Let's Talk About Science

I have a friend, who, although quite close to me, differs significantly from my view of science. His name is Debanjan; I'll call him Deb here to save myself the trouble of having to type out the full name every time I make a reference to him. Deb is a brilliant student, and I believe he has quite a future ahead of him in physics. He is an ardent student of quantum physics. But that is beyond the point here. Deb has very strong opinions, and he holds to them and defends them to great depths with much logic. This I find particularly delectable, because when I enter into a technical argument with most people they back down before my own expressiveness. As a result, time and again we have very interesting conversations.

One particular topic about which we differ greatly is the aim of science. I hold a belief that science is meant for the benefit of the common people and to improve the life and living of the masses. Deb on the other hand believes that science is a natural outflow of the joy of discovery, "the pleasure of finding things out", quoting Feynman. As a result of this, we come to rather contradictory conclusions and tiffs regarding the nature of modern research. For one, I acknowledge that for an innovator, the kick of finding things out is like a drug. It gives you an addictive pleasure from which it is indeed very difficult to draw yourself out. Due to this, researchers go deeper and deeper into more and more esoteric topics, to hunt out the intimate details of the truth behind things.

The negative of what I find in this is that researchers, especially modern researchers, overlook the fact that they have some, even if very little, responsibility to the society from which they come and to which they belong. By saying this, I mean that modern research goes so deep into so difficult things, that what they do seldom benefit the common man at all. Much of the research that goes on today, if you see reports in good technical journals, will have a title that in unnerving enough. As soon as you read the title you know that you are as far away from it as one could possibly be. Worse still, I have discovered topics which are somewhat related to my own field of interest, and yet it has gone to such a depth of specialization that indeed I can understand very little about it. I am not against such research, mind you. I appreciate the intelligence and knowledge it requires, and respect the fact that the people involved in it get some great enjoyment in doing it.

The problem I placed before Deb in our debate was thus: imagine such a man, maybe yourself, who knows "very much about very little" and is doing great things in that. Now suppose a simple man, who works 10-to-5 and goes to the market everyday morning, meets you on the street one fine morning and asks you what you are doing. You explain to him, as best as you can (there is a difference in opinion between us here too, but lets leave that aside for the time being), that you are trying to figure out the probabilistic path taken by the electron cloud  between two contacts in a quantum transistor, and how the same maybe modified by the use of magnetic fields (actually it is perhaps far more complicated, but lets suppose we bring it down to this). Mr. Simple Guy frowns his brow, tried hard to understand, breaks into a sweat, gives up and finally asks, "I am sure it is very great, but how is it going to help me, or those like me?" What answer do you give?

Deb is of the opinion that the pursuit of knowledge in science in a natural process. If scientists had to worry day in and day out about fulfilling the expectation of the farmer, the laborer and the quintessential family-man right here right now, life would become very difficult for them. They would be forced to think about things and find solutions to problems that really do not interest them, and would perhaps make a mess out of it because they did not put their hearts to it well enough. Deb believes that researches are best left to themselves, doing whatever they please and however they please, without worrying about the fact that whether they are benefiting people or not in the present scenario.

But what about the people, I ask him. What about the thousands of people who live around you. We studied in a college whose fees were greatly subsidized, and if I am not wrong, the subsidy came from the taxes paid by those people about whom you are not willing to spare a thought. Is that morally correct, and do they not have a right to ask you to what effect they invested their money in educating you? Was it not in the hope that you, being brighter and smarter, would show them a new, perhaps better way of living? How can you so casually evade your responsibility to the people behind your success and move on to "whatever you please"?

Deb feels that it is out of context to ask for benefits right now. He believes that what science achieves today benefits people in very tangible ways a few generations down the line. For example, when John Bardeen and Walter Brattain worked hard to develop the first semiconductor transistor, I am sure nobody felt how useful this could be (perhaps not even they themselves). But look now - the transistor, a few generations down the line and with more innovations, has made possible today the computer and the mobile phone and a host of other things that every other person is using. The esoteric has become the pedestrian, and people are reaping the benefits of what once might have been considered to be pursued in "pure academic interest". It may be humorous at this point to note that when the first telephone was invented, the then-president of the USA said "Its a wonderful gadget, but who would want to use it anyway?" Funny as it may sound, it is the root of this argument - what seems to be mere fanciful inventing today may turn out to be instrumental in a mass technical revolution just a few years later.

