I found a friend

In this transforming world and my ever-changing life, there is one thing that has never changed and perhaps will never change; the way i treat my childhood friends. Amongst all the transient factors this conspicuously constant behaviour is what I cherish the most. Be it all my Ahmadabad Buddies, one of the closest one to my heart (so what if Shishir acts indifferently), few of my buddies from KV2 Bhopal, (yeah, I found it hard to resonate with these guys), and of course some of my Kali Bari buddies, I will ever remain the same kid for them.
Now what might amaze you is why I am writing this post. It’s because this Sunday I came across another childhood friend. I have seen her around a lot of times but never gathered the courage to say her ‘Hi’. The reason was not that I enjoyed pestering her in school, along with my buddy Yash. Nor, for that matter, we fought stupidly for getting ahead of each other academically (Well I guess I have made clear how ‘fast’ friends we were. But then this is yet another type of childhood friendship). It was because physically, I have changed drastically and at times people deny recognising me. But I finally gathered the courage and called her name. She paused... creased her brows... her lips were confused whether or not she should smile... She stepped forth and suddenly with a beam of delight spoke,” SAMRAAAT” (yeah there were 4 A’s in my name that evening). I had a sinking feeling in my stomach for I couldn’t believe that she would recognise me. Anyway we couldn’t converse much, but then I always find it hard to speak out in front of girls. No I am not pretending to be innocent. Actually I always run out of topics while talking with them. Luckily we had so much from our 7th class days for chat.
Well about this girl, I must tell you our friendship was like that of a cat and a dog... (Yeah I know all men are dogs... so am I). I must admit she remembers a lot of my nonsense acts way too much than I could even recall. And I thought I had a good memory.
Finally it seems to me that I have added one more friend to my friend list, whom I can really call a friend.

The blame game continues...

The failure of operation-green hunt is being credited to the slag in communication between intelligence and state govt... remember 26/11?? Someone has rightly said- a bad workman always blames his tools...

A 'minor' incident

I furred my hair and tried to bring my ever messed up coiffure to a tolerable look. Brushing the dust off my head-wrap that has become indispensible for me after so long a hairfall era in my life, I crumbled it and stuffed it inside my bag. My hair... I find it hard to keep it the way I comb it in the morning... So I have stopped combing. I nudged Ankit to make way for me to the class, and climbed up he stairs to my place. No matter how much we try to change our seating arrangement in Minor exams, we always get caught and are made to sit as usual. The sophomores, prefinal and final year mechanical were busy with their last minute preparation and the class was beaming with weird voices filled wih technical babbles. As soon as I placed my stuff on the desk, the voices became intense and a whole bunch of students funnelled inside the class like sheep herded by a shepherd into the fences.
Someone shouted," Lanjewar aa rha hai"
Another replied," wow yaar mast cheating hogi"
Third voice interrupted," are nahi be wo Mtech waala C!@#@!# aa raha hai"
About this Mtech Guy I just mentioned... He is a real ..mmm... smart guy... Reason??? He always nabs you when you are not doing anything unfair. And when you are actually doing, so he never figures it out... Ranjit was an exception.. he git caught. So statistically speaking, in a one hour test, if you spend 5-6 minutes playing peek-a-boo with your neighbour's copy... This means this guy will pester you for the rest 54-55 min.
A month ago, which was ofourse winter, a season with only one reason to be hated by me that being my olfactory senses becoming useless due to leakage in my phlegmatic reservoir. So I keep a handkerchief at hand to wipe my tunnels off to avoid any disgraceful dripping in front of someone. On that day, I did the same and my handkerchief was dripping with phlegm.
I know that sounds gross, but this is a biological flaw with me. My nose leaks out more water than a common kitchen tap does in an entire day, if not closed properly.
The test commenced, I had written necessary formulae on my table for reference... ;-) I wrote the paper without much problem, except for my oozie nosie... I bent forward to wipe off my nose with my hankie and this guy saw me. He came over to me...
checked underneath my desk, made me stand up and checked my jeans... and then... ewwww... he picked up my hankie dripping wet!!!! and asked..." ye geela kyu hai?"
I replied with a sniff... He still didn't realise what a disgusting thing he had picked up...
Anyway that 'smart' guy couldn't see the formulae written loud and clear on my desk.
I was shocked... with amusement... :-D

Some memories are really worth preserving. Just played the months-old recorded interview of Roopa over his Copenhagen strip club adventure...

