from a bitsians diary

Its all new

bitsian — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:22:00 +0000

As I always say, my last sem was the best on campus. For the first time in three years, I could find friends who thought on similar lines when coming to living those three days of extreme enthusiasm – the festivals. Apart from that, being in the organizing team of our sports fest, left me with more wonderful experiences than one. While I go on this way, the optimist and the enthusiast in me come, slap the blabbermouth and say… the next is gonna be better, if only you stop thinking of the past !

My perception that the semester started off on a good note ended soon, days after it actually began. One reason has to be the courses and the other, the most important, I would not want to discuss here. The electronics courses luckily turned my mind away from this diversion in their own way and other good things also happened. Grins that lasted from east till the west were shadowed by those unseen long hours of deep thinking and remorse.

Of the good things, that happened comes the course structure and the mess. The change in the former was good and the next… ‘awesome’. I also resumed my habit of writing a diary- after almost ten years. It was a pain studying with the super-stud junior kids and in the midst of those absolutely jobless (sad, but now in the true sense !)…the mono major fourthies. A couple of new and never-before stuff happened as well this semester, that left me in a daze… as in where we are leading the juniors ! the campus student council elections marked a tie between a presidential candidate and none of the above. The first in the history of bits-pilani did give a chance for the students to rethink their motives. Weeks later, another never-before, a fourth year student became the head of the student council. Waves shifted to the first semester, implies a major shift in concentration of work to the first semester. In under a fifty days, the campus showed us loads of surprises. But never had I expected something like this – a fifteen day break due to the outbreak of Jaundice and Hepatitis A. The whole semester plan shifted by almost ten days.

So, have I really liked the change? The answer would be no. Despite my new found interest in change, I quite disliked it in this regard. The mid-sem break, though left us with more holidays than before, will eat up the december vacation which gives us the necessary freshness to start over again. With completely new neighbours, it was another story. Not that they were bad, but it took me quite a long time to gel. Never thought, I would miss my PS friends so much ! …and the thought that the next is going to be worse, sinks me down. Above all this, I recently developed an illness of overthinking owing to my experiments with human relationships. With just under three months to end this semester, I hope the rest would make up for the mess that already happened.

Its time to cheer myself up and get ready for the return journey !… keep thinking, till then.

5 done and counting

bitsian — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 19:11:30 +0000

3-1 goes into my life’s album as something very very memorable and i have a host of reasons –new friends, involving courses, farewell and the most important of all – that which changed my outlook to life .

After a paltry fourth semester, I vowed to be sensible in my division of time for academics and else. To be satisfied with what you’re doing..its very important you love it. ..and the most important part is to develop a keen interest in what you are doing and its only then, you’ll be able to love it. It took me quite sometime to realize this and half my semester was over by then. It was the way my preparation for comprehensives shaped out, that really interested me (though I never felt the change while implementing it )…do not over strain yourselves preparing whole of the course, what’s more important is how much you have learned from whatever you’ve read (be it little …its no mistake) .. i have a feeling that knowing something is pointless unless you can apply it in life. Be confident on your opinions and ideas but see that you have space for others’ view as well. This change in my mindset… owe it to my alma matter..the wonderful place that taught me so much. From being a pessimist, who never even read the questions in an examination paper fearing that something he doesn’t know ahead would take away his confidence to someone who tries to link that up with what’s around him when sitting idle in that very exam hall … there has been a tremendous change ….and no one can better explain it than me in person. One important notion that became inherent in my thought process was ‘think only of what you are doing now and not its result.. Added to this i had a couple of involving courses after a long while .. making it more enjoyable. The minors were ‘okay’ish but the comprehensives imbibed a sense of confidence in me as they progressed and that was something i always wished had happened to me .

Complementing the serious part..i made some really wonderful friends, who actually showed the missing spice of my life. As it was the beginning of the last year with a lot of friends and quite a few really lovely seniors…thought to make the most of it. I joined my friends more frequently in their errands to Vasco – the closest place to the campus for some good food and fun. But, the best evening till date while at school was our farewell bidding to a few truly supportive seniors. An amazing evening..about 15 of us went to Pentagon – a restaurant kinda thing near some beach (the name of which i don’t remember ). Tasted all kinda possible vegetarian …n i truly loved it ..i still remember those yummy cheese balls and single spoon trials . That evening reminded me there’s only an year more for most of us at the campus to graduate and days seemed to pass at supersonic speeds. ..and that is all i remember about the memorable last day of sem 5.