True. But I have more to say. What about astrophysicists? Prof Hawking for example? What he has done is marvelous, and has richened our understanding of the universe in ways that cannot be explained in the mere words of a fool like me. But how many generations and how many more innovators down the line will it ever become useful to common people? Besides, how many researchers can boast of having done seminal work which has brought in a revolution a few generations down the line? What about the loads of rubbish people produce every year (which perhaps includes many of the undergraduate dissertations we scripted ourselves - God knows whether anybody even reads them) and pass of their entire lives in the name of "futuristic research? Or the people who work on number theory? As of now, I know no application of the practical world where that field has ever proven to be useful.

Deb tries his defense here too. He counters by saying that in that respect many of the greatest discoveries should be called useless. The Special Theory of Relativity, for example. Probability and combinatorics. Even quantum mechanics!

No its not true, I argue. Special theory of relativity is useful, although we may not be aware of it. This theory tells us how to harness nuclear energy, and bad as that may sound, it may well be our prime source of alternative energy a few hundred years down the line, considering the rate at which fossil fuels are getting depleted. Special theory of relativity has its uses in modern aeronautics and allows pilots to drive people home safely, talking of more immediate impacts. Probability and combinatorics are almost the backbone of the world of finance and speculation, the basis on which billions of dollars of forex trading take place and people make or break their fortunes in stock exchanges. Quantum mechanics has allowed us many things, not the least of which is to understand solid state physics well, abstract it to a simpler lever and happily teach it away to undergraduates in the name of electronics! Even molecular reactions owe their full understanding to quantum mechanics, and although many genetics engineers may not be aware of it, the discovery of the structure and thereafter artificial production of life-savers like insulin are, in the history of development of science, an offshoot of quantum mechanics in the name of crystallographic studies (remember Bragg's law, anyone?)

Deb takes these points in his favor and strongly sticks to the fact that such esoteric practices must go on, because that is the way progress has been ushered in in the past and perhaps will continue to be in the future. But who are the recipients of these benefits? The elite? The people who are directly or indirectly funding your research? USA and Europe, to be more in-the-face? What happened to poor India? What about the people here, who will come back for them and benefit them, even if it is 7 generations away in the future?

Deb says science and scientists serve mankind as a whole, and are not limited by political boundaries. Nobel as it might sound, it is fallacious, because if you disregard the political boundaries then you become only more strongly answerable to every common man in the world. The poor farmer who rides on his wooden plough trying to bring his unruly oxen under the harness beneath the burning sun to till his field perhaps gets only more right to question the outcome of your research and its impact, if that be the way. I am yet to receive a satisfactory response to this question.

It is difficult to come to a conclusion on something like this, but what I feel about the topic is this: it is undeniable that research cannot be put under the yoke of day-to-day concerns, and the creativity of innovators must be allowed to run free if discoveries like the recent artificial development of genetic material to bring to "life" an otherwise inactive cytoplasm are to become reality. Needless to say, this research, no matter how esoteric it may seem to the plain eye, has immense significance which I, being a gob-smacked idiot in the world of biology, can also appreciate. But perhaps it would be good if all these great minds sat up straight and decided, that out of 12 months of the year, I shall put 10 months in what I want to do, and think for 2 months about what the people, my people, mankind at large, need, right NOW. And I shall use my mental faculties to find some practicable and useful solution for them, to make the world a better place.

And above all, no great mind should ever become blind to the impact of his discovery on the practical world, in the name of "the pleasure of finding things out". Feynman himself said that when he started working on the Manhattan project, his chief concern was that if Nazi Germany beat them to the race of successfully making the bomb, then the losses to human life would be incalculable. Thus it was a necessary evil to put their minds to work for the bomb. But when Germany was defeated, he regrets that not once did it strike him as to what point was there in continuing the work he had been doing, so lost he and the team was in the kick of discovery. He admits it was perhaps the greatest mistake a scientist could ever make, to allow his brain to be used by the "worldly wise" for unscrupulous purposes while allowing himself to be fooled under the "pleasure of finding things out" syndrome. People around us are too smart, unlike what we "educated" ones think, and they can manipulate us in ways we cannot imagine. In view of mankind, then, let us indulge in the joy of discovery, but not become blind to what it may mean to, and how it may affect, our people, and lets spare a little time thinking for them too.

