India on Wheels !!

There was a time when I was a true follower of the following lines
"Almost all men can stand adversity but if you want to test a man's character give him power "

Some engineer gave the Indians the power to drive and I tell you they have done pathetic..!!
I have yet to see a man or a woman drive the way a car or a bike should be driven.I can really say my Dad is an exception .Anyways leaving him aside ,lets talk about whats happening on the roads.. If you make a donkey drive car it will do better. How many of us have seen the cars meandering right n front of our eyes. How many of us have seen the bike zigzagging as if this was a street act ..Yet my friends we have not even 1 formula one racer and well India on bikes is complete no-no . All these Narayan Kartikayein and so so are to be found on Delhi roads only .
From jumping Red lights to U turns on no turns ,Indians on road are all over the place . An Engineer gives you a flyover and we really know how to make use of it .Use it for late night car and bike races and then end up getting killed or badly injured in accidents .
If urban people are racers villagers aren't doing any better you give them railway crossings and then end up squandering away their life just to save that two mins. I think even Warren Buffet wouldn't be that busy.
How many of us know that the white lines on the roads are not for decorations but actually they are for lane driving ..Sounds Greek right ..I know I know ..
I really wish that our drivers were exposed to some more stringent laws and if not atleast more strict law enforcement agencies.
Anyways drive safely ....

Whats wrong with the Media..!!??

The media is perhaps a contact point between the world and the common man .!! But time has come when we actually begin to question the efficiency of the media..!! How many of us are bugged with the non-sensical news channels.I am sure almost all…

Well the ignition point of this blog too lies there..the thought came after I saw this particular news channel boasts of a breaking news mind you “Breaking News”…Ashwathama is alive ..Gosh this would lead almost all the historians in this country to scratch their heads… and wonder ok are we really talking about the Ashwathama from the Mahabharat Era..

A boy falls in a ditch and over the next 48 hours all the news channel are hovering around shooting pictures rather than saving that poor child .I wonder how do camera men shoot these ghastly pictures because logically if you see an accident you would rather keep your camera down and save the grieved .

Anyways not all the media people are doing this bad. Barkha Dutt is doing a great job.. The Tehelka guy Tarun Tejpal had a good thought in his mind ofcourse though in India even the most corrupted find an alibi and the judiciary system tries its best to save even the worst .Thus Mr.Tejpal having a hell lot of time exposing the worst came as a no surprise to me .

When I was a young boy of say 12 or 13 my parents used to tell me “Son you got to watch the news channels to stay updated “ I wonder what will I tell my son perhaps” Son ,better stay away from the news channels ,because they show you the maximum violence and minimum of relevant news” .I wonder what good can any show like “Vardaat “ or “Jurm” do to the psyche of a young child .No wonder a class 8 kid shot down his own classmate in a Gurgaon school yesterday .

If electronic media is exposing young minds to hell lot of violence and crime ,how can print media stay any far behind . When I was back in St.George’s College ,Mussoorie ,guys used to get the Times Of India for the second page for reasons well known to the Y-Generation.! So well if some years down the line if I have to stop the daily news paper supply to my home, don’t take it as a money-saving measure rather take it as a embarrassment escaping method.!

Today the media can be defined in single word. “Gossip” and nothing else. Gone are the days when a newspaper could bring about a revolution in the country and when the top and the most intellectual minds in the country wrote articles, influential enough to drive men , women and children out of their houses to unite and fight for their motherland.

All that is left on the screens and paper are pretty faces with no substance to hold fort .

Has the world become so non-happening that the media has to resort to absurd news broadcasting to stay afloat. This is a question that the media people need to answer soon because Indian public is not as stupid as they think .Pretty face and flimsy covers wont stay afloat for long . The TRPs will soon be southward bound .So wake up … before its too late ..

As the Curtain falls...

Time goes we say ah !no alas! time stays we go ..only memories remain..its a been a while since I wrote something new ..thanks to the damn damn hectic schedule of the semester exams...

Now all that are left after these 10-11 days are nothing but groggy eyes ..some very tired bodies and not to forget some very interesting memories..

