Shanky

People and most importantly Shanky i don't have to tell you whom this blog is dedicated to. The title says it all. It's dedicated to one of my closest friends (words can't describe how close he is to me). A person who has had a very deep impact on my life and one whom i hold very dear to me.

The story started off in Vasu's as i like to call it, what a place that was. I was casually drinking tea and having a garam when this guy, till that moment a total stranger walks upto me and asks if I am from the same battalion as he in IMA. I answer in the affirmative and thus starts a friendship which i hope even time can't weather away and weaken and i firmly believe that it won't. We realise that we are just what each other is looking for, a friend without boundaries of course, seniority-juniority, and all that jazz. Over the next six months we develop a relationship and a bond that far surpasses the one shared even by brothers.

We spend almost the entire day either talking to each other and the evenings with each other, at times partying at times brooding but in each others' company nevertheless. We realise what the so-called divine connection really is. I can now vouch that it really does exist.

The next six months pass in a blur and we realise that it's time for us to temperorily part ways. It was as painful a thing as I had ever known. But helpless in the situation we did part ways, but the connection remains till date and i pray that it remains the same, unadulterated, pure and true forever. I have written someting on my blog after a long time because i have felt this way after a very long time. And as any regular reader of my blog would've realised this is the first time i've written about someone other than me and my experiences. This piece of literature (if at all it can be called that) isn't about me. It's for someone who is as close to my heart as the closest person i know today. Brother this is for you. Love you.

NAUKRI by chance

"So Mr. Bhup Singh(can't think of a better fictitious name), how much work experience do you have?"

This is the most common an stereotypical question in any interview. With the MBA fever catching people like the dotcom boom had people in its wraps about a decade ago and H1N1 had people last year, the number of underemployed MBA graduates is increasing almost at the same rate as the population. While there was a time when as soon as you had finished your MBA you were the toast of the town(read neighbourhood) and all of a sudden the prodigal son or daughter became the pride of the family. And in a typical indian environment hit the headlines, if not of the national newspaper, atleast, of the matrimonial column of the local newspaper. Suddenly there were marriage proposals pouring in like the fan mail in Amitabh Bachhan's mail box n aunties who had eligible (or even not so eligible) children would all of a sudden remember that she went to school with your mother on the same rickshaw or some such weird relation with the proud mother of the MBA graduate.

That was the scene "Once upon a time in India". I was recently talking to a friend (read Bhup Singh)who had just finished the "prestigious" MBA degree. The moment he went for a job interview he was tormented by the question which makes up the first piece of the satire (if i may call it so). As soon as he answered in the negative he saw the colour fade away from his prospective employer's face and needless to say he couldn't really bring it back and came back as free as he had walked in. No tension, no hassles and no job either. Not to be fazed by these minor impediments he bashes on regardless.

By the third day he realises that he's got determination, academic qualification, fresh ideas, a zeal to work but no experience and so no job. Whoever spoke of bright young faces with fresh new ideas was obviously delivering one of those high flying fancy sounding annd morally upright lectures and didn't mean much of the script his seceratary had typed out while he was giving his office boy a mouth-full for the cold and tasteless coffee that he had only brought into the boss, in this case the self righteous speaker's room. Coming back to my inexperienced friend he carries on and lo and behold he finally finds a job with an employer who expects him to churn out in an hour, the same work that he crawls through in a day. After quittting two jobs in three days my friend realises that life after an MBA isn't as rosy and cosy as he had imagined it to be. The bubble hath burst.

Having done my first bachelors degree from JNU (i am serious. Please don't laugh) and currently pursuing my second bachelors degree also from JNU (c'mon..i requested you not to laugh) i haven't had to go through the pain of doing an MBA or the worse ordeal of being an unemployed MBA graduate. All i can say to this highly educated and erstwhile terribly in demand race is, "Plough on. I am sure there is somebody out there who recognises fresh ideas and not just how may hours you've already spent in a box made from the cheapest possible plastic (read office cubicles). All the best. You will get you NAUKRI by chance."