PS: I am not sure if my readers will find this interesting. If you do, let me know, there are several other equally, if not more, interesting debates, that we had, which I shall be glad to share with you.

The ways of the Almighty...

There is a popular line in drama in my mother tongue (Bengali, that is) which goes as "Kotha bolo na; tomra keu shobdo koro na, bhogobaan nidra giyechhen golojog shoite paren na; kotha bolo na!" Translated to English, that stands as "Dont talk, dont make a noise, the Almighty is asleep, and he cannot stand being disturbed, so keep quiet". Every time I hear this line, I feel something very queer, which is perhaps not noticeable in the lines in a hurried read.

The surprise element lies in the statement that the Almighty is asleep. Think about it. Someone whom we visualize as our guardian above, who watches over us, protecting us from harm, noting our deeds and punishing or rewarding us accordingly at the end of our mortal lives (at least so says mythology, of almost any religion) is asleep. ASLEEP. HE is not watching over you. HE does not care about who is doing what, the good the bad and the ugly. Is HE at all interested?

Its a philosophical thought, but it brings to my mind the question "what if?" What if all that we were taught was wrong? What if values, virtues and the fabled "triumph of good" do not exist in reality? What if the good do not get rewarded in any way and die miserably, and the bad who manage their way all the way up are the ones who end up with everything they want in life? What if there is no grand record book of earthly doings? Worse still, what if the judging criteria of a man or woman on earth is not what we imagine it to be? What if it is exactly reverse?

What about the old guy who lives down your street? The poor man spent his life working hard at the local post office. Little did he earn, but spent it unflinchingly to educate his son. Great was his joy on the day when his son finished school. Unbounded was his pride when his son studied in a good college by a scholarship. He held hands with his elderly wife, sitting at the park bench, sighing at having successfully raised a family and served his nation, waiting for his son to come to him with visions of a better life.

The wait never ended. His wife perhaps realized its no good waiting, she quietly passed away one day. Heartbreaking it was, yet an occasion with a silver lining, for on this excuse his son did come home for a week. But then it was all gone, and the shroud of loneliness descended upon him. He waits still, but suspects that his wife knew better, and hopes that one night he too will pass away in his sleep, unnoticed to the rest of the world.

And then relatives will come and say "He was a good man. God rewarded him, he passed away painlessly." Painless, was it? Was that all the reward he deserved? Oh the folly! But the topic changes soon, to more important things like inheritance.

In a Bengali movie called "Kori diye kinlam" (among the better ones) there is a silly old man, who says two lines of great wisdom. When a girl about to be married asks him "Will I be happy in life?" he says "Oh you silly girl, dont you know? In this world he who is rich is happy". And when the girl asks him about punishment after death, he vehemently protests "There is nothing after death. Nothing. With death its finished. Its all gone, dark and hollow". Remarkable. Why have people not thought about this in greater detail?

There is a little girl at the corner of street where I turn. In ragged clothes and dirty hair she scrubs away at the cups and plates piled high and deep at her feet. She works fast, because her angry employer shouts at her when she does not. But in her heart she knows another reason. Everyday when she finishes her work, she gets a dry biscuit from the owner of the ramshackle dhaba. She tries to time this precisely at the hour when her 3-and-a-half foot high hero comes with a holder full of tea glasses. If she succeeds, she manages to share the biscuit with the urchin, who in turn manages one extra cup of tea everyday for this little intimate brunch. The owner looks suspiciously at the pair, and seems to be in an unusual hurry to close shop and go home. She hates it, the moment of separation.

God's children, aren't they? Well they'd better be, for there is nobody else alive who would call them their children. And what is the fate of God's children? Somewhere below the wheels of a car? Or are they to succeed the beggar a little further down? Who keeps note of their tender feelings, and where will those take them?

Don't seethe your temper against the owner of the shop. He does not earn much himself. Has an ailing wife, and a promiscuous daughter who ran away from home for ... He shivers at the thought. God knows where she is now. His wife weeps every night secretly for her. He weeps every night thinking of all the money he owes the street ruffians who threaten him in different ways every week. They are backed by the police, who share in the earnings. Its no good fighting crocodiles in water, so he tries to accommodate. And when bereft of all hope he stumbles along the lanes of the red-light area dead drunk shouting out the name of his daughter, not knowing whether to be happy or sad at the lean prospect of a reply from one of the windows above, a little feeling stretches out for the pair of urchins back at his shop. He'll scold the girl even more the next day, he tells himself. Maybe that way she wont lose discipline like his daughter did. And he'll keep the boy away from her, this is where it all begins. But maybe, just maybe, he'll get her a bigger biscuit.

