Ambition - Repeat Telecast

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1992 January 29:
Kapeel was a special invitee to my son's 11th Birthday Party. He was leaving IIT KGP for Princeton and, over the past 4 years, he had acquired the title of Bada Beta in our household.

And he was regaling kids with magic tricks and jokes. The one joke that stayed with me was this:

Man: Beta, bade ho ke kya banogey? (Son, what would you become when you grow up?)

Kid: Aaadmi banoonga! (Will become a Man!)

Man: Aadmi tho banogey lekin karogey kya? (Man you will become but what will you do?)

Kid: Shaadi karoonga! (Will do marriage!)



Somehow that summed up the ambition of us 20 kids who passed School Final in 1957 from our seaside Village Muthukur.

Today's youngsters have to stretch their imagination to its limit to understand our isolation from the big broad bad world. There was no 'Current', Telephone, Radio, National Newspaper, not to talk of TV. Our daily life was full of outdoors play apart from the few hours of school.

There was no concept of a 'career'.

About 10 out of us 20 dropped out due to poverty and fell back on their family callings. The rest 10 wanted to become 'Government Servants' with assured pay and pension; and get married as soon as their jobs became 'Permanent' at about the age of 20. (Only I had to wait a further 15 years but my circumstances were rather special).

The available Govt Jobs were Clerk (coveted post), Block Development Officer (some perks), Teachers (most, including me, and one more who studied Engg but preferred to become an Engg Teacher).

We never met nor had a Reunion, but just hearsay.

Prasad Rao, a very sportive kid, couldn't become a Permanent School Teacher but remained Temporary throughout since he got a Third Class (English did him in).

When he appeared in the Marriage Interview, the Bride's Father asked him if his Post was Permanent. Apparently PR turned rather philosophical and replied that nothing in this world is 'Permanent' including Life itself. This crack seems to have impressed the F-i-L so much that he gave away his daughter at once, mentioning that they could dispense with dowry since that too was not permanent.

Since PR was not a Permanent Teacher, he was not bound by the Conduct Rule prohibiting tuition. So, his small home became by and by a mini-school and he could teach his half a dozen kids at home along with the others.

When last heard, all kids of PR are settled in the US, and he and his wife spend most of the year shuttling Coast to Coast except when they are in Muthukur for a couple of weeks every year.



The Muthukur nostalgia got the better of me last year. My son and wife who were subject to my tall tales of our school life asked me to take them there once to see if I was bluffing.

So, the three of us traveled there in an Ambassador Car of my Driver-Friend and drove through the Main Gate, which was of course unmanned, and barged into the HM's office unannounced (on purpose). She was a nice plump lady, and seeing my handsome son and fair wife she asked us to take our seats in front of her table adorned with the good old pin-cushion, pen-stand, blotting paper rocking roll, cycle-bell converted into a calling-bell...

And I said that I am an old student of her school and my Father was the first HM of her school. She was happy to hear my Father's name from the horse's mouth and said they hear a lot of him all the time.

And after a few minutes asked us politely what the 'purpose' of our visit was.

My son took out his wallet and pulled out a crisp Rs 1000 note and told her that he wants to donate it to her School Library in his gran'pa's name.

Believe me, Money Talks!

Cups of coffee were ordered, and I took over and told her that I brought a few copies of a slim booklet of Raadha Rhymes which I wrote a few months back and I wished to donate them along with a Rs 500 Note each to the Best Boy and the Best Girl in English.

She pored over the latest Marks List of the outgoing Class and called the Peon asking him to fetch Nazeer and Laxmi from their class.

In a few minutes Nazeer came in trembling all over, fearing what mischief he did now to be pulled up from an ongoing class. The Peon said Laxmi was absent.

Looking at Nazeer, I felt my plenty years rolled back all of a sudden...he was a spitting image of myself at that age, it looked. Thin to the bones, average height, no footwear, crumpled 'bush shirt' and pant and false humility all over his face.

Our School remained a poor kids' Govt School...no fees, no uniform, no labs, nor even desks.

On a rare impulse, I got up and embraced Nazeer and asked my wife to do the honors of gifting the booklet and the Rs 500 Note.