The great Civil Gang-up @ the Chai break @ 10 pm.. Realizing at 12 in the night before Transportation Engg paper that what we have been studying for the last 24 hrs has been a waste of time ..Imagine the cold shiver that runs down your spine.. Chuckles..

CAD was no better…till almost 10pm we were doing our own research work .What in the true words of Dr.R.K.Dutta is “making it click “….Before someone dropped the big bombshell.. Thanks to few dear friends the next few hours were like real spoon feeding ..

Funny seems to be the condition of parents too who ask you after you have slogged for say a day (nobody studies more than that in NIT) “Do you have an exam tomorrow.” ..Poor they ..Anyways not their fault too ..that’s the general state of any Hosteller. . The Curtain Raiser to the Exams were no better..The Pracs..Vivas were funny this time around … In Transportation ..I was bound for the wrong way..Absurd Numbers were dropping off..1355 for a 1370..2025 for a 2055.. Anyways 41/50 didn’t look bad at all in the end ..Though I still wonder how..

Some warriors were the saving grace during the Design Paper ..and I just simply love the IS-456:2000…For reasons well known to the Civil Engineering genre..

But what truly brought the “special” talents to the fore was Environmental Engg..I don’t know what I studied .I really don’t know what he asked and I seriously don’t know what I wrote …but I still managed to fill almost the entire booklet provided… Funny .. as it was nothing but a ‘Ghussi’ paper in true NIT-Lingo..

Anyways I shall be headed home soon ..But before that I better shave..uurrggssss….I don’t want to get kicked out...Chuckles….

As the world sleeps ..

Sleep perhaps is the most important activity and if you ask any of those fitness gurus ..Mandatory line "Sleep for atleast 8-10 hours at a stretch.." Well I think if these gurus come down to NIT\JNU\IIT they would just handcuff all of us ..!! Well as I begin to write this its almost 2:31 am with my gtalk status "waiting " ...LBC "wink wink "is still to log on so you never know till when we will be up..Well we two are not the only culprits..My two dear roomies are even worse.. One is somewhere playing Counterstrike while the other is my DJ for the night ..Night was beautiful till the last song "Chaudvi ka chand ho ..yah aftaab ho ..jo bhi ho khuda ki kasam lajawab ho ..uummmm..feel like humming it all night ..and then a change in the mood ..add some pep to it "Apni toh jaise taise ..thodi aise ya waise ..Amitabh 's classic .. " Poison..Led Zeppelin ..John Denver ..All the flavors for the night the whole night long ..!! Isn't it amazing when at home life retreats back to the bedroom maximum by 11:30 pm ..Institutes like these nurture some real night hawks for the future ..Hey change in song ..love you DJ .."choo lene toh najuk hoton ko..kuch aur nahin jaam hain yeh .."
That daily cup of coffee at 3am .. All gratitude to the daring Nescafe walla..Those groogy eyes all the day..10 minute so called power naps all day ..are all an outcome of these ghastly routines..
Well I know if my parents or relatives read this ..A good scolding is on its way the very next day .. But well isn't this the best parts of being on the campus..I remember atleast a dozen movies that I have myself started seeing at say 3am ... Latest being Om Shanti Om..Well must say it was not worth the efforts ...
When late nights are being discussed ..2 very important "events " are being missed..
The Bihari gang card game ..(28\29)..which has given us the elusive Sunday's Breakfast..Ofocurse if you are up all night playing cards and realize only at 7am that its time to pack up ..Then you are bound to hit the mess sharp at 7:30am..
And the one is perhaps not at all my favorite ...in NIT Lingo "night outs" before exams..I simply hate them ..because perhaps they are the only one's where I actually start feeling sleepy..Urrggss..I hate them..
well its 2:54now and things have drastically changed..My DJ has gone mad " tang karne ka tuse nata hai gujaria ...kaun disha mein le ke chala hai baturia " thats playing in my room..LBC is no where to be found ...Even this laptop is hating me for keeping it "awake " till 2:57 am..Looks like it time when yours truly night hawk hits his bed.. I beg your pardon..Sleeps.After all hitting the sack and sleeping are two altogether different processes..In the true words of a mathematician "two independent events .." Wait wait wait twist in the tale ..my Counter Strike freak friend is back in the room and what else could have wished for at sharp 3am ..A nice home made ladoo..
And his PC is being booted in the meanwhile ..So looks like for AD-105 in Dhauladhar Hostel its still not time to hang the boots ,well quite literally I must say ..
Looks like LBC has plans for me ..Boy You have got timing ..May you live a 1000 years .As I was in the middle of the above sentence mentioning the great LBC.The phone rang and who else but the great LBC was on phone ..!! .So adios people..Good night ..Well Good morning would be more pleasant at 3:37 am..