And in contrast we have God's privileged child. The symbol of Hinduism. The god of the state. He who brings great investments and great industrialization. He who, not so long ago, was charged of inactivity, or rather instigating activities between 27th to 3rd February of 2002. He who was, possibly, indirectly responsible for the death of almost a thousand innocent people, orphaning of children, rape of women and numerous such atrocities. He who was accused of having systematically planned government and security level inaction against a terrible carnage. Numerous aging parents like the one who recently passed away down the street have been pushed to wait forever for their children to return by him. Countless little girls and tea-carrying urchins have been purportedly produced by him, who loiter the streets with no place to call home, and nobody to call dear. Perhaps even today, the graying hairs and the wrinkled brows of some father like my dear dhabawala try hard to conceal the screams of imputation to the Almighty against him, only to break down in the comfortable numbness of inebriation.

But is HE listening? His ideal demagogue came through clean. Of course he did, the Government found nothing wrong. They even got him a better rank and position. And I am quite sure, after death, if he stands before HIS court, he'll come clean there too. "Pichhpaa noy bidhatao dudhete jol meshate" we say in Bengali - Even HE does not hesitate to mix water in milk. HE could with with a little more money and power HIMSELF.

Maybe in the Christian schools when the kids line up in the morning for their prayers, they should just say:

Dear God,

Are you watching?

Amen.

Those 4 years...

This is a tribute to all those with whom I started a wonderful journey, but shall be compelled by circumstances to end the same without them.

Fig. 0: The haluest guy is the writer of this blog

Ayan Sengupta:

Fig. 1: Ayan files a petition demanding worse weather (sunshine, rain, etc) along with Bhalu

Ayan is mentioned first because (i) he is the institute topper, unless he horribly screws up his last endsems ;) (ii) not mentioning his eminence first may have consequences like DC etc. Mr. A Sengupta (B.Tech version), also known as Prof. ASG among the junta, is the living personification of how people conceive, chase after, hunt down, skin alive, roast, devour and finally ingest dreams. One fine morning in Salt Lake, ASG in presence of a catalyst named Debangshu Mukherjee, suddenly realized how poor his academic concepts are. And then there was no stopping him. Immersing himself in super human pressure (measured by a special unit named after him and his partner-in-load Debanjan – 1 “Chaap” – which approximately equals the pressure exerted by an elephant trying to balance himself on a pin) ASG chased relentlessly after the gilded circlet of glory. We who have been fortunate enough to witness the precise mechanism of that phenomenon (a queer mixture of comedy, tragedy and oodles of the aaaaarrrrrrgggggghhhh factor) shall remember him for years to come, and uphold him as an example for our kids not to follow. :P

Ayan can be currently found around EPFL in the Swiss Alps, staring hard at the snow until it melts in fear.

Nachiket Desai and Tanaya Sahu:

Fig. 2: Nachi (right corner, green t-shirt) delivering his electronic sermons

When God wanted to try his hand at electronics, the Nachiket avatar was born. Known as Nachi to the department and Nochi to Ayan in particular, he is one guy who learned something out of the 4 years spent here. Secret news is that first year students play trump cards in which Nachi features as a prized possession, with statistics like “744 pages of notes photocopied from him, 87 assignments distributed by him, 17 people passed with his help, 8 codes shared with all” glittering the parchment. Not to mention “current residential status” set to “MIT” and “current relationship status” set to “committed” (you think that’s not an achievement?? Just come to IIT!!). Sitting beside Nachi in the classes is a recursive call to a class in itself, with information flowing more densely from your right (or left) than from out in your front. Nachi’s phone serves more customers in trouble than a reputed BPO, especially the night before examinations. Everybody is in awe of him, except one, who has marked him as “liar liar” on the back cover of the digital VLSI notebook.