By then word spread that something was afoot and a host of Teachers gathered and we had a group photo taken by my son's Canon, my wife handing over the stuff to Nazeer, me on one side and the HM on the other, and the rest in two rows behind.

HM promised to make the Prize-Giving a Public Ceremony next day in the Assembly (sending word to Laxmi not to bunk); and also read a few Rhymes...

Coming out of her Office, I sat under the good old Neem Tree for a couple of minutes...nothing seems to have changed...

Except, Nazeer said he wanted to become a Doctor and migrate to America...when asked why, he said Doctors in America make a lot of money and he wanted to take his poor parents also along with him...

I said:

"Amen!"

...Posted by Ishani

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Gone with the Wind - Repeat Telecast

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In our Village School at Muthukur, we were taught English in our mother tongue Telugu till the School Final Class which my Father used to teach. He never broke into Telugu in his English Class though he used to teach our Science in Telugu (laghu lolakamu yokka dolanaavartana kaalamu stood for the Simple Pendulum's Time Period).

And our English then started with Elizabethan (Shakespeare) and ended with the Victorian (Bernard Shaw). So, I didn't learn any flash words, slang or even colloquial English till I joined our fashionable University at Waltair.

As a freshman when I once said to my bus-mate (who I came to know later was in the English Department): 

"I am sweating", 

he looked at me and said: 

"Typical!"

That was the first time I heard the word 'typical', so I kept quiet and looked up the COD when I reached home. Still, it didn't make any sense. As I grew up in the University, I came to know that everyone said 'Typical!' for everything, without intending any harm. It was just the fashion of the day to say it with that typical exclamation mark as often as you can. Much later I read from Feynman that the flash word in the Math Graduate School at Princeton was: 

"Trivial!"

Another fashionable phrase at my University was to say:

"Excuse me!" 

even when I didn't see anything excusable or even inexcusable in her behavior. They said it even when they were asking for the time. At KGP when I used to ride my pushbike, the wayside rickshawalas used to shout:

"Time kotho?" 

That sudden question used to break my stream of thought and I had to look at my wrist trying to answer him and lose my balance and hit the fence and fall down, to the merriment of other rickshawalas...they ought to be ashamed and say rightly: "Excuse me!" and I: "OK, Excused". Then I saw one of those fabulous Dean Martin movies (The Silencers?) where he ceremoniously picks up a stooping villain off his guard, says: 

"Excuse me!" 

and punches him fatally.

At KGP there was this Dev Anand who would say:

"Could you please...!" 

for everything from asking for the sugar bowl at the dining table to borrowing a hundred precious rupees. That reminded me of the famous joke in which Pope was being dined and wined by Lord Mountabatten who asks:

"O Divine! Pass the Wine!" 

to be followed by the equally poetic Nehru: 

"O Supreme! Pass the Cream!" 

and then Baldev Singh, not to be outdone, says: 

"O B*****d! Pass the Custard!"

There was this very erudite and lovable Dr Chitnis who for a while stayed with us in our Faculty Hostel. He was fresh from a decade in the US and I learned many things from him, including the latest Americanisms. 

At school, my Father used to say: "Keep quiet! I am correcting the answer-scripts", which he really used to do...I mean 'correct' the errors before awarding marks...to be passed on to his students. But by the time I reached IIT KGP, we never bothered to 'correct' but just glance and give marks. So, 'correcting scripts' was a misnomer that I keenly felt. Dr Chitnis used to say: 

"I have to check the scripts" 

(another 'check' list!). 

One summer noon at KGP the temperature soared and I said: 

"It is very hot!" 

And Dr Chitnis smiled and said: 

"Sastry! It is very warm...hot is for chilli masala"

Once when I said without thinking: 

"That is like wanting to have the cake and eat it too!", 

Dr Chitnis gently corrected me: 

"It should be...eat the cake and have it too!"

There was once this after-dinner round of stale Sardarjee jokes (like the Baldev Singh's above). When my turn came I narrated the one about Baldev Singh breaking the wishbone and saying triumphantly: "Napoleon" instead of "Bone-apart!". Dr Chitnis then narrated the current American version of: "Do and Tell":

When this Sardarjee's turn came, he went to the stage and asked for a Table Fan to be installed. Upon which he slips his pants down a bit and stoops in front of the fan and asks his audience: 

"Name the Movie!"

