Life is what you perceive and not what you think or plan...

Every now and then I have wondered, has everything gone as I had planned, or has everything gone the way it had to go. I simply never get an answer. Just because I do not have an answer. Whatever I have planned for my career, for my living standards, for my education and for myself, those events and things have gone the way they should have. I have deviated very less in this regard. However, BHEL was a big surprise jump in my career, from IT to core operations marketing :).

But when it comes to life, it is a bigger surprise. Once I had thought that I would perhaps never get a soulmate. As and when I came across people, I was left out with huge differences in attitude. Slowly and gradually I started becoming averse to even trying to find a soulmate. In management terms we call it the "spiral & denial death trap". If someone goes into the "Ho Jaayega" mode he is more likely to fail. I went into that same death trap and left myself to fate. Somehow, fate had something in store for me. It had the biggest surprises of all. It would change my way of looking at things and conversely looking at myself being with people.

I found someone, from whose eyes I couldn't take my eyes off. It was not just beauty that bedazzled me, it was something more than that. It was her ability to actually let me be what I am. It was her ability to actually boss around on me, but, still giving me enough freedom to breathe my part of life. It was her ability to give me myself and make me realize that I was needed for once. That was enough as it catapulted me towards her.

I am a maverick who does things out of the box. But I keep things simple even though I might make them look terribly complex. One has to work with me to understand and live with me to figure out, how I keep these pieces of jigsaw puzzle together. One has to engage herself with me to understand the pieces I am made of. And also most importantly one has to make me assured that I am needed and she has to be open about her love for me.

This was done so stupendously by a girl, which I think has changed and evolved my way of thinking. Earlier I used to think that she is so similar to me. To be truthful, she is similar to me in instances of generic thinking about how to live and how to let live. But there are some starkling differences which make us even more unique as a couple. I end up messing things, and she has the ability to put things back into context. When I am lazy, she springs into action, and when she is lazy I lend her the shoulder to rest. This way at least I am useful once :). I think in too many directions and she has the ability to think in one and one only. This helps me back into track. I plan too much and she deters in planning, at least both ways we have a plan and at the same time we do not have a plan. So the confusion ends up on we laughing on each other. I love to blow things out of proportions and she loves to keep it simple. This enables both of us to learn from each other. I love playing with kids and she loves me doing that. This was something I could see when I was there with her at her home. I love to love her and she loves being loved. She hates that she loves me, but she loves me and I love that she does that :D. Our food habits are totally different, they are worlds' apart :).

There are so many things that make us similar and so many things that makes us different. It is going to be interesting with her as we will be having an adventure of exploring ourselves everyday and still won't be running out of ideas. It is important to keep that spark alive in ourselves as a couple, and perhaps we will find that too. I want to learn everything about her, and still I should be left to learn more. That way I will have more to explore and she will have more to enable me do that. I love that I love her.

In desperate search of happiness...

As the global recession unfolds, it brings about the tyranny of human suffering along with it. Here in India, however, things seem very different. We have altogether suffered more than any of the so called First World countries that we have grown immune to it. Somehow, we are also not very immune to it. I heard a very recent quote - "If your neighbour is in economic pain it is recession, and if you are with him then it is 'Depression'". Very true, as our economic neighbours such as the US and Europe are in severe pain. But to roll back and trying to contemplate the actual reasons for this are fruitless as it shows, how human judgment can go wrong and greed can overpower the same judgment. This was so ridiculously true about Lehmann Brothers. Yesterday, I was going through an editorial in TOI which talked about "Fall of Capitalism". The author gave out many instances of fall and then rise of Capitalism. I will quote him differently though. Capitalism as a term should not be used, because it is an evolving organism. In today's world we cannot term something as Capitalism or Communism. China changed over a period of two decades and now perhaps US will go through a change. We call it - "The incessant push towards 'equilibrium', in simple terms of economics".

Perhaps US economy's overdrive towards heaven was suddenly halted, and the age old saying that no one could touch the sky, and one who thinks he has, he has to fall down to realize that he hasn't. With fall of US economy, I have a very nervous feeling that a new world order might arise. The question is who will be part of this new world order. I count the candidates on my fingers and can get some out. China, I believe is the biggest candidate. But like India they too are plagued by incessant paranoia. France has come out as another candidate. But they too suffer from too much inward delusions. Israel is too busy in their own wars. Germany is totally spent. English seem to have lost out. So who is left? There is a painful answer to this. Every great economic fall has led to a war. Last time it happened in WW-II, when Germany rose out of the economic rot to become a superpower. At that time Germany had the inner resources and was always seen as West's prime enemy. Thus, they came out to become the adversary.

