Farewell

You are more into something when you are away from it.

Miss the farewell function of this evening for our final year students of the Dept., which I presume, by now is at its peak.
My best wishes to all. May you all become worthy children of this country and we all feel proud of you. May you all nurture in you how this institute came up in a detention camp of freedom fighters, where two of them laid lives when British police fired at them, where Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose visited. May you all remember your role as a maker of this nation. The country cannot afford to make the best of its education infrastructure available to all. It is given to the chosen few, the most capable ones, who you are, the blessed, the deserving ... with a hope, with an urge that the enriched you, your capacity  will help raising the country, your fellow countrymen - the suffering millions, the downtrodden, the ones who also deserve access to education, employment, health, shelter, a space for themselves ... who are waiting with expectations in those tearful eyes..... in overcrowded general compartment of trains, in long queues of Govt. hospitals....when the educated, the empowered ...you, will reach out to them.

I am sure, wherever you are, you will carry 'India' with you and will not leave any opportunity to see that India achieves the much desired inclusive growth ... beyond islands of excellence ... creating opportunities for all. Tall task indeed ... that's why the hope rests on the tallest amongst us, young graduating IITians. Your batch, previous and succeeding batches - together you are a great force, you can and I am sure you will. The nation will see in you not only leaders in technological field but leaders who are 'Dedicated to the service of the Nation' on their graduating day, as inscribed in the magnificent main building that beholds all of us. Let me end this little speech :-) with what we all KGPians remember by heart, the famous quote from Pandit J. L. Nehru's first convocation address, "Here in the place of that Hijli Detention Camp stands the fine monument of India, representing India's urges,India's future in the making. this picture seems to me symbolical of the changes that are coming to India." May you all lead a happy, prosperous and meaningful life. May God bless you.

The old building of IIT Kharagpur during World War II, a picture from pre-independence era.

 

The making of the new building. The main gate was in place before others.

 The making of the signature tower. The F-116 (Bhatnagar Auditorium) entrance to main building is in place.

Farewell 2011

Good-bye 2011 ... Welcome 2012!

Wish the new year ushers in happiness, peace and prosperity to one and all! My apology if I am not able to reach out individually to all with whom I enjoy a relationship laced with love, care and share.

Earth's revolution

Crossing 40, one perhaps goes into down count mode. With 10-20 years remaining in which health might cooperate, we perhaps try to make every year count. We try to align ourselves more with things that are near and dear to us. We try to get a sense of satisfaction that the life has been a meaningful, worthy pursuit - the goal reached or not. Here comes the question. What has been the goal? Was there any goal for myself? Or was it always living a life on others' terms? Something like Brownian Motion, colliding with one thought now and next with another, leaving a zero net displacement at the end! As Earth completes one revolution around the Sun, it is time to take a look at what our thoughts and deeds revolved around in the year gone by. As it revolved in the orbit, spiraling up, our work may have yielded few milestones. Time to feel proud of it and look for more in the coming year. If something is missed due to slackness, time to take a resolve to remove them in the new year. The more important of course is to take note of what is there at the centre of our revolution, what is the fulcrum. Is it a desire to emerge as a better human being?

Feeling Nostalgic

Looking back at 2011, find a lot of room to improve in the coming year as far as slackness is concerned. I think that I can work even harder. Yes, there are too many responsibilities to give time to. Still, a better time and work management can bring out more. However, I am satisfied on one count. I have learnt to respect people more during the year, specially my young students. Be it my research students, or students in my UG classes, or N.S.S. students; I was simply humbled to see their character strength - the last semester specially was very enlightening. Thanks to all, my students. The strict, rigid personality you encountered day to day and tolerated :-) wants to thank all of you from the bottom of the heart for gifting a wonderful 2011, to which I feel like attached to. Attached is an image from our 25th Dec. Vizag tour. Gadadhar, not yet Sri Ramakrishna, the world renowned teacher who could not spell 'education' properly leaving native village for Dakshineshwar. (This exhibition is on Ramakrishna Beach of Vizag at the other side of the Beach Road. This is the best of such exhibitions I have seen so far.)

One has to move on. Hope, the 2012 batch of students will be similarly generous, if not more.  

Garbeta College Visit

The will and wish of many prevailed. The 5 day year end Vizag family tour followed high fever of daughter. There was an invitation to address N.S.S. volunteers of Garbeta College on 30th Dec. afternoon. My 9 year old daughter who usually prefers mother's company to enjoy her freedom to the fullest, wants me always to be with her when ill. The organizer's thankfully swapped two afternoon programs and mine was rescheduled on 31st Dec., the farewell day of 2011. By that time, the fever came down. We four (myself, Rajat - faculty of IIT Kharagpur and NSS program officer, Sahidullah - senior PhD student and Mr. Prabodh Kumar Sasmal - President, Kharagpur Vivekananda Yuva Mahamandal) set off at 11:15 A.M.  We reached Garbeta college, 65 KM from our campus at about 1:15 PM. We stayed there till 4 PM.