Everyone was silent and wondering which film it could be and gave up.

Our Sardarjee stands up and says:

"Can't anyone of you tell? It is very simple...Gond pe Wind!"




...Posted by Ishani

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I wish I were...Repeat Telecast

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For most folks it happens in their teens; for me it happened at 50.

'I wish I were...' was the topic of the Essay we were all asked to compose when we were in Class XI (Matriculation Final Year, 1957).

By then every student (except me) in our Class had access to Lifco, Leo & Duco Guides:

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2010/08/books-guides.html


My HM-Father forbade me from consulting these Infectious AIDS and insisted I write original pieces, if in faulty English..I guess I stick to it even now about 50% of the time.

All put together, the Guides had about 20 Pieces.

Boys usually chose Engineer, Doctor, Cricketer...

Girls invariably chose Florence Nightingale & Apple Tree (non-existent in our sea-side Village Muthukur)...

I wrote in halting English: Tailor and Postman.

Tailor was my friendly neighborhood Jaan Saab:

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2009/10/teacher-is-born-with-lesson.html


And somehow I always wanted to be a Postman. The other day I was reading RKN's Malgudi Days and found an entire Short Story on the Village Postman.

When I went to College, studies were so insufferable that all I wanted was a job.

And when I got it at IIT KGP, I thought, like Jerome's Dog Montmorency, that I reached Heaven and never wanted to be anything else than a Teacher there.

I am claustrophobic, so I never watched anything in Netajee Auditorium for more than 10 minutes at a stretch (except unabridged Gandhi, English, by Attenborough).

Then one day there was this Poster of a Lecture in Netajee by one Dr Sethi on Jaipur Foot. Since my Medico-Wife was getting bored at KGP, I thought I would drop her there, go out for a round of Woolgathering at Harrys and pick her up at the end of 2 hours.

But from the first slide on I stuck to the seat as if the seat were pasted with that glue with a couple of Elephants in its ad: "Joins Anything but Broken Hearts".

At 50, I ultimately couldn't escape feeling for a fleeting moment that there were other things to do than Teaching Physics @ IIT KGP:

http://medgadget.com/archives/2008/01/dr_sethi_and_the_jaipur_foot.html

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Dr. Sethi and the Jaipur Foot

 Filed under:

The New York Times has a nice obituary on Dr. Jaipur who changed the lives of countless amputees with his advanced, affordable prosthetics.

From the Times...

The Jaipur foot, which has never been patented, is available in more than 25 countries, most of them poor, many of them with great numbers of land-mine victims. Unlike many high-priced prostheses in developed countries, it can be made by traditional craftsmen, lasts more than five years and costs about $30, making it affordable for mass distribution...Dr. Sethi came up with his invention after years of extensive research. He was helped by Ramachandra Sharma, a semiliterate craftsman who had been teaching lepers to make handicrafts and who became his assistant.
The two made a foot of vulcanized rubber but found it too heavy and stiff. So they filled the shell with sponge rubber and modified the design. They used a stiff piece for the metatarsals and added microcellular rubber for the heel, cutting wedges at its upper end to make a universal joint.
Since 1971, when Dr. Sethi presented the foot to British orthopedic surgeons at Oxford, the Jaipur foot has revolutionized lives in war-torn countries. It is very flexible, allowing the wearer to run, climb trees or pedal bicycles. It is well suited to the needs of many Asian countries in which most people sit, eat, sleep and pray on the floor. Using the Jaipur foot, a Bollywood actor and dancer, Sudha Chandra, was even able to perform a demanding dance sequence in the movie musical "Nache Mayuri."

Technology notes from JaipurFoot.org:

1) The limbs made with this technology are closest to a normal human limb. The Jaipur Foot has virtually got the same range of movements which a normal human foot has. It has dorsi-flexion, inversion, eversion, supination, pronation and axial rotation allowing a amputee not only to walk comfortably, but also squat (sitting on hunches), kneeling, crouching, sitting cross legged, walking also on undulated terrain, running, climbing a tree and driving an automobile. In other words, it is an all-functional, all-terrain limb. The other limbs with SACH foot cannot have these flexions and functions. There are some Multi Axial Feet but these allow specific limited flexions and functions.

