An Year at IIT Guwahati

I wrote my last exam of the semester yesterday morning. It wasn’t great but it wasn’t as bad as another paper that I wrote last week. Since I also tend to think about a lot of things right during the examination preparation time, I realised that with the end of the second semester (results pending!), I actually finished with one academic year of education at IIT Guwahati and this is a good time to look back.

What was I doing during May last year? I think I had taken a couple of leaves for some farji reason and was preparing to write the JNU International Relations paper sometime around May 17, from what I remember. I wasn’t yet prepared then to join a university that has a strong leftist leaning because the left somewhat stifles me deep within. However, JNU was my only option because no other ‘reputed’ university had this course that I really wanted to read for, unless one includes Pondicherry University, but heck - who goes to Pondicherry to study!

The only reason I actually chose to write the IIT Guwahati DS exam was because I didn’t want to take any risk with my higher education plans. If I hadn’t moved out of Google then, I would never have been able to. It’s a nice, comfortable place and that’s the problem! Anyway, this blogpost isn’t about Google and my tenure there, so I’ll stick to IIT Guwahati. When I came to know in May sometime that I’ll be required to go to Guwahati to write the entrance exam, I was taken aback and a little uncertain. Unlike what my readers may be guessing, I wasn’t all that bothered about the situation of security here as much I was about the idea of travelling so far (Guwahati isn’t Bangalore!) and wasting so much money for it (about Rs.16,000?). Obviously, I had to fly in and out because I didn’t really want to use any more of my leaves.

When I came here for my exams, I had two problems that I identified with this place – first, this is way too less urban for my liking and second that at that time it was humid beyond survival. Having experienced the horrid weather of Calcutta, previously, during a vacation, I didn’t want to study in a place that was as humid or worse. In any case, I wrote my exams, came back, learnt that I was selected after a few days, quit my job (without having the need to tender the full notice period, thanks to my lovely manager, whom I had once thought to be a dimwit), and flew in to Guwahati.

Although, like the rest of the student community of IIT Guwahati, I got an independent room to stay, I didn’t quite like the people in my hostel as much. Very few of the boarders appeared to be from cities, given their accentuated Hindi and lack of promise of speaking comprehensible English anytime soon and I am not ashamed to confess that it made me uncomfortable. It was only later, during my various involvements in the activities of the Institute Literary Society did I realise that indeed the MTechs were mostly the black sheep of the IIT Community and there are strong reasons why. Not to forget, my own classmates! When I came for my document submission, on my first day as a student of this place, I was so disappointed to see my classmates. Not one person was from a city as big or, for that matter, bigger than mine and not more than one of them could speak ‘fluent’ English. Sometimes I think that I was being a little too demanding but that’s the line of argument that I haven’t yet reconciled with.

There were two sorts of people in my class, one from Assam and the other from Bihar, two states I didn’t have any particular fondness for. I only realised a little later in my various interactions with the students of Assam that there is far more truth to be searched in their simplicity than in the complex lives that we lead in large cities. I’ve come to be fond of the Assamese, since then!

Before I paint an absolutely dark picture of the Masters students of IIT to my audience, I must mention of my various interactions with the students of Design. I found them so much more pleasant. Are they the saving grace of the pride and honour of the Masters students of IIT Guwahati? I am not sure if I’m ready to give an affirmative nod to that as of now but certainly, I am a little inclined to! I’ll be taking a course with them next semester as an Audit and I am quite looking forward to be studying in that sort of a batch.

Next that comes to my mind is my own department – my programme, faculty and everything around that. Unlike what a lot of people think and although I carry the looks of, I was never a class topper. In school, I was always in the first three but it started slipping down as I moved to junior and Degree College. Here, though, I ended up topping my programme (at least until the mid-sem exams of the 2^nd sem.) It was about choosing the right course, I think. I was always made for the Social Sciences. Studying Math and Science imparted a sense of logical and sharp thinking but my mind was always inclined towards the Social Science and I am glad to report that I am happy to have picked up the pieces of my shattered pieces of dream that I had crashed right after my class 10^th by not having taken up a study of Social Sciences.

