Appy Fizz time :)

Every damn day was difficult with a daunting task ahead of me. The whole world who knew what I was after, called me a fool, lunatic and an insanely crazy person. I was in a very nice position with a fat pay-package is an MNC, when I thought that enough was enough. I called it a day after two years of hard-work and abruptly stopped my ascendency. What I set out next was a crazy idea if you are an Indian and know about the way it works here. The only best thing about India is that, when you go out in the battlefield, fighting for your most prized possession, with nothing in hand, you find yourself in a corner, with millions of better people in the same battlefield, eyeing the same prized possession.

Day in and Day out, I assiduously prepared for the D-day. One of my successful brothers once told me that the one who has never failed, can never taste success. On January 12^th, I failed. I failed because of Statistical errors or whatever reasons they were. My preparations were good, I gave my best and yet I failed. I failed miserably in the section which was my percentile booster in the previous editions. It was as if the world was mocking at me. I didn’t sleep for many subsequent days. May be I slept because of fatigue. Again, it was one of the toughest periods of my life. I pushed myself to the extent that I convinced myself saying that the worst was yet to come and with this in mind, I kept pushing myself forward.

Hard-work pays, but, only in instalments and never can you have all at once. The subsequent exams were disasters followed by calamities. For the first time in my life, I was unsure about myself. To the outside world and the social media I was known as the adventure-man, travelling far-off places with no intentions in mind. But, deep down inside, I was coming to terms with my failures, with a huge question of “What’s next?”

By God’s grace and I must say that by God’s grace, I cleared a couple of exams. Though not convincingly, I was ready to take up anything that I can lay my hands upon. On a beautiful Friday, SJMSoM gave me a call. I knew that it was my only chance to make it up for the lost ground and I told my dear one that I will make it, if they just gave me a call. Just one call and I will cover up my shoddy performances. To gain practice, I gave 6 real-time interviews before my panacea. I used up all my experience of bad interviews in the one that mattered the most. I gave it, and once I came outside the interview hall, I knew for myself that I nailed it. Exactly a month later, the results came on 27^th April and the final verdict was not different from what was expected. I stand to face the world of achieved something, but, a lot of hard-work was done by my family (mom, Subha, Sharanya) and friends (Sangeet, Abir, Alok, PPK, Adi, Shweta, Monica, Praveen sir) to keep me standing against a strong current across my face.

My IQ increased by 3 points, I learnt to smile a lot, I learnt to be serious in life, I became mentally stronger and most importantly, I learnt to deal with failures and not to accept defeat until I finally lost out and invariably, I learnt to celebrate life…….

Appreciate the journey, because it is always better than the destination.

Sutta..

The cigarette was in my mouth. The urge to light it in front of her near the Prof. Canteen made me realize the importance that the cigarette gained over her. The cotton bud was tasteless, yet so soft. It took me back to the “Heat Transfer” class when my professor gave a problem to calculate the time taken for a cigarette to extinguish, while the tip is 810ºC with pre-determined values of latent heat of tobacco and length of the cigarette. The question carried on the onus of plotting the graph with MATLAB on varying lengths as well. Nevertheless, the one in my hand was the first one, out of my money. Two and a half bucks for a Navy Cut and the clear-cut path to cancer was sitting tightly between my lips. I lighted the match stick. It went out in a flash with the help of a strong breeze. I didn’t know the art of lighting a cigarette and I already was in my pre-final year. Struggling again, I tried, but, in vain. With ample shame, I asked the guy of the couple-next-bush to light it for me. He happily agreed and there went my first sutta into the bush and never came back - My first and the last cigarette.   

Moral of the story: Never share three things in life: Underwear, girlfriend and first sutta.

A night-out at IIM-Lucknow..

The bus from Kanpur dragged its bit out. The place I had to get down was Aal-Baal. Or that is what I got of the name, Alambagh. Lucknow was just 84 km from Kanpur and yet it takes two hours to reach the place. It was a bumpy ride and I could reason out why Uttar Pradesh is still in the BIMARU list. The rail connectivity between two important cities of the state was good, but the trains are never on time. Road connectivity was haywire. I saw railways crossings, like the ones in Bhurkhamunda village in Orissa, in NH25 connecting Kanpur and Lucknow. Construction of flyovers was on, but Gammon India would need their time to construct, maintain and collect their toll taxes.

