Shy Guys

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Whenever I don't find much to blog about, I blog about myself...a safe, if boring, topic.

So here it is...my best-kept secret:

I am a shy guy.

I don't mean I am modest...that is altogether a different thing.

A shy guy wants to be the Seer rather than the Seen.

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When they announced in my school that a pre-NCC thing was taking off, I was all for it, but backed out when they said I have to wear a uniform and a cap with feathers in it (the whistle was ok).

When it was announced that I came second but not first in our school-leaving exam I was relieved that I don't have to walk up a stage and bow to the Chief Guest's Wife and then turn to the Audience and bow again, my HM Father watching me critically all the while.

Then I had to live for 2 years under the roof and care of my maternal uncle (M.D.) who was notorious for his tongue-lashing. He took the high road and I took the low...we exchanged about 20 inane sentences in all those two years.

When they said I stood first in the Main (Physics) in my B Sc (Hons) but missed all the medals which took the Math and Chemistry also into account, I felt relieved once again...my friend KLM proudly went up the stage, I was told, because I skipped the Convocation when they said I have to wear rented black gowns, hoods and caps...

I got my Ph D when I was very much a member of the Faculty at IIT kGP. And I was wondering what pretext I could invent to skip it...fortunately I was dragged to Madras to assist my Father who was hospitalized for a surgery.

And on returning to KGP, HNB asked me to quit my single room and join DB in a double room.

Very soon I found DB to be equally shy, if not more.

I am reminded of the joke where two crazy prisoners are asked to share a cell in NYC. For six months neither opens his mouth. Finally one of them says: "I have decided to buy NYC"; upon which the other quips: "Sorry, I have decided not to sell it".

At the end of our six months of silence, DB said something about Lamb Shift and I contradicted him at once. There was a bet then and there and we walked defiantly side by side to the Central Library and opened the Phys Rev Volume.

Fortunately we both were wrong; and that paved the way for 20 years of fun and frolic, since we discovered we were wrong for the right reasons: I was wrong in the theory part and he in the experimental part. So we discovered that our interests and 'skill sets' as they say sillily (there goes that red line again...what is wrong with 'sillily'...just checked Webster and he allows it) are mutually exclusive and complementary, happily.

I was thirsting to get married ever since I remember but they said I had to appear in several interviews. I told my mom that I would appear in one and only one and quit if I am rejected...thank God I wasn't...these blogs would have been morose Kafkaesque reflections otherwise..."Confessions of a Deprived and Depraved Soul" instead of sexy.


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Tail Piece

That my roommate DB turned out to be shyer than me reminds me of the following family joke:

That mother of six naughty kids was asked:

"Who is the most well-behaved among your six kids?"

"Look out there! That one who is standing legs astride at the cleft of the top branch of that neem tree and peeing and watching the parabola trying to maximize the horizontal range"

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Olive Oil

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I have said it a dozen times in these blogs and I will say it again because of its immense practical use to readers.

Here it is...the gps dictum:

"A gram of Olive Oil is a thousand times cheaper than a gram of Gold but is a thousand times more effective"

Olive Oil comes with several labels like 'butter', 'buttermilk', 'castor oil', 'grease' but it is the same old stuff in newer and newer bottles: all are lubricants.

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Olive Oil comes in 3 grades: Thick, Thin, and Superfluid.

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Thick

All gods and God Himself seem to be constantly demanding heavy applications of Olive Oil.

The Sanskrit root is 'sthuti' from which come a thousand 'sthotras':

In English: "Praise the Lord"

No problem; all gods reside in Heaven and so I could never see them with these gross lecherous eyes of mine.

But I did watch a Representative of God commanding it in public at a secular place like IIT KGP (post Nehru who wouldn't have allowed it in his fond Temple of Learning whose Foundation Stone he laid with his own sleek hands).

There was this Sankaracharya of one of the 4 or 5 or 10 famous mutths who was invited to IIT KGP by his followers and was advertised to hold forth in the OAT.

I was curious and went there a few minutes before the scheduled arrival of the saffron-clad danda-kamandalu wielding dignitary, and took a back seat for a panoramic view of the Seer and the seen.

And was lost in my woolgathering.

Suddenly there was this great commotion and a couple of youthful sadhus arrived shouting sthotras loudly and heralding His Eminence with all synthetic decorum, pomp, and protocol, followed by the beaming Acharya himself and a couple more of his ilk trailing him.

Our young and nice Director who was 'gracing' the occasion was watching the tamasha from the front row.

And soon after the Acharya took his seat, the Director was surprised when he was escorted graciously by the Organizer of the Event to the podium and made to touch the Holy Feet and seek his blessings.

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Thin

This grade of Olive Oil is applied by some IIT students seeking better grades and recos from their teachers.

It is thin because all IIT students are 'World Class' and so they can't possibly do it overtly to Faculty whom they deem ministerially not so 'World Class'.

But, as you know, even Lord Krishna's Dad had to apply Thick Olive Oil at the dead of the night to a donkey who decided to bray the very moment Vaasudev was trying to smuggle out his Divine Kid across Yamuna...Krishna was truly naughty like our li'l Ishani who makes her mom run round in circles at feeding time.

So it is applied subtly and in private lest it be discovered by their other 'World Class' wingmates, who come later in the evening.

And, thinking that the poor fools wouldn't know when they have been oiled...the oil being just a thin moisturizer.

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Superfluid

This grade of oil is applied in Reverse Osmosis by a very few IIT Faculty like gps to his students.

There are two reasons for it:

1. Material (feedback forms)

2. Spiritual (feast of reason and flow of soul)

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Tailpiece

I read this piece in Reader's digest half a century ago and remember it vividly.

A middle-aged woman was getting unsure of her native beauty and vivacity (a common complaint).

So she put on her best dress and applied her best cosmetics and perfumes and boarded a train for a joy ride.

The compartment was empty till a youthful lad entered and took his seat opposite hers.

During the half-hour ride, the kid was surreptitiously ogling and giving her the once-over delicately enough as not to be beaten up.

She got up when the next station arrived, and as she was getting down, she looked at him demurely and said:

"Thank You!!!"

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Blind Man's Buff

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The other day, my friend N invited us to his grandkid's Birthday Party.

He knows that I don't eat at Parties; so I am allowed to mark my attendance, return after a couple of hours, do a bit of gaga, and leave with my family.

But this time he expressed a wish that I stay back since he has a surprise for me.

That of course aroused my curiosity.

And as soon as we finished the attendance formalities, he fetched an old goon of about my age and said that the gent was PKM, my classmate for five years at AU a half century ago, and N enticed him to his Party with the rare chance of meeting good old gps.

And N left us in the peace of a two-seater sofa with a cool drink as a sweetener.