Nano-ing It..!!

As I write this I am in the Lunch Break of a National Symposium being held at NIT ... An enthusiastic first session was enough to bring the blogger in me to the fore..
The first speaker of day Mr.Murthy ..oops Murty ..( as he said that if you include the "H" ..The reference will be to a CSE deptt professor at IIT-Madras ,his workplace..)..I really liked the way he fragmented his presentation smoothly ...Anyways the topic on the floor was Nano-technology..How everything can be "nanoed" down to a very small particle ..I really liked the way he introduced himself after he was introduced by the emcee .He said---- "Newton once said "I stand on the shoulders of the giants and from there I see the world from a new point of view..Therefore to call me a genius would be a mistake .All that I do is to add that small delta X to the already defined quantity ..Just that " " ..Anyways the way nano tech was made simple was impressive..How would it sound if you could reduce the Supercomputer down to a size of a small cube and yet as powerful as a billion laptops.. And how would it sound if the motherboard of your computers were floating in a liquid to reduce the heat generation ..And well how would it sound if people wore self cleansing shirts .. Urrgsss .. Anyways Nanotech ..in this period of metamorphosis of technology... seems like the next big thing..with an expected annual budget of 30000 billion dollars in the US by 2020..It is definitely the thing to be.. India too are making rapid strides..However a Civil Engineer in me now begins to bang its head in desperation "When I am trying to make the Biggest dams... the longest bridges..tallest towers ..these Nano technicians are spending mind boggling amounts on Nanoing everything around them.." How small is actually small ..A nanometer is approximately 10 raise to the power -9 metres..40000th part of the hair thickness....However minus-ing the techinical aspects its a great field to work on..It did ring bells in my ear at least when he mentioned "Nano-cement" and self cleaning glasses for skyscrapers .. and how the lotus leaf's mechanism of shrugging off the water droplets are being utilized to make self cleansing materials using nanotechnology...
So as somebody once said "There is a lot of room at the bottom "..

Eastward Ho !!! Are we Ready..!!

A raging bull at the market .. Sensex on an all time high.. Ever increasing foreign investment... World's 4th richest man's home ..! Indian Bank Shares prices rising each day(wink wink ).More and more NRIs returning home .Are we not seeing a reversal in trend..But are we really ready to take it all this growth in such a minuscule period of time ..China and India are considered to be the place to be for any sector in the coming time...
Seeing the rupee being on an all time high might sound a great news to all laymen but for some industries its more of a "nightmare ".Gosh Rupee going stronger a nightmare!!! Ask the BPOs..their are almost sensing a rough time ahead..
Anyways thats for the Big Shots to discuss ..Where my thought process is headed are very basic questions that probably would nag any NIT\IIT student at this stage of his career."Whats for me ?" .
A jump to the west when all the happenings are here in my own home land or take up the challenge and make a mark here..Well I shall leave these decisions to the pundits ...By pundits I dont mean those "Poor Parrot " dependent sick pundits ..But rather the more experienced genre of engineers ... hey that reminds me of my earlier post "To be or not to be ..that is the question "... Eastward Ho..Am I taking my decisions correctly..Am I ready ??That is the question..

They always play blind...

They are the people who are perhaps the most influential in a child's life and beyond..when we are to our teens to most of us they are more of a strict school nut headed professor.. and when we reach our adulthood they are treated like "burdens"...even today hardly 1% elderly parents get the treatment that they actually deserve...
Funny is the fact that world is a damn round place .. what goes around comes around.. almost all parents go far beyond their imagination and perhaps capacity to give their children the best of just everything..regardless of what they get in return.. infact they put their entire life on a gambling table and hope that someday their offsprings give them the happiness that they truly deserved in their hay days.
My parents sent me to the best boarding school in this country ..Never cared where would the money to pay "ghastly " amounts of school fees would come from .... No business tycoons no media giants ..just simple middle class parents having a dream in their eyes and a hope in their heart.. Now that I am in NIT the onus is on me ..What I give them in return for all the blinds that they have played ... do I manage to be the Ace of Spades or just another card in the pack..They always play it blind .Don't they..