2) Jaipur Foot is cosmetically also closest to the human foot with toes etc. Once Jaipur Foot was developed many other companies in the world added these cosmetic feature to their limb products to look like normal Foot or Jaipur Foot.

3) Jaipur Foot is water proof as many other artificial limbs in the world are.

4) Jaipur Foot is a dual purpose foot. It may be worn with shoes or without shoes depending on the desire and the need of the patients. This feature is crucial for meeting the cultural needs of many regions of the world. For example most of the modern limbs can be used only with the shoes on with the result that such amputees cannot enter the temples, mosques etc and cannot pray or perform NAMAZ.

5) The normal life of Jaipur Foot piece is around 3 years.

See also (for more info):


http://www.goodnewsindia.com/index.php/Magazine/story/jaipur-foot/

...Posted by Ishani

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Name-Dropping - Repeat Telecast

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I now narrate an absolutely true story (really!):

1992: Midway through the 10-year Rule as Director of IIT KGP of Prof KL who also happened to be a Physicist-Material Scientist of world renown...

A month after he took over, he transformed the ground floor of our Department and converted it into a gold-plated hi-tech Microscience Lab and recruited a dozen or so Research Scholars and co-workers in his Lab. The place started humming with unusual activity. He got installed the then latest Nobel-winning Scanning Tunneling Microscope whose output photographs I displayed, by the way, in my B Tech Class which converted the Pussy Cat from Chemical Engg to Pure Physics: 

http://gpsastry.blogspot.in/2010/01/russi-modis-tom-cat.html

One fine noon, there was a phone call for me from our HoD, Prof KVR, asking if he could meet me urgently in my celebrated Room C-239. I replied I could as well go over to his office, but he was particular that, since the work was not 'official' but 'personal', it was his turn to come to me, as per protocol. 

I said welcome.

In a few minutes, he arrived, closed the door, drew a chair close me so that his back would face DB (who was blowing smoke rings and searching for a poker to hit with his sledge-hammer called S-W Transformation) and said sotto voce tremulously that his honor, if not job, was in jeopardy. 

I asked him what such a serious matter could be. He replied that he just then got a call from the HoD of Material Science that he was forwarding an RS of the Diro, KL, with a crystal whose optic axis needs to be determined experimentally. 

HoD, Mat Science, thus washed his hands off the matter since KVR, on his own proclamation, was the local authority in Dielectrics, so the baby was squarely in KVR's lap. KVR couldn't back out (his honor was at stake). Nor could he fail (his job was at stake, as per his hallucinations). And he confessed that he never had to locate optic axes of any crystal in his life. He brought his crystal samples from MIT a couple of decades ago; and...that was it!

I told him not to worry but simply send the RS of KL to me with the crystal. At that time crystal optics was at my finger tips. And my UG training at AU made me fearless of labs.

In a few minutes, Ms M (KL's RS) arrived in my room smiles all over. The smiles, I thought, were of mutual recognition: she and her would-be (who sat in my M Sc class a couple of years back and whose Hall Day Group Photo was still in my album) were attending my Lectures on History of Science & Technology sitting side-by-side. 

Little did I know!

I asked her to hand me the crystal. She said she would fetch it whenever I was free. I asked her to bring it that Wednesday afternoon when the Second Year Lab would be free.

Come Wednesday afternoon, Ms M was accompanied by a total stranger, Ms P, who fished out the 25-paise-shaped crystal from her money purse and handed it to me. 

I kept quiet and got down to business.

I pondered over the issue during the interval: since they were asking for 'the' optic axis, it should be a uniaxial crystal. And if I was lucky, the optic axis could be either normal to its surface or lying on its surface...most cuts are like that, perhaps. This could be decided in a few minutes. If so, the matter is simple. I could locate its optic axis by sandwiching it between two Polaroid sheets and rotating them suitably.

I was lucky: the axis was on its surface. 

Those days, Polaroid sheets didn't come with their Pass Axes drawn on them. So, a supplementary experiment was required to determine them. The only recourse is to Brewster's Law. I knew where exactly a glass slab was (I was the Second Year Lab-in-Charge some years ago).