And this is the rough dialogue that took place thereafter:

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PKM: How wonderful to see you after so long! You haven't changed a bit!!! Where do you live?

gps: Madinaguda

PKM: That is far from civilization...but I guess it is very peaceful and free from the pollution of Jubilee Hills where I live.

gps: Yes, I am now very happy after 3 years at Banjara Hills.

PKM: I met B a week ago at a Party

gps: How nice! I hear he traveled to Antarctica for six months in that Expedition

PKM: No, that was T; B retired from Khadakvalsa College. I am told that you met L recently

gps: He kept in touch with me

PKM: He went to the Road Research Organization at Delhi; no?

gps: No; that was M; L went to Cornell

PKM: Is that so? I meet Ms K every other month

gps: Ah, I met her nephew once...she was at Chennai, no?

PKM: No, that was Ms S; K retired from ECIL here itself

gps: Is that so? I do hope they remain the great buddies they were at our Univ.

PKM: No, they never were; except for public pretense...they still bicker

gps: How nice to see you and exchange gossip!

PKM: Yea! We must meet often

gps: Sure; I must be going

PKM: Me too...my wife doesn't know anyone here

gps: Bye

PKM: Bye

N arrives and asks if we had a great time getting together...we both agreed vehemently...


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Stickerwise

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During my time here 'sticker' has been a revolutionary invention right there with 'chip' ( both potato and silicon).

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Right from my days of innocence till now, South Indian ladies (especially the married lot with spouses intact) compulsorily wear a 'bindi' on their forehead.

My mom had a set of two pill-boxes, one for powdered kumkum (vermilion) and the other for wax. After bath and before Puja she used to gingerly apply a bit of wax first as a base on which a pinch of kumkum was evenly spread delicately till it takes a lovely circular shape of the required size.

When I got married, my wife used to ask me to buy a tiny bottle of liquid bindi with a brush tucked into the cap of the bottle.

Kumkum Powder gone with the wind in my household.

Very soon however 'sticker bindis' took over and have been ruling the roost till date.

What a great convenience among nuisances! (or the other way round as someone said of hooked left kets...'they are in the way'... much like bushy mustaches)

Ishani (now 1.5 years) is a fanatic 'dot buster'...she peels off the sticker bindi from her Grannie's face and applies it cockily to hers and saunters to the standing mirror.

http://images03.olx.com/ui/1/38/23/1353523_1.jpg

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Sometime around late 1980s rich ruffians from downtown KGP used to drive down merrily in their jalopies to the IIT Campus and on their drunken drive tease our comely occupants of SN & IG and zoom away merrily.

IIT authorities then issued 'IIT KGP Stickers' with our twin towers printed on them to all genuine residents asking us to stick them on the windshields of our cars and faces of our scooters so that those vehicles not sporting these holy stickers could be denied entry and turned away at the Security Gate.

Good strategy... but you know what happens when you suddenly block wholesale what has been a thoroughfare for donkey's years...resentment mounts.

Every good thing has its flip side...as Gerome said when they came down heavily for funeral expenses of his M-i-L.

Simply put, the Campus was never a sealed unit since everyone had to go downtown for Puja Purchases, and our 'stickers' were an easy giveaway for the pent-up fury of the disgruntled.

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The other day when my Driver-Friend was shipping me by his side in his Tata Indigo with a Nellore number plate, I warned him that sooner than later the renowned Traffic Police of our megalopolis would stop and ask us to step aside into the kerb; which they duly did at Punjagutta for sporting a 'fancy' stylized number plate.

Since we were in a hurry and so were they, a wee grease let us go.

But I was wondering if another needy bobby would do the same at Dilsukhnagar and another at L B Nagar and so on till we get out of our blessed Hyd...we didn't have a receipt....

This morning I read a news item that a wise bobby and his coterie were caught issuing 'fancy stylized stickers' which can be attached to the affected windshield and which would act as 'open sesame' for 24 hours...just enough to slip away from our Charm(inar)ed City.

How decent of the Traffic Department and how very convenient!

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Hyderabad is a youthful city. And colorful too.

Every Counter in every Private Merchant Outlet here is 'manned' by a cute girl in her teens... a visual delight for dispassionate old folks like me...I do hope they pay them well.

A couple of hours back I was sent to our delightful AC Supermarket to fetch a 2 Kg packet of Toor Dal costing about Rs 200 .

And I landed a heavy transparent plastic Toor Dal bag (even I could recognize the contents).

But the packet had a sticker with its fancy barcode and stuff saying 'Jeera' 100 grams @ Rs 20.

I kept quiet till the cute cash maiden sullenly pushed it under her scanner and said: "Rs 20 please"; which I paid and said:

"Thank you for the heavy discount!"

And she was all of a doodah trying to rectify the computer error so that she didn't have to suffer for the goof-up of some other kid-girl.

Sticky wickets, 'stickers' could be.

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Legalese

I thought all my life that 'demise' meant 'death', period.

The other day when my son signed the lease agreement for our newly rented apartment, I found 'demise' all over the document and thought it must be a spelling mistake for 'devise'.

But, no! Webster says it means: 'lease'.

One lives and learns even at 68.

Again, today I learned that someone was wrongly confined for 'consuming' pornography which apparently is not a crime unlike 'producing' or 'distributing' it.

How dearly I would love to 'consume' it right to the bone like a ripe Alphonso Mango!


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Pull, Push & Chase

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One of the abiding nightmares of my student life was that I overslept and missed the Exam. I am told this is quite common.

But, though none of my colleagues confessed it to me, the recurring nightmare of my teacher life was that while I was talking to the blackboard, the entire class just walked away silently.

That brings us to 'Crowd Management'

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During the 1960s at IIT KGP, the Spring Festival was a vibrant affair held in the open air in the Football Ground with just a tent on a bamboo platform for the performers. It was all local talent and everyone from students to teachers were there to watch. The closing ceremony was an entertainment program by KGPians...no outsider was invited.

Sometime by the 1970s when the Poppy Flower Power dawned at KGP, the crowds at the SF started dwindling.

And forsooth the venue happened to be shifted to the newly built OAT with a seating capacity of thousands.

And the organizers had a double whammy...huge big auditorium and tiny audience.

So, it was decided to invite some celebrity crowd-puller from outside for the final evening's tamasha.

And someone thought of our Jasmine Flower Power...the dum maro dum Iyer (naa) Uthup.

The rest, as they say tritely, is History.

Word leaked and the entire KGP town was there trying to gatecrash. The OAT overflowed, branches on all trees were bending and breaking along with a few bones, crowds swelled all the way to the Puri Gate, and since the sound system was new and loud, everyone was gyrating...too much of a good thing.

Then on entry-passes were invented and maids were imploring their mams to please...

That is Crowd-Pulling.