But the question is, who now? Perhaps the game has changed now. I feel, the next war is going to be fought over energy, as one philosopher had suggested. The axis might be declared and it might well turn out to be the Middle East. Right from Iraq till Pakistan. Breaking out a war here is perhaps what US will always want for its gloating war machinery. But this war which seems to be war of unequals may turn out to be a global catastrophe. The simple analogy for this catastrophe is the rogue nature of the states that are under the war radar. Countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia are quite peculiarly backstabbing. Perhaps no one should forget Pakistan which is another runaway rogue nation. It is ruled by nincompoops and the power centres in Pakistan are so many that you cannot tell where the rulings are coming from. Pakistan is on verge of self-destruction and in a desperate last attempt it might fall down in front of the terrorists it grew on its soil. This will be a disaster, as the rogue nuclear facilities in Pakistan will fall in hands of these terrorists and that will be the start of global nuclear pounding of Pakistan and other adjacent nations such as Afghanistan and Iran.

My greatest fear is for India. It might turn out that the fallout of Pakistan will subsequently be very bad for India. These terrorists will have ready target in India for their rogue nuclear bombs. America is very far away, thus, their vulnerability is lesser in comparison to ours. Apart from India, China too might fall prey to their own buyers. Chinese have been suffering a lot of humiliation in Xinjiang, from these so called Islamic nincompoops.

Whatever might the scene be, a third World War will spell doom on this world, because in WW-II, at least Germans were reasonable enough, even though they were barbaric. Their loss subdued and repelled the Nazi character. However, for a third war on these rogue Islamic states, things will be different. Many of these Islamic leaders or nations, have little or no reasoning ability. Their sole push is for a revenge which has never been justified. Half of them don't know whom they are taking revenge from. Decades of in-fighting and social disasters has turned them into social zombies who have no brains. Thus, fighting such a lot needs equally bad attitude. Perhaps this time, allied forces might go for a total wipe-out of civillizations after civillization in these regions. If it happens, it might be very sad.

For India, the fear is of its own large Muslim population. Let us see how future's history unfolds...

Things are back into Shape Finally

I don't like it when things are not in my hand. I love times when I have freedom to do whatever I want and achieve. My motivation always lies in completing tasks with 100% of my effort put in. Also I don't like ups and downs in life, rather, I prefer things to be stable and persistent. People might think that I am a little conservative, but to tell the truth, this conservatism has bind together my family very firmly. And as I put my family first, it is always my first priority to have a stable life. After Aricent fiasco, I realized how weak Aricent's business model. Even in other IT firms it is similar. They have very weak models, even though they have survived for a long term. But I doubt that they will sustain businesses. When I came across BHEL, the first impression to me was that this firm would never like to have a guy like me. I am a software Engineer, who is too much into Services Marketing. The reality is this. But something else I came across when I sat in the interview. The scenario changed. My interview was not that great, but I did answer smartly and dodged dirty questions like a pro. Dimplomatic is the correct word for this. However, I was still unsure. But in the end of the day, I got the job... :) and finally my life is back into shape. BHEL is a PSU and have a very strong business model, unlike these lying software firms. Though they give lesser salaries, but they are surely better off, as they never face recessionary pressures. They have established themselves and thrived on it. Being a Govt. organization ensures that I will never lose my job. That is essential as I will be soon getting married. So, now I can breathe easy for a while, but not too easy till I get the offer letter and the joining letter. I cannot be so damn eased off now, as Aricent had did a fraud with me. However, I believe BHEL is not going to do something like this. Finally I can smile.... :)