Which brings us to the topic of Tanu. Tanu started her career most benignly by chasing birds and roaming around the corridors in school in utter ignorance of the fact that she was supposed to sit in one place. From that, the damsel with the beatific smile, whose left hand is longer than her right (or maybe the other way round), promoted herself to the Goddess of Good Handwriting, and the Chair(wo)man of the NDC (Notes Distribution Committee). SN Hall’s gate is always crowded by boys for her. Don’t get me wrong, it’s for her notes, which circulate the department till the dire emergency of its return to its rightful owner emerges a few hours before the examinations. Add to that her culinary and singing skills, and you will be as confused as I am about which trait exactly won Nachi over.

The immense intelligence of the God and his Goddess took a backseat when they placed themselves on diagonally opposite ends of USA. Never mind. Bless their (going-to-be) children; I would have been born psyched with parents having a combined CGPA more than 19.

Nachi is currently busy belittling Profs at MIT. Tanu waits for Prince Charming in UCLA California, singing Tere Bina Jiya Jaye Na… while scrutinizing Nachi’s income and expenditure statement for possibilities of optimization.

Fig. 3: Nachi and Tanu insisted that no picture of them together be put up. Obviously they underestimated my smartness

Dhaval Chudasama:

Fig. 4: Gujju either shouting "Yo Gujrat" or "Yo Nehru" or "Yo SBI ka khata"

Unlike his name, the Gujju isn’t sexy. Gujju openly flaunts his Gujju-est accent in class, shamelessly confesses having left his khata in State Bank and has a fetish for sleeping on his infamous gamcha at arbitrary locations in Germany. But Gujju is so sincere about his studies that for every class he misses (no! he doesn’t bunk!!) Gujju reads the notes and writes them down in his own notebook manually, but never photocopies them. Gujju is a big shot in Technology General Championship for Nehru, and missed out on the GC by a hair’s width of poltu in his final year. Gujju however, has found his place in J.P. Morgan Chase, and intends to chase success henceforth with full concentration (in preparation for which he took a special course on algorithms and regretted it later).

Gujju can be currently found in JPMC Mumbai, contemplating the economic impact of converting cotton mills of Gujrat into semiconductor fabrication labs, and the investment required for the same.

Aayush Prakash:

Fig. 5: The "Zara Zara Touch Me Touch Me Touch Me" Boy

Everybody calls him Juice, I call him Chhamiya, for which he calls me gay in return. But trust me, Giselle Bundchen would have wept after seeing his waist. Juice made the mistake of his life by forfeiting a lucrative (read juicy) career in modeling and aiming to become an engineer. Almost every guy in EC Department has a crush on him (including me). Juice stays indoors in fear of us, plus that of getting blown away by the wind. Juice has a smile that can start a thousand IC’s. And Juice has a strange telepathic connection with Prof IC, so that every time he decidedly announces “Aaj Sir nahi aayenge” IC walks in through the door.

Juice is currently following in the footsteps of Linda Evangelista and Yasmin Ghauri to try and re-orient himself in the Canadian modeling industry. His studio is in Waterloo.

Prabhu Pritam Dash:

Fig. 6: :P :P :D is now after Hakim. You can see "prank" written on his face

Convert his initials to smileys: :P :P :D , and that’s the best estimate of the department’s electronic monkey. It has been claimed that :P :P :D at some time was a quiet and serious guy soaked in his books. We all think it’s a blatant lie. He is the biggest and most heartless prankster to ever roam the ramparts of EC department, including the most horrible Amma repeats examination joke which made us want to hang him. :P :P :D is permanently after everybody, and takes special interest in irritating Shaunak Mishra in particular (covered later). :P :P :D goes to classes (if at all) to find a quieter environment to indulge in his i-Pod related activities, and has a chain of alleged girlfriends / crushes whose names end in “-ta”, only exception being Gaurav Srivavastava. And what :P :P :D did in Amsterdam is still a fill in the dash for all of us.

:P :P :D is currently with erection… err.. Ericsson in Gurgaon. The typo may be correct too, it’s the Dash part of him.

Shaunak Mishra and Sunav Choudhary:

The BB – Bokaro Brothers. They studied in the same school, with one coming first and feeding samosas to the other as a token of consolation.