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When I used to watch some inane song and dance shows on TV, the audience used to be just full. I used to wonder how.

Later I was told that there are specialist Event Managers who, at short order, can fill up any gallery with the required mix of men, women and kids, all trained to applaud, grin, frown and jive at the appropriate moment.

And I am not talking of truckloads of 'supporters' of political parties that fill an entire football field, with incentives.

The nightmare of any amateur organizer (including for seminars by august speakers) is that the podium with 6 chairs are occupied by the Guest Speaker and the Host Dignitaries, but that is all...no audience...

Indeed I was the Seminar-in-Charge for a year (a punishment post by rotation) and sadly I had to stoop to the mean trick of pushing my captive students inside with carrots and sticks.

And the Gymkhana President in 1976 had to shift the Evening Tea & Snacks of all Halls of Residence to makeshift tents around OAT for the Farewell Function of the outgoing Director, Prof C S Jha, who was a great sport and cracked that the big audience was there 'willy-nilly'.

So much for Crowd-Pushing.

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For my Ph D Viva, the brand new rule was followed that it had to be announced by notices put up everywhere.

"All are welcome!"

And many of my colleagues, and research scholars, were rather curious; and I had to go to them an hour before and promise a big 'Party' if they skip my Viva.

It worked...and the subsequent Party in the First Year Lab is still talked of as a historic event.

Also, there was this custom in the B C Roy (SN) Hall those days that an outgoing RS with a brand-new Ph D under his (her) belt (skirt) should be ceremonially seen off at the Railway Station by everyone...only, the RS should give away an ice-cream cone to everyone on the platform who took the trouble.

Many scholars used to sublimate under cover of the dark night by the last Local to Howrah surreptitiously.

These are examples of Crowd-Chasers.

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One of the Punch Cartoons of the 1960s I vividly recall is that of an English Football Team that is given a roaring sendoff by a huge crowd at the Heathrow, with bouquets.

In the second frame, news is leaked that the Team lost in the First Round and a huge crowd is there to 'welcome' them with brickbats.

In the third frame it is shown that their plane crashed; and the crowd melts away with great disappointment.

In the next frame it is shown that all the Players survived and swam to a deserted islet, growing beards and stuff.

In the next frame it is announced that a rescue plane spotted them after six months and they are all happily returning home good and alive.

In the last frame, the entire crowd reassembles at the Heathrow, with all their brickbats duly picked up...

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Of Asses & Abhimanyus

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Donkey's Lament

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

"In Pune, Shiv Sena Volunteers forced a man walking with a girl to marry a donkey they were carrying, in protest of Valentine's Day Celebrations"...News Report

"I saved that ass Balaam one day
And carried Jesus on Palm Sunday;
Now on the streets of Poona
Solemnized by Shiv Sena
I wed a MAN this Valentine's Day!"

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html

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I read that in the whole of the voluminous Holy Bible there are only two animals that had power of human speech:

1. The Serpent in the Garden of Eden to Eve (Ouch!)

2. Balaam's Ass to her owner (what an ass Balaam was!)

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During my long innings here I have seen many PMs, all of who did some good or the other.

But if you ask me to share an hour with one of them on Harry's cement bench I would certainly choose Ataljee.

He was different

By the way, where is he now?

Theoretical Physicists sometimes say profound things crisply. Abraham Pais ticked his roommate Feynman off:

"Publicity is a whore"

Just in four short words, he spoke volumes of truth.

Anyway, I remember Ataljee's regime for two good things he did to me:

1. Explosion of mobile phones

2. The Golden Quadrilateral.

Before those squeaky-clean four-lane Highways materialized from Heaven, road travel in AP was a pain in the spine. But nowadays I prefer long colorful journeys by road to short boring flights (they cost the same in time and money to Nellore from Hyderabad).

The other day (when I took casual leave for 3 days) I traveled in the front seat of a spacious Tata Indigo by my trusted driver friend all over AP for 24 hours in two stretches stopping wherever we want for tea.

And I was asking him only one question repeatedly:

"Where have all those famous donkeys of AP gone?" (PJ of our time: "To KGP")

And he too had to admit to his dismay

RKN wrote a lovely piece: "The Donkey" in his unrivaled first Collection: "Next Sunday".

And it is celebratory to its Hero.

That Collection dates back to my school life in Muthukur (early 1950s).

And part of my sweet memories of school life were the omnipresent donkeys keeping themselves to themselves but for a few hours of drudgery to their dhobi owners and an occasional Love Call that shattered the silence of summer afternoons.

Today's TOI had this front page news item that their number in AP has dwindled from one lakh a decade ago to a mere one thousand now.

What a fall was there, my countrymen, as Mark Antony moaned.

And the twin reasons are:

1. Dhobis prefer dark and ugly mopeds to fair and lovely quadrupeds nowadays (Environmental Pollution)

2. Non-vegetarians took to eating their meat on the sly (next will be human's)

And apparently the AP Biodiversity Board has woken up (they will commercialize donkey meat and go into mass production...braying donkeys enter and sleek tins exit the assembly lines)

As another Mark said:

"Man is the only animal that blushes or needs to"

Another chunk of my Muthukur gone forever!

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The AP Abhimanyus have done it again and bettered their last year's score.

IIT JEE results are out and the All-India Topper (in the Open and Reserved streams) is from AP...from the Coromandel Coast of Yonghy-Bonghy-Bo.

They also bagged five out of the top ten ranks and 25% of all seats.

Messes in KGP will be catering Idly-Dosa-Sambar everyday.

Crazy Opulence as I said sometime back.

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Tailpiece

There is a cute photo of Didi in her famous off-white Dhanikali sari entering the Colonial Writer's Building surrounded by half a dozen body-guards.

Lal Salaam, Didi Dear!

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Infinite Conpassion

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OK, so you thought there was a spelling mistake and I am going to preach about the Infinite Compassion of Jesus or the Buddha.

Wrong again!

Conpassion is the precise opposite of Compassion; contrariwise as Tweedledee said.

I met many many persons (of both sexes) who are never happy with what you are or say or do.

Conpassion is a credo with them.

Let me illustrate by a 'composite dialogue' between a personified IC and me

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IC: Where were you working?

Me: IIT Kharapur

IC: No good; IIT Kanpur is the best. What subject?

Me: Physics

IC: Pity, IITs are meant for Engineers. Anyway, Theory or Experiment?

Me: Theory

IC: It is stagnating, unlike Nano-Technlogy. Who was your guide?

Me: XXX

IC: Two of his scholars committed suicide and the third is in an asylum. What was your pay?

Me: XXXX

IC: My daughter is in IT and she draws ten times your pay at half your age. Children?

Me: One son

IC: Sons are useless. They migrate to the US. You ought to have a daughter like mine

Me: My son is in Hyderabad

IC: Shockingly dirty place. He failed in GRE?