Nevertheless, Aal-Baal came. Oops, Alambagh. It was a crowded market place and reminded me of Chandi Chowk, Delhi. Fighting all odds against the traffic, my friend Pratap finally got there to spot me. Vroom as we went and he showed me the railway station upfront. Trust me; it was one of the most beautiful Mughal architectures. It took my breath away, though my fellow Lucknow-ites where just whizzing past me, oblivious to the marvel, embellishing the place with pan flavoured red juice. As a part of the ritual, I had to pay my visit to Tunday Kababi at Aminabad. I never knew that, kebabs could actually melt. These Tunday kebabs, they did. Before we knew that it was 2000 hrs, 3 plates of kebabs vanished down our throats.

Pratap, then, told me of his plans of visiting the Janpath of Lucknow. On our way to the Janpath, one thing I noticed about Lucknow, reiterated by Pratap, was that the traffic signals at Lucknow do not work. Except the one I found in a busy market area. The signal near Vidhan Sabha did not work and so did the one near the Janpath of Lucknow. When I entered the Dr. Bhimarao Ambedkar Smarak in Gomati Nagar, I realized that it was not Janpath. It was Jannat. Elephant statues adorned the place; the haathi-senas were sculpted with red stone. Not only were there statues, but also bridges, structures, arches and various other portraits. It looked like Central Park of New York, although, my knowledge of the international hangout spot is only through hear-say. But, I felt that was the most justified way of describing Gomati Nagar’s flourished art work display - roads were wider; bridges over River Gomati and at fantastic speed on a motorcycle, the place didn’t look like the clichéd Uttar Pradesh.

We zoomed towards the prestigious Indian Institute of Management. A 15 km ride took us to the magnanimous school of management gurus, the fact being that it never seemed to come, until it really did. Carved out inside a dense forest, a passerby wouldn’t have an iota of knowledge of an IIM in that vicinity. We went in, and just like any other government institute the guards didn’t bother to awaken from their deep slumber. A peek into the ‘evergreen’ campus and I came to know that they do grow Grass which by popular thought was considered relaxing. Not to mention the inmates’ favorite code-word – “3.4” which translates to the 24 hours BSE (Booze Sutta Exchange) that is at 3.4 km from the main gate.  Thanks to constant pestering, Pratap took me to Himanshu Rai’s residence. I wanted to break a glass or two, but there were other serious issues, like the Indian cricket team being slaughtered by chokers, to watch out for.

As we reached Pratap’s hostel room I headed straight for the common room, greeted by just 5 guys watching the high tension match. My question was “Are you nerds kidding me? Five is all the number that you could muster for this livewire drama?” Yet, one cord of similarity between an ordinary Indian and an IIM guy was “Why did Dhoni give that last over to Nehra?” Reasoning with the former question, my logical thought was to believe that these guys weren’t watching the match for obvious reasons: because of their everlasting assignments and quizzes. On the contrary, the real reason was that that it was a Saturday night and thus there was no better thing to do than to attain Moksha.

Every wing had a party zone and every party zone was filled with guys directing gaalis at girls (they had a better word starting with the alphabet “b”), professors, the nine-pointers (euphemism for c**k-suckers) and obviously their untalented friends who made it to IIM-A. The generic widespread frustration among the lot was how close they were to IIM-A, but on the note of grapes being sour, they boasted of a better placement statistics than their considered rival school. I had an awesome night-out and never felt out of place. I never had to introspect on the fact that I could not make it there, despite which we all belonged to the group of souls enjoying similarities in rock music, grabbing pegs of soda and banging our heads.

It was four in the morning when I took an auto-rickshaw to the railway station as my train back to Delhi was at 0525 hrs. It was a journey to remember and quite obviously from my past experiences, the train was late. When the perpetrating train did arrive, I took my seat, with no fellow passengers for company; I settled down to sleep, until I was awakened by a co-passenger in Kanpur.