N.S.S. Special Camp at Garbeta College

Dr. Sushil Ghosh, PhD from IIT Kharagpur and now a faculty member at Garbeta College, looking after NSS activities there organized the special 7 day long training camp. About 120 students participated. The pre-lunch session used to be physical work. The post lunch session was on various trainings (e.g. first aid, fire) and talks from invited speakers. On the 2nd day of the camp, Swami Sunishthananda, Principal, Midnapore Ramakrishna Mission School had an inspiring discourse. I heard Swamiji before addressing young audience. One has to listen spell bound when he talks. In my one hour address, I stressed on (i) challenges of modern society (ii) what is social service - self awareness before making others aware (iii) internal and external discipline (iv) self-confidence and believe in the power of the good (v) need to reach career milestones, not for flaunting ego but to be able to serve more (vi) importance of balanced development of Heart (to feel), Head (to think a solution) and Hand (to implement, not outsourcing all the time) (vii) the power of organization (viii) establishing network among NSS units - shared email address with all and requested to follow up. Rajat shared his unit's experience at NSS, IIT Kharagpur with campers. This followed an half-an-hour Q & A session. Finally, it  was time to end the session. We are not too much used to college students touching feet at IIT environment. But this is a common practice in a small town college of 3700 students but with broadband connection, catering to many, many villages in the neighbourhood. As is said, our nation lives in the villages. I was embarrassed a lot when students started asking for autographs.

We paid a short 10 minute visit to a place called Gangani in our return trip. This was one KM from Garbeta college and had a beautiful landscape.

V.S.R.C. Hall Day

This too was scheduled on 31st Dec. evening. VSRC houses project students with separate blocks for boys, girls and married couples. The project students of our lab. invited our family in this evening celebration. We discussed at home. Though the daughter is on recovery mode, it appeared that it would be ambitious to attend it. Hence we decided to give it a miss.

Having returned from Garbeta College at 6:30 PM, I was preparing a project proposal to mail to sponsor and the phone of one project student from VSRC came. "Sir, the program has started. We are waiting for you." There was a need to procure something from the market and I made a detour to VSRC to spend half-an-hour with the students. The cultural program was on. Since I had limited time, visited rooms of our lab. students on their invitation, had sweets and photographs there. They are kind enough not to force me for the dinner. The new block of VSRC meant for girls looked contemporary and beautiful. The old ones for boys looked depressing, perhaps needs a fresh coat of whitewash. The girls of course argued that they take more care of their apartments so that they look good. Among the boys, Isr... beat everybody by several notch in maintaining the room. Among the girls, the ones of Resh... and Debapr... were very nicely arranged. Neer.. disappointed me in the sense that his room had pic.s of only Lord Shiva and Swami Vivekananda :-) He is a regular in Wednesday Bhagavad-Gita class here and I was expecting more such pics there. In comparison, Resh.. had a greater much greater company of gods and goddesses in her room!!! Wished everyone Happy New Year in advance and left VSRC at 8:30 PM.

Gods and Goddesses

I leave it entirely to personal choice whether one believes in gods and goddesses. To me what Vivekananda said, "Be good and do good. That is the whole of religion." or "Religion is the manifestation of divinity already in a person." are sufficient. If worship of one form or the other or no form at all, helps one to have meditative mind, do self-analysis and strike a balance in life and not becoming superstitious or fanatic, it can be considered as a great device. If there is a better device, let one go for that.

Few weeks back was traveling by car with Akash on steering wheel. Akash, a young boy, works in a car rental agency and we got his service on several occasions before. That day my mother was there in the car. She noticed that there were pictures of Goddess Kali of Dakshineshwar, Sri Ramakrishna, Ma Sarada in the car. Also, Akash stopped the car at one small road side temple, bowed and threw a coin. To this Akash said, "I never looked at images of Gods and Goddesses or cared about them at younger age. My father used to say that a day might come when I would bow to even road side stones. Now into the profession of car driving, those words have come true." Our faith in gods and goddesses, unless originated from family values or deeper discourses, is proportional to uncertainty faced in life. A regular salaried employee with a guaranteed monthly income, in general, starts the daily chore much differently from a shop-keeper as far as their engagements with gods and goddesses are concerned. Even an otherwise non-believer turns believer when in duress. Does it help? The prayer may help in generating more energy, strength, wisdom which is already in us, not coming from outside. It may help to focus, concentrate. Our mind has great power. Our senses which are oriented outwards, defocusses it and we do not usually feel the power within.

