Bye Bye CSC

Sometimes life gives you the finger and sometimes it gives you a gift also. Desire rather than reason governed human behavior has helped me to achieve a short term goal.

I resigned from CSC on 14th April, on auspicious Tamil New Year. Why ? I have been selected for admission to two year full time Programme for Postgraduate Diploma in Rural Management, 2011-2013 at XIMB (Bhubaneshwar). So dream of going for rural management course will be completed in XIMB, not in IRMA. Anyways, first step taken for a long term.

The era of self confinement is nearly over. This tranquil solitude has helped me to develop vigorous individuality.  I learn that : 1) Never evaluate one's success through the standards set by others. 2) Transparent character melts distrust. 3) Be alert with the trap of self persuasion.

Engineers are considered as the individuals whose ideas and expertise made possible technology-based economic output. Engineering field is quite a finished business now. The era of Mechanical Engineer by degree and Information Security Engineer by job is over. I will add little social perspective to this management programme in further studies now on.

Knowing my limit as mediocre, I will push the boundaries and extend my creative instinct. I have shortcomings that I lack the courage to be real soldier or real dissident. So will do best this time in the college now.

Thanks to Varun Grover for his tip that Irreverence will take you further than you can imagine. That was a advise that I ignored first. But finding it much true day by day.

Changing Times

A Day Trip to My Alma Mater : One of the best memoir and evaluation done by alumni on IIT system.

The Disadvantages of an Elite Education : Our best universities have forgotten that the reason they exist is to make minds, not careers. - By William Deresiewicz

what do *you* want to do?! -- Author points correctly that forget science, everyone should be prioritizing their activities and asking themselves - is this *really* something *I* want to do?!

Amusing Ourselves To Death : PBH: Huxley Vs. Orwell: Infinite Distractions Or Government Oppression?

My Wishlist of Reading : Yayaver on Flipkart

Reality is both good and bad depending on our view. Torture, suicide and terrorism are the three blind mice of our era with no one knowing clearly which of them is leading us astray. And all of them are born out of religion. They have played a major role in the grisly battle between terror and retribution. Similarly, prostitution is only product of repressed sexuality and marriage without love.

What happens in the initiative of an individual to change society ? First people will ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they feel insulted and fight you, then you win.

Graveyard is a place is full of people who thought that the world can’t do without them. But the world goes on with new ideas and lives. It will go without me also. The black sheep was waiting for turning into suddenly the dark horse. The ambition disappeared and with that black sheep will remain true to its natural form.

Fierce critical interrogation is sometimes the only practice that can pierce the wall of denial consumers of images construct so as not to face that the real world of image-making is political - that politics of domination inform the way the vast majority of images we consume are constructed and marketed.

Udaan to Infinity and Beyond

Udaan is touching chords of nostalgia of growing up amongst adults and charming the young with hope in the eyes. The undecisive youth wants time and emotional support to pursue his/her dream career. Udaan is going to be more than teenage success in coming years, a benchmark for coming of the age film. Udaan is going to be our own The Catcher in the Rye, an expression for the teen angst.

Udaan was selected in the competitive section in the prestigious Cannes film festival. And the mainstream media and bollywood reaction: silence. Unforgivable! Such efforts need encouragement in an early stages so that Udaan could have good outreach to global audience. Mainstream media and bollywood fails us in great way. Now, when Amitabh Bachan likes the movie, everybody is hailing it as masterpiece. Udaan is a cinema based on real life and that has touched us in our lives. And people must watch it as its the voice and angst of mature teenager. I find ~uh~™ 's review enchanting and rational to support my view :

At 17, most people don’t know what they want to do with their lives. At 35, most people realize that they should have done something which they loved to do at 17. The rest, just a handful, takes a path of their choice. Udaan is about realizing that choice in life. Though, Udaan is definitely not one of those ‘protagonist is a winner’ tales, but just a hint of the force to win. As they say, an end is always the beginning of something.

Many people raise this question, ‘why should we watch a movie like Udaan and waste our quota for weekend entertainment, which doesn’t solve any problem, but just shows what we already know?’ or ‘ The story did not end properly’. Well, Cinema is a medium of expression by which a writer/ director expresses his feeling, makes a statement and leaves it to the interpretation, acceptance or rejection to the audience. The more real the story is , the difficult is to end it. Is there any ‘ending’ to real life stories ? As Satyajit Ray said – Cinemas of the world were not meant to change a society. The audience is. But Cinema has created sensible audience. What a cinema like Udaan probably does, it uses the language of cinema to educate and inspire many young Rohan’s to take off on the right direction, at the right time.

