perception

The Year that was: 2010

2010-12-27T13:57:00.013+05:30

3 trips to remember
Beauty of Mountains: Shimla What a break it was indeed, after a grueling schedule of shuttling between Panipat and Delhi. It came as a breather, staying in shimla for 3 days, roaming around like crazy, a great dine and a lil old wine, and all this with 2 of my best friends.

Catch the future: Bhubaneswar: Business at its best. A summit that attracted intellectuals, investors, government bodies and investment seekers- A great recipe for future.

Back to roots: Telanwali After a long time, the whole family was together on the occasion of Diwali. Laughter were left loose again, memory lanes were visited, sweets were on every menu, farmhouse visits, cricket at farmhouse and an unusual guest. All the more fun, all the more folks.

3 Books that left an impression
A Brief History of Time- Stephen Hawkings (Science)
Rich Dad, Poor Dad- Robert T Kiyoski (Business, Finance)
Twilight- Stephenie Meyer (Love Story, drama, Thriller)

3 People who met and are there
Pankaj Chaudhary: My teacher for my CAT prep and now a colleague. Nice to get back in touch with Pankaj. But this time, as a friend, not as a teacher. A great, down to the earth personality with expertise knowledge in his area. We are jelling well with lots of fun around.

Mr Ramachander, T.I.M.E. Delhi A very creative, helpful person. Played a big time role in setting up my business. BTW yet to meet him in person.

Tanvi ‘cutie pie’: Friendly, tension free, ready to jump for new things and a girl with unparallel devotion to her work. You will never feel bored in her company. A good friend.
An extended list
My Christmas Gift: Too early to comment anything.

3 incidents that still scare me
Brand Factory: Bought a new T-shirt from a mall and was wearing it for the first time. A few praises and a few likings. But this girl (a friend of mine with whom I just started spending some time) had no effect of this t-shirt. It became a routine wear. And then suddenly one day, when I was wearing this T-shirt for nth time, the small logo which was hidden near cuff area was visible. “PUMA, Oh my god. Wow. Nice T-shirt yaar” screams the girl. Last time I met the brand factory.

Finals of Badminton
Intra College Badminton championship was going on. I was playing really well and semi-finals in no time (both categories single and double). And then it struck. Fever. Lasted for three long days. I got my matches shifted to the extent possible. Finally had to withdraw from Singles. Thought of giving a try at Double where you can still play with your mind and your partner’s strengths. BTW got two Red Bulls as well, so relying on that strength as well. But due to too much of shifting, my semi-final and final of doubles were on the same day. Two Red bulls lasted only for two sets of Semis. In final, we were beaten like hell. We were no match for opposition. My legs were not moving at all. A bizarre ending to a long and almost everyday badminton practice.

3 Days’ torture
From dad’s warnings to mom’s emotional atayachar, 3 days were really hard to pass when they threatened me to marry. Was being called from Panipat on a note of unprecedented love. As soon as I unpacked my bags, a bomb blasted “Tomorrow we are gonna see a girl. Get ready at 9AM.” I was dead. Mere sab friends ki gaaliyan asar dikha rhi thi. I know how it was to avoid it all for threeeeee long days of my stay.

I would remember this year as a transition phase to business life. Liminal phase I must call it.

Going to miss my Alma-Mater

2010-03-28T04:11:00.006+05:30

3.30 in the morning and I am not feeling sleepy at all, despite a tiresome day. It’s my last day at SIBM Campus (‘Symbi Resort’ as we fondly call it), last day of my MBA experience, may be last day of my official student life. Fascinating has been the discussion tonight with four of my close friends about the 2 year experience. Revised the whole chapter over few hours and a couple of drinks. From the day 1 of SIBM Bangalore campus and 1st round of drinks; we started the analysis phase leaving no teacher or student unturned. From personality analysis to one word definition, from fresher to farewell, from awesome personalities to nerds awards, from eccentric groups to serious couples, from academic rigor to well shaped figure; we discussed about almost everything under the roof of SIBM.

Two years seem like 2 days; as if it was just a few days back when I started from home with my bags packed. Came to campus with an open mind ready to see a new world, observe, involve and learn from it. A fresher Economics Graduate, coming out of his state for the first time had a clean slate to get prints from the real world. And now sitting at the last junction of these two years, I can safely say that my expectations have been met with panache. Leaned a lot, laughed a lot, slept a lot (not only in the class but also in the room), partied a lot and most important of all- made friends for a life time. Where else will I get such a talented bunch of people with diversified knowledge, who also happen to laugh, dance, shout and cry with you.