Shining Sodium light on the glass slab via the Polaroid, and rotating it viewing the reflected beam till it disappears, the thing was done in 10 minutes.

I asked them to give me a ball pen and lightly drew its blessed optic axis on the surface of the crystal. 

And pocketed the crystal...

And asked them to tell me the whole story. 

It turned out that neither the crystal nor the problem belonged to Ms M of the Diro's Lab...but to Ms P who was an M Tech student in the ECE Dept and was a close friend of Ms M in the Ladies' Hostel, doing her project.

Bomb-Shell-Name-Dropping!

Felt sorry for KVR.

I wanted to teach them a lesson, but not a stern one. I told them to go to Prof KVR next day and tell him the truth. Then and then only he would give back their crystal to them. 

They agreed. 

I knew KVR would be furious with the girls. So, meanwhile, I met him and handed him the cute crystal with its optic axis drawn on it and asked him to return the crystal to the girls but not to report the matter to the Diro till I submitted to him the: 

'Detailed Write-up of the Experimental Procedure' 

Which, of course, I never did!



...Posted by Ishani

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Parent-Teacher Thing - Repeat Telecast

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Shy and reclusive as I am by nature, I always avoided the compulsory Parent-Teacher Meetings of my son, and sent my meek wife instead, from LKG at St Agnes School to KV @ IIT KGP.

But she put her foot down and refused to do duty in his Class 12 and I had to reluctantly go.

I had earlier promised myself that I wouldn't interfere with the Teaching at KV come what may.

But I had to break my own promise when they started teaching that a point charge left at a point on an Electric Field Line will travel along it forever.

The two young and handsome Physics Teachers rebuked my son for his effrontery, showing him that they had followed in letter and spirit what was printed in the very popular text book they chose; and were no doubt waiting to pounce on me in the PT-Meeting.

I hid myself in a backseat in the Class Room watching the fun going on at the Teachers' Table where the two poor souls were hounded by angry mothers pointing out mistakes from totaling errors to outright wrong questions; and making them eat crow.....I too am wit-scared of Campus Mothers...

After everyone left, my son crawled to the Table to have a ceremonial peek at his script, sign it, and return it hastily.

But the two Teachers refused to hand it to him asking for his Physics-Father.

So, I had to walk up and wish them in all the humility of a wrong-doer.

They asked me to have a look at the QP and AP; but I buttered them up declining to do either, saying that I myself am a Physics Teacher and so have implicit faith in them.

It was as if two huge balloons were punctured with a pin...they were expecting a Battle Royal.

Then they offered Tea and winked that my son is good but busy otherwise than studies in their School...and we all agreed that it is the hormones that flow in Class 12...

They then asked me my advice as to what is the most important thing for a Teacher of Physics.

I said honestly that picking up the right book is half the battle.

And told them how fortunate I was that Mathews & Venkatesan chose to write a book on QM when it fell to my lot to learn and teach QM all by myself...the book is almost flawless and made a great foundation to build on other lavish books.

We parted with great empathy after they reopened my son's answer script, reevaluated it quickly and found it deserving an extra fifteen marks all in all here and there...not that their marks mattered a whit in Class 12...

Good Old Olive Oil...



...Posted by Ishani

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Attitude - Repeat Telecast

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http://www.toonpool.com/user/997/files/about_your_attitude_eskimo_1190055.jpg

'And before I go, gentlemen,' said the excited Mr. Pickwick, turning
round on the landing, 'permit me to say, that of all the disgraceful and
rascally proceedings--'

'Stay, sir, stay,' interposed Dodson, with great politeness. 'Mr.
Jackson! Mr. Wicks!'

'Sir,' said the two clerks, appearing at the bottom of the stairs.

'I merely want you to hear what this gentleman says,' replied Dodson.
'Pray, go on, sir--disgraceful and rascally proceedings, I think you
said?'

'I did,' said Mr. Pickwick, thoroughly roused. 'I said, Sir, that of all
the disgraceful and rascally proceedings that ever were attempted, this
is the most so. I repeat it, sir.'

'You hear that, Mr. Wicks,' said Dodson.

'You won't forget these expressions, Mr. Jackson?' said Fogg.

'Perhaps you would like to call us swindlers, sir,' said Dodson. 'Pray
do, Sir, if you feel disposed; now pray do, Sir.'