I don't know about other times. The motivation, self-realisation for energies happens more in company of friends than family these days. Thanks to the Indian family environment that averts risk tendency for more stable and well traveled path. Generally, we often seek jobs for position and prestige, not passion or drive. Our aversion for patronizing good cinema can be well understand by analogy forwarded by Bq on ours attitude towards study of liberal arts : [Source]

"Regarding education in the liberal arts, you have to admit there is a certain class element to those who chose to/are able to pursue serious study in its various fields. For example, someone who is a first generation college student, i.e. first in his/her family to pursue education beyond high school, would much rather choose a ‘safe’ field such as engineering or medicine or aim at clearing the IAS exam, simply because it makes the most economic sense to do so. I would even go so far as to argue that for a country to have a vibrant intellectual environment in the liberal arts, a substantial middle class is pre-requisite; the liberal arts being a more likely choice of perhaps the 2nd or the 3rd generation college student.

I’d imagine something of the sort applies to the US as well if you look at period such as the 60′s, when a new generation not only revolutionized the the popular discourse but also the intellectual one in various disciplines and departments across liberal arts colleges in the US. A generation, I would add, that was considerably better off than the previous one, considering most of them were born in the booming post WWII era. Now whether the second or the third generation born in India post the 1991 reforms demands better avenues for education in the liberal arts remains to be seen."

This movie reaffirms my belief that content is the king. Movies like Udaan are flying high and are capable of taking Indian cinema to infinity and beyond. The perspective of the dreamers are raising and there will always be several flights of 'Hope' in the sky!

Ten Issues - 4

1- Half-life of the Coal Child : Not many know that the dangerous and suffocating rat mines of Meghalaya are worked by 70,000 child miners. Following them into hellish pits, Kunal Majumder exposes the dark veins of an exploitative industry.

2- Glory, piety and politics : With Pakistan’s two main political parties looking exhausted by being made to play a continuous game of cat and mouse with the establishment, the new generation of young Pakistanis began to look elsewhere.

3- A Short History of Rebellion" : TSI discovers that most fade away or come back ‘home’. Some do make history–for better or worse.

4- Interview of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad given to the famous journalist Shorish Kashmiri for a Lahore based Urdu magazine, Chattan, in April 1946.

5- Of grids and groups: An alternative view of "open" and "closed" societies.

6- Over 200,000 Narmada Dam oustees still to be rehabilitated; A crime that goes unpunished for 25 years.

7- Killings of Ahmadis unleashes fresh soul-searching over Pakistan’s identity : The soul-searching is particularly acute given that the suppression of the Ahmadis is officially endorsed by the state.

8- The 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective People : The thing about habits is that for good and bad they require no thinking.

9- Invisible environmentalists : They forage the city, collecting and sorting often hazardous waste when the city sleeps and by day they are gone. Most of them are women and we have no long-term policy in place that looks at their welfare or health, writes Kalpana Sharma.

10- The Great Bhopal Killing : Read here complete history of Disaster.

In Between, Abhishek Singhvi who is the spokesperson of Congress is also the legal representative of DOW Chemicals (the company that purchased Carbide). Not only that, he is also a member of the committee that is supposed to investigate the Bhopal incident. So on the one hand he is an investigator, and on the other, he protects the legal interests of DOW. What a wonderful world !

Thodasa Roomani Ho Jaayen

I have passed 8 months in Hyderabad and it has been pretty average time of my life. Time flies away at least the effortless one. As the title suggest no bullshit today. Just few quick, rough and minor updates supported by the light hearted comments (that too copied from here & there ).

Me and mine home town, Azamgarh has lot of bad fame attached to them. Azamgarh is now nicknamed ‘Aatankgarh’ by a nasty friend of mine. Whenever he pinches me too much on this issue, I sarcastically reply him- " Don't disturb me man as I belong to sleeper cell of terrorist." [ Actually Sleeping heavily in office during night shifts for practice :) ]

Career: Prof Sunil Handa from IIMA quotes: The question we need to ask yourself is “will you be happy with a boring, glorified, clerical job throughout your life?”. Keep questioning, keep improving. I have a hypothesis that MNC just exploit our talent and most important phase of the life (22-30 years) for ours need of quick money to stabilize in the life. The most hindering block in any less traveled path taken is 'acceptance'. Acceptance by society, family, friends and never ending list pile on. However, acceptance comes with time and success. And, parents are not very specific about the choice of career; they only want ours happiness.