He is immortal..

I first saw Him in bits and pieces when the tournament started. But, when I saw His cover-drive, I became a die-hard fan of Him. Even in that match, when He got out the scoreboard read 99/1, soon, the team was reduced to 120/8. Fifteen years later, I saw Him with naked eyes and He was still the same person. No amount of adulation or pride can ever get to His head. I have seen ordinary mortals succumb to fanfare and the pride that they carry with them and perish, but, immortals have their own way.

Time and again He was tested. With injuries, with atheists’ ridiculous criticism, with God testing His own counterpart, but, He came out strong. He came out victorious. Five World Cups later when I see Him donning the dark blue jersey, not an ounce of the spirit to win the coveted cup has reduced. When, His team won the toss and the 39,000 people in the ground knew that He was going to come out and bless them with an avalanche of beautiful stokes, but He chose not to. The umpire didn’t hear the nick, so didn't the rest in the ground, yet, He walked back. The reviews would have helped reaching a decision on His return, yet, He displayed His integrity.

He came back to the field and was fielding in the opposite corner to where I was seated. Every ball that went towards Him was cheered. Every time He went near the ropes, six year olds to sixty year olds cheered His name. And He waved back. He knew He had disappointed them earlier in the day, but, a wave of His hands to the mad crowd made their day, if not years to come. Finally, in the last half hour of the game, He came towards our side of the ground. And we called out His name and He waved back. A man of His stature waved back to us and I had Goosebumps all over my hands. I realized that I can never realize what He is made of. So much pressure from millions around the globe, so much expectations and still He has His head on His shoulders. I don’t think that is humanly possible. I haven’t taken His name and still you know who He is. He is not the greatest because of His records, but, because of the person He is. He is God and I will sacrifice my life for Him and so will billion others.

Zoozoo vs Sachin!!

The focus shifts to cricket for the last time before the world comes to an end in 2012 - One of the main reasons for its end being Sachin Tendulkar’s expected retirement. Aal-Baal News has strong rumours that Vodafone has been reported to be have cashed in on the big fish. In a bid to strengthen its market share in the 3G sector as well as the forthcoming 4G, Vodafone has initiated talks with the God of cricket. The Messiah of cricket, who has given respite to billions of cricket fans all over the world from poverty, corruption and suppression with his style, performance and charisma, has previously done ads with Airtel and Reliance in the same sector.

When Jithan Ramesh Welingkar of Ogilvy India was contacted over the issue, he was surprised on how the insider talks became so prominent. Blaming it on the Superman-3G-zoozooo for letting clandestine information out, he divulged certain important details exclusively to Aal-Baal News. Mr. Welingkar who shares the middle name with the run machine has conceded to the fact that they have zeroed in on Sachin, because, wherever he goes, people follow him; which in a way is Vodafone’s ex-marketing strategy. Elaborating on the “wherever”, he said that even when Sachin gets out, the whole team, batsman after batsman follows him back to the dressing room. “This is one pattern that can be unanimously seen over the past 20 years and it is still continuing. More than the billion followers of Sachin’s batting supremacy, it has always been his teammates who has consistently followed him over the years”, iterated Jithan.

When asked whether the Superman-3G-zoozoo will take a hit when Sachin’s ad takes the centre stage, Mr. Jithan said that they have a long time to go before formulating and roping in the resources. “Sachin is the person whom we follow, but, the pug which personified the network will be replaced by a dummy Indian team, which gets all-out before a special pooja is made in the nearby temple for the same cause not to happen.” opined Jithan. “He is our perfect representation and we at Ogilvy have tried and tested patterns.” explained the issue with an example of the recent India-South Africa World Cup match.

Aal-Baal News’ personal opinion on this issue is that Vodafone and Ogilvy has realized it better late than never. They thought that the Indian team will improvise on their mistakes and won’t follow the pattern for such a long time, but Ogilvy were consistently proved wrong. If the deal goes through, it will be the perfect stage to express why India loses every time Sachin scores big and finally zoozoo will have to work their ass off, if they have one, to survive competition from the original Superman.

