Friday, November 18, 2005












Taking stock !
After being at this place (IIM, Bangalore) for a better part of two years and now that the beginning of the end is near, I decided to make a balance sheet of sorts which would let me know the kind and the amount of "value addition" that I have achieved over here (Alumni tell me that as the programme draws to a close it is normal to get feelings of this sort). So I too decided to give vent to my feelings. However even after trying for an hour I could not point out something concrete.........now this was a particularly disturbing thought....Is it that I have gained nothing?...but how could that be??........People around me say that I have changed such a great deal (for better or for worse? results in a mysterious smile........however i assume positivity).....parents tell me that I have become more focussed ("now you can sit at one place for more that 20 min at a time........a feat unthinkable of in your previous 'state' ")........friends tell me that now I have that killer instinct, the urge to go for the jugular ("yaar....aajkal tu bike badi fast chalata hai...aur aaj to tune us bandi ko 'u're welcome' bhi keh diya uske 'thanks' kehne ke baad").....however my mind needed something more convincing, something that says empthatically that Sunil Khaitan has not put his father's hard earned (and hard stolen from under the taxmen's nose) money down the drain.
I generally refrain from counting things like maroing fundaes (though I assure that I am no mug at that, ask any facha here) and putting gyan on any topic under the sun (a friend of mine emphtically and proudly points out "Yaar ek baat to tumhe manni padegi.....main chahe DML(Director's Merit List) mein na hoon par main ab fundae aur gyan to kisi ko bhi pila sakta hoon") to all and sundry, wiling or otherwise. However desperate situations called for desperate measures and if this situation was not despo enough I don't know what will ever be (my maadu mind had already started calculating the opportunity cost of my two years stay over here......which went like: Straight cash outflow of Rs. 3,54,000 in tuition and mess fess....chakravarti byaj on this @ Rs 2/sankda for 1.163 years (as cash flows were intermittent) add to this what i may have earned had i gone into the family business.....and my head starts reeling)......
My search still continues........