Certainly going to miss this place a lot. Going to miss tapri (and delicious omlette it serves), badminton court (where 23% of my awake time has been spent), card games late at night (fight to become ultimatum bluffmaster), Goa visit at the special request from College (!!), Chandna (Ye Khopcha kahan hai tumhe pta hi hai) and LemonTree (of course for its famous Lemon Tea), regular commentary in the class, late night debates and ever flowing music in the room. WILL MISS MY ALMA MATER ! WILL MISS SIBM B.

size matters (even in recession !! )

2009-09-25T13:43:00.006+05:30

Even before the debates on estimates of cost of sub-crisis are subdued, a new debate has started whether economies across the world are reviving. At least in India we have got enough reasons to believe so- a significant rise in IIP index, increased freight movement across ports, companies going on hiring spree etc. The pace at which banks were collapsing at one time has been shadowed by the pace at which economies around the world are recovering now.

A large part of this fast paced recovery should be attributed to governments across the world which have left no stone unturned in paying honest tax-payers money to crooked institutions. From Greenspan’s cheap money to Bernake’s cheap money has been a scintillating and fast journey. And mind you this is not applicable to one or two countries alone; this has been the trend everywhere. Globalization in true terms!!

But what signal is it sending to the companies? Go and enjoy the world till the sun is shining; when there will be night some Fed will come to save you. “If you were not taking risk and making money, you have been a fool, is the message which companies are getting by all this”- says a noted economist. But I have just a correction to make here. “If you wanna take risk, which is not even comprehensible to yourself, please make sure that your size is big enough.”
Small fishes are not entertained here – Fed Reserves.

economics with cuteness......

2009-07-08T23:21:00.009+05:30

Okay c’mon tell me what is wrong in studying economics in graduation?

It came to me striking while I was having a lovely chat with a few lovely girls in a café recently (I don’t know why everything related to girls comes striking to us?). I was sitting with the friends of a friend of mine so I thought to concentrate on her friends (of course to make them feel at home); especially to one whom I found really cute. Our jokes were understood by each other very well followed by an extra ounce of laughter. As a group also we were going nicely, discussing the latest movie- NewYork, dressing sense of Katrina and John, then we went on to discuss new movie launches in pipeline (I was dreaming the future prospects) until one of them raised a technical question (I hate it when girls raise technical issues and that too in between nice talks). The question pertained to my studies. Economics Graduate I said. And after that the reactions changed from wow feeling to Oh! "Oh the number stuff? Why even after so many economics theories we can’t prevent a recession when it comes? Why everything in economics start with hypothesis?"

Oh my god this was not where I wanted to land.

And then started what I may call my nightmare. My cutie pie asked- Did you take Human Resources Management as your specialization to give yourself a human perspective after this economics degree or you were genuinely interested in taking up HR? I tried to lighten up the environment by cracking actually it was because of pretty girls in HR that I took HR. But my jokes were not jokes anymore. I could have understood if it were from one or two girls. May be a breakup with an economics guy or some time table guy (remember Dil Chahta Hai?); but there I was with four girls just hell bent to post mortem my decision of taking Economics at first place and then the dare to follow it up with an HR.

So finally I had to take up the stage to clear things about economics. Yes economics guys are a little enticed towards numbers (when somebody asks us how many hours you slept yesterday we tend to say 8 hours, 33% more than my average sleeping hours and so on). Yes economics theories did fail to solve the problems many times but believe me I had nothing to do with those theories. So finally 43 minutes later, after 7 arguments in favour of economics and 3 proofs about economics guys being human (even without studying HR), we came to the conclusion not to ostrich economics people from society. But in the process of reaching to conclusion my cutie pie was lost somewhere. My future dreams which had started coming in the beginning of the talk were forgotten in between somewhere. What an opportunity cost of discussing economics!

Independence - To think, to decide, to act.........

2009-06-17T02:53:00.009+05:30

What determines the level of success and competence in a human being? What kind of skill set one has varies but the basic tenet remains unchanged; the degree of a man’s independence, crave for a new beginning and undoubted love for his work decides his level of talent as a worker and his value as a man. Independence is the only true parameter of human value. There is no alternative for personal dignity and self. Never in your life let anyone or anything become bigger than you. You are a unique creation and your degree of self respect will determine your level. Before others can think high of you; you yourself have to think high of you. Don’t let anybody and everybody sway your opinion. Question before you agree; think before you produce an opinion; believe in what you say and do. The man who can feel, think, judge or act is the man who can make a positive change for himself and the world.

Make your life worth living...

2009-05-24T22:22:00.011+05:30

Almost no one likes uncertainty in life but uncertainty is what makes our life worth living. Excitement of doing things for the first time, not knowing whether it will be successful or not, gives us butterflies in the stomach. What other feeling in life can match the feeling of giving an important competitive exam, being late for an interview with slightest chance of making it on time, the feeling just before the results are going to be out, the feeling of purposing first girl in the life (the fear involved ranging from a firm No to a ‘I think I don’t like your face’ to even a Slap; but also slightest chance of Yes). How much boring life could have been if there were no uncertainty, had we known everything about the future?