My journey back home started at dawn the next day. I had more fun this time than ever even while travelling….i somehow enjoyed the five hour pause at Guntakal unlike before ..thanks to sindhu and co who stopped me from being idle. Reached Hyderabad early in the morning …there was a big grin, from deep inside my heart for it had cached more memories for the future in these six months than all those before… put together.

/* this might be rather uninteresting unless you know me very well */

Zimbabwe – redefining inflation

bitsian — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:28:25 +0000

With the fuel prices sky rocketing and the prices of all regular commodities at their all time high’s, many people started thinking of what they have read of a long back while at school – inflation. I always thought it was some other stuff like democracy that exists only in the books, but now has proved itself not to be. The common Indian man has started facing the wrath of inflation with the rate hitting a 12 percent. Gasoline which now costs about 57 rupees a liter along side the soaring costs of liquefied petroleum played a prime role in such an uncontrollable rise. When the indian government, a collection of some of the finest economic gurus in the world like Mr Chidambaram, Dr. Manmohan Singh who successfully handled such adverse situations more than a decade ago, couldn’t stop it, think of the poor African nations which do not have a proper governance, no law, no health care system and absolute poverty. Yeah, the results are clear with a mammoth inflation rate, outbreak of famines, shortened life spans and dignified living just a dream. Imagine a place where you need to carry a billion dollars in local currency for a loaf of bread, its not a stupid fantasy, the real life situation in Zimbabwe.

Overthrowing the white Rhodesian government, Robert Mugabe more than thirty years ago paved way for the situation in Zimbabwe now as per many economists. Despite Mugabe stepping down, what actually started during his regime did not come to a halt. The result is a claimed 2.2 million percent inflation rate by the government ( the experts say it is over a 20million percent). Imagine the plight of people living there when we are lamenting a 10 percent increase in inflation. One lesson, everyone needs to learn from the Zimbabwean situation is not to misuse or waste the cultivable land and resources. The produce of every good is in a deficit, but it makes no difference as the people are not in a situation to buy them. Every shop is filled with commodities, but no one to actually buy them. With the value of a Zimbabwean dollar as per estimates, decreasing at over a 5 percent every day, people find it wise to invest in some food rather than in banks which offer a 5-10 percent annual rate of interest. The central bank has issued a $50bn note to ease the woes of its people who were forced to carry leaps of notes for everything. The value of the Zimbabwean dollar has gone down to a level that about a $100bn equals a 36 pence (0.36 British pound).

Exchange of foreign currency in the country is also limited to a few higher officials at about $30000 per USD. Parallel exchange rate stands at more than a $270bn as per the Guardian report.

Click the link below for more on the issue

The Guardian – an article on Zimbabwean inflation

Some of my Adobe PS creations

bitsian — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 16:22:11 +0000

A portrayal of some of my favorite time killing works.

If you find any of these interesting, please don’t mine dropping your e-mail id in the comments section.

conflicting ideas

bitsian — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:02:07 +0000

everytime i pass the busy streets of secunderabad, i notice a pain gripping my head. In the midst of the modern man passing swiftly for his routine work, lurk the physically challenged and some elderly eagerly looking for people to donate them some coins. This gets more painful when, kids of my age (probably younger than me) who should be in a school studying, take the responsibility of feeding themselves and their family. A rather immature thought in my mind asks a question- why does the world that has so much wealth, that has many dont know how to spend the piling notes, trigger those children who at such an age bear the pain of a life time. A more practical reason for the situation that comes in everyones mind would be the economic disparities.n.

The other day,when i got down a bus ..it was a blazing summer in hyderabad, my eyes were searching for some nearby bakery where i can go quench my thirst. luckily i found something close and the moment i was about to get into the shop, a young girl in rags was looking at me. I then lost the thought of going in, when my eyes couldnt reply to the plain eyes of the staring kid. I left the place wid my brain storming in the hot sun.

I’ve encountered such situations a hell lot of times, and everytime my thoughts get sluggish looking for an answer. Whenever possible, i give a helping hand as there’s nothing wrong in helping a challenged or an old person and the single pie i give him will not effect my wealth. But why support someone if the person is capable of working but is not doing just for the cause he is getting money by being idle? Its nothing but supporting a person for no cause and further encouraging him to pursue begging. Those children urging for money should be put in the schools aided by the govt that support who have no one to look after them by providing food, shelter and education. Ofcourse a common scenario is a part of the process- many parents donot want to forego the income their children fetch for them by putting them in schools. This very reason is responsible for practices like child labour and all still persisting in the economy.