'I do,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'You ARE swindlers.'

'Very good,' said Dodson. 'You can hear down there, I hope, Mr. Wicks?'

'Oh, yes, Sir,' said Wicks.

'You had better come up a step or two higher, if you can't,' added Mr.
Fogg. 'Go on, Sir; do go on. You had better call us thieves, Sir; or
perhaps You would like to assault one Of US. Pray do it, Sir, if you
would; we will not make the smallest resistance. Pray do it, Sir.'

As Fogg put himself very temptingly within the reach of Mr. Pickwick's
clenched fist, there is little doubt that that gentleman would have
complied with his earnest entreaty, but for the interposition of Sam,
who, hearing the dispute, emerged from the office, mounted the stairs,
and seized his master by the arm.

'You just come away,' said Mr. Weller. 'Battledore and shuttlecock's
a wery good game, vhen you ain't the shuttlecock and two lawyers the
battledores, in which case it gets too excitin' to be pleasant. Come
avay, Sir. If you want to ease your mind by blowing up somebody, come
out into the court and blow up me; but it's rayther too expensive work
to be carried on here.'

And without the slightest ceremony, Mr. Weller hauled his master down
the stairs, and down the court, and having safely deposited him in
Cornhill, fell behind, prepared to follow whithersoever he should lead. 

http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/580/pg580.txt    

That was a classic case of trapping an irascible person into losing his temper and making him blow off his steam; and also losing his cool and trying to invite him to hit, in the presence of impeccable witnesses.

For, it is well established that in a civilized debate, the one who loses his temper first loses the argument; and the one who hits first is the aggressor whatever the provocation.

I recall how our Chanakya (GSS, ex-Diro, IIT KGP) used this strategy so effectively that what was turning out to be a crisis of first waters got blown off in a second and the two impulsive union leaders lost their jobs overnight and their sure victory turned into an ignominious defeat and at one stroke (literally) academic peace reigned in the campus till I retired.

That was one reason why I kept my cool almost always while in service at IIT KGP. It became my second nature not to enter into any argument at all. On any academic issue I used to state my position at a most appropriate moment and fall silent.

After retirement too I stuck to this policy except once when I really blew my top in public. 

It was like this:

The apartment complex near Banjara Hills where we lived for three years was constructed 22 years ago when Hyderabad was not yet a hi-tech city and most of its populace were too poor to own a car. So, the builders never bothered to provide a pukka car-park. There were just four built-in garages that could accommodate four cars. But by and by Hyderabadis became affluent and the number of cars increased to six, then eight, and by the time we rented there, the number was ten. Since there was no car-park allotment, folks used to park their cars hither and thither on a first come first served basis. There was just enough open space within the complex. Of course, there was a scramble to get into the covered garages, but I never fell for it and used to park my ancient Maruti peacefully in the open...

One afternoon, I had to drop my son at the Secunderbad Railway Station on his way to Chennai to attend a Business-Visa-Interview at the US Consulate there. Pretty important, for, if he misses his date, the next one would be a couple of months later...closing the stable door after the horses have bolted, as the saying goes.

My son is a KGPian and imbibed all its chalega attitude and so took his sweet time getting ready and emerged just in time for our trip to Secunderabad. By then I was already in a 'state' with butterflies in my good old stomach. And as we came out of our door we found a visitor's car parked plumb in front of our matchbox Maruti in such a way there was no way it could be steered out of its cubby-hole. And the watchman was missing...it happened to be his 'happy hour'. And for once I was enraged, because there was no sign or trace of where the driver of the offending car went. Obviously he must be visiting one of the 24 apartments, but there was no time going about knocking one door after the other.

The only way was to get into my car and toot the horn. First two civilized attempts brought no response. Then I had to resort to wild life-threatening honking. Doors of every balcony opened and folks came out to watch what was happening. My son was getting jittery because he never saw me in such a rage. Finally, after a good 3 minutes (a very long time), one young chap in shabby attire emerged and walked down towards the offending car so coolly as if nothing happened.

I then stopped him and said angrily: 

"Don't you know the simple etiquette of parking? You ought to be ashamed of yourself"

The chap looked up and down and saw a dozen tenants watching the show and kept quiet.