Still we fear the unknown world more than anything else. We are not ready to take risks in life. But the fact is that we almost never regret doing something but we regret things we didn't do in life. We regret for love not shown, for words not said, for not understanding the viewpoint of a friend, for not giving full hearted efforts at something which interested us once, not taking enough risks. By living our life on safer notes all the time, aren’t we depriving our grandsons of stories of our adventures, depriving ourselves of the line- 'I was so crazy once'; depriving ourselves of a life that we could have made?

Always be confident enough in life to make it worth living.

a dream is not what comes to u while sleeping but it is what doesnt let you sleep...

2009-05-11T03:11:00.011+05:30

Imagination takes us to the world where we fly, birds dance, flowers speak and where offices are perfect, people mingle easily with each other, bosses give unbiased reviews, everybody talk to each other with good intentions (without being selfish), ideas free flow (better say there is space for ideas), you learn new things (not doing the same thing over and over) and you get intellectual people there. But not all the dreams come true, not all the imaginations bring fruits.

It was my first exposure to the corporate world when I entered there for my summer internship project, with a reputed company. I had my own assumptions regarding the corporate life, none of which came true when I joined. Birds were not supposed to dance in the world of practicality, flowers were not supposed to talk. Only thing where this experience has helped me is in building in me a strong desire to become an entrepreneur. I have given a good amount of thinking about my personality, what makes me happy, what is my turning on points etc. Once I had an eccentric discussion with my MBA Prep coaching classes’ Director on the day after my final selection call for SIBM, about the futility of MBA. “Throughout your MBA course it will look useless to you, but if it makes you realize your dream and what you want to be in life, you will understand value of MBA. In fact this is only thing in MBA worth looking forwards to – attitude, which you acquire there is with you for a life time. You will need nothing else in life once you get the right attitude and your choice. Everything, then, will fall in place” said he. Today I realize, although to only some extent, how true it is.

I am devoting most of my energy for last few days (not to mention sleepless nights that i am going through) towards cherishing my dream- to contribute towards education industry (more about it in any of the next blog entries). At the same time I am also working with a friend of mine on the business plan which we had presented in Innovation Challege 2008 and won the first prize. Currently I am working as the HR Consultant for the company. The level of freedom of taking decisions and challenges is enormous and gives a diferent kind of feeling altogether. Now i am planning about going in full terms as an entrepreneur. If everything goes as per planning sibm will get one more entrepreneur from its soil. In reality, I will never be able to forget sibm for making me realize where my true flair lies. At the end of the day what matters is whether we are satisfied or not, whether or not are you following a distant dream? A dream is not something which comes to you while sleeping, it is what does not let you sleep.....let me work upon my dream once and see what comes out of it. Two main things which are driving me towards education sector are- all my passions will be fulfilled there and freedom of work while staying in your own state, with your family, friends, people whom you know, who know you. Hopefully I will be able to make a positive difference (education system needs a lot of them) in a better way in an area where my interest lies.

I am looking forward for a partner, enthusiastic about a career in education sector, to make our journey together.
- sunil Rao

A system avoiding failure or a system for FAILURES......?

2009-05-02T01:45:00.003+05:30

Why does it happen so many times that people who top an engineering College or MBA College or any other teaching institute are not the most successful people in life also? Why do we see people like Bill Gates or Ambani there? Why do we see that CEO’s of most of the companies are never the toppers of their school or college days? If life is one factor which gives us the most important lessons of living then why do we need an education system? Is it for those failures or dumb people who can’t learn from life? May be no but may be yes also.

Education as a system itself corrupts our mind in the sense that it provides us with the limitations, it teaches us a few notions which we carry throughout our life without even thinking how true they are. It gives us a conformity criteria in which we try to fit ourselves. Isn’t it possible to allow everyone to explore things on his/her own? No boundaries, no formalities, no compulsion to be the same like everyone else is. But with this freedom we run a big time risk of failure also. Whether failure prepares you for a better day next time is a separate line of discussion. But this fear of failure is one of those things which are the base or oxygen of education system.

Do you think our system needs only brilliant, innovative, idea generating, strategically thinking brains? Never the case. If all people are genius then who will do the mundane, routine tasks (without thinking much) which provide us basic necessities in terms of production or services? For example shop floor activities or even engineering stuff like coding, testing etc for that matter.

This is the base of education system- it prevents you from absolute failure because it will make you the way system needs you. Therefore toppers may not be the most successful people but they are almost never a failure in life also.

you cant eat the cake and have it too..