Me: He never appeared

IC: Hm! Afraid of failure? Has any kids?

Me: One daughter

IC: Too much dowry in Hyderabad. He should have a son

Me: I will pass on your suggestion

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The trouble about folks here generally is that they want to quantify everything. Like Money in the Bank. If you stop by and admire a lovely black rose in their garden, they say it fetches $10 in the current export market.

If I say my son shifted to a new job the only thing they ask is how much is the hike.

If I say we shifted to a new apartment they ask how much is the new rent.

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Weighty Matter

There is a curious news item today that a Senior Police Official tried to hang himself in his Police Station during lunch hour, but the attempt fizzled out: the rope snapped...he was too obese for the rope.

My friend NP used to say that every engineering student of his time had to pass a hated subject called: Strength of Materials.

But, as the Guard in the open-air crematorium at KGP used to say, after lighting his beedi in the engulfing fire:

"Everything has its use"

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Last Laugh

Apropos yesterday's "World Class Blogpost" as Supratim calls it, there is a cute cartoon on Page 10 of today's Deccan Chronicle titled: "Two Idiots".

I looked at it a dozen times.

Here it is:

http://www.dc-epaper.com/PUBLICATIONS/DC/DCH/2011/05/25/index.shtml

Click on it again if at first it doesn't open.

Enjoy!


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World Class Abhimanyus

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Before I forget, here are two suggestions...take them, they come Free!

Suggestion 1:

Change your glasses at least once a year. Whatever the cost or boasted quality of the lenses, heat, cold, dust, wear and tear impair them, and unless replaced early, eyes suffer unknowingly and unnecessarily (Ask me!).

Suggestion 2:

There is nothing to beat a completely empty gastrointestinal tract for heavenly bliss for a while. Enjoy it for an hour every week (I do it every day).

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Cassius Clay is said to have boasted: "I am the Greatest!"

Let me boast: "I am World Class!"

Don't believe it?

OK, here is why:

I was an IIT Student (Ph D) who worked under a World Class Guide, SDM (ask John Wheeler)

My thesis was World Class (ask C H Papas of Caltech)

I was a World Class Teacher of IIT (ask Edwin Taylor of MIT)

I am a World Class Blogger (ask Varuns, Sr and Jr)

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This chap Arjun of Mahabharat knew every trick of war and he was fond of boasting about it to his wife, Subhadra, who was as drowsy as my own when listening to husbands' cheap boasts.

So, one day he was explaining how to crack Chakravyuh and how to get out of it alive.

He thought she was intently listening, an unusual thing, because she seemed to keep muttering: oh, ok; oh, ok; oh, ok;...

But indeed she was fast asleep as usual, and the oh, oks were coming from her son Abhimanyu who was in her womb (like our own Salvador Dali).

Half way through when Arjun explained how to get into it but before teaching how to get out, Krishna played the spoilsport (as ever) and dragged Arjun to Harrys.

So, Abhimanyu met his bitter end because he didn't know how to get out.

IIT students are like Abhimanyus: they are World Class as far as knowing how to get into IITs (their corporate schools only teach this half).

But they don't know how to get out of IITs unless their World Class Teachers give them World Class Grades and World Class Recos.

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Jokes apart, let me say something inane:

I draw the simile from Kathopanishad.

IIT is like a World Class Cart.

The horse that draws it is a World Class Teacher like gps.

Director is like the tonga-driver with a leash to whip the horse when it doesn't draw well (by denying promotions) and a tickle on its world class vitals when it needs to be amused (by undue promotions).

World Class Students of First Year (segregated) are like passengers that board the Cart.

The journey is reasonably smooth with occasional halts (Summer Quarters).

It ends when the World Class Degree Holders end up in the World Class American Heaven.

So, everything is World Class as my 40 years experience shows...and anyone who denies it has to teach at KGP for 41 years or more.

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Last Laugh

I am told by Dick Burton that the few surviving Frenchmen in NYC have decided to slightly alter their country's slogan thus:

Liberty, Equality, Futternity

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Newsiness

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Here is a curious news story that appeared in both Deccan Chronicle and Times of India yesterday:

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...According to Begumpet Police Inspector (Mr AY), R (21), who works at a car accessories shop in Ranigunj and resides in Patigadda, invited three of his friends, S (21), A (21), and J (24), for a party at his house terrace on Friday night.

The party continued till 4 AM.

Meanwhile, a cat reportedly landed on the spot drawn by the food. R tried to shoo away the cat, but it kept coming back. Irritated, he went downstairs and got a toy pistol. He fired at the cat, but it managed to escape. The 'bullet' hit the window panes of a house of retired ASI, MAK. He had worked as ASI in Begumpet and retired last year.

Hearing the loud sound, the former policeman's family members were jolted out of their sleep.

On Saturday at around 7 AM, the retired ASI lodged a complaint at the Begumpet police station against R. Based on the complaint, police arrested four persons, R, S, A and J, and remanded them to judicial custody.

"We registered a case against the four persons under Section 336 (act endangering life and personal safety of others) and 427 (mischief causing damage) of the IPC."

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This reminded me of another news story of a couple of years back:


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Thursday, April 2, 2009

Pet Rage Doggerel

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"A senior Punjab IPS Officer grabbed his security guard's AK-47 and emptied the entire 32-round magazine on two snarling stray dogs and ended up shooting his own gunman in his thigh trying to save his pet dog. He was booked for his cruelty to animals":

News item on page 8 DC April 2, 2009



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IPS Officer's Defense:

They tried to kill my dog, they did;
I shot the mutts with his gun, I did;
My dog I saved as I wished, I did;
The poor cur lost his head and thigh, He did!

Posted by G P Sastry (gps1943@yahoo.com) at 4:10 AM

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Note the following points common to both stories:

1. In both the cases, Policemen are involved. It would be worth pondering if the cases would have resulted in arrests otherwise. The matter would have possibly been settled out of court amicably.

2. It is a matter of cats and dogs... poor chumps.

3. In both the cases, the pellet or bullet unfortunately went awry and hit the wrong party. If it happened that the cat or the dogs alone got killed, the matter would have ended there. And no one would have cared.

4. Just look at the Sections of the IPC that were invoked. In the first case, there was no mention of cruelty to the feline. It was a case of cruelty to the retired ASI; and it was not as if he was the more aggrieved party. He just lost his sleep for a few hours. The cat certainly would have been frightened out of his wits and stopped eating thereafter.

On the other hand, in the second case, the criminal was booked for cruelty to animals while the injured party was much higher in the animal kingdom: viz. a poor and innocent Security Guard.