I then asked him: "Are you the driver of this car?"

He stiffened and said:

"No, I am the OWNER"

And I said: "That makes it worse.."

And he slowly removed his car outside the complex.

I asked my son to get in and drove away like I never did earlier.

And my son said: "Dad, cool, cool, you will hit that chap's car!"

After two good minutes and into the fourth gear, my son asked:

"Have you noticed what car that was?"

"Yes, a brand new BMW M5"

...Posted by Ishani

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Khadi Gandhi - Repeat Telecast

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http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110727/images/27jairam.jpg

Our World Class IITian Congress Cabinet Minister is in the news again (for the wrong reasons).

As far as I could glean from News Reports (surely deniable), the facts of the case are as follows:

He was attending a State Function in Rajasthan. He was offered a spun cotton khadi garland. As is the custom, he took it off and placed it on the table. Then, I don't know what happened. Suddenly, he lifted his right leg above his left thigh and took a piece off that khadi garland and wiped his shoe clean with it.

Murphy's Law prevailed, as usual, and the shoe-cleaning ceremony coincided with the moment when the CM of Rajasthan was exhorting the audience to realize Gandhian Values in their lives.

Much happened then which I don't have space to narrate, but it all culminated in BJP Workers (of all folks!) burning his effigies saying he insulted the Father of their Nation.

See for more details:

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/story/jairam-ramesh-wipes-shoe-with-khadi-garland/1/146222.html


I want to stoutly defend our Cabinet Minister's unintended offense (if there is one). You must have seen that in my thousands of blog posts, I have rarely taken up any political issue or event. But I wish to make an exception in this case, for the simple reason that us IITians must stick together when assaulted by outsiders. We may have our differences whether Bombay is more World Class than KGP, but that is between us.

Yudhister laid down the law eons ago:


"Vayam Panchadhika Shatam"

Which meant that Pandavas are 5 and Kauravas are 100 when they fight among themselves. But when Gandharvas attack Kauravas, blood becomes thicker than water, and they make up 105 defending one another.

So here goes my Defense:

1. It is just a weird coincidence...not premeditated that the Rajasthan CM was speaking of GandhianValues. How could our Cabinet Minister guess that BJP Workers (!) would be offended (the Improbable, although not Impossible...he is no Sherlock Holmes)?

2. Whenever the Resident Crow at Harry's decided to shit on my head when I was preparing for my Lecture on the cement bench, I automatically used to wipe my head with the khata in my hands. It is a reflex action. The QM khata (topoed from Feynman) just happened to be handy. If someone claims that I was insulting Feynman and burns my effigy, they are welcome...their case wouldn't wash in any court of law...judges too perhaps wipe their dirty gowns with the nearest law tome available when they are hit unexpectedly by airborne chappals 'projected' by their lady typists in court halls:

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2010/02/shake-leg.html


3. It must be remembered that it is hardly a week since our Cabinet Minister was promoted to the Cabinet Rank and shifted to a weightier portfolio. I recall, when I was promoted (unduly) as a Professor, I was walking in a daze on Cloud Nine and was prone to wiping my Black Board with my hankie...ask Aniket or Kedar or Supratim or Saswat...they must have heard the story if at all there was any inter-batch mixing on Hall Days and their Arabian Nights.

4. Also, the affairs of the New Office which must have been in tatters before he took over must be bothering him inwardly...us Intellectuals are different from the run-of-the-mill aam janata politicos...we come from the Upper House with all its rarefied 'aambiaance' (as my son corrects my speech...he learns it from his Yankee Customers). 

I rest my Case...Ishani is threatening to pick it up from here, and I can't quite trust her...she is not an IITian...not yet.




....Posted by Ishani

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Acknowledgmentality - Repeat Telecast

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https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3Z5XC10NPlLSxnWZYOFmCJ-cm6AFkEu7Nqfp3q6wVw7nPpFo7-wVDsIzFrNM7-gJGlJbgKQ3HEhKFPdK2onnZtNOvqgDtDUL8ga_ts6bpwNxbKNGEFxVGeXvzc5eFdQKaRcfanygEmCQ/s1600/acknowledgment.jpg

I didn't know that 'acknowledgment' has an implicit reluctance concealed within it:

'acknowledge implies the reluctant disclosure of something one might have kept secret (he acknowledged that the child is his)' 


....Webster


Ha!