2009-03-23T17:09:00.005+05:30

So far I have voted two times in my life for government elections- once for assembly elections and second time for Parliament elections. But since I have a deep interest in reading and knowing stuff related to politics I read a lot on this subject. I have always thought why politicians use petty issue like religion, communism, caste etc and on based on these sentiments they try to win elections? Don’t they have self conscience? But today I got an almost same analogy and I understood the concept in a better sense. Today we had elections for selection of Student Council President and Coordinators for various committees in our college. Even in this highly educated class of MBA’s, issue of casting votes according to class sections raised significantly. It was looking as if section A were fighting against section B or C. Can’t they understand there is much to life beyond a small section boundary? And here I got answers for my earlier questions - When people can raise this section thing just to win a small election what’s wrong if politicians raise such divisive issues to win Parliament or Assembly elections where stacks are really very high. Next thing is even worse - why do people vote for such politicians; why do we constantly select people with corruption and criminal records? When it comes to shouting about the problems we have to face due to poor functioning of government, our people will be in front shouting against government but when time to choose good representative comes they will decide with a MY perspective in mind. Instead of going by merit; people go for - My caste, my religion, my boli (language), my section. We people are big hypocrites; while choosing our representative we will ask for MY, but while looking for performance we want best quality. “cake ko ya to kha lo ya bacha lo- dono kaam ek sath to nhi ho skte.”

Live the life beyond doubts

2009-02-19T01:15:00.013+05:30

In our life we live less and doubt more. We doubt the intentions of people close by, we doubt whether person X is true to me or not, we doubt the capacity of our educational system to provide us knowledge, we doubt the capability of government whom we have chosen, we doubt the world around us, we doubt our boyfriend or girlfriend, we have serious doubt about the real meaning of what a person has said to us even though the person in question is known to us for years. We know the person very closely for years but still instead of understanding the meaning, we will go the simple path- ask him to clarify what he said. Does mere saying something over and again would make that more forceful. Why do we need clarifications even after years of relationship is beyond my comprehension. And in between these doubts we forget to live the life. We don’t even have the time to see the world beyond doubts and enjoy the blessing it has in reserve for us.

who says we learn from history?

2009-02-08T16:09:00.009+05:30

Protectionism as a policy is one of those policies which had hurt economies all over the world very severely. But the sad part is people get a feeling that by applying protectionism, government is doing them a favour. Take a recent example of USA government which is putting a condition on bailout companies to take only Americans as their employees (Big story in today’s newspapers on cutting H-1B Visa).

In a way government is saving its people and organizations by providing them a shelter. But what about the cost that the organizations has to take in the form of increased payment (more people would have created an excess of supply and decrease in wages) and loss of quality (less people to select from; leaving talented migrated people), and that too at a time when any organization needs these two things the most.This way USA is protecting economy or digging the hole further?

This reminds me of July ’08 when food prices were on their peak due to shortage of food grains. It so happens that one part of world (which is a significant player in that grain market) may not be able to produce grains due to any reason say drought for argument sake. Now there is a shortage of that particular grain in world market. Prices of that grain starts shooting up and other grains (substitute goods effect) also catch up soon. Countries start feeling scarcity of grains; they tend to go for the policy of protectionism and don’t send their own production out in order to protect their interests. But this creates more scarcity outside and further increase in the prices. Hence other nations also follow the suit (protectionism), and in the process drag market for that commodity into deep trouble. This is exactly what happened which started with Australia where continuous drought for 7 years reduced rice production by around 60-70%. At a time when all economies were supposed to come together and take steps, they were busy in forming protectionism policies for their countries.

Now USA is repeating the same mistake. Who says we learn from history?

we live our life only once...

2009-02-07T14:43:00.005+05:30

Each organization has its own culture and a value system inherent in it which you can feel in the people of that organization. For so many years, I have heard a lot about sibm culture but today I felt it. Symbiosis as a culture can be described as a culture of friendship and joy. People here love reaching out to people. One more thing which is entirely visible is love of symbites for their institute even after years. Alumni just love coming to institute to meet even years after years. Today two events ran this sudden streak of thought and brought out the feeling which I was experiencing for a long time. After the Leadership event(a big event consisting of many leaders across sectors), I was outside the campus to bade my friends. We were clicking photos with our cellphone camera. All of a sudden a charming person around the age of 35, with a high quality camera in his hand, who I think was going back, appeared and offered to click our photo. We were all surprised. He clicked the photo, took one of our email ids, and promised to send photo on that id. We all were mesmerized at this gesture, he said- “1992 batch” and walked away. I was so shocked and delighted that I could not even ask the name of our friend.

Also I met one more alumna of symbiosis, priya, a really nice and pretty girl, 2005 batch pass out from scmhrd. One can see the proud of being associated with sybmi in the eyes that young lady. I liked her down to the earth personality and love for symbiosis. She was excited visiting the symbiosis after a long time, interacting with sybmi students. We discussed a whole lot of issues ranging from practibility of curriculum, market conditions, to symbi feeling. “You can recognize any person from symbiosis just by interacting with them for 5 min. That’s what culture is all about. we live our life only once and rest are memories.” – puts priya. Rightly defined. Currently she is working with Standard Chartered here in Bangalore.

