Way To Go

Life at XLRI sure takes me by surprise. The summer placements,a most sucessful one, was just over and all around there was a lot of wrok. Classes to be caught up on, projects to be submitted, quizzes to be taken. Just as everything seemed to have settled into the regular routine (what with a term of a million activities!) - the 1984 riots shook students into a frenzied discussion.And while I refrain from quoting anybody - here's my take on it.


To be frank, I was hardly old enough to remember what happened right after Indira Gandhi's
assassination except that I came across the 'concept' called curfew. I've always stayed in a very mixed neighborhood in an old part of Cal, and although I’ve grown up with a Sikh family right across my house, I really haven't seen or heard anything atrocious being done to them. In fact they all still are there. The 1992 Babri Masjid incident however, and especially news of the Bombay riot was a hit closer home. With the huge number of Muslims, I saw signs of terror, and later heard tales that when I still recall makes me shiver. Orissa rocked with the news of the brutal death of the Christain missionary, and of course to say the least the Gujarat incident are more than clear in everybody's mind.

Taking an overview - Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Sikhs - and probably most of the other communities within or without them have been persecuted at one point or the other.
Without alluding to any other country (too political) and without making an attack on any particular religion/political party - I think I agree that any government that has allowed such things to happen, should be without a moment's deliberation condemned. However before we come up with a solution, I have a question - what is it that we hope to achieve? (Assuming we could do something and did it) Do we just want the anti-communal sentiments to die down? Do want the change to be overnight or gradual? Do we want a government, which will be tolerant and unbiased? Or even protectionist? And if so, what it is it that we are trying to protect - surely not any particular community or religion. After all - we here all claim to be truly secular.

As an Indian I find a lot to be proud about and yet many things to be ashamed of. Maybe that is the way that it truly is - like everything else in like - we don't feel for our country in a black and white way. If the beastly behavior exists, if the horrors we hear of - as part of any religious community, or political affiliation – are there in front of eyes and we recognize it and abhor it, perhaps it's time to educate not only ourselves but others and broaden the mind. Perhaps to simply live as we do - by turning a blind to eye to it, as it is convenient because these do not truly affect many of us, is itself the worst thing to do. And if, as many here on the newsgroup, feel so strongly about it - it's time they did something about it. After all, it all starts with 1.

Maybe it's just time we stopped looking back into the past to just point out mistakes that have been made - there is no undoing them. Maybe it's time we left caste, creed, religion and all of that behind and just looked at being an educated human-being as opposed to literate. Maybe to contribute to a change we don't have to start a 'movement' so to speak - but simply do our parts as a citizen of the country without always putting ourselves first. Can we just do that?

I am a Bengali and am proud to be so. I am an Indian and am proud to be so too. I don't believe that just because I am a Hindu, I would have to be anti-Muslim, and that because I am Indian, I have to be anti-Pakistan. I don't believe that just because I am Bengali - I have to hate other communities. I am a human being - and that's what I believe I am first and foremost. I don't support many things and no, I cannot claim to have done a lot of things to contribute to these sentiments. But I can say I have, at every chance, stopped what I believed was wrong - not because I was a part of a country, or religion but because I am human-being with a sense of right and wrong and a mind of my own.

I am proud to be who I am - and I am what I am as a function of my ethnic, cultural, religious and educational background. I am proud of them too.

Author : Mononeeta Law, IR 2005

Bishu’s… A legacy

Imagine this… you wake up at midnight, ravenous after a hard day’s work lying in bed, pull on your winter gear and make the long trudge from your room across hostile terrain to GH1… only to find the mess lights off and the area deserted. You blink in disbelief—are your eyes deceiving you or is it just a bad dream? What happened to the XLers usually hanging around, sipping endless cups of tea and zealously guarding their plates of cheese maggi? What happened to the night canteen? What happened to that familiar face behind the mess counter, patiently flipping an endless number of aloo parathas and tolerantly reminding yet another XLer to clear his credit?

Worry not, nothing has changed…not yet. The Night Canteen or Bishu Da’s as it is more commonly known, has been in existence for the last 8 years. It started with students bringing food over and casually asking Bishu Da to cook it for them late at night. Then Mess Comm provided supplies for a while, with Bishu da being given a salary for his services. Over time, Bishu da was asked by Mess Comm to set up and run a night canteen. From then to now, he has been running the night canteen in much the same way, improvising on his offerings based on preferences and selling on credit to a large number of students.

