The whole environment was mesmerizing & unforgettable. For the first time I listen to our Director (Prof. Surendra Prasad, alumnus 1968 batch), & other honorable invites without dozing off in between, although much of what they said was very diplomatic & politically correct without crossing the lines, but what was appreciative was that President , Mrs. Patil pointed out the lack of patents filed by our country w.r.t China or USA, Kapil Sibbal announcing 14 innovation university (other than IIT) to be started (God knows where they will get the fund, faculty & resources for those but, nevertheless it's an announcement like many others they do), but best of all was the speech by the gold medalist, Lalit Mehra (batch 1966, 1st batch to pass out from IITD), we expected him to be as boring as we will expect an oldie, maggu, student. But there he was all excited and speaking about all those incidents, which we will hesitate to speak about infront of people of stature of President and such esteemed gathering, but I believe the adrenaline rush inside his head & the excitement of holding that dice again inside Dogra hall, made him do that, he told us about the establishment of BSW, SAC and all the co-curricular activities which they started from day 1, he told us that first building their was the small building which is textile department now. It was real fun listening to him, from the minute he started speaking, all we were discussing was (saala IITian kitna bhi bada ho jaaye, rahega wahi, as soon as he will start speaking, u can indetify that he is from IITD, that carefree attitude, never saw that anywhere else). Moving on from the Dogra out in open, it was drizzling outside and we were supposed to move to block 3 lawns for lunch, but before that we needed to collect the phones, electronics, car keys, etc which we deposited (in a small make shift counter under the ramp infront of reading room) earlier.
As soon as I reached there expecting a queue of old gentlemen standing with poise waiting for their turn to collect their respective belongings, Only to realize it was not there (as expected isn't it), those oldies were jumping over one another from all sides flashing their coupons, asking to serve them first, And some how I started laughing real loud, confusing my fellows their as everyone seemed eager & in a hurry, I said, "We are here for the whole day, we have nothing to do but have good time, next activity i.e lunch will go on for another 2 hours and still these old horses are jumping over each other showing impatience, IIT might have taught them best of technologies, and how to face a technical challenge, whatsoever it is, but they forgot to inject an ounce of Civic-sense inside this wild bunch, howsoever rich or old you get, somethings you will inherit and follow always as in Indian, not standing in a queue is one of those" And just then I heard 2 uncles (they must be at least 45), standing in so called 'queue' pushing every one around with their arms and elbows, looking around in disgust & saying "When will people learn manners to follow the queue system" (another trade mark of being an Indian, Preach but Practice not required).
I went ahead for lunch (btw I was one of the last persons to collect my belongings, trying to maintain an ounce of civic sense) where got an opportunity to meet some of the alumni, 2 of them being from the batch of 1968 (first batch which came through JEE in year 1963, before that it was merit basis entry), amongst various things one of them (who was a retired bureaucrat) informed me about the eagerness in IITians to join civil services at that time, which resulted in real country growth till year 1980, after which people's inclination started to decline towards UPSC, and more inclined towards industry jobs (for the obvious reasons), resulted in a decline in number of bureaucrat who were from IITs & other primary institute, results started showing in the growth & countries development as a whole, number of IITians fell tremendously low as the time passed (I don't have any facts to verify this, so I am mentioning what I interpreted from what he told me)... this shows how there is a necessity to encourage more and more students from such premier institute to join IAS & other bureaucratic positions, if we want to see India rise and shine again and not just on papers.
For the first time, I voluntarily went to Dr. S.R.Kale's room to have a little word with him, to say hello to him, I was surprised when he recognized me (not my name of course, but only that I was a student there), he told me about the changes (which were very few in terms of curriculum, but very high in terms of course structure) The strength of a batch has reached to 850 odd students from 550 at our time, 104 being the mechanical students. He told me that the batch of 2009 was the worst they have seen in a long time (with around 100+ defaulters, who got their degree extended, unlike previous years when number was somewhere between 20 and 45). He also informed about the gr8 progress IIT Punjab is making in terms of course structure, student quality and infrastructure setup.
It was time to catch up with peers, met a variety ranging form batch 2004 to 2009, shared some light moments, some catch up, made some new friends, overall it was one Monday which I would have regretted to have missed. As they say the value of any particular outcome cannot be judged unless you compare it with the alternative histories (what could have been if I didn't go there) and here as much as I think, I say this day won't come again, as IIT Delhi won't celebrate 'Inaugural function' for Golden Jubilee year again, and I am proud that I was there, when it happened.
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| IIT Delhi @ Night |