The Research Scholar's flamboyant start-up:

"It is a great pleasure to acknowledge..."
translates to:

"It has been a sustained pain in the arse to work under my Guide but for whose misguidance and nitpicking, this thesis would have been completed within two splendid years and would have been crisper and sharper"

Acknowledgments come in rainbow colors starting from the hilarious:

"But for the advent of my luscious wife and then our (unplanned) lovely kid, this thesis would have been written up a decade ago,

...vivaham vidya nashanam, santhanam sarvanashanam

And then there is this tongue-in-cheek declaration from that RS whose Official Guide X has been busy globe-trotting drumming up custom while actual help was got from the post-doc Y of some other Prof Z:

"I thank Dr Y for his indispensable and invaluable help, and Professor X for being kindly cooperative..."

TRR (who went to USC for his glorious Ph D around 1989) did his M Sc Project with me on Edwin Taylor's Spacetime Software. But he had an unequal tussle with Prof KVR from Day 1 of his First Year when he started asking indelicate questions in the Class Room. 

And TRR was avenged by being asked to keep standing for an entire lecture hour of KVR just because he was 5 minutes late, discussing his project work with me. By then KVR however rose to be HoD. When TRR approached me for permission to write up his thesis, I smilingly asked him not to forget the default Acknowledgment to the HoD. He bristled and shot back: 

"What for?"

and I had to tell him that HoDs can in principle have a great nuisance value if they are displeased....I mean what is wrong in pleasing and propitiating an innocent soul after tormenting him for 5 years?

While I was writing up that Joint Paper with TRR for AJP, I told Edwin that the Title of our Paper on his pioneering Relativity Software contains his name. He demurred and wrote back that it would be too embarrassing to find himself on the Title of a Paper in a Journal for which he was an Editor long ago, and that a mention in a significant way in the body of the paper would do.

So, body is different from head and the tail!

SDM had this fixation that he should have at least one independent Paper every year lest folks should suspect he is bloodsucking his co-workers. So, he was working on his own Paper on biaxial crystals while I was working on related problems suggested by him. By then I won his confidence and he showed me the Manuscript of his Paper that he sent out to Annals of Physics (NY). 

I then pointed out that his 'generalized uniaxiality condition' must appear as a Section-Head than in the text obscurely. He demurred and said that the so-called 'condition' of his relates to the particular choice of coordinates and is not a feature of the crystal. I opposed him and said it is quite independent of the choice of coordinates and is a feature of the crystal class itself.

He then asked: 

"Do you mean to say that it is a minor discovery of mine?" 

And I had to tell him: 

"It is a fairly major discovery of yours" 

and showed him how. We then parted but after an hour he was knocking the door of my digs in our Faculty Hostel. And upon my opening the door, he entered, kept his heavy trade-mark bag on the floor and glumly uttered: 

"What all you said and I agreed to is WRONG"

I then had to ask him to be seated and show my detailed calculations to him. He heaved a huge sigh of relief but turned glum again saying:

"In that case I have to acknowledge you in my independent Paper!"

I assured him it wasn't needed because after all I was his own student. He shook his head this way and that and when the proofs arrived, he inserted a handsome Acknowledgment and showed it to me and asked:

"Do you think this will do or should I make it stronger?"

dekha hoy nai chokshu melia
ghor hote shudhu dui pa felia
ekti dhaner shisher upor
ekti shishirbindu ||

for me it ought to read:

dekha hoyeche!

At times, an honest Acknowledgment could pull you down by a Grade, as it happened with Sumita Das, another Project Student of mine and one of the best. She took as her Seminar Topic my Flickering Bulb Paradox Manuscript, worked it out, and presented it in a Board in which I wasn't invited as an Examiner.

DB reported to me that she was hassled: 

"Thought Experiments are useless"

...only thoughtless ones can get Ph Ds ;)

And she was finally asked: 

"Whose idea is this?"

And in her childish innocence she bowed her head reverentially and said:

"The most respected Professor gps"

All she got was a handsome Acknowledgment in the Revised Version of that Paper of mine in AJP.

...Posted by Ishani

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