5. In both the cases the cub reporters' fortunate beat was the criminal court and they had an easy scoop (they were surely not present at the scene of the crime before or during or after the event):

It is said that dog biting man is no news but man biting dog is.

It is also said that a kid asked his papa:

"How come there is always just enough news every day, without fail, to precisely fill the 18 pages of our paper?"


====================================================================

Recycled Carnations

===============================================================

For me Reincarnation is a Fact.

It is not a matter of Faith, Theory or Surmise.

It is as much of an obvious Fact to me as the God Particle.

That brings us to God and Heaven.

Hyderabadis normally are obsessed with Money, Caste Politics and Sleaze, and have no time for anything else. But these days I see inflamed Letters to the Editor questioning the right of our Chair-Man trying to rob them of their favorite Personal Heaven. They ask, pertinently, what business is it of he to dabble in religious matters...they never questioned his equally invisible Black Holes, did they?

O, well!

Whenever I used to talk cogently of Reincarnation, my friend DB used to question it. He of course belonged to the now-defunct Left Intellectual Clan.

That brings us to our Karate Champion who single-handedly did what even the Marylin-Borne Kennedy couldn't do.

It is not that he wasn't forewarned: I cautioned him more than two years ago:

*****************************************************************************

Friday, April 17, 2009

Chairman Mao's Karat(e) Guide

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Indian Communists are regressive; from British Rule till now": Manmohan Singh

Mao's Precepts

Give them food, they ask sex;
Give them sex, they ask house;
Give them house, they ask job;
Give them job, they ask news;
Give them news, they ask vote;

Then Freedom, that's your Doom;
Brinda swept by Mamata's broom!

DON'T GIVE THEM FOOD!

P.S.

Learn from My Lai
& Dalai;

Food's ticket for Tibet!

Posted by G P Sastry (gps1943@yahoo.com) at 11:03 PM

********************************************************************************

In the process he dumped my favorite Buddha in the Calcutta Black Hole.

Buddha kept quiet when He was asked if there is God.

He also kept quiet when He was asked if there is no God.

How clever!

But Buddha did talk of Reincarnation of Himself as, if I recall right, 27 Bodhisattvas (I beg to be corrected).

Anyway, whenever DB used to doubt Reincarnation, I used to drag him by hand to the Chamber of Professor X, our common detractor.

Incidentally, whenever anyone spoke of his Office as 'Chamber' I used to recall the heavily disputed Nazi Gas Chambers.

This Prof X used to keep his door always open whenever he was 'in'; I can't guess why.

And then, pointing to him, I would ask DB if so much goofiness can be accumulated in one lifetime, however hard he tried.

The force of my logic used to swamp DB's Leftover qualms awash.

After all Mother Earth's crust is a fairly 'closed system', no?

So, it is just a matter of recycling the genetic soup.

Well, not exactly perhaps...Mother Earth, I am told, is constantly gaining weight like Queen Victoria due to the cosmic dust she absorbs...but it only adds to the soup.

Concerning Heaven, let me state that just watching Ishani grow hour by hour is a Heavenly Experience.

I would strongly recommend my readers to marry early and get one or two grandkids instead of wasting time in their fruitless postdoc labors.

In this context I must remove a serious misconception of Siddhartha (another name for Buddha) who seems to think that the COST of a Happy Marriage is $105514.79.

No, no!!!

It is its Annual Worth!

About 10 Postdoc Schols.

*****************************************************************************

Tailpiece: Lovely Names

Jenabai Daruwali
Gangubai Kathiawadi
Dono theey Mumbaiwali
Dono theey 'Don'nie Rani!

Good Night!

================================================================

Crazy Opulence

=================================================================

I am crazy.

You need proof? Here it is:

I brush my teeth at least half a dozen times every day. And take cold shower every time I brush my teeth. I eat only one meal a day at 3 AM. Not on the desolate dining table but on my bed with my snoring wife for company.

I define craziness as an alarming lack of sense of proportion teetering forever on the precipice of stark madness.

Crazy folks do few things. But when they do them they overdo them atrociously.

I am not alone. The recessive gene (I have to check with Supratim on this) is endemic in AP...all of us here are crazy.

*************************************************************************************************************

I never heard of IIT Kharagpur (or any other Poor for that matter) till my frustrated co-research scholar discovered an ad for a junior faculty position at that strange place while scanning Indian Express. (The rest, as Pratik once put it, is history...me, he, DB and SDM are all co-travelers).

None of my co-research scholars too ever heard of IIT when they bid me fond Farewell...one smart-aleck said that Physics people are treated as harijans in an Engineering College (no offense meant).

When I used to go home to Gudur on Vacations, folks in the market place used to ask me where I work. And sneer at me saying that I had to go all the way to Calcutta when brighter people got the same job at Gudur itself. (They confused IIT with ITI, the Industrial Training Institute which gives one-year diplomas for those who couldn't make it to college).

It has always been my policy to keep mum when long and fruitless explanations are called for.

Till 1990s few students in AP ever heard of IITs.

Then, one lone Teacher in Hyderabad started coaching bright Hyderabadi students for IIT JEE.

They then learned that an IIT Degree is a passport to their American Heaven.

The flood gates opened crazily in no time.

Listen to this news item in today's newspaper:

"...Of the 2,610 students who qualified from the IIT Madras zone last year, 2,095 were from AP. With 9,059 seats available in 15 IITs nation-wide, students from AP got 22 percent seats. Which means that almost every fourth student joining the IITs last year was from AP...Last year, AP students bagged seven out of the top ten ranks in IIT-JEE including the all-India first rank for the first time ever..."

It is a news report and is liable to the familiar errors...but still...I mean what a lark!!!

************************************************************************************************************

When I was a kid, the few Telugu films ever produced were poor cousins of Tamil films...and they had to take the help of studios housed in Madras.

And they were phenomenally good and memorable for their social content, music, dance and culture.

Then the Telugu producers fought with Tamilians and shifted their operations to Hyderabad.

Listen what happened then on from today's news item:

"...The Telugu film industry, which boasts of producing the second most number of films in the country, has earned the dubious distinction of being on the top in trying to peddle obscenity, vulgarity and violence in films....In terms of length, for the year 2008 a total of 8,073.68 meters of film had to be cut by filmmakers as the censors found it objectionable. Compare this figure to Bollywood's 1,825.66 meters...and Bengal's 116.59 meters.."

Hurray!!!

*************************************************************************************************************

Not convinced?

Here is another statistic:

A weird chap from Hyderabad posted 600 odd blogs in less than two and half years...and Supratim says:

"...like good wine, (they) are getting even better with time..."

QED

=================================================================

Digital Tyranny

===============================================================

Thank Heavens I am not, but if I were asked to now write a Primer in Physics, I would start something like this:

************************************************************************************************************

Long long ago (forget how long, it is not all that frightfully important) there was no Earth, nor Sun, nor Stars, nor Home Loans.