Fig. 7: Load takes the onus of 4G Matched Filtering upon himself

Had I known Shaunak in my first year, I would have found a perfect example of a DC motor running on full load. Load is psyched about anything and everything that has remotely something to do with acads. Which has reached such an extreme that he runs to the toilet at the end of every class, and jumps up in fear when someone pings him with a picture of RVR. Load has an amazing record of messing up interviews, including one occasion when he casually walked out of the room before it was actually over. Load searches Google for everything, including the definition of frequency (you know what I mean) and picture of a blonde Oriya Brahmin girl who he dreams to marry (don’t mistake the blonde part, the first comment Load passes on an insanely hot girl is “Abbe uska baal dekha??”). Load is the God of communications, curses his choice to no end, and played football till he dropped after finally landing the dream university. Load is terrified of policemen. And Load teams up everywhere with Sunav.

Talking of Sunav, he has no nickname. Sunav was under the impression that the world is composed of men, and some people who somehow don’t look like men. He also condescended to marrying one of that sect under pressure from his father way back in first year (for the future, I mean). Sunav takes electronics real seriously, going as far as getting himself electroculated in the rain while wading through a puddle. And then, one fine morning, Sunav’s Gtalk status message announced “Vegas Baby Vegas”. Thus Sunav became aware of women. But it has not affected him much. His first favorite music track (to which he secretly tried dancing in his room) was Jhalak Dikhlaaa Jaaa(n)… by you know who. He still talks to the jhaal mudi seller in Hindi within West Bengal and in Bengali while in Jharkhand. And he remains the God of Mathematics till today, when all of us have happily removed it from the tiny hard disks residing in our heads.

Load can be currently found in one of the toilets of UCLA sending wireless signals to Sunav, who receives the same from USC Viterbi. Content of those messages is suppressed.

Fig. 8: Sunav (camel t-shirt) visibly upset at being separated from Load

Pritam Mukherjee:

Fig. 9: PM reflecting peacefully about life

Had PM been a little shorter, he would have beaten even Juice in Miss India contest. PM is the God of peaceful affairs, and it has been commented that unless one day PM realizes that there is a time bomb ticking away inside his trousers, he won’t get excited. PM is another God in Mathematics, and claims the most esoteric and byzantine theorems to be “obvious”. PM rides a cycle which is older than him, and respects the venerable object dearly, and a working model of the first mobile phone to hit the Indian markets still vibrates in his pocket. PM assumes a circular topology beneath his famous chaadar in winter and goes into hibernation. PM is also our suggested future replacement for PM senior, save the fact that PM junior feels a little out of place among poles and zeros.

PM currently lives his good old halcyon days in Maryland. No cute girl has excited him as of yet.

Sharad Sensharma:

Fig. 10: SSS uses Colgate every morning. Aur aap?

SSS is the management guru of the EC department. The dude is so freaking awesome, he maintains a CGPA well above 9 despite being a member-turned-head-turned-S.Comm. of Kshitij (although we know how he does that :P). Plus SSS is a deft swimmer and a real good TT player. Contrary to popular opinion, SSS does not smile, his face is set into a contortion that resembles a smile at all times. Such is his glamour, SSS leads the way in interns and placements alike, sidetracking the Gods upon every opportunity. And despite all this, SSS roams the campus in a discolored orange T-shirt bowing his head and meekly smiling. SSS is seldom there in class, and when he is, he makes sure his presence is noticed by suddenly starting to ask doubts. SSS is a highly eligible bachelor (as are 80% of the people reading or mentioned in this blog - plus the writer), and apparently SSS would love to fall in love, but as is the way with women, they fail to recognize the real gems.

Currently SSS can be found in the BarCap office in Singapore. His employers suspect he is under an advertising contract with Colgate from his never-ending smile.

Anandaroop Chakrabarti:

Fig. 11: Andy being given the Best Biceps Award

The hitman /bouncer. Somewhere in 2^nd year, Andy decided to have long hair (thankfully he got rid of his mane later on). And then came the gym. No man has shuttled with so high a frequency between classes and the gym as him. The effect showed. Andy blew up like a hot air balloon, and latest news is that Andy no longer finds the weights in the machines in the gym sufficient, thus lifts whole machines for his daily exercise. Andy apparently also lives under the oath of reticence, with the answer to almost any question under the sky being a mere “Hmm” from him. Andy does not miss classes, and in addition to that does not miss sitting in the first row right next to Stud Matka, although he has been caught shamelessly sleeping at times. But the greatest thing about Andy is nobody dares to tease him in any way. Effects can be lethal, as had been demonstrated by a “friendly fist” upon our dear bear brother in 2^nd year which promptly landed him up in the hospital.