Before Light

This is a story that was not recorded, but, pure fiction. If it violates any Holy Book, I sincerely apologize for my ignorance. This is a Pilot. Kindly, share your comments.

It was cold outside. Science was nowhere to be seen, so were religions. The darkness creating a shadow of doubt if there will ever be light. Then out the blue, came the monologue, “Let there be light”.

God was scanning through his network to find the right place to create life. He was so bored after the “Big Bang”. Just that it has happened, there was nothing much interesting happenings in the cosmos. He bookmarked a few planets from different galaxies and started sculpting the various life forms. On a lottery basis, Earth’s life form was chosen to be made of Carbon. Planet Zrancia’s beings were that of Phosphorous; Germot’s were Silicon; Streghout’s were that of Nitrogen. And their respective periodic table elements were left to discovery. And more so that it was centered on their respective base element. That is, Carbon for Earthians, Phosphorous for Zrancians and so on. But, He made a mandatory clause of Oxygen being the breathing element.

Zrancia, Germot and Streghout made a head-start, as their version of Adam was not a fool like ours. The respective Adam didn’t eat their respective versions of apple and came out strong in the test. But, with time they also, one by one gave into temptation. The more they resisted, the powerful they became. The winners were endowed with the cosmic knowledge, they were ahead of time, and teleportation was their normal means of transport. Light was their toughest competitor, but, Earth still didn’t have their dominant life-form. God punished Earthians for giving into temptation.

After deep thought, God gave Earthians a chance made Man. Man was very soon visited by many of his cosmic counterparts. Their technology was so advanced that they manipulated their version of DNA to Carbon’s version. On the other hand, man was happy that he invented fire. The Extra-terrestrials taught man things that he portrayed to the outer world as if he had found them. Wheel was one of the examples of plagiarism and there were more to follow. Man ruled relentlessly and gave the Zrancians, Germots and Streghouts the name “Gods” and erased every source of their extra-terrestrial nature. With time, man became a slave to the tyranny of man himself. God started enjoying this play and thought to himself, “Let there be enough light to this drama and I must say that Man is the best creature I have made. He is just a Carbon copy!”

Sham(e)

The “Digital generation” as we call ourselves is one of the most selfish generations to have resided on this planet. We don’t see what can be learnt from our Gen-Ex but, we google a lot of other things. Things have changed a lot in this age, that we feel that we don’t need anyone to support us. We feel that we are independent to lead our own lives, but, search for new virtual friends every day. We have so much digital security around us, but, still we feel so insecure about ourselves, looking for recognition in a virtual world.

Earlier, society was largely confined to the neighborhood. We used to get to know people when we venture out to play in the evenings. After school, bring your friends home and the respective mothers, catch-up with each other. There were no Saas-Bahu serials to discuss upon, but, exchange of cooking recipes and knowledge on religion were a part of the usual story. Dads came back in the evening with chocolates and ice-creams and obviously, weekends meant to play with GI-Joes and Hot Wheels. Life was uncomplicated. We knew people, we were happy in the real sense.

Things have changed and I don’t refute that the same things are being done by the kids of our generation and the succeeding one, but, only with a simple twist. The Facebook status goes saying, “Got a new GI-Joe, who wanna come and play”, and followed by “23 likes” and a few other comments. The Tech companies have made so much in-road that sensing your urge to play the particular game, they create online platforms and let you rot in it. There were no cell-phones, but, still we found our friends, but, now, the call is perennially on wait. These are just a few examples. But, the real question is where have we gone wrong? We have so much time, yet, we don’t spare a moment for each other. Why are we lacking the integral part of our integrity?

