Reco Mela - 3

======================================================

Varun N Achar says:

It is comforting to learn that the awkward feeling about the whole reco business is suffered by profs and students in the same boat, with unspoken solidarity.

During the first half of my final year at Kgp, I hardly met my thesis advisor Prof. Khastgir, and made little progress. This gave me such a complex that I decided not to request him to recommend me in any of my applications.

The following semester I met him more regularly, and one day he asked me if I hadn't applied anywhere, for I had never approached him for recos. Then I admitted my complex to him and he spoke very kind words to this effect: "You must never hesitate in these matters. It is something you require to help you in a good cause; it is our duty to do all we can for you".

I regret not having taken his kind support in my applications. But by God's grace, I have gotten by.

***********************************************************************

gps: Varun's comment evoked, provoked, and tickled many pickled memories:

1. During the late 80s (Hawking's and Black Holes time) there was a tremendous surge of enthu among our Physics students to specialize in GR & Cosmology. But there was none in the Department ready or willing to guide even an M Sc Project in the subject which was not in the Curriculum, in spite of heavy demand from the students (they went so far as to submit a mass petition to the HoD).

Nothing came out of it.

So, as usual they approached the Jack of all Trades gps to help them out. I agreed, borrowed the only copy of the highly readable Weinberg's tome: Gravitation & Cosmology from the Central Library, and spent almost an enjoyable year working out the GR part of it (about the first 13 Chapters) and decided to take any Project Students interested in the subject and make them work out some Chapters of Weinberg related to current topics and pursue further.

For about 6 years there was a serial rush. To help them access the book, I xeroxed the whole of it and got it bound in 2 volumes (Part 1 and Part 2). As soon as students were allotted to me, I lent my Xerox copy to them, asking them to pick out a topic, work out the relevant Chapter and do some further literature survey to bring it up-to-date. During those years our students didn't have any training at all in general tensor analysis and had to learn it from scratch. It did take an entire year for them to do justice to their project.

And when Kapeel left for Princeton he gifted his Xerox copy to me. So, I was pretty cosy: even if the Central Library demands return of the original, we have 2 copies between us.

'S' was the third or fourth student to opt for GR, and I gave S a current topic. S was an almost topper, very bright and hard-working. But had this unhappy habit: Every Wednesday afternoon when we met to review the progress and clear S's doubts, I used to notice that S scribbled a large amount in the margin of my copy with a 2H pencil. I was objecting to this vandalism, gently saying that we should all resist the temptation of leaving our footprints on the sands of time; but S didn't take hints and kept on and on, with the result that the entire Chapter was bristling with S's scribblings.

One afternoon towards the end of the Project, I told S jokingly that if S didn't erase all S's scribblings prompto, I would locate S whichever US College S was admitted to and write to the Dean complaining of this bad habit of S.

S's face fell and then on S was careful. But apparently the damage was done.

S didn't take any reco from me, but used to visit the Room No C-239 I shared with DB stealthily. DB told me one day: "Your Project student S is taking 10 recos from me!". Then I told him about my threat and both of us had a hearty laugh.

S of course scored Ex in Project and was apparently relieved that I was not that bad a sort.

And then a day before S left KGP for good, S entered our Office when both of us were present, and gifted each of us a whopping bag of Superior Quality Darjeeling Tea fresh from the Gardens. A nice parting gift to teachers. [There must have been the proverbial 'third bag full' for the other mystery recommender {;-}]

But to this day I am not aware where S was headed: simply vanished from my Radar screen, which is rather unusual.

P. S. Sorry for not using any personal pronouns.

********************************************************************************************

2. Talking of gifts from students, I recall the afternoon my wife rang me up in a tizzy saying that a courier arrived with a huge tightly zipped bag and asking me if she should accept it. Those were the days when this letter-bomb scare was there in every news channel. And she somehow convinced herself that her husband was ever the target of assassination plots by virtue of his Superman Intellect (it took almost another decade for an IIT Professor to be so felled).

I asked her to look up and let me know the Sender. When she did it I told her to have no fear and accept it. But she was too scared to open the 'black bag' till I reached home. And then she found that it contained half a dozen exquisite goodies and latest gadgets.

She then was worried if it was right to accept a bribe from the father of my student. I replied that it would be a bribe before the act but not after the kid was ready with passport, visa and ticket to his Heaven (incidentally he was the only one who spit on his hands and declared honestly from house tops before he flew that India, including his dad's favorite Rural Bengal of Pather Panchali, a romantic myth, was a vast collection of primitive slums and shanties and he would never return to settle here).

One evening after he settled down in his Promised Land, he was calling and talking to me at length from his US phone. And between us the usual to-and-fro kidding was on, he saying that String Theory was the most desirable thing in the world, and me countering that marriage took that exalted place. And he praising the US culture and values and me saying that IIT KGP was the best place in the world.

He then flung his trump card and boasted: "At least things work in the US".

And within a couple of hours, that thing that was racing home from space burnt and blew, with our Haryanvi girl steering it (they threw dark hints as to who was responsible).

He was properly contrite the next day and admitted that "he spoke before his turn".

Another verbivore!

Still my wife was worried about our 'return gift'.

I assured her that in spite of his boasting, he would be pining to revisit his Azad Hall Room on his very first trip back home (he was pestering me all the while from the US who won the Illu, and when I told him that his Hall won it, he apparently threw a huge party and celebrated wildly with song and dance).

So, I said we would make him our honored guest in our palatial Qrs B-140 for the night.

Which he was.

I drove down to the KGP Railway Station in my brand new Maruti 800 that evening to pick up our VIP guest from the US; and we all had a rollicking night-out (including my son who was by then attached to his rival Patel Hall).

Gem of a fellow!

India's loss and America's ill gotten gain!

Move...A DraftaniketanushreeAparuparundhutiedwingpsHouse RentindrajogiakkkripaLVK Moorthynpraopratiksayanshyamalsonoo ========================================================