So everyone who lament not having an air conditioning at work, or while waiting for a bus that is late by some ten mins, remember the fact that lives of tens of millions of people are worse not momentarily but all the while.

Thanks Divesh for ur help regards the post as wellas for supporting my thoughts

Quark 08-Engineering Perfection

bitsian — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 17:16:29 +0000

Quark 07 was the first technical festival of bits-pilani goa. The festival was not up to the expectations of many students for they wanted something as flashy as waves again. Quark happened only a week after waves and this did serve as a reason for the not so enthusiastic quark 07.

Having studied the reasons for failure, the orgC of quark 08 began their work months in advance. The mistake was not repeated – gap between quark and waves was a decent 30 days this time and quark happened earlier. Care was also taken to keep the teams for both the events as disjoint as possible. Division was done more professionally with more care and every department that was involved in the event tried their best. The result was evident- abt a 1.3 million sponsorship amount, an outstation participation of 400 students and more than registrations. Quark 08 showed that technical festivals can also be entertaining. rohan and bhiday came up with a software that took care of every participant’s complete data reducing the woes at the registration desk as well as providing necessary information whenever necessary? the total number of registrations for the events ended at a 4300..a very good participation for a technical event in an infant college like BPGC. An awesome work by the information management team that communicated for more than four months with the students and answered their queries, the publicity team that looked into the registrations and sending posters to good colleges in major citieslike bangalore, hyderabad, mumbai, chennai, the spons who garnered a very respectable amount, all the assocs who worked for the betterment of their events led to the glory. The performance by the mime club was decent on the second day but was shadowed by the breath taking performance of the jugglers from the London “Feeding the fish”. The standing ovation by everyone inside the auditorium after the show just gives a glimpse of their perfection.

the magical jugglers in action

Three workshops were a part of the three day event- aeromodelling, origami and telescope making . Stalls by major companies like Bosch, nVidia, Schlumberger, Reuters adored the library and the venues. Quark merchandise also was everywhere during the event- from notepads and pens to tshirts. The airshow was a great treat to the eyes. The gaps in between the events were covered by informals where akhil, pranshu, prateek and co did a wonderful job.

The result was the fantastic quark 08 whose team was congratulated by many participants from other colleges via mails, calls and appreciation through blogs . At the end of the day,i only had one thing in mind, the caption would have been more apt, had it been redefining perfection rather than engineering perfection.

Reservations- my idea

bitsian — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 03:05:53 +0000

When i first heard of this issue, i was surprised..really surprised, why for the cause of a parasitic ancient social practice,the govt is inversely trying to do justice now?? Its been over seven years since i first heard of it, n me being a kid,i couldn’t get my concentration off it for a while. Years after facing this system, i got used to it because, i know the society will not change. I am against the very policy of casteism and feel every human is equal. No one has the right to treat the other person inferior. According to me, the government should concentrate more on eradicating this system rather than trying to encourage and support the oppressed. This will for sure create a society where every individual is equal..i know this is not as simple as i’m speaking, but can be achieved by the generations to come if we plant the seeds for such a society.
Reservations which were intended to decrease the separation between the ancient indian upper and lower castes have not very successfully worked for the cause. Had this been followed well, the reservations in india would have ended decades ago as initially thought of by Dr Ambedkar. Todays world obviously has less disparity between the so called classes. The reservations in the modern world have no other result than reminding a person which caste he belongs to and in this process do humiliate the people from the so called backward castes by reserving them seats at every level of their life and reminding them that they are from an oppressed class. Why in a democratic india do we need reservations when all the people are equal in terms of right, talent and freedom. Personally i’ve noticed all my friends equally talented, whatever be their caste or creed or religion. This puts the life of a middle class average student in jeopardy. he can neither get a good institution to study( where the entrance to almost all educational institutions is reserved), nor a good job( the private sector is also victimized now). I agree they tend to decrease the disparity, but what the hell is happening here. Providing reservations at multiple levels is negatively working on the target here.
The reservations to the so called backward castes should be provided at their primary level so that by the time they reach grad, they can get into the world full of opportunities where they are on par with their peers.
not more than a week ago, i read an article where the government issued a notice saying that the posts of faculty in the IIT’s will also be reserved from now on..wtf . The deans of almost all the IIT’s were shocked at the decision and had the same opinion that it will decrease the quality of education in the renowned institutes.. This ofcourse is not a relevant subject to the issue, but my point is the government instead of trying to solve the issue is further intensifying the situation and taking decisions not so noble that degrade the meaning of quality indian education.
whenever i think of the issue,i feel rather happy for studying in a college that selects students based on merit and not on anything else( its ofcourse one of its kind in the country). Cheers to the institute that didnt agree to the unjust ideas of the rulers and also to the many bitsians who were ready to study in the midst of better students rather than better facilities (which the college would have got from the grants of the commission had they agreed to their reservation norms).