The new divide

Hindus were not enough so they divided Muslims... now Muslims will also have quotas according to cast. The quota privilege will exclude Syeds, Pathans, Iranis and Arabis. Seems like the general category, which is actually an excruciating minority in front of all the reserved classes put together( not including women), will have to stand and fight for its existence. The conundrum of reservation is not whether it should be sustained or not, rather whom should it be given to. I have been repeatedly supporting the idea that criterion for reservation should be money instead of progeny. If a candidate is pathetic inspite of a firm financial pillar underneath him, then why is the caste system being blamed.
Possibly 'they' want to convey that the candidate had recalled the atrocities against his forefathers just before the exams, interview or whatever he couldn't perform well in. Or maybe he was afraid that the invigilator, professor or interviewer might expel him out of the room at any time because of his origin. Or may be they have some better reason than I can think.
Whenever I mention that income should be the agency of reservation, people try to refute by mentioning the illegal proofs of income. I do admit the problem, but is there a better way to appease the unrest in unreserved class? The solution to the question just posed can be introducing strict norms while availing for reservation. We do have evasion of income tax, but still it is collected. A sub-middle class man, who has hardly any other income, and the one I advocate should cherish reservation, won't find it hard to disclose his entire incomes. Perform hard core raids where you suspect a fish, nab them and 'reward' them. Bet my money India will be a better place again.

An excuse for agnostics

I am really confused, so long I have been declaring myself as an atheist. Rather I had been dwindling between atheism and theism when finally I have felt the need of God. When I wrote about this on facebook, Manish kumar agarwal, a friend of mine, gave me a neo-kabeer doha:
Dukh mein sumiran sab karae, sukh mein karae na koi;
Jo sukh mein sumiran karae, TO WO SUKH KAAHE KA HOE.!!

Ready for the ride

It's time to gear up for the BAJA.. the ultimate dream of every mechanical engineer... We have a long and hectic path to tread, with placements, CAT, college projects and BAJA of course. I am sure this ain't gonna be a smooth ride but I... err.. we will have to manage these things

New MANIT motto

'fiat lux ' is the motto of university of california which means 'let there be light'.... MANIT's motto is 'Docomo Dettol' which means 'life can change in seconds, so be prepared with the solution'

only 1409 left... tiger project needs a correction

This is a short post dedicated to the recent incident of the cloud that hovers Ranthambore National Park. Recently, on march 7th 2 Tiger cubs were found dead which, sadly, corrects the save tiger project to only 1409 left. What added to the grimmace was the news of a man-eater in the National Park. Officials have firmly denied existence of any man-eating tiger in Ranthambore, possibly to pacify the tourists who were woken up one morning and given the news of 50-yr old villager being killed by 'some' animal. Forest officers are strongly rejecting any possibility of a lurking man-eater and trying to give the credit to jackals, inspite of canine marks being found on the victim's shoulder and throats. I wonder which jackal dares to clench a human by throat.
Anyway the point of discussion is not who killed whom and who is being blamed. Instead, if at all a man-eater exists he will be killed in a few days, if forest officials don't succeed to catch him alive. .If we look into the matter more deeply, we will find that about 60 Bigha of forest area has been encroached in 1998-99, Data about later years are not available. Besides Illegal poaching still continues in that area. I assume the reader is better acquainted to th fact that the biggest dealer of Tiger hide and its body parts is The China, where tiger is believed to possess medicinal properties. The solution to this lies in tightening the patrols in Tiger Reserves and providing them with more sophisticated equipments for surveilance and security, which at present are hardly anywhere near modern technologies... (blog post coninued...)

R.P. Singh Rocksssssssssss... not the cricketer but our director

Finally the 5 day technosearch-Maffick is over... But I won't say that College is back to it's early schedule, because Sportomania will start from tomorrow. And even after that I don't think our Golden Jubilee celebration will allow us to... err.. allow college to return to it's original state.
The Techno Maffick was a huge success and my favourite event, of course after the Kailasa night and Kumar Biswas, was our Director's fundoo speech. No event can equal the cheer and claps that the director earned in his speech. I must quote one such cheered line that he quipped for the junkyadr wars..." maine raat mein dekha ki ladke ladkiya kuchh kar rahe hai.... maine poochha to pata chala ki wo log kabaad se kuchh srijan kar rahe hai.. maine poochha yaha koi apriya ghatna to nahi hogi?? jiska aashwasan aapke president ji ne diya.." the entire speech was funny and the college enjoyed it..
The reason behind mentionig this is not that it's merely an incident. I mentioned it because it was a relevent speech for a techfest. It didnt annoy the students like every professor's speech does but it stood apart and allowed itself to be enjoyed by the students