To....point 5

2009-01-28T22:29:00.008+05:30

The worst thing with the relative grading system of evaluation is that it is really hard to fight back once you have left the trail somewhere. The system works like this- if you have scored relatively less in your first semester, you tend to work harder to cross the average and perform better (a few folks who don’t share this idea please forgive me; but believe me I am also amongst you). But the problem is that you are not the only one who is thinking this way. There is whole bunch of below average and about average people who are thinking on the same lines. So next semester these hardworking people will work harder and push the average high in the process and when looked at relative performance, they will find themselves almost on the same position (isn’t it seems like being inspired from five point someone; of course it is, you fool). But the point is today I have got the grading of 2.492(almost 2.5) out of 4 (just above average )so I have all the rights to write about it. Now onwards my whole target in MBA is to reach 2 point 5 instead of tending To... point 5. Quite moderate a task; seems like but when you look at my daily schedule (of novel, newspaper, TT, Gym, Chess and Chatting) you will find out there is hardly any scope to improve in examination related stuff. And I will be satisfied once I achieve my target of 2 point 5. Anyways if you score more than that, people will say- “ saala ye to MBA me padhne gya tha!!!”

To a serious note, i would say that though marks are important in MBA but MBA is lot more apart from marks only. It is more about overall development, networking, focus, confidence and loads of fun.

“Does petrol cost us what its price is?” – one more reason to be an entrepreneur..

2009-01-25T02:37:00.007+05:30

What was the cost of petrol when you bought last time? 53.5? or 45 ? or 39? Okay whatever be the price; is it possible that the person buying next to you is buying cheaper than you? Or may be dearer than you? Is it possible? YES. It is. How? Read on...
There is difference between the price of petrol bought by an entrepreneur and petrol bought by a person working as an employee. It is the rate of tax and calculation method, that create the whole difference.
For the sake of building the model we assume that tax rate for everyone in the country is 30%. We also take market price of petrol as Rs 50/litre. If the income of an employee is Rs 100, after tax he is getting only 70 and hence for him the petrol is costing around Rs 71.42 (50/70*100) effectively because he is paying 50 Rs out of his income of Rs 70. On the other hand, for an entrepreneur the same kind of an expenditure gives a tax shield to the effect of 30% (how ethical, showing personal expenditure in business, is a different issue)which makes his income of 100 as 130 effectively. So for him, effective price of petrol is Rs 38.46 (50/130*100) only. The same logic goes on when we buy laptop or a software or electricity and so on and so far.
So what’s the lesson – there is one more reason to become an entrepreneur – effective use of tax slabs.

People leave their highly rewarding jobs to realize a distant dream of their own and become an entrepreneur. So if a good idea strikes me, will I go on to become an entrepreneur? The thought of starting something of my own is becoming more and more prominent in me for quite some time. But sometimes I think I am not ready yet. I don’t have any experience in the way things move in corporate world. May be I would like to have a firsthand experience with corporate and then 5 or 7 years down the line I may think of becoming one. Let’s see how things turn out.

MBA - Is the juice worth squeeze?

2009-01-18T13:19:00.006+05:30

One of the most obvious and most asked questions in MBA is – Is it worth anything what we are reading? Does it have any practical application at all? Or most of the time we are mugging up theories only?
We, as human being, are what our teaching, life experiences, people around us have made us. Our environment and learning in life put a deep impact on our way of thinking and applying the thoughts into practical life. But is it possible to cut that learning into pieces and say that this part of my behavior or learning can be attributed to my learning at the age of 15, this can be attributed to my learning from std 8th and like that? The way you behave or solve a problem in particular situation depends on the learning and experiences applied cumulatively. In the same manner it will be difficult for us to say whether a particular part of our MBA will be useful for us in long run or not. It is never that you take your decision exactly as per some theory taught to you in class but these theories definitely have an impact in shaping processes of mind and molding it to think in an intended direction. MBA is all about building the right attitude – about work environment, about colleagues, about the problems that you face and about the LIFE.

And the most important of all; an MBA degree can take you to the boss' position...read further:
When the body was first made, all the parts wanted to be Boss. The brain said: "I should be Boss because I control the whole body's responses and functions." The feet said, "We should be Boss as we carry the brain about and get him to where he wants to go." The hands said, "We should be the Boss because we do all the work and earn all the money." And so it went on and on with the heart, the lungs and the eyes until finally the asshole spoke up. All the parts laughed at the idea of the asshole being the Boss. So the asshole went on strike, blocked itself up and refused to work. Within a short time the eyes became crossed, the hands clenched, the feet twitched, the heart and lungs began to panic and the brain fevered. Eventually they all decided that the asshole should be the boss, so the motion was passed. All the other parts did all the work while the boss just sat and passed out the shit!
Q: What can we learn from this?
A: You don't need brains to be a Boss - any asshole will do.