Left out, cheated, duped and perhaps with no chance even provided

I start writing this with only one note which I have been writing all these days. Repetitions of these same events of cheating targeted towards me in this grim scenario of economic downturn has left me totally helpless. I simply don't know what is happening and what will happen. With education loan breathing down my neck and virtually no finances to support myself, I am in midst of self destruction. I have been very diligently following what is happening in the market and can tell that it is no where near recovery. Why I say so is because of chronology of events and the chain reaction which led to this problem. However, this post is not for this discussion. I maintain my previous position that all I see is total calamity for myself in the coming months. I have no great financial backing or background. Thus, I had to take a loan of Rs. 3 lacs for my education. It will have an emi of nearly Rs. 8000 when I graduate out of IIT Kharagpur for a forgettable MBA degree. With no job and also an obligation to pay out nearly 12-14K per month in EMIs, it is coming to an end of the road for me. Aricent did the worst cheating with me. I just can't believe on what happened. I was left clueless. They did it after day 0 and 1 had passed out. I was not even given a chance. So nicely was the cheat done on me. I can now never forgive Aricent for the torment they are putting me in. Here in IIT Kharagpur also I would say that the MBA program is a big farce. They claimed to be the top of the league college, so why the hell are they not able to bring some major companies which are visiting other campuses. Surely, the bubble here has burst too. I had to apply into several commodity trading and separate consultancy firms, out of sheer desperation. I knew the result yield in these would be very less and in fact none of them materialized. I simply don't know where I am headed towards. I think that I might have to sell off my car to reduce the burden of loans upon me. I love my car but I believe that I have to let her go as I cannot afford her anymore. My shweetu too is now suffering with me, which I believe is another chain reaction. I always had a fear of this and it has occurred. Is it because of me? Is it my mistake? I have no answers. I believe that this will be first time in my life when I will go without a job. I have been an excellent performer, but I feel performance has no value. The world is ruled by cheats who cheat your ideas out.

Living in denial - As time passes by...

Here I am, writing again. The world around me falls and good that it falls. It seems that the tag of being a management graduate, what it brings to me? I feel cheated and robbed of my career. Everywhere, I see, I see nothing but failures. I want a job, and the place where I want a job is full of morons on the top, who have run the business as it had come. This has been proved, now that the economy's flip flop has actually opened their inabilities of contingency planning. Perhaps contingency planning was only secondary to them. It was merely a jargon thrown around. A jargon which has been used mercilessly over the years, without actually working practically on it. I am not a commentator on this subject. But it is merely a view.
Am I so unable to get a job? So how was I working for 3 years with my abilities? It simply defies logic. I now can evaluate, what happened? I can tell you the exact reason. The reason is very clear: The MBA which I did is a complete crap and disaster. MBA has rendered me useless and without any abilities. I have turned into a person full of marketing jargons and nothing else. A person full of no content. Here in campus, I can tell that the firms which have arrived, the candidates they look for, the way they conduct interviews. I can tell that they are uselessly wasting their own time and wasting time of candidates. They do not know what they are hiring for. When I used to hire, I used to tell the candidate about my work first. What I am working on was on top priority. The candidate then had to tell about his/her own abilities in the field. Here in MBA it is all that we say - "GAS" and nothing else. They hire for the sake of hiring. Then these people are fired on the sake of firing. Literally I am so pissed off now that I cannot tell.
MBA - The big myth...
1. No value additions, just big jargon based morons created year after year
2. Jobs suck because the MBA guys suck. They are not sure what to work on, they do not know about what they want. Their overgloated ambitions hurt them more on the job.
3. Firms don't know why they hire MBAs. (Big crap)
4. Sales and Marketing can be done in-house, why do you need people who do not know your business to come in and that too from so-called top management institutes which have no content but simply huge amount of "GAS".

Why do I feel cheated?

I have been re-evaluating my position in past 2 months and more I do it, the more I realize that how much I have been cheated by fate and people around me. I start chronologically from November 14th 2008 and end to this day January 18th 2009.

November 14th 2008 - I got the information of me getting a pre-placement offer from Aricent came in as a pleasant gift. I was with my love when this news was broken to me. I had known about the offer however. That actually changed the way I approached the job situation. With a good job of Business Development in Aricent, I knew that life would have been much easier. I owe a lot due to the loans that I have taken for my education. The effective EMI return would be something around a total of Rs. 14,000. Thus, I needed to earn at least 4 times this amount to sustain a proper living. Aricent actually gave an opportunity.

I was laid back. The only contingency I had was my CV, which fortunately I always keep ready. I was laid back and I relaxed and kept the books aside for that moment, to concentrate more on how to get engaged and married. Everything was so much in line.

