A friend: Someone asked me once "Who is Sujesha"...The tone was bit rural types and it sounded like "Who is Su jaisa"...and obviously the answer was no one...And yet another obvious thing was that the listener got baffled..

Lolz.

My tryst with Religion & Atheism

Ever since I can remember, our family has had an inclination towards spirituality, and a belief in God. My dad, though never a regular to temples unlike devout Hindus, always advocated that "God was One". So, irrespective of religion, he did believe in God. Maybe it is more apt to say that he believed in "all gods", and believed that all religions essentially teach the same, and that all religions are a way to reach God, etc, etc, etc, but there I digress.

The point I am trying to bring forth is that my parents, and hence our family, were believers. We had faith in some higher power that had caused our existence. Of course, we didnt find it necessary to visit temples to re-assert our faith in Him, because we also believed that "He was everywhere".

Cut to April 2010, when my dad passed away due to a (multiple?) massive heart attack(s). It was like a bolt of lightening out of the blue (pun unintended). So many hopes, wishes and dreams lay unfulfilled. Try as I may, I could think of no explanation why his end had to be that way. Many "why" questions arose (or threatened to arise but were throttled?) in my mind. But I never spoke them aloud, knowing fully well that "Anything that is born, will die someday." I tried to accept the incident, as just a fact of life. However, a question that soon accompanied was, "So now, what is my belief in God?". I had asked myself that question for the first time, in so many years. I had never before fully weighed that question in my head - it had just been an accepted fact of life for so long. And now, it felt as if my beliefs in God were shaking.

Still struggling to find a mid-way somewhere, an explanation that would make sense, an explanation that could tell once and for all, one way or the other. Perhaps it would make the loss a bit more bearable? But considering that these questions have been eluding philosophers for centuries, I do not know how probable it is, that I would strike gold in this pursuit.

PETITION FOR EQUALITY IN ACCOMMODATION

FOR
POST-GRADUATE MEN AND WOMEN

The Director
IIT Bombay
Mumbai – 400076

Date: July 23, 2010

Subject: Petition against disparity in accommodation for PG boys and
PG girls in our institute.

Dear Sir,

We, the undersigned, seek to bring to your notice that there is an acute disparity between the accommodation facilities extended to PG boys and PG girls in this institute. While male Ph.D. students are being granted a single room on Day 1 of their stay in the institute, female Ph.D. students are still awaiting their chance to get a single room, even in their second year. While male M.Tech/M.Sc students are getting a single room at the end of their first year, female M.Tech/M.Sc students are expected to stay in double rooms till the end of their tenure. Even in the case when M.Tech/M.Sc. students are expected to share a room (for emotional and moral support reasons), they should be expectedly sharing a double room, and not sharing a small single room.

The above facts bring out a pattern of (as yet unacknowledged) discrimination against PG girls. This discrimination, even if unintentional, is causing undue stress on research environment of PG girls and the facilities available to us, like messing facilities, bathrooms and other basic amenities.

The earlier petition that we wrote was addressed to Chairman, HCU, our request being that one of the smaller hostels (say, Tansa or new wing in H-12 or H-14) be released to us. However, nothing concrete has come out of it. We have only been assured that new building construction is set to start soon, and that our accommodation problems may be allieviated in a couple of years.

Our stress is more immediate and we can not wait another 2 years in the hope of new buildings (whose construction has not even commenced in the past whole year). It is our concern that, when male PG students are comfortably nested in single rooms, why should female PG students face such hardships? Any problems that prohibit Tansa/new wing allocation to girls, should be dealt with and resolved, instead of being wished away by abandoning PG girls to adjust with whatever is “available”.

Considering the urgency of the situation, we earnestly request you for an immediate redressal of the grievances of PG girls, and to take a stand on the issue of equal treatment for men and women in Post Graduate programmes in the institute.

Date: 23.07.2010

Yours sincerely,
Undersigned

Need some more time in life. Gimme more!

No more Bhopals. http://www.greenpeace.org/india/stop-another-bhopal

Every obstacle is an opportunity for research.

Prepaid Tales

Today morning, I had a pre-paid talk-time balance of 58 bucks. As luck would have it, the first call I thought of making today morning was to my brother in Australia. I wondered for a moment what would be the current calling rates to Australia and deciding that 58 must surely be more than enough, I proceeded to dial his number.

To my surprise, I was greeted with a message saying, "You have insufficient balance to make this call"! I was bemused. 58 bucks not enough to make an ISD call! In these times! Ok, I decided that I better call my mom and ask her to tell my brother to call me. He had confirmed earlier that he got much cheaper calling rates from there. So I dialed my mom's number.

Horror of horrors, I got the same message again, "Insufficient balance". I was thoroughly miffed at Airtel prepaid's unprofessionalism, as I saw it. A call to my mom should cost only 1 Re., why do they claim I do not have enough balance to even make a local call? Now they will force me to recharge and then only allow me to make any calls. So ran my thoughts...

In my indignation, I decided I wont recharge right away. I reached lab and just when my eyes fell on the date/time on my desktop, a bell rang in my head and it suddenly occurred to me that perhaps the validity of my prepaid card had expired. I checked it and turns out, yeah, that was the case. :) That explained why I was unable to make calls. And that is perfectly fine, however, the misleading error message that greeted me had me all baffled earlier, and led me to jump to the wrong conclusion that these people were out to fleece me. :D

Well, finally I recharged with "lifetime validity" and was able to make calls successfully. Btw, when I checked the expiry date of "lifetime validity", it says Feb 14, 2013. A friend informed me that that was the date of expiry of their license. So, in essence, lifetime validity refers to lifetime of the service provider, and not the lifetime of the human being. That is still acceptable I guess since 3 years is still long enough, and the service providers likely expect to renew their license by that date. But it still begs the question, "why the surprising affinity to Valentine's day...?"