There was indeed Nothing other than Myself in deep sleep.

As the Upanishads put it rather neatly, it was all One without a Second.

It got rather bored and exploded in a terrific Big Bang.

Then came Light, Darkness, Man, Woman and Population fighting for land.

Then came Geometry, which, as the name implies, 'measuring' the land before cutting it up.

They then tried to square the circle and failed; to this day.

They then said it all depends on an 'irrational' if not 'transcendental' number.

To this day, whatever they fail to do, they call it irrational.

Like the 8th Order Perturbation Correction to the Lamb Shift.

*******************************************************************************************************

Unfortunately, my Physics Primer was not this frank.

It started with a most horrible Chapter called Units & Dimensions; and talked about some platinum-iridium (or was it rhodium?) alloy safely stored somewhere in France (of all places, where the units and dimensions now have all got screwed up).

And then as if it was not sufficiently boring, they talked about CGS, FPS, MKS, SI (French again)...they then said it didn't matter at all...you can make c or e or G unity...

And then the most inscrutable Vernier Calipers with its zero error.

That launched them onto an even more horrible Chapter called Error Analysis.

I frankly don't know how I survived it all for 47 years.

*********************************************************************************************************

Concerning numbers, my friend DB had a healthy apathy...he outsourced his Income Tax Calculation to ME of all people. Since we always had the same salary and no other income, he used to copy my Returns taking care to not copy the name of the Assessee.

He also never had a pocket calculator nor log tables (Cal Univ was liberal).

He dabbled only in symbols safely.

And he was always defensive about non-numbers too.

One wintry day when he was blowing smoke rings in our Office (in KGP you can do it only during the week-long winter), I recited a lovely verse from the Brihadaranyak Upanishad where Sage Yagnyavalkya talks about Self-Love as the Universal Truth.

DB couldn't care less, for, he was negotiating a wicked contour integral.

But to show me up, he asked:

"What do the Upanishads say about infant mortality?"

To which I replied:

"That doesn't fall under their scope"

He at once agreed with the soundness of my answer because he knew that my counter-question would be:

"What does Gel'fand say about it?"

***********************************************************************************************************

All these germane (good word that I wanted to show off) thoughts sprang up from today's news item with a London Dateline:

"Happy Marriage is worth $105514.79 (at today's exchange rates)"

It seems there is no Error Analysis there.

================================================================

Confessions of a Sex Graduate

==============================================================

These days my readership ratings have plummeted to a worrying all-time low.

Even the tried and trusted Varun wakes up once a fortnight and submits a hilarious link and goes into hibernation...I don't know when he is going to catch up on his hefty backlog of about 70 lessons.

So, I thought I must stoop to the good old journo stratagem of a titillating title (sorry for the inapt alliteration).

And what else than sex to come to the rescue and do the needful!

Every Man and Beast from Adam and Eve is intrigued if not obsessed by this all-pervasive topic from womb to tomb.

Indeed Thurber quotes the irrepressible Salvador Dali as saying that he was aware and distinctly recalls having hallucinations on this subject even when he was in the womb.

And what a womb!

As for tomb I don't think Thurber is allowed to dig it up, American Prudery being what it is.

Before entering their tomb, their golfers, governors and honored guests cultivate it assiduously but they stop short out of their received wisdom that dignified quietus must be maintained till the D-Day.

On the other hand our Hindu Gods are a promiscuous lot who assure us that we don't have to fear or respect Death, since we pass from Life to Life as they say...reincarnation is built into our scriptures so that we are not officially in any hurry to finish it all up before it is too late.

*********************************************************************************************************

Education being my livelihood, I always felt that All Education progressed linearly during my time here, except Sex Education, which seemed to have had an exponential growth.

Reader's Digest 1960s:

Daughter (6): Mom, is it true that you and dad have sexual relations?

Mom (guardedly): Ahem, yes

Daughter: Then why is it that they never visit us?

Reader's Digest 1990s:

Grannie (75): Give me 100 birth control pills

Shopkeeper: At your age!!!

Grannie: They are my tranquillizers...I slip them into my granddaughters' milk

*********************************************************************************************************

My troubles started with an unthinking Father who wanted to get me out of his way when I was just 3. My elder sister (5) refused to go to her All Girls Elementary School unless someone accompanied her; and I was the scape goat.

You might think that being the only boy among hundred odd girls is Salvador Dali's Heaven. Poor chap, he didn't know.

Only Lord Krishna could have coped because he was endowed with this most satisfying gift of multiplying himself as and when the situation demands.

All I recall is that girls are more curious than boys...the less said the better.

From that traumatic imprinting experience I never recovered to this day...I suffer nightmares that Dali would cringe from.

And when I won my liberation from Elementary School to High School, the pendulum (no pun) swung the other extreme...I was in an all-boy's school.

...Just when I needed all the Education I craved... Life is always like that...it kicks you from one goal to the other straight.

And all I could get was hearsay.

OK, I did have a tremendous crush on our only Lady Teacher...but that is neither here nor there...all our 25 Male Teachers also had.

I then gave up.

*************************************************************************************************************

By the time I joined KGP as a Teacher myself, there were no Lady Colleagues...IIT KGP was worse than Caltech.

And I came to know that it would be a long while (14 years) before I could hope to get a Line-Clear for my marriage.

Then I read Dale Carnegie's bestseller:

'How to Stop Worrying About Sex and Start Living'

That helped a lot till I got eventually married to a Medico, who I thought would finally educate me.

On our first night, she brushed aside my probing questions and told me that what I wanted all the time was Sex... period.

How true!!!

==============================================================

Soft Facts

======================================================================

Whenever there is a paucity of hard facts, Artistic Freedom is allowed its free reign; and justly so. Everyone craves freedom and artists make their living out of it.

Take for instance, the Death of Gandhijee.

I presume there is a plethora of hard fact evidence for us to agree that he was fatally wounded in broad daylight in public by a pistol shot.

But there is sufficient disagreement as to what his last words were.

Quite a few playwrights as well as Gandhians differ:

Gandhians insist that his last words were: "Hey Raam!".

The dissenters insist that all that emerged from his lips was an incoherent gurgle.

The choice is yours!

********************************************************************************************************

Suppose an injured body were found beside the rail tracks in the morning and no one has a clue of what happened during the dead of the night.

The dozen odd onlookers are free to make their own theories like:

1. The poor chap was hit when he was drunk
2. He had an argument with his wife and decided to end it all
3. He was thrown under the train by his political rivals
4. Same as above but by his business rivals
5. Same as above but by his wife's paramours.

and so on....

At my age I would prefer to profess that I actually watched him try to save a lame street dog in the tracks from being run over and lost his balance after saving the dog.