Waves 07- the urban chaos

bitsian — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:08:18 +0000

Waves -07 was famous as the biggest cultural festival in the party state of goa. But from my point of view it is more important as a festival that transformed the mindsets of many individuals who beleived bits pilani goa as any other ordinary engineering institute but with the birla tag, to something thats as capable as its sibling- the pilani campus. The three day cultural extravaganza was a show case of the hard work of hundreds of bitsians for more than a ninety days. Stages were set up behind the administrative B-wing plaza besides the lecture halls and the amazingly big state-of-the art auditorium. I was a junior then and was very interested in contributing my best for the biggest event of bpgc. The whole event was organized decently well, with the work being distributed and coordinated by different committes. I was involved in putting up the publicity material inside the campus. It was almost 1 in the night the day before waves (we needed special permissions to stay outside our hostel). The inaugural ceremony of waves 07 goes as a fond memory into the pages of my life. The whole campus was filled with the enthusiastic students who flocked the stages. Never a dull moment in the whole three days. My day was filled with covering the event, managing the venues, helping the students of other colleges through the routes( they were envious of the fact that we stayed in such a beautiful campus ). The evenings had head banging rock shows that echoed every corner of the campus. The fire wallz- students in charge of the campus security worked their asses out through out the event and really deserved a pat. The organizing committee, sponsorship committee, the publicity committee, the department of backstage, the department of photography, basically all the clubs in the campus tried to be impeccable as far as their work was concerned and have contributed in their own way to the grand success of waves 07. DJ Sasha’s special nite on day 2 was awesome which made even guys completely exhausted tap their feet to the trance. Bhayanak maut and Half step down were good as usual. Rock bands from goa gave some of their best performances infront of the B-wing dome during the event. One event of waves 07 that jampacked the auditorium and enthralled the audience was Mr n Ms Waves. The timely comments by Prakhar made the three thousand people laugh their hearts content on the evening of third day( He did get a hug from the gorgeous Vanessa- Ms Waves 07 for that ofcourse ). The whole day work and in sufficient sleeps made us completely tired, believe me..i did sleep once infront of 15000 watts of music :0 . All the pain the bitsians had put in the previous three months had its fruit then in the form of the stupendous Waves -07.

a sense of accomplishment

bitsian — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:41:41 +0000

three minutes ago i was watching the tv with my eyes searching for something interesting..yeah i was lucky.. really lucky. i found the CNN-IBN’s programme on the best educational institutions in the country. I was eagerly waiting for the turn of engineering colleges, and as the turn came, only the first five were mentioned, IIT-the name was echoing. I was sad as only the top five were mentioned and my fingers involuntarily were fondling the remote to change the channel..then came the discussion of the top private engineering colleges in the country. Obviously as expected BITS PILANI was declared the uncrowned king of the category. The introduction began with ” think of a place where you dont have attendance, where you can choose your own courses, where you can select who is going to teach you…yeah it is the birla institute of technology and science, pilani. This college started 45 years ago and since then is the pioneer…..” and it goes on for a three minutes. I cant write of the excitement that gushed out of me with tonnes of torque..a special feeling only a bitsian can have. Lucky chaps, all my friends from goa doing their ps at CEERI Pilani covered the screen with a grin on their glowing faces..sourabh, leela, kasliwal..hmm

cheers to the college that always makes us proud.

i wish all those parents who were askin me whether its worth sending their son,daughter to bits pilani would see this

test blog using scribefire

bitsian — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 08:46:55 +0000

while searching for some impressive blogging tools, i found scribefire. So thought, why not give a tryyy?
scribefire download