The Great Indian Novel

This book was read by me 2 months ago, during the semester breaks, but the book was tremendously vague and incomprehensible for me to write a review on it. But lately I came across another piece of writing by the same author, who was recently inked with allegations for using MEA website for promoting his books, and learnt the real implications of this book.
The author wrote this book inspired from a number of authors who have rewritten literary works by some brilliant and eminent authors of all times with a tremendously different perception. The famous example is Gone with the wind written by Margaret Mitchell which was rewritten by Alice Randall as Wind done Gone where the latter narrates the same story from the slave’s point of view.
The Great Indian Novel has been written with a similar intention that manifests The Mahabharata as the story of India, specifically contemporary. The characters of the great epic have been remoulded into our famous freedom fighters. The writer narrates the pre-independent incidents expressing them in the Mahabharata way. The unique factor is the striking resemblance with the freedom fighters, their traits and the incidents they were a part of. Or may be it’s just the writer who has successfully made us believe that way.
The book unfurls Mahabharata right from the beginning, i.e. from Ved vyas and unfolds through a series of incidents like the entry of Bheeshm Pitamah( Gandhi) and the terrible vow he takes, and finally nears the end with the Kurukshetra…
If you ever chance to read this book, then you will appreciate the humours that have been cracked from time to time. A detailed piece of art that goes transcends all conventional writing barriers.
Let alone the fidgety narration of incidents, this book is a pack of entertainment if you search for the joy in it.

Indo Pak dialogues- a fruitless road

When I have nothing to do, I prefer to talk. I suppose the Indo-Pak dialogues over solving the issue of terrorism rests on the same ground. Every single dialogue is a futile attempt towards curbing terrorism.
The Indian Govt is very well acquainted to the fact that why terrorism prevails in India, that includes issues graver than the Kashmir one. Still it behaves like an infant by continuously clamoring for Hafiz Saeed.Anti-India Terrorism does originate in Pakistan but the fodder it nurtures on is freely available in India. The motivation is floating in Indian air. One needs to just tap it which is not at all a tough job.
Time has come when government should act prudently and nip the peril from it's root, and stop playing charades.

I feel bad

This issue never made me feel incompetent, neither has it ever done my head in. But at times it has given me a reason to feel bad when I realise that I have never been able to 'enjoy' a head-phone....

hand got bruised, still happy I am

Today bruised my left hand with clogged gear shifter of Bajaj chetak.. hell lot of effort it needs for a shift, and has got a lot of play in it... still I don't feel bad about it, owing to the fact that it has been nudged out of the production lines... but not from our hearts... Hamara Bajaj
Note: play is a term used to define a peculiar condition of a machine element in which it has got undesirable motion in addition to it's usual motion, if at all any.
For eg.: a worn out bolt tends to sway orthogonally to it's axis when fitted .
:-D

I didnt like this movie

inglorious basterds is a falsely glorified movie, as I perceive it. The history has been pathetically manipulated and the subtlety is missing in the modus operandi of double agents.Finally I'll write what a movie review quotes:"A movie satisfying the desire of torture porn against Nazis....." But do watch it if you love fiction.... and unpredictable stories.

Minor Minor burning bright, MANIT students with all your might

Have you heard of ironies??? I am sure you must have. Minors is specifically what we can call a perfect irony. They have named it minor. But it has hardly anything to do with its name. It's as much enormous as diminutive it sounds to be.
They torture you, slit your throat, amputate your limbs...
Okk I am exaggerating...
But two minors a day!!! Which kind of right in Indian constitution permits them to do so? Still they call it a minor!! The only possible justification that I find is that they have Majors in the end, which are bigger than these counterparts. But then they should name these as Minor-attack and Major-attack respectively. However, sometimes... rather most of the times, the minors are far more torturous than majors, owing to the very little time they give us for preparation. Nobody is going to ask them, so why am I bickering? All I can do is thank them for one-subject-a-day for this minors. But I am sure that they will return me my 'gratitude' in the next minor, which will be probably two in a day, or may be even three in a day!!!

No more balkanization please

Telangana protests have begun once again. Govt should see to it that demands for new states should be nipped in their buds, by passing a rule freezing all the states from further fission. The demand for a new state should only be put forth when there is a serious adminstrative and bureaucratic failure in the state, to which a division of state is the only solution left. Such claims should be backed by reports submitted by constitutional committees. Further any violent protest for the sake of New state should be declared a national offence, since it further challenges the integrity of the country.

Why do I abuse........