She is like a dream..!!!

In this journey through the hills..I found a companion in Jan 2002 and life has never been the same again ..
Blogs are too small a space to write her all down .. Funny how we suddenly find the sunsets and the sunrises a little more beautiful than the usual and ofcourse add to that the very Romanticism of being with your beloved holding hands and how suddenly you say "Now I realize why god made gaps between my fingers so that yours can fit into mine " ..ooohhh ..i love this one..
The ever rising phone bills..the very adventurous me that has evolved in these almost 6 years..
for all that she had made of me .. I bow down humbly in respect and gratitude ... I am what you have made of me ..
There are friends and then there are some more friends but amongst all of them you find one person who stays in the background always and yet be the one that really matters..The one that walks in when the whole world walks out... The one whose hands who hold tightly when you are afraid..the one whose name comes first to your lips when a bee stings your feet.. Its a nice feeling deep down your heart when you think ..I have at least tried to make that one person happy in my life ... when you might unintentionally hurt a thousand others ... She is no more a person she is a feeling ..an epitome of beauty and grace .. for once this tiger would be on his knees to propose to this lady ... I have promise to keep .... I am ... You...

To be or not to be....

That is the question..ringing some bells down all the ears..!!
to be an engineer or to be a doctor that is the question..
to be a topper @ sports or a race to the first spot in class..
To marry or not to marry ....
To propose the girl you always admire or to wait for some more time..
To pursue the career of your choice or what your parents want..
Isn't it funny that just one Shakespearian line almost effects every single decision of our life..
Few years back I remember asking my uncle very well settled in his sphere in Virginia .. Uncle Was it a good decision moving abroad after a Btech degree from IIT..Dont you miss home and relatives sometime ..To be or not to be .. That is the question..I still am looking for his answer...Funny I must say ..even top exes fail to answer simple straight forward questions..
For the last few days I have been trying for an internship in an US company ...
Same question has been banging my head ever since..To be or not to be..
To take the easier way through and do an intern from any of the 1000's companies here or try the difficult way out..!!
tough na ..
few days back i was going through my same uncle's blog ..he said his companies are seeing India as a major prospect for the future..Now tell me what should i call it .. I can happily announce it as a sweet step closer home..
I know India is doing it strides and inching closer to what can be called a major industry boom..Construction companies are ruling the roost .Finally Civil Engg is back in fray ... But still to be or not to be.. a civil engineer..that is the question..

A Journey through the hills !!

Okie.....my first blog.!first question that anyone would ask is "why journey through the hills" ...10 years my friend 10 years in hills ...no joke..!!! 7 years in St.George's College Mussoorie followed by now 3rd year running in National Institute of Technology..
So well my love for the hills refuses to die down..!!
Every time i travel home from here ..."Home " ... dont forget the word..!! just that in the last 10-11 years i can count number of days i might have spent at home can be counted on my fingers..I look at the vast mountains and realize well they are like my second home !!
Anyways life has been wonderful to me ..given me so much variety so much spice..
Meeting new people almost daily ...copying assignments(Cut copy paste work ) ...doing those last night fights ..Life in NIT is rocking man..!! and well life beyond NIT is even better.wink wink..!!
But behind all this lies a guy ..who from the shadowy corners of Patna has come to this place ..Seen a lot of turmoil..all around..
But even today when I see a Bihari speaking guy or some old bhojpuri classic my heart runs out to him..
My girlfriend perhaps has seen me perform late night dubious bhojpuri songs .. She would perhaps kill me for that..!!:)
3semester more to go..A lot of work to be done ... A lot of promises to be kept ...!! Loaded with dream ..my eyes still long to be back home someday..though my definition of home has chnaged a bit ..

I Will Be Back....