Noblesse Oblige!

**************************************************************************************************************

To tall-tale tellers like me there is another angle to this freedom above the facts.

Most of my blogs are reminiscences of of events long past with few witnesses to confront me.

I don't take liberties with hard facts but I do with a hazy soft past, just to round the story up.

Memory is a tricky thing. The event of a half a century vintage, when recalled is in black and white.

I first color it up by deleting the inessentials and improving the nucelus, which is essential for the sake of brevity and readability.

Finally when winding up, I subtly alter the hard facts by adding one or two scenes that make the ending look great. Now this addendum has to be such that it doesn't violate the basic structure of the characters and their images; but highlights them.

After indulging in this imagination for a while and writing it down, I truly 'believe' that it is TRUE!!!

Such is the power of a 'story' recalled as Wordsworth put it:

******************************************************************************************************

...For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils...

I am sure Wordsworth was making it up quite a good deal...he must have omitted the inconvenience of a long trek, foul weather, stinking lake and stuff.

*********************************************************************************

Let me give an example. Long while ago I posted a blog called: "My Fair Russian Lady".

The events happened a good 40 years ago and there are no survivors to challenge my personal account described there.

Everything said there was 100 % TRUE, but I am not that confident about this prefinal paragraph:


....Time for her to leave: the entire Faculty Hostel where she became the most popular Visitor threw her a grand Farewell Party. We decided that each of us her admirers would file past her by the Dining Table and present her with one rose each. She was overwhelmed at the unexpected gesture. Tears swelling in her eyes. We then asked her to make a short speech in Pure English. She blushed and gamely tried and we would hoot whenever she slipped into Russian. And we all laughed and laughed, she joining us most sportingly.....

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2010/03/my-fair-russian-lady.html

I now tend to believe that this really happened, but would not bet my life on it. It just sounds great and that's enough for me not to investigate too closely into these soft facts.

======================================================================

Shakespeaks

=============================================================

Last night Shakespeare skyped me:

"American English's rotten
Their roots completely forgotten
Yup, indeed they CAN
Yap a li'l different THAN
From who they have it gotten"

==============================================================

Casual Leave

=================================================================

Going out of Hyderabad and blogosphere for some time.

Cheers!

==================================================================

Tradishun

==================================================================

There was one Brahmin family in our Village, Muthukur, which had a quaint custom:

Before the start of any religious function at their home, like Ganesh Puja, Saraswati Puja, Shraadh Ceremony... the kids of the household hunt for a neighborhood cat and bring her home. Mother will then bring out an age-old wickerwork basket from the attic and hide the cat under it till the function is over; thereafter the cat is fed with milk and payas and let go.

Everyone took it for granted that the custom is a sort of voodoo peculiar to the family.

But it turned out on investigation that their great-grandfather, an orthodox Brahmin, had a rare weakness for a pet cat. Since a cat is supposed to be not only inauspicious but a nuisance, trying to grab every holy thing and jump into his loving lap while he was doing worship, he would order that the cat be covered under a basket for the nonce.

The great-grandfather joined his ancestors long ago and the cat joined him after her nine lives; but the ritual became a tradition to be strictly followed by the household which no longer had pet cats; or dogs for that matter.

************************************************************************************************************

AP was cruel to her Brahmin widows.

I myself knew of several of my grandmother generation whose heads were tonsured, and shaved every new moon day; and they were made to wear white or saffron saris covering their heads throughout the rest of their lives.

One newly widowed lady was waiting for the family-barber to arrive so that she could get her head shaved, and bath and Puja done, before she could eat.

But the FB was nowhere to be seen on the horizon.

Vexed, like Alice, she said to herself:

"If only my husband were alive, he would have fetched the barber in no time..."

**************************************************************************************************************

In 1983 I bought my scooter.

Our Agent took a hundred-rupee note from me and got the Learner's License from Midnapore without my having to go there.

Within the stipulated 3 months, he took me to Midnapore (rather it was the other way round) for my Driving Test. He assured me that I didn't have to prepare for the preliminary Viva in the morning before the Practicals in the afternoon, since he would coach me 10 minutes before my turn.

The highway signs were easy enough.

He then got up and demonstrated the hand signals:

Right hand held high pointing to the sky for caution that I would be stopping; horizontal for the right turn, waving for 'overtake'; doing a clockwise rotation for left turn and stuff.

I passed in the Viva @ Rs 100 again.

In 2000 I bought my Maruti Car.

By then the Viva was no longer waived for the Learner's License. I was required to take the Viva before I could get the LL.

I asked my Agent if the Viva for the car was any different than that for the scooter.

He said "No"; but it didn't matter...

But, I said, Maruti or any other car in the market then had blinkers for right and left turns, red light for braking, tail lights (and 'back-horns') for reversing...

He said it didn't matter...

But, I said, most other cars had AC on and the driver can't stretch his hands out and dance since all windows would be closed.

He said it didn't matter...

**************************************************************************************************************

Teachers of our generation took it for granted that every class room had a blackboard, duster, and chalk box, without which the room would be as naked as Eve (before she bit that apple).

Teachers were literally 'white-collar workers'...some had their hair also sprinkled with white chalk dust...some their noses...

Towards the end of my career at KGP I was required to teach a class of 350 students and the class room had a white screen (like our good old touring movie theaters) and an Overhead Projector.

I managed somehow but DB declined the sacrilege...

===================================================================

Ambishun

=================================================================

1992 January 29:

Kapeel was a special invitee to my son's 11th Birthday Party. He was leaving IIT KGP for Princeton and, over the past 4 years, he had acquired the title of Bada Beta in our household.

And he was regaling kids with magic tricks and jokes. The one joke that stayed with me was this:

Man: Beta, bade ho ke kya banogey? (Son, what would you become when you grow up?)

Kid: Aaadmi banoonga! (Will become a Man!)

Man: Aadmi tho banogey lekin karogey kya? (Man you will become but what will you do?)

Kid: Shaadi karoonga! (Will do marriage!)

*********************************************************************************************************

Somehow that summed up the ambition of us 20 kids who passed School Final in 1957 from our seaside Village Muthukur.

Today's youngsters have to stretch their imagination to its limit to understand our isolation from the big broad bad world. There was no 'current', Telephone, Radio, National Newspaper, not to talk of TV. Our daily life was full of outdoors play apart from the few hours of school.

There was no concept of a 'career'.

About 10 out of us 20 dropped out due to poverty and fell back on their family callings. The rest 10 wanted to become 'Government Servants' with assured pay and pension; and get married as soon as their jobs became 'Permanent' at about the age of 20. (Only I had to wait a further 15 years but my circumstances were rather special).

