading quality of India’s entertainment industry…especially the filmdom…

The essence of film making seems to be shifting from creative and intelligent story telling to depicting absolutely baseless crap..just adorn a movie with a few beautiful people…and that’s it…the content can go to the dogs... Seriously speaking..”Rock On”..was the probably the last movie I enjoyed..it was ‘fun’ and most importantly ‘something different’…”Chak-de”..”Jodha Akbar”..”Fashion” are some movies worth mentioning..but then such movies are rare (or have become lately) to the greatest possible degree…

Nonsensical movies have gained their foothold in the market… “Rab ne bana di Jodi”..How the hell can just the removal of a moustache and change of attire make a person so utterly distinguishable that even his wife fails to recognize…something’s surely must have been innately wrong with her…”Love story- 2050”…a blunder..cant even be closely related to a sci-fi movie in any small way..must we mention that we did make a good beginning about a decade ago with “Mr India” and then years later with “Koi mil gaya”.. though the latter lacked originality ..but even then it was commendable. After this movie this genre of movie-making has been completely ignored…why???...

Pondering about the such movies in the west and a host of names come up…”Matrix”…”Star wars”..”Independence day”…”Transformers”..”E.T.”..”Armaggedon”…pieces of amazing cinematography combined with some splendid acting…

Chupke chuke…Chalti ka naam gadi…Andaaz apna apna…these legendary comedy movies are totally a thing of the past…at present the genre itself has expired from our industry…and whatever is left out of it is just confined to sexist and satirical humor…I fail to understand how movies like “Kambhaqt ishq”..”Partner” etc...manage to lure such a large audience…are we not disgusted and tired yet of the same banal and unamusing ‘jokes’ with the same elements as mentioned above..??...Actually we do get a good dosage of comedy movies in the form of horror movies… “Darna mana hai” and its sequel..”Phoonk”..”Krishna cottage”..”Ssshhh koi hai”..were more of a laughter riot rather than being scary...

We even tried out ‘Superhero’ stuff…with “krrish” but we better remain shhhh about it..while ”Spider-man”..”Batman”..”Superman”…keep us completely engrossed till the ending minute..so much so that we eagerly wait for their sequels…

Animated movies in our country are made just for toddlers as the target audience…In the west..animated movies themselves constitute a huge industry and made for people of all age groups.. “Ice-age”..”Kungfu panda”..”Over the hedge”..”Lion king”..”ratatouille”..”Madagascar”…the list is endless..each one with a different story-line..hilarious..and out n out funny..

Why is it that we are lacking so much in quality when infact even we are investing stupendous amounts of money inthis industry…films worth hundreds of crores are being made every year..but are highly lacking in calibre … like earlier movies today are not capable of exhibiting emotions in their pure or raw form…A new trend of copying the storylines from the west has started…it must be understood that simply replicating a movie from the west to an Indian version will not solve the problem..

On the contrary there are some intense emotions which only we Indians can project in its righteous form..A fanatabulous example being the bond of love shown between a mother and a son in the movie “Taare zameen pe”..”Parzania” being another brilliant piece showing the hard hitting reality of our nation…

The Indian film industry must reinstate its originality and creativity…for we have to our credit a chronicle of good film making preceding us…probably at present we’ve just got bewildered somewhere in the middle..

Hoping we bounce back at the earliest…

11:43 pm.....