Bishu Da’s isn’t just a quick-stop snack bar. It is where birthdays are celebrated in true XL style, where we take a break when the pressures of a Pray project or an impending Gango quiz become too much, or when we simply want to catch up on the latest grax. Most of us cannot imagine night life in XL without Bishu da and his daily offerings—noodles in soup
and egg-aloo paratha are just some of the quirky combinations he prepares on demand. Many will vouch for the lifesaver that his nimbu pani is during particularly thirsty times, when laced with a little something. But that is an altogether different topic of conversation.

Most of us, at some point of time, have carried on a conversation with him that goes beyond “Bishu da, ek bread omelette”. But how many of us really know the man? Ever wondered what his story is? Each time I’d see him settling in for the night in one corner of the mess I’d wonder what drove him to live such a life. What forced him to make those choices?

Bishu da has been working in the XL mess since 1980. His two sons are in school while his 7 yr old daughter was born deaf and dumb and needs special attention, besides medication and hearing aids. As with most families, he is the sole breadwinner for his family. It is a tough life he leads, but he is by far not the only one. All around us, there are people who have no choice but to push on in order to make ends meet.

As the offsprings of a premier B-school, we are expected to understand what corporate social responsibility is and to practice it. It starts with being sensitive to one’s immediate environment and to the people in one’s immediate vicinity, understanding their needs and motives, seeing beyond their functional use and acknowledging the individual.
Bishu da and the many other residents of XL aren’t just sources to fulfill our needs…they are individuals who have seen XL grow, have grown and changed with our alma mater, and are the link between XL’s past, her present and her future. They are XLRI’s legacy to us…part of the kaleidoscope of memories we’ll carry with us that identify us as an XLer. So the next time you have a craving for some cheese maggi, or just some midnight grax over a chai and sutta, remember the people who make that possible…..

Author: Abhilasha Krishnan, IR 2006.

Fraxers at XLRI

One of the things one learns very quickly at XLRI is that not all people have the same threshold of panic. While some are easily petrified at the thought of a project deadline, others awaken just the night before submission day. But XLRI offers yet another unique species – one that we call a FRAXER.

A fraxer is an individual who though considered intelligent and normal in most respects, suddenly turns into detached yogi at the merest hint of contributing to a group project. Indian philosophers would be impressed with this kind of renunciation!
Fraxers find new and innovative ways to express their personality. I had interesting experience in the first term with a particular project group. One problem that I faced with this group was the group’s collective (!) ignorance of the existence of a certain Microsoft product called PowerPoint. Being the only computer engineer in the group, I was always entrusted with the job of designing the project presentation. I have no clue how being a computer engineer has anything to do with PowerPoint skills. After all, PowerPoint was designed for executives – people who are good at nothing but know a bit of everything! But try telling that to a group of fraxers. Of course, once you design the ppt, you have to give the presentation as well. And guess what, you would have to do most of the report as well. After all, you designed the presentation, so only you understand its contents. (For the uninitiated, projects at XLRI work in the reverse way. Making the presentation is the first step of the project as opposed to being the last step.)

How to become a successful fraxer?

A successful fraxer is one who does nothing for a group project, yet the group members feel powerless to do anything about it. Follow these steps to become a successful fraxer:

Create an illusion of ignorance – Pretend not to know anything about the subject on hand, thereby excusing your lack of contribution.

Add negative value to a project whenever you actually work. This will ensure that group members won’t approach you for anything except the most risk-free part of the project such as collecting the printouts!

Smile like an angel – yes it helps! Develop a personality that is so charming that people actually feel bad about asking you to work.

Pretend to be working on other projects. This can be accomplished by opening an excel sheet and pretending to do something for a Finance elective project whenever a group member calls you for a meeting.

Sleep – Yes, sometimes it helps to just sleep. Most people hesitate to wake up a sleeping person and would rather do a project by themselves.

Become a perfectionist – This is accomplished by becoming disproportionately interested in the
nitty-gritty issues such as font choice, font sizes, margins etc of the project report. This will ensure that group members won’t approach you for fear that you would waste time on useless things resulting in a late submission.

Fraxers are an important part of society at XLRI. Fraxers are usually liked and popular too except when they have to work on a group project. Some Fraxers have this unique ability to not appear to be Fraxers when all they do is frax! Such individuals are specialists in the art of looking busy and doing nothing. Interestingly, Fraxers are not necessarily people who aren’t interested in academic pursuits. Far from it, quite a few Fraxers I know are doing really well on the CQPI front. I guess Fraxers might someday become better managers – after all what is management but the ability to get others to do your work.

Author: Mohit Kishore BM, 2005