Building Infrastructure is NOT a solution to current recession

2009-01-13T01:45:00.006+05:30

Governments all over the world are mulling various options to overcome recession. Building infrastructure is candy of eye of all the governments as the solution. . J.M. Keynes, in his book ‘General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money’ argued about the relationship between production, wages and employment. According to Keynes, purchasing power in the hands of people was the most crucial factor for the economy to revive. He suggested that government should pump in money because no private investor would be interested to take risk in turbulent times.
Although the benefits to economy from building the infrastructure cannot be neglected but I have reservations about whether it is a solution to recession. In earlier time (when Keynes has given his theory), building infrastructure was labour intensive. But today it is highly mechanised, using little labour. Dams, power plant, airport, roads etc are capital intensive these days, not labour intensive. With today’s technology, building infrastructure is not a big job creator unless we insist on inefficient, obsolete techniques, a mistake that government of India had committed when it stipulated that 60% of cost of building road under NREGA (National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme) should go to wages. As a result, we got low quality roads which disappear almost after every monsoon. This approach of forcing the mechanism of building infrastructure can never create good infrastructure.
Also, normally infrastructure projects have a long incubation period. So they have their own time in disbursing money and hence cannot provide Keynesian boost.

a few past entries from my diary

2009-01-08T03:18:00.009+05:30

a few entries of past dates from my diary:

August 4, 2007
Our bathing spree on the way from tuition to home last evening was superb, really awesome. Events when done against established norms give you a different kind of thrill and pleasure. Her idea of having an ice cream, while both of us were shivering in the rain, blended with cool wind was quite a different experience to have. That half an hour in the rain with a good friend has been and will remain as a memory forever.

September 8, 2007
The novel ‘Fountainhead’ is one of those novel that has given me a new way of thinking altogether and has answered a lot of my questions which i used to ask myself. Really a thought provoking novel written by Ayn Rand. The biggest thing about the novel is that every character of the novel is so strong that it’s hard to decide who is going to prevail in their fight; in fact a queer type of fighting where publicly they are with each other but inside they are playing a different kind of game. And if that is not enough, they love to a person whom they want to destroy. What kind of a novel is it? you have to read it to find this out. But one thing i can assure you is that you will enjoy reading this novel. This has become one of my favourites.

September 18, 2007

Today I had a long, infact two long discussions with two different mams in my college. Both the mams are quite opposite in nature and so were the discussions. One is maths mam to whom we played the prank of ’rechecking’ today. Actually what happened was that we had a maths test today and not a single boy had attempted anything. All sheets were blank. Kuch aata hi nahi tha humko to attempt kya ramayan-mahabharat kren? Mam was distributing back the answer sheets after the correction (of course there were a few stupid girls who had attempted questions and needed correction but majority was with us). We all boys received blank sheets back with zero marks put on it while some girls were going to mam to increase their marks which they think were not accounted for( a common practice with girls as if with two more marks they will win the world). So inspired from these hard working girls, I wrote a small letter saying that my paper needs rechecking because I have got very less marks. Pasting that slip on paper, someone gave it to mam and she got damn angry. Followed which I had a 20 minutes long intense discussion with mam which in literature world is known as monologue. First time I realized she speaks so fluently. But I think she needs to improve a little on her pronunciation. Rest is fine.
And the other mam, I was talking about having a long discussion with, was Neha S, a friend of mine according to some students. Okay I don’t mind it. She is so damn beautiful and young, with an age of 23 only; why should I mind? Frankly speaking she is the one who is doing proxy for me in English lecture. She is really sweet, not only because she makes for my attendance but also because she encourages students to participate in the class activities and working hard for their English improvement. She has respect for others and for talent. Nice personality residing inside a beautiful appearance. Today we had a long discussion on my hobbies, interests and my choosing career in MBA (she was forcing that I should go for civil services). While people were learning via Distance Learning Programme on LCD Projector about how to write a letter; I had an interesting and fruitful discussion with Neha..i mean Neha mam.

we see the world not as it is, but as we are.

2008-12-29T12:30:00.002+05:30

Most of the times, we like things with whom we can easily relate ourselves. Sometimes we like a quotation, although it is just a normal one, because that quote reflects our state of mind at that point of time. Sometimes it so happens that we had listened to a song so many times in the past, but we didn’t like that, but all of a sudden we listen that song in a state of mind which matches with that of the song and that song becomes one of our favourites. Perhaps “we see the world not as it is, but as we are.” And here also lies the truth of life- People live in different states of life, some are poor, some are extremely rich, some are fortunate, some are not but still people feel happy or depressed in the different streams of life. It is because outside things can never give a person happiness; it is his inner state of mind that makes you feel happy about a few things and sad at a few things. Take an example of a toy, it may give happiness to a small kid but the same toy would not be able to give the same amount of happiness to an adult. It means that happiness is not in the toy but it is in the state of mind (sounds like movie Matrix?). It also depends on the belief system one follows. Belief system or call it culture- what is that? Culture can be defined, in other words, as the brainwash of person in order to benefit the society. Extending our analogy of toy to the example of beef. We, in hindu society, are barred from eating beef and therefore we don’t like eating it while in western countries they eat and enjoy beef. The beef is the same; what has changed is our perception towards it. It is more dependent on our state of mind. We enjoy things not as they are but as we perceive them.

what one look for?