Today I could have been in real trouble had I not narrowly escaped shouting swear words in front of one of my friend's parents.
I had just finished with the engine assembly workshop, which was specifically meant for sophomores and had taken along JD with me. I was returning home after looking out for some stuffs at Vishal Mega mart, which unfortunately I coudn't find. I decided to refill some fuel before leaving with JD, who had gone for susu. I looked around for JD and found him across the road. I shouted ,'JD!!!'. He didn't hear. I shouted again. Still no response. I was about to shout,' m@##@$# susu karne gaya hai ya gaadiya gin raha hai ', when suddenly I saw her parents. Whoaa... Goodness I didn't start my Shlokas. I greeted them with trembling hands, out of the fear that what would have happened if I had begun with my cat call. But I was happy that I didn't.
Maybe I should put a leash on my swear words... They come out in some of the most awkward situations across my life. The last time it happened was in front of some professor when I shouted 'behen!#!@#!' for Mahitosh and it reached the professor's ears earlier than it did to Mahitosh's. He turned back but I disappeared in the crowd... Thankfully, once again, I was also 'some' student for him so neither of us knew the other.
Another hillarious incident took place with 'Shefali'... My mech brothers know who she is... She liked me a lot... And it's apparant from the fact that there hasn't been a single electrical Lab when she didn't yell at me; despite all my pre-emptive measures to make sure she doesn't... Finally I started enjoying it and she gave me good marks in Lab. So it happened like this, she had just finished scolding me for switching off the supply to our experimental set up. Weird act by me of course, but I had just got an electric shock at home the previous day, so I was a little jittery with electrical appliances. Let's return back to the story. I was really pissed off with her behaviour since I was in I-yr and hadn't been through this before. I started grumbling, ' K#@$@ kahi ki. kya samajhti hai khud ko...' only to be interrupted by Mahitosh,' Saale baaju mein khadi hai... marwayega kya'. Phew.. she didn't listen us
Lets hope that things always turn up like this and never land me in trouble, till I shirk this habit of abusive disgruntlement

Listening to Grasshoppers

There can be no other book that can devasate your reverence for India, that you have within yourself, as much as this book can. In fact Arundhati Roy has stood apart for her communist ideologies, blended with the grudge, however justified, that she holds against the industrialists for forcefully acquiring the lands from the weak. This book is a scinitillating compilation and analysis of the events that reveal our country as a saffron chuvinist, the law and order as a bestial body and the politicians, whose image was ameliorating, as parasite. It consists of essays that were written in the wake of incidents like 13-dec, assaassination of hrant dink, godhra massacre, nandigram issue and 26/11.
The book makes shocking revelations, backed by proofs of webpage links from international press, that changes the way we think of the 13th dec parliament attacks. A lucid evidence that's given is that how can Afzal make a clear confession when his family lives in the kashmir valley where they are an easy kill for the people he is speaking against. As a matter of fact it is possible, provided the torure he was subjected to, like giving electric shocks to the genitals, thrusting iron rods into anus, wearing shirt for weeks which must b used to cleac toilet and forcefully made to drink urine. A fact which many people don't know is that afzal was a suspect much earlier than the attack and was in close touch with the STF. Then how is it possible that nobody kept an eye on his activities.
It also condemns the Indian media for the irresponsibility the show while airing a news. Despite the Godhra event, things havent changed much. The credit for Afzal being viewed as a public enemy is indisputedly claimed by the media. Further the death sentence issued to Afzal becomes a little cloudy when we read the supreme court decision that quotes ' The hanging would satisfy the collective public conscience'. It's quite disappointing to learn that the death sentence awarded to Afzal is not consolidated by any of the evidence, rather they make it more confusing.
Other issues that the book raises includes the hegemony of saffron politics, the credit of which is claimed by more than 'one' party, under which thousands of minorities have been killed in two seperate state organised massacres. There are explicit description of the bestiality bestowed upon those people, the brutal killing of former MP Ehsaan Jaffri, the heart-shattering interviews of victims and other ruthless events.
The most important issue that the book discusses is about the Supreme court. Specifially the Chief Sabarwaal case. But folks, there is a law that refrains people from condemning the apex court, so it'd be better if you read the book and spare me the trouble.
here is a link to one of the essays http://www.countercurrents.org/roy260108.htm

last few minutes

The clock has struck... marking the eleventh hour that crept in when I was sleeping. Or perhaps I wasn't. I knew this day would come but I hardly prepared for it. Time is swaying away like the pages of an open book fed to the wind. I can feel the stress in myself and sense it in my comrades as well. No wonder I try to abstain social networkin as much as I can, but seldom i do log in to express myself. The call of the hour is commitment, which I can't see in myself, but I have to deliver the untold promise. Two and a half years swept away like smoke and I ain't sure where i will be 10 years from now. When people ask me why am I preparing for management when I am into technical discipline, I prefer to keep quiet. Not because I don't have the answer, but I prefer to act rather than to speak. Parallely I am looking out for campus placement as a Plan B (or is it?). I will take the CAT and appear in the Placement window by the fall of this year and I got to get in one of them. Wish me good luck