Suicidal Engineering

People say, “When Engineers play, the world sees a revolutionary way”. I concur. Most of you would agree. But how do these Engineers play. A burning question, do they even play?

Like every day as we assemble in the Mausi (read: tea-shop), even today we did. But unlike other days when our center of discussion were ranging in a very narrow bandwidth of Start-ups to internships. Today we had a sad story in store. A dear friend of ours had left us forever. Although none of us had seen him earlier, neither of us could trace who he was. But he was someone within our family our very own NIT family. For the administration, he did commit suicide. And the best here I can do, I mourn for the departed soul. May his soul rest in peace!

Does the story end here? It has been 29 months since I came into engineering and this was the 6^th condolence meeting I was in. I was sobbing while in the condolence. How these suicides and deaths have become the run-of-the-mill for the engineering institutes. After all where is the flaw? The administration obviously can’t evade, it is to be blamed. But is it only the administration which is to be blamed? Aren’t we also responsible to an extent? People jump from the fifth floor just because they failed in love. Can you imagine more stupid reason for a suicide? Agreed, I’m not the right person to comment on love and valentine. But suicide isn’t sublime.

And strikingly, more reputed the institute, more suicide cases buzz. Students are stressed with the curriculum unreasonably. And the ones who attempt suicide are a subset of the union of the two mutually exclusive sets.

Set 1:

Students who aren’t endowed with extra ordinary intelligence. (I personally believe, talent can never be nurtured, it is always god-gifted) This type of students are either in Engineering because, the government treats them as their son-in-law and reserves seats for them or because they couldn’t think of any other career option after class XII and iteratively tried for Engineering exam and made it somehow after ‘n’ number of attempts.

Set 2:

Students who are endowed with intelligence but they don’t have faith in their intelligence. Rather they prefer working hard which brings them among the elite in terms of GPA. Even if you burn the midnight oil in Engineering, you can’t be satisfied being second to any XYZ. And if it becomes repetitive the bad consequences start popping. Had they kept faith on their intelligence and would have done smart work instead of working hard, they would have never been in the elite group but would have done fairly well and been above average.

There is another set of students, the Set 3:

These students are in engineering not because they are super talented but because they are lucky to have affluent fathers. Any engineering college can be their dream alma mater they just need to throw in some cash. This set of students unlike the previous two, doesn’t bother about GPA and so is rarely stressed. But a fair part of this set goes insane, when it comes to love and valentine. And a few cases of suicide do come out of this flock, but the reasons are different, for their father’s would have thought, Engineering was not their cup of tea. These students would have done miracles in the domains they loved.

Fortunately, IITs and NITs are devoid of such set 3 students. Had they been not, maybe I would have attended few more condolence meetings.

WAKE UP PARENTS !

Don’t be so obsessed with Engineering. Stop saying to your children, “ Beta Engineering Entrance me to baith hi jana”. There is no dearth of lucrative career options. Just put yourselves in your children’s shoes and see the world. The world would look better and brighter.

image courtesy: greenbd.info

The Shift . . .

The excerpt that follows may sound a little trendy as you find in autobiographies but is apt sans any exaggeration. I recall the shattered face of that lady who rented me a room in her flat in Kota for two years for my engineering entrance preparation, when i first uttered that I am a Bihari after a fair deal of finalising the room for a couple of thousand bucks a month. She was like, 'oh my god, Bihari !! My goodness , what if you use my ally to shit.' I ain't expecting any cheap laugh at this point. I guess, even she doubted if i would rape her daughter. This was sad but it was moronic on my part that I couldn't blame her for this after my worst possible insult.
If you remember the movie, 'Ye Mera India'. There is a still in which Rajpal Yadav arrives at the Mumbai CST and begs for job to a beggar over there. And even that beggar kicks him saying,

"Go back to Bihar, you Biharis come and pollute Mumbai."

In the same movie, the Mumbai traffic police stops a car walla just because he doubted him to be a Bihari, because his audio player was rhythming at

'Main aayi hun UP Bihar Lootne'.

Though I liked the movie, its very sad for me and the Bihari community (which I never endorse as such) that our conditions have been a source of inspiration for such movies. Aweful ! Yesterday when I was searching for the nearest Subway outlet in Patna on subway locator, you couldn't imagine it was in Durgapur (West Bengal). What is, that made Subway to prefer Durgapur over Patna ? Not a single Subway in entire Bihar. Even, I bet if some one has travelled entire India except one state, that one would be Bihar !

But then, There's a paradigm shift . . .

Today, contrastingly, if any leading firm wishes to expand its span, the first state it travels is Bihar. Untill recently there was not a single Shopping Mall in the state capital, but today there are a plenty of and a dozen under construction. A single man makes up the majority if god is with him.

Imagine the case when thousand men will be having thousand respective gods with them, and thus they will be making up thousands of majorities. Won't they bring about the change thousand times as Bihar had recently. I say, crap the thousand deal, just 28 + 7 of them are enough. But, the question arises, who should they be ? I have laid down three criteria:

1. He should not be even a distant kin of Mr. Karunanidhi.

2. He should not be a PhD holder from any of the Bihar Universities during 1990-2005 (The infamous Lalu Kingdom).The degress were all fake.

3. He should not be an Anti-Hindu Muslim or an Anti-Muslim Hindu.

Just these three criteria make up the things. Apart from this if he happens to be an Engineering student or in a case any graduate from any reputed institute is all enough to flagshipize the Indian Glory. Why did I say engineering student and how do I define a reputed institute ? I will come to it in a while. At this point, I say,the power and the enthusiasm the youth possess is incomparable. You can't expect a septuagenerian Prime Minister with a bye pass surgery done to handle the Onion Price, check the Naxalite attacks, Scrutinize the corrupt cabinet ministers, attend the G-20 summit, fight for the permanent membership in UN security council and to deliver the convocation addresses in Universities all in one stretch. It's is simply impossible.

India now needs people like me and you who has education, who knows the societal set-up of rural India and also has been an intimate denizen of the breeding mall culture. The person who can sip his morning coffee in the Starbucks and while on the way to his uncle's place, can also stop by 'amar dhaba' and can have his Gold Flake. Such a versatile personality is all what Indian politics lacks as on date. The Indian Politics is corrupt. Young people should survey out the society. Their needs should be properly analysed. A proper frame work has to be made. And then youth should launch their campaigns in accordance. The honesty, the dire to work hard, and the thirst to see India developed is at its trough in the 35% young enthusiasts of our nation. Just put the onus on us and see the miracle in a decade.

For God's sake, if I become the cabinet minister then, will drive straight to Kota just after the oath and will kill Mrs. M.L Sharma in my first agenda. And then the drive to flagshipise India will take precedence over even extra marital affairs.

I'm waiting for the day when Bhartiya Janta Party will come to NIT Rourkela for recruitments. Just they need to drop in a mail to the Training and Placement cell. A pick -up to the airport will be sent for sure.

Image Courtesy: http://churumuri.wordpress.com/2011/05/