My view on this point is that we have moved away from religion. Taking a cue from a personal incident, a few years ago in an audition for the Literary Circle, NIT-D, I made it to the final round. There, I was asked a question, “If you were given a page in our magazine to write upon, what will be your genre?” I answered, “Spirituality”. I wasn’t paid much heed from thereon and was eventually not selected. I don’t say that I was not naïve, but, that was all I knew irrespective of the confusion, which religion to follow. Thinking from a magazine’s point of view, they were right in not selecting me because spirituality hardly sells (Deepak Chopra has got it in him).

But, neither do we learn from our elders. They have lots to offer – assiduousness, determination, security (financial, economical, emotional and spiritual) and lots more. But, we hardly seem to notice them all. We seek for a closure online. We try to be cool and look like a fool (obviously, copied from song lyrics). Are we are still happy – in a virtual world and in a virtual sense?

O-balm-ah -> The panacea

Shahrukh Khan could have waited for 10 months to proclaim that he is not a terrorist. Barack Obama is in town and he is going to reside in the pristine Taj Mahal hotel in Bombay. Do Kasab and his forefathers have the balls now to target the targeted? May be they won’t, after all he is Barack Husein Obama and he also is not a terrorist (atleast presume him not to be). But, the whole confusion is what takes the centre-stage in the agenda of the meetings; be it economic ties (selling Nuclear technology to India), strategic ties (tell to China that India is better than them), military ties (respite to Pakistan-Kashmir issue) or the  Uncommonwealth ties (India’s ties with Iran).

Economic ties: USofA cajoled India to sign the Nuclear deal promising to set-up blah-blah nuclear plants all over the country, but, took away the outsourcing jobs. American companies are  free to set-up the units to produce power and bridge the power shortage that India is facing, but, God forbid, if any accident occurs the companies won’t take responsibility (that’s what the deal says). Planning to repeat a Bhopal tragedy? To protect American jobs, the outsourced Jagan to Jacob and Manish to Mark have to lose their jobs. And India said yes to it and reached a compromise on the economic ties. We were given only the cherry of the big-cake where the full cake was taken by the Americans. Could we expect to divide the cake properly on the so-called economic front?

Strategic and Military ties: You go to China, tell them, “Hu-bro, you gotta poke your nose into Kashmir and facilitate a solution”. Hu must have said, “Barack, my mate, first let us take Arunachal Pradesh from them and then we will talk about Kashmir”. I think Hu Jintao must have misunderstood “facilitate a solution” to “make Kashmir China’s”. And you come to India and tell us, “Man-paaji, you and China are pretty strong here in this region and we are anyhow cutting our ties with Pakistan. So, give Arunachal Pradesh to them and take Kashmir from Pakistan”. Does our netas have the balls to say, “Barack-ji, both Arunachal Pradesh and Kashmir belongs to India”? No, they don’t. They will nod their heads and ask Obama if his plate has to be refilled with Chicken butter masala.

Uncommonwealth ties: What is your problem, if India tags along with Iran for economic exchange? Dude, eventhough India makes the most-fuel-efficient cars and also the cheapest cars, we do need oil. You for the better part of the centuries had and have Iraq under control; you have so much oil that you can mix it with water and still not be bothered about it (Gulf of Mexico). But, we need someone who can sell oil to us behind the counters at Diwali discount. Next month we can ask for Bakrid discount followed by Christmas, New years and Maharasankranthi. We have our plans cut-out, but you wouldn’t allow us to prosper.

Obama dude, Watch “Robot (Enthiran)” Relax over here. Don’t worry about the recent resignations in your office; don’t worry that you didn’t bag Nobel Prize for Peace for the second time (although you have done your best); don’t worry about anything. This is India. Yehan pe sab kuch CHALTHA HAI!!! (Anything is acceptable)

My first sweater..

The whole fury in the common room got over. People across the country got to a consensus that it’s each and everyone’s responsibility to extend their vacation until Diwali. I was the small town boy not understanding the dynamics that was taking the centre-stage. The mid-sems were causing abnormal bowel movements and cheating in the exams was not a part of the armory then. I was the plumpy 85-kg chap when I joined the institute who reduced to a 72-kg piece of meat over 3 months.