My programme is inter-disciplinary and covers a gamut of Social Science courses. It is as if the cosmos is playing a motherly role and giving me another opportunity understand all that I missed previously – Sociology, Economics, Philosophy and the like. My department has been debating lately if the MA programme has become multi-disciplinary instead of being inter-disciplinary but I think I am quite happy with the way things are. How else will I get to know about each of these areas of interest? As for the faculty, they are nice, in general. Some are left-leaning, which is sad but I was thinking the other day that if a few left-leaning faculty members can make me uncomfortable, how would I have survived in JNU? Well, as they say in Hindi, whatever happens does happen for the god – the reference being to my not making it to JNU. Also, I must remember to mention that the left-leaning faculty members in the department are actually one of the most well-read people I’ve met, who’ve also given me some of the highest marks, despite being fully aware of my political and economic leaning. Strange, but true!

What else did I do of significance here? I fought a hostel election! For a position perceived as trivial as the Literary Secretary, I did not expect any competition because I thought other competitors may not consider filing their nominations, being aware of my past experience of having worked with the Institute Literary Society and having been the face of this hostel in the various literary events conducted by the Institute LitSoc. However, on the contrary, this election did make me understand something that every student of Social Science knows and appreciates - Electioneering is the worst form of democracy but we have no other options!

Prior to the elections, the candidates and voters alike, split into Andhra versus non-Andhra lobbies and I was pulled into the Andhra one. While I was all glad that this was done because I lived in the state for 22 years, it was not to be! I was picked because I had a north Indian name and there was a perception of easy victory for me. It was assumed that creating a ‘panel’ of candidates with majority of positions given to Andhra candidates and minority to north Indians (me included), the panel would have a high chance of winning.

As luck would have been, a fellow-Andhrite who had nothing to do with this political bunch until now decided to stand up for the LitSec’s post. What was amazing was that this guy stood for the position because he had managed a library in his (undergraduate) college, located in some rural part of AP, for two years. He couldn’t speak a line of English or Hindi without making an error and had no idea how he would deal with the Institute Literary events but was sure of bringing in new magazines to the Hostel Library like ‘Wisdom’ and ‘Competition Success Review’! God forbid! I went door to door, meeting absolute strangers, chanting out my agenda and seeking their valuable votes. In any case, his hard work at campaigning and pleasing a rather dumb electorate with impractical, ridiculous promises resulted in his losing the election with a margin of about 35 votes, the narrowest amongst all positions that were fought for. Oh, did I mention that since he decided to stand for the position, I was ended up being absorbed by the North Indian lobby?

I understood that if you’re going on the discrimination path anyway, ethnicity will always beat everything. Not that the ‘North Indian panel’ didn’t use me – I wrote their manifestos and election debate speeches. In return, I got their help in as far as securing the votes of the non-South India electorate was concerned. What the end result? The entire North India panel won. Was it a victory of inclusiveness against regionalism? Our ‘panel’ didn’t have a single south Indian candidate but the managers of our panel would argue that this was the result of either not finding a ‘worthy’ south Indian or south Indians not willing to be a part of our panel. Do I trust this argument? I reserve my judgement for now.

In the aforementioned filth, do we see a reason why urbanisation and growth of cosmopolitanism is good? I do! Therefore, I agree that electioneering has barefaced flaws but one can’t do away with it as well. The flaw is located more with the electorate. Also, an aware and educated electorate is also no guarantee for their promise of unbiased voting.

In Guwahati, I’ve discovered greenery beyond my imagination, people beyond known simplicity, academics to fulfil my need for education and time to discover myself. What do I plan to do now? I have a plan to finish reading at least 50 books before the year ends and I know that is a tricky task to achieve but I plan to challenge myself around this. I need to be applying to various universities so that somehow at least one of them picks me up, work to ensure my class gets placed somewhere, mentor juniors from the hostel, if I find anyone interested, to do well in the Institute literary activities, finish my project and paper writing and so on.

I am not sure how well I’ll do in the coming year but I know I would have learnt so much more, actually quite a bit than more!