2008-12-27T22:10:00.003+05:30

If I were to pen it down to one point as to what is most important thing for people while making their decision, I would say that it is a crave for respect for themselves. I mean a person looks genuine respect for himself in the eyes of other person and this phenomena is a phenomena of give and take. In other words it can be called consideration. This is human tendency to feel satisfied upon achieving a high objective and in a way that consideration, that valuation/recognition in the eyes of another person gives him satisfaction. Okay, so how does people differentiate among people as to who can be their friends/partner? In a way, if the quality or competence is the ultimate thing then why not everybody does become friend of competent people only? The answer again lies in the fact that people look for mutual respect and not doles. The mutual understanding and respect come, most of the times, when you are on the same level. That same level can be age factor, can be intelligence factor or simply can be an emotional factor also.
Today there was a small exercise in IP class which revolves around traits and receptivity of feedback. The aim of exercise was to find out how people perceive others and how do they take that feedback especially when it is negative. So what we did was like we sat in a circle and one person(victim)was to sit in the center. Others round him were to tell him(her) his (her) negative traits. The only condition was that nothing should go beyond the mode of play. No animosity should be felt afterward. Exercise went really well. It seems everybody was interested in IP class for the first time. One thing was surely evident from the exercise that it is really difficult to take negative feedback on the face value. It’s really hard to be neutral when someone is giving you negative feedback. Of course my turn also came. Point that came out after the discussion was that I am comfortable with only my set of people. I find it really difficult to get along well with the people who don’t conform to fit in my image of nice persons. I think this analysis was quite appropriate and tells the exact nature of my personality. I expect certain standards, values, systems and respect from people and whenever people tend to deviate from their responsibility or those standards etc; I normally tell them strictly that it is not what is expected from you and please make the necessary improvement. The only thing is that I say this in Haryanvi tone which makes it a little difficult for them to assimilate the basic reason behind the cause and they start probing the tone most of the time. I have observed myself not going well with a few people but at the same time I have found myself going nicely with a lot many people. I think I need to improve on my tone neutrality. One more thing, where I need to work on, is my communication skills. I need to work a lot on areas of stress and fluctuations in my speech.

competency or relations- whts ur take?

2008-12-22T00:02:00.002+05:30

Gussa b ek emotion hota hai…..is it why I never get angry? Because I don’t have emotions or is it just a matter that I don’t show it? I feel for others so much so that even a normal person would never do, but I don’t know why I have never been able to show the kind of emotions which society norms want me to show. Isn’t it sufficient to do things for your friends even before they ask you to do or you need to tell them also that you are my friend and I am giving the proof by doing this? I know that, most of the time I do not necessarily talk their language, most of the time I am impartial towards things, most of the times I prefer truth over relations, but it doesn’t mean that no emotions exist. Do words contain more power than the actions do? But the fact is that, for most of the population, words contain a lot of value. This reminds me of the example given in Blink, a psychology novel written by Malcolm Gladwell. In this he says that chances that patients file case of negligence against a doctor depends on how well or bad they converse with their patients, not on how much they are competent in their profession. It seems as if patients need more of a moral support than the treatment. But then, did this mean that competency has no value in the eyes of people? May be yes. I have also asked a question, which is related to this topic, to many people. The question is- suppose you have a problem and there is one person who is most competent in solving that but you don’t know him personally; and there is another person whom you know, but who is average or less than average in solving that typical problem. So, to whom will you go for the solution? And around 73% of times I found the answer as the second person. If we were to pin down to just one answer, what is one thing which is most important for people in making their choices in life? ? ? ?

losttttttt

2008-12-21T02:30:00.003+05:30

One should never go for things which he can’t afford. A big culture conflict is going on inside me these days. It is looking as if i am lost somewhere without even a trail to tell me where to go. Was there a misunderstanding of my own culture or just there was a showoff praise for a different culture? A culture which I never liked, a culture where relationship contains no meaning whatsoever, a culture where every day is a new day and every night a new night, but, a culture for which I always showed a false yearning. Why? Was this a try to look modern or you know look cool? But life always gives you hints on the right time. It is just a matter of catching them on time. I have got my lesson and will always try to keep this in mind- One lives and prospers only with his culture which he should never leave for anything, because without roots a tree may stand in pleasant weather but would never be able to face a cyclone.

sometimes travelling gives you more pleasure than reaching destination..