Come Durga Pujo, the vacations started with the most tiresome train journey defying the normal sleeping hours. Back in Chennai, people enquired about my place of study and the second question that followed was “Isn’t there a big Durga Ma temple in that place?”  I used to laugh it off saying it’s so grand a temple that you must pay a visit. Durgapur doesn’t mean that it has the biggest Durga Ma temple, similar to Puri, does it have the biggest Puri?

The vacations weren’t extended to Diwali as the earlier consensus was supposed to. After a couple of weeks, I was back in West Bengal. Meanwhile, my Ramzan month fast continued and it was bad to be back again with nothing else to expect from life, but to be ragged as first years. But, I was proved wrong. There was something in the climate that was changed. The air was a lot cooler and was as mesmerizing as the Bengali girls (not the ones in college). A single t-shirt no longer sufficed. A type of clothing unheard of, made its way into my wardrobe – woolen clothes. My first sweater, my first razai and my first wind-cheater, all made special appearances. I was for the first time in my life introduced to the loveliest of all seasons – “Winter”. Hailing from a tropical coastal city, rains and a chill weather with the mercury stooping to 20⁰C was all the winter I had seen in my life.

This experience was very different. Roomates fighting for the electrical heaters, the foggy mornings (of course not caused by grass smoking), the hot teas, the pleasant weather, the spectacles getting blurred while coming out of the computer laboratory, playing cricket with woolen clothes on, not able to decipher a girl’s figure because of her over-sized woolen clothes, days getting shorter and absolute bliss while hanging out in the evening with friends. I miss Durga Pujo, I miss the change that it brings into human life. The sense of calmness and tranquility that prevails can’t be expressed in words, but can be felt and remembered for a very long time. 

Lets Go!!!

Some things can be changed, whilst some can’t and we call it the inherent nature of a person. From where does this inherent nature takes its genesis from? Cell? DNA? Genes? Who cares by the way as these things are very much restricted to geneticist. Who bothers about these issues as long as justice is delivered? Talking about justice, every person following the Indian politics talks if the justice was fair and square. I am not talking whether we are doing justice to ourselves by hosting the Common Wealth Games, but the Ram-Janmabhoomi-Babri-Masjid case. 

I personally didn’t care what happened. I neither watched the live or the file coverage of the eagles preying on the carcasses nor read the glaring reports from newspapers, the next morning. I didn’t go to pray my Friday Jumma in the mosque not out of fear, but, to remain ignorant on the issue. Diplomacy is supporting both the causes, while I chose to be ignorant. My friend calls me up from Singapore to fret over wasting $15SING on the movie Enthiran (Robot) and the next conversation was whether the Babri-masjid’s justice was fair enough. I wasn’t worried if Lord Ram was born right at centre of the gravity of the geometric figure which is to be divided into three equal parts (although Mathematics says it can’t be), or if Babar built it to satisfy his barbaric needs. If the previous statement’s structure is considered, the analogy doesn’t seem to be right. On one hand, we have one of the Gods of Hinduism while an autocratic king on the other. And to say the least of all, they both have contributed immensely to what is known as India. 

I don’t have an opinion on this case in particular, but, like every other Indian; I am entitled to have one. As a person who has been brought up in a Hindu-Islam mix culture, I can have a unique opinion of my own. The case was resolved after 49 years; 18 years after the demolition took place. Don’t you think, our judicial system is pretty slow? Or was it a conspiracy involved, to pass the judgment when Indians understood each other better? Had the judgment been made in the 20th century, would it have affected the harmony of India? Now, we the mature Indians passing comments on colored-terrorism, viz. the Saffron-terror and the Green-terror, isn’t it an irony that these colors are the constituent colors of our proud National Flag? Innocent blood has been shed on the streets of the disputed site over blame-games. Will God be ready to reside there or be ready to be ever born again (avatar) at that same place? It is not a victory for a group and a compromise for the other, but a reality show for the Rest of the World to deride on us. We have just given way too much fodder for them to feast upon, let us roll up our sleeves and stay united. Hey Media folks, that was to you too. 

Questions galore will remain unanswered. But, God knows the best.