Andy claims to be at Columbia University, but trusted sources inform us that he stalks the streets of New York by night and works as a bouncer in Las Vegas in summer for extra cash.

Devi Prasanna Pati:

Fig. 12: See how happy (not gay) Pati is?

Pati (also called Devi at times for his ineluctable femininity) was not in anyway one of the winners of Kaun Banega Crorepati. But he does have a secret resemblance to Sunny Deol. Pati resembles a smiling gunny bag, and the sunny side of him lies in his "dhaai kilo ka haath". Not that it has landed on anybody, but rumors are the Santa (Santanu Mandal) has been threatened more than once with the same (upon which he screamed out his passionate love for Pati to win his heart over). A sheer opposite to Load, Pati has never been seen tensed - be it an extra assignment, an increased end-semester syllabus or an extra class called at 8 PM. Pati has a watch which people believe to be the core portion of a broken down grandfather clock, and the huge rectangular dial is frequently consulted for the moment of emancipation while Pati is in class. Pati has also been accused of under-utilizing his glasses; more often than not Pati peers from above the frame than from through it; but such effects may have been imbibed out of admiration of the departmental post office with not-so-admirable services (you know who..).

Pati now "think"-s at IBM Bangy. Whether it is for mankind or for formally assuming the status of pati is an entirely different debate though.

Kunal Datta:

Fig. 13: Little Ribald Red Riding Hood KD

Small is the new big, they said. And right they were! KD is the smallest organic chronometer ever designed. KD wakes up at 6:50 sharp, brushes his teeth for precisely 2 minutes 37 seconds and has breakfast 7 minutes 13 seconds starting at 7:20, upon which he leaves for classes. KD held an astounding (and, let’s admit it, extremely irritating) record of 100% attendance till his 7^th sem, and only in his 8^th did he finally decide to give it a break. When KD’s door-lock cranked with the noise of being locked while KD was in the process of leaving for classes, I would mostly be rolling beneath the sheets, trying to contemplate whether today’s lecture would be worth attending. KD supersedes Tanu in the matter of notes distribution, only that in his case it is intended for his juniors (check the wing dustbin right after the exam, you’ll find INR 1000/- worth notes enough to make you a nehli). KD’s assumes a pose on the mess chair which makes one suspect that he is awaiting a lap dance. A firm believer in 2 fundamental and highly controversial principles – “Love is lust” and “Life is a race; if you don’t run fast you’ll be like a broken anda”, KD continues the dilemma regarding whether he is human or an android even today.

KD now resides in USC, stalking Los Angeles latinas twice his height with the immense confidence that his stipend is twice her salary.

And that all is just the tip of the iceberg. Each person I met in EC department was (is and will be) a genius. Ok, the profs would disagree, but I have seen much more of them than they have after all. Michaelangelo (Pankaj Chaukikar), Michael Jackson (Shishir Narayan), Usain Bolt (Kaustav Hakim), the Webmaster (Sai Krishna Tejaswi), the Passionate Othello (Sunil Sharma), the Smiling Wonder (Sushant Kondguli) or the Dark Knight (Kolluru Vinod) - name the masters and you shall find a budding maestro in EC department. Studying (studying???) alongside you has been an honor, a privilege, and I stand by my statement any day - I have learned much more from my friends outside the class than within.

Fig. 14: A bunch of crazy people I'll miss every single day of my life

And so. After 3 years of having braved every threatened punishment to proxy each other’s names in the attendance register, copied from each other in assignments, class tests (and semesters too) with unobtrusive shamelessness, jhapofied treats from the unsuspecting nerds at the slightest pretext, crashing into rooms for GPL’s with reckless abandon at weird hours of the night, photographing and sharing lab note books with greater gusto than a marriage ceremony and falling asleep on one another’s shoulders through lectures, it’s all over. The terrible times we spent together in labs, the morning tea Meherda bought us (actually he never paid) almost every day, the lab-bunked afternoons spent lolling on the Vikramshila grass, the late nights spent ogling the occasional samples of pulchritude, the endless frustapa of waiting for that damned BTP simulation to give the correct results and then pinging each other desperately for sources to copy from, the photo sessions, the punctured tire and the hitched ride, the laughter, the screams and the tears… it’s all gone.

Or is it? People who design memories can never forget them…