December 11th 2008 - In comes the heartbreak. Aricent withdrew their offer. The one thing that flashed in my mind was - Why the hell did they offer in first instance? Did everything change in 20 odd days. If things were going wrong, they could have not given the offers altogether. They could have withdrawn the offers much before. But why after Day 0 and 1 of our placements.

Why wasn't I given a chance? I was totally unprepared for the placements as we were not allowed to apply into firms, for we had accepted the PPO. Ha, now I laugh, even my sarcasm cannot justifiably interpret this. Losing two days seemed losing out on almost 2 years of my own career. And now in fact I feel that I have been cheated so much that doing MBA for two years was nothing but a big waste of time. It has robbed me of my technical abilities and has endowed me with totally useless abilities which I know are never going to be in demand.

My manager in Aricent used to say - "Why shall I hire MBAs? They are a cost to my company, they do not bring profits, they are technically not sound and they have ambitions beyond the sky limit. Why shall I hire MBAs?" I totally agree to him. We are a waste of company's resources, as we acquire no special skills to actually benefit a company. The usual counter-question put forth to me is - "Then why do so many people do MBA?". I say it is herd mentality. Unfortunately I fell into the same herd mentality. MBA is a disaster course. You can learn far better by working on technologies and field work, rather than doing a course that simply augments you with a tag of good institute. I feel IIMs are far worse in this category. They cannot compare themselves with IITs because if you see the number of enterpreneurs from IITs and IIMs, you will find that IIMs come no where in picture. This is simply because IITians have special skills on tools, technologies and prowess over making new things. Management comes in as a second trait and they learn it while they work.

I particularly feel that MBA grads are nothing but a wholesale bunch of losers who do nothing but meetings in an organization. These are the same people who led the banking sector, all over the world to a disaster by their greed and the ambition to be more greedy. I am a particularly technical person who throws jargonism out of the window and uses plain english to define a product. I can also work on things because I have a knack of doing so. But this MBA has robbed me of two years of my precious tech. career. Maybe I will be able to go back, but will that be possible. I have to do a catch up act, which I believe is very difficult at this point of time.

I shall also do the expose` of standards in teaching around these institutes. In fact, most run by names and have very less to offer when it comes to actual knowledge enhancement. The students coming out of these colleges learn only big words and jargons. I feel pity as our careers are so empty without content.

January 18th 2009 - I come to the part of being cheated by people. I was giving an interview to a small start-up a few days back. In the interview itself, I was asked about the PPO from Aricent. I was totally taken aback. I had not written anything on my CV as such. I wonder who told them. I had very less to defend, as they asked me that if my PPO was re-instated then I would not join their organization. I lost the chance, there itself. I came out and took a look around for who could have done this. By looking into eyes of people I came to know who. Well I have forgiven that person.

Today was even more hilarious. I was hearing about a small software firm from the mouth of a placement committee member here. I reminded him to put the opening. And guess what, he forgot. Here people are without jobs and forgetfulness and Counter Strike keep more meaning to people. Well I can believe so, as he himself has a job. He is laid back. At least the opening is now on the list. Thanks for that.

I don't know what I got from this MBA here, but one thing I certainly got - I shall go back to my roots and start afresh, and make sure that I throw this degree out, as it is nothing but a liability. Maybe I will keep it for the namesake. Maybe it will help me with its name only, but I don't expect any other gains from it.

A Big Surprise for India's External Affairs Policy

With Sheikh Hasina coming to power with a thumping majority, caught everyone by surprise. She is the most pro-India leader in Bangladesh and India would be more than happy having her at the helm in Bangladesh. What is more intriguing is the time at which she has come to power in the country right next door to us. With Pakistan cornered, in Saarc, Pakistan would have been much happier with Jamaat and BNP in power in Bangladesh. This would have eased the pressure on them through the Saarc channel. But with Sheikh Hasina at top, known for her anti-Pakistan tendencies, it is now clear that India has gained another ally in quick succession. I wonder if Hasina's win had anything to do with the MEA policy of India. It is a far fetched idea, but not an impossible one. India had always wanted Jamaat to be kicked out of political domain for its support to HuJI, the islamic militant group operating inside Bangladesh. The Bangladeshi people's suffering had increased over the past years because of this rule. It was evident from their economic collapse last and this year. Sheikh Hasina's return promises Bangladesh a brighter future as the ties with India will definitely improve. It would further enhance India's position as an ally of Bangladesh, provided that India's MEA takes proper steps to keep this good relationship going on.