2008-12-19T19:29:00.001+05:30

A lot has changed in the college after the joining of the new director, Pankaj Gupta. College is again looking like a place to study which once became a fun resort. Now with the renewed focus on studies with IIM lecturers and more discipline, pressure is slowly building up. About 1st semester, I can certainly say that things did not turn up the way I thought them to be and certainly this is not what I expected from SIBM. Sometimes even the feeling had come as if I had made a mistake in choosing SIBM as my destination and partner for two most important years of my life but then I think, actually how does it matter. A few external factors can never define a man’s destiny. It is something deep inside him that defines it. External factors at best can play a role in highlighting or hiding that innerself for some time. May be my destiny has something for me here which is as unique and in resemblance with the way i have travelled so far in life. Who thought of the path, travelling on which I have come to here, when I started my journey? From a small school in M Adampur to Holy Child School hisar. And from there to Holy Angel for a small stint (with those tuitions for PCB) and then from there to Polytechnic Nilokheri for one month (mind you, with rank 6; topper ki hawa hi alag hoti hai yaar college me) and finally to HAU veterinary Deptt. Those two years in HAU were wonderful in terms of getting friends and doing a lot of masti. But the veterinary college afterwards wo topper wali hawa nhi khha ke dekhi kabhi. After veterinary to Bachelor’s and now here in SIBM pursuing my MBA. Who has thought, life will take so many turns but it has. And the biggest point is that I am satisfied with the way I have travelled. When the way itself is so joyful who cares for destination or in other words- the real essence of pursuing destiny is in the travelling.
Ya from learning came to my mind a thought on which I was contemplating for long. One thing which I have learnt here in my first semester is how to use the technology, how to utilize laptop optimally, how to use latest softwares, how to make best use of internet. I got the chance and I made a small movie for our college to be sold with the prospectus.
2nd thing that I contribute to learn from sibm is the culture from different part of India and even that from across the globe. I am always mesmerized by the diversity and learning which takes place when each of 165 individuals brings with him his culture, his values and dreams. For example south Indian people, as per my observation, are hard working but less innovative or imaginative when compared to north Indians. Maharastrian have more chauvinistic feelings for their state and language etc, they tend to bind more among their own people. People from gulf (NRI) and even from other parts are more passionate about things whatever they do- be it dancing, be it guitar, music or be it drinking/smoking or four letter words for that matter. I am enjoying here in the company of great minds. Let’s see where is going to be my next step?

change-defined

2008-12-19T01:31:00.001+05:30

The complete day I was thinking on the question which I raised in the last blog entry. I started thinking taking the premise that no contradiction can exist. And belief in this statement made my task easy. The answer lies in the fact that it is not us who should try to bring change in person with whom we deal but as a person one should keep evolving oneself so as to bring the best outside. Putting it in other words; we should not try to change the environment every time; but we should try to be the change we want to see in the world. This is the essence of the whole concept of change.
Finance is an area where i can sense my interest in, apart from HR. I love to play with numbers but only till they produce result. The best thing about subjects related to numbers is that, in these subject, there is only one right solution. Once you reach there, it gives you a sense of achievement and satisfaction of something being done or a sense of success whatsoever small or big it may be.

change or not to change

2008-12-17T11:39:00.001+05:30

You can never understand a person completely how much you may try. Every time we deal with people we think after wards- he could have done this way, why did not he said this etc. We differ a lot in our way of thinking, doing things. Perhaps this is justified also because every person is a different entity, thinks differently, acts differently. And of course we should respect individual’s identity. As they say-“the beginning of love is to let those we love be themselves and not twist them to fit our own image; otherwise we will be loving only the reflection of ourselves in them.” then why do we try to change them. Why is there so much of a fuss about change. ‘Change is the only constant thing in world’ goes the old adage. Isn’t it a contradiction in itself? But if the world is up and running on certain principles, then it is for sure that there can be no contradiction what so ever. This contradiction problem has to be solved.

social service- what is that?

2008-12-17T01:00:00.001+05:30

Today I finished reading Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. The astounding story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world- and did. Tremendous in scope, breathtaking in its suspense, this book is one of the finest books I have read. It is my second book from Ayn Rand and the bad news is that she has written only two fiction books (leave her first attempt towards it- Anthem). What a writer she is! The way she portrays her characters, the way she puts the philosophy through the characters and the way she describes each and every event in detail is just superb. One thing which separates her from normal motivational writers like Robin Sharma, is the way she puts her messages across. She doesn’t throw her preaching directly on the face of reader; instead she builds the way towards it. Whereas her first book Foutainhead was on the theme of invidualism v/s collectivism; this book Atlas Shrugged is on the theme of capitalism. The theme tears off all the veils of the tag of social purpose which people put to protect evil means only. According to her, the true social service is to acquire the expertise in your area of working and hence provide the benefit of efficiency instead of some fancy social service. The ideas and concerns expressed in the book are very much relevant even today although this book was published for the first time in 1957. These days social servicing has become more of a PR activity than a social service. The latest buzz word is CSR ( Corporate Social Responsibilty). Most of the organizations today assign big budget for CSR basically not to remain behind in some kind of high service to society and also it gives a lot of free publicity. With this kind of a huge budget, companies, I think, can do a better service to society by keeping their cost and prices at minimum level. Ultimately where does all this money come from and if saved where will it go in form of less prices? Of course, to the society.