Cricket Fever: The campaign of Dhoni's team is over at Champions Trophy. Apoorv Singhal comes up with his ditty on India: "O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The rain saves us the shame of losing two on the run, The port is near, the bells I hear, the Oz horns are blaring, While follow eyes the steady keel, the media grim and daring. I was in staunch support of SA but cheering SA in any tournament feels like staying with a repeatedly unfaithful girlfriend, but the heart overrides the mind. They are bunch of chokers... As for the low crowd attendance at ODI games, who in his right mind would want to be sitting & watching two of the world's top teams competing in a crunch game in the cricket stadium when you could be sitting in a boring office following the cricket on Cricinfo? Getting the point guys ..

Movie Fever: 'Wake Up Sid' would be releasing tomorrow with the them of coming of age movie. There is a dialog in trailer that "come to office for 30 days and the car is yours." One person commented (pun intended) "Lucky us who have to sweat? out for EMI’s and all that stupid stuff :-) " Watch few movies of John Hughes if you are really interested coming of the age drama. He had directed lot of youth oriented films like Ferris Bueller's Day Off (Have seen it 100 times), Breakfast Club and Sixteen candles. He had given voice to the teenage rebel spirit without making them a rebel without a cause.

Now, for upcoming 2nd October remember Mahatma Gandhi who quoted: Be the change you want to see in the world. I have to ask that any of you has been fed up with impossible deadlines and graveyard shifts.. Break away before burnout from the work. Join the protest with the slogan Kaam ka Bamboo, Mat le Shambhu from now on. Chao......

Watch this Offisial Atyachaar..

Introspecting Career

"I am an enthusiast, not an expert."

It took me 23 years 11 months to realise and write this line. Now, this line holds key to my future. I was never involved with full extent in anything in past. I was working as a CATALYST for the process but didn't actively participating in it. Further, this nature prevents me to start anything new as entrepreneur or provide service under hierarchical structure order. What I am able of was to inspire/aspire others for achieving higher goals. So, I have decided to plan my career on this inherent talent. Now on, I will give a talk about my career in casual manner in this post.

A Quote for Self Motivation at Start:  "Don’t meet people who just want to meet you. Do something that makes everyone want to meet you. Make a short that is good enough that no one can ignore.”--Anurag Kashyap

Once upon a time, I met a mechanical engineer working in Delhi metro project. What we majorly talk is irrational here but his one sentence always keep in the mind. He stated that make yourself irreplaceable with gaining expertise in the line of work, otherwise you had wasted a great opportunity in the life. I may not fully agree with him still consider it for introspection purpose in the professional life.

I was more process oriented doing thing step by steps till I entered ITBHU. My thinking changes 180 degree after that. Soon due to carelessness, I came in the category of Engineers for whom: It doesn't matter ki question kya hai, they say bataoo answer kya laana hai. Rest of the account about my graduation years is briefly stated before. Then, I escaped from the core mechanical area after graduation and got job in the I.T. (service sector). Long gone back those days of relaxation and now I have highly monotonous routine of office-home and viceversa. I can describe my life in the words of Anton Chekhov (provided by the furobiker)-: Any idiot can face a crisis, it's day to day living that wears you out.

People who know me are well aware of my fickleness and desperate search for career path. Standing on one leg and balancing other leg may not be my favourite stance but my career progress is like that only. A sort of dissatisfaction from the present and highly aspirational future dream. This parallel career with 'happy go lucky' attitude is taking too much toll on my health with loneliness increasing another psychological problem.

It is my philosophy that our thinking is not best expressed in words. It is expressed in the choices we make up with fully owning responsibility. I have interest in Cinema, Socio-cultural studies, Intellectual Property rights, Composite material, Energy Engineering, Administrative Services, Knowledge Management & Developmental Studies at different span of time-line in last 5 years. Finally after a long run in diverse field, I have started preparing for entrance examination of MBA in rural management.I had previously heavily criticized my fellow batch mates (not all but most of them) for blindly pursuing MBA without even assessing their inherent potential. It may be my prejudice but I think it takes very long time to decide your career shape before investing your time and hard work in it. So, IRMA Anand or XIRM Bhubaneswar are my dream destination. If the dream comes true, I will be abiding technical/software and corporate field forever. Note down that I write this blog without fear of HR & Management which can easily sneak into personal blog in recession times.

There is no right or left for me now...there is only up and down of life.

For the times they are a-changing and I have found something to compete for finally..

A Quote for Self Motivation at End:. “All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.”—T.E.Lawrence