The available Govt Jobs were Clerk (coveted post), Block Development Officer (some perks), Teachers (most, including me, and one more who studied Engg but preferred to become an Engg Teacher).

We never met nor had a Reunion, but just hearsay.

Prasad Rao, a very sportive kid, couldn't become a Permanent School Teacher but remained Temporary throughout since he got a Third Class (English did him in).

When he appeared in the Marriage Interview, the Bride's Father asked him if his Post was Permanent. Apparently PR turned rather philosophical and replied that nothing in this world is 'Permanent' including Life itself. This crack seems to have impressed the F-i-L so much that he gave away his Daughter at once, mentioning that they could dispense with Dowry since that too was not Permanent.

Since PR was not a Permanent Teacher, he was not bound by the Conduct Rule prohibiting Tuition. So, his small home became by and by a mini-school and he could teach his half a dozen kids at home along with the others.

When last heard, all kids of PR are settled in the US, and he and his wife spend most of the year shuttling Coast to Coast except when they are in Muthukur for a couple of weeks every year.

***********************************************************************************************

The Muthukur nostalgia got the better of me last year. My son and wife who were subject to my tall tales of our school life asked me to take them there once to see if I was bluffing.

So, the three of us traveled there in an Ambassador Car of my Driver-Friend and drove through the Main Gate which was of course unmanned and barged into the HM's office unannounced (on purpose). She was a nice plump lady, and seeing my handsome son and fair wife she asked us to take our seats in front of her Table adorned with the good old pin-cushion, pen-stand, blotting paper rocking roll, cycle-bell converted into a calling-bell...

And I said that I am an old student of her school and my Father was the first HM of her school. She was happy to hear my Father's name from the horse's mouth and said they hear a lot of him all the time.

And after a few minutes asked us politely what the 'purpose' of our visit was.

My son took out his wallet and pulled out a crisp Rs 1000 Note and told her that he wants to donate it to her School Library in his gran'pa's name.

Believe me, Money Talks!

Cups of coffee were ordered, and I took over and told her that I brought a few copies of a slim booklet of Raadha Rhymes which I wrote a few months back and I wished to donate them along with a Rs 500 Note each to the Best Boy and the Best Girl in English.

She pored over the latest Marks List of the outgoing Class and called the Peon asking him to fetch Nazeer and Laxmi from their class.

In a few minutes Nazeer came in trembling all over, fearing what mischief he did now to be pulled up from an ongoing class. The Peon said Laxmi was absent.

Looking at Nazeer, I felt my plenty years rolled back all of a sudden...he was a spitting image of myself at that age, it looked. Thin to the bones, average height, no footwear, crumpled 'bush shirt' and white pant and false humility all over his face.

Our School remained a poor kids' Govt School...no fees, no uniform, no labs nor even desks.

On a rare impulse, I got up and embraced Nazeer and asked my wife to do the honors of gifting the booklet and the Rs 500 Note.

By then word spread that something was afoot and a host of Teachers gathered and we had a group photo taken by my son's Canon, my wife handing over the stuff to Nazeer, me on one side and the HM on the other, and the rest in two rows behind.

HM promised to make the Prize-Giving a Public Ceremony next day in the Assembly (sending word to Laxmi not to bunk); and also read a few Rhymes...

Coming out of her Office, I sat under the good old Neem Tree for a couple of minutes...nothing seems to have changed...

Except, Nazeer said he wanted to become a Doctor and migrate to America...when asked why, he said Doctors in America make a lot of money and he wanted to take his poor parents also along with him...

I said:

"Amen!"


===================================================================

Their Last Laugh

==================================================================

1992 Midday April Last Week:

I was sitting in my Office at KGP and trying to read Weinberg.

The door opened and in entered Kapeel.

One look at his pained face and I was scared what happened.

His left arm was bandaged with a sling round his neck. There were five or six blotches of red blood leaking through the cotton rolled around his arm and a couple on the left half of his face.

I asked him what happened and he replied amidst sighs of pain that he was hurrying to his last Exam at IIT on his pushbike, knocked a rickshaw, fell down and injured himself, then was carried to the BC Roy Hospital by the rickshaw chap where they quickly did a hotch-potch job since he had to hurry to the Exam Hall to beat the half an hour deadline, managed to sneak just in time, was allowed by the Hall-in-Charge who was all sympathy, the paper-setter duly visited the Hall and offered him extra time which he refused, managed to finish all his questions just in time, and was visiting me if I could drop him at his Hall on my scooter.

As I was getting up in a hurry, he gave a broad smile, pulled his arm out of his sling, removed the bandage, rolled the ink-filled blotches of cotton from his arm and face and threw them into my dustbin, said sorry for his make-up, and laughed boisterously at fooling me as well, said that his pushbike was very much in its stand and the whole gag was to celebrate his exiting IIT Exam Halls for good.

Apparently it was the done thing...

Got me completely fooled...I didn't know that such larks were on then.

When I joined KGP in 1965, every student was dressed like a gentleman (although they were anything but that), there were no T-shirts with loud messages, nor jeans, nor bathroom slippers.

Somewhere down the line I read on the back of the first page of the answer-scripts among the Instructions to the examinees as well as the invigilators a line saying that all students should be 'properly' dressed.

Kapeel was as usual dressed perfectly but for his 'ill-dressed' wounds.

Beat the system hollow...there must be many such inventive by-byes to the IIT in which they had their highs and inevitable lows during their 5-year stint.

Damn good gags!

******************************************************************************************************************

2004 mid-May Evening:

The door of my Office opened and a weird-looking girl entered. The features looked familiar but not the make-up.

She said: "May I come in, sir!"

The voice was a give-away.

"Why the hell are you dressed up like a nauch-girl", I asked my son.

He peeled off his bindi and other outer feminine overalls and replied that their Final Year Grand Viva was just over and the entire batch of 9 boys and 3 girls went to their Chemistry Lab where they had hidden their fancy costumes in their lockers, put them on with suitable make-ups and went round the Department asking their revered teachers of 5 long years: "May we come in, sir!"

Apparently many teachers were taken aback, but recovered, and the entire set of their teachers posed for group photographs in front of their hated labs!

**************************************************************************************************************

1997 April

I walked into Room Number F-232, where my students (among others) were answering my (equally hated) Question Paper, checked and signed the specimen copy, said 'hi' to the 3 invigilators and was walking back.

The Professor-in-Charge of Exams who was a close friend of mine, and the Dean were about to walk into the Exam Hall to inspect if everything was going well.

I pulled my friend aside and whispered that they don't have to worry about copying in this Hall since there were 14 invigilating heads.

He was curious how the regulation 3 invigilators for this small Hall got escalated to 14.

I replied:

"Prof X. Panchanan (5) + Prof Y. Panchanan (5) + Prof Z. Brahma (4) = 14"

==================================================================