No Smoking

Suraj was the driver in last Kolkata visit. This was the 2nd time I traveled with him. He had to abandon study at Class VIII due to sudden demise of father and started career as a helper of a truck. He takes all care for his sister who is on the verge of completing college education. Suraj wants to study further. Reading is no problem for him but he finds it difficult to write. We discussed if he can use waiting hours at parking to practise writing. That day, he had to park the vehicle at Sector-V, IT hub for some time. I had a discussion for an upcoming research lab. at IIT Khaargpur to be sponsored by the one of the largest Indian MNC in IT sector. In return journey, we stopped at Sher-i-Punjab at Kolaghat for tea. I asked Suraj how he liked Sector-V as it was his first visit. That place is giving employment to lakhs of people and looks so vibrant! Suraj gave an unapproving look at me and said, "What you say is fine but girls working there smoke." I said that there might have been stress in the office work and may be smoking gives some relief. As such everyone now is trying to quit smoking due health concern. Suraj did not look convinced. He said, "The girls were coming in large groups to that shop, close to where I parked the vehicle. Not one or two, all of them were smoking and they did not look stressed. Can so many of them be stressed simultaneously?"

It perhaps was not just a social taboo or gender / class discrimination or cultural shock he was referring to. Perhaps the brother in Suraj was worried about the future of his college going sister aspiring for a job.


New Year Resolution

Let us try sincerely in this new year to come out of the habits that weaken us as an individual or as a nation and embrace the habits that make us strong.

Vizag Tour

My daughter (Brishti) had only 6 day long Christmas leave. We left Kharagpur on 22nd Dec. evening. The 5 day tour was all fun. The scenic beauty is unparallel - the hills merging themselves into the sea, the likes of 'Dolphin Nose'. Brishti spent everyday no less than half-an hour in the sea. Even on 27th evening, before we were set to depart. And it was no surprise that fever came few hours before we were set to board train. That apart every single thing was enjoyable. The hill top film studio, Kailash Giri amusement park, the zoo, submarine, museum - besides the various beaches. I scored a numero uno in some funky sense. Never ever got into sea anytime during the tour, not even the toes got wet! Much did my daughter and her excellency (6th pic from bottom, right side of the frame at Titanic Point of Kaliash Giri)) tried, always found a way out! Two of my pics at film studio is also there - one in OC's chair of the filmy police station (not related to texts where they appear)!!!


Professional Life

This is life as usual like any IIT faculty member. Interacting with students, technical staffs, colleagues, sponsors, collaborators. Trying to reduce no. of sponsored projects to remain focussed. Have had enough to develop a very, very decent lab. infrastructure. Just trying to get funds for existing students and being choosy about new projects. Not renewing projects with two sponsors who supported us for long. Our sincere thanks to them. Shall remain available to them whenever there is any specific need from their side. Shall work with a new sponsor (one Govt. research lab. delivering technology to field) who finds a very good match with our technology portfolio. Shall continue with a physcian sponsored project due to its special nature even if the project value is not high and there is manpower constraint. Seldom we find such a commitment from an individual, a medical expert. Two more interdisciplinary (inter- Dept. projects), One-Two new industry funded collaborative projects - and my hands are full. Cannot take any more. Moreover, would like to finish the book project asap. This is a commitment for long. Admin. responsibility is increasing and cannot help there too. This is what is lined up in 2012, as far as I can see. 

I must say one thing here. The industries with whom we interacted and FICCI have been quite appreciative of our work. This inspires us a lot. On 21st Dec., there was a video shoot in our lab. by media people for an upcoming documentary. There was a dfference this time. In several places, I had to walk from a distance towards the camera. It was difficult for me to give a serious look at my face and there had to be few retakes.

Three Bags Full

One for my family, friends and well-wishers

There was a flurry of activities yesterday. In the morning, at about 10 a.m. came to know that a Bengali daily has given a lot of space (A4 size) to our invention in day's edition. My student Su.. had a talk with the reporter. They want to know more about other activities being pursued currently by our group to report them in future. We circulated copy of the newspaper article to many Prof.s, Lab. technicians in the Dept. Some came to us to collect a copy. It was a proud moment for all of us. Even De..(SR..) also wanted to have a copy. And of course, my family members too were very happy. As I mentioned in a previous post that my mother always dreamt that his son's name would appear in the newspaper. I was delighted to present the newspaper to her.

As I was sharing the news with HOD and others, came a phone call. AajTak/HeadlinesToday, a national TV news channel is coming to IIT Khargpur in the second half to exclusively cover the invention. WOW! That's something! They came at 1:30 p.m. and stayed upto 4 p.m.. My first experience to talk to a microphone like that with news channel logo etc. My student, Su.. also told few things after some fumbling and cut, rewind on one occassion. We asked them to put our Lab. technicians too in the frame. They were very cordial, professionals with positive attitude. Then they came to my office, did some recording there and also the front of our dept. etc. After necessary editing, they may show it today in the TV. They too asked us to contact whenever we crack something new. I asked them if they would like to talk to any other person, say De.., HO.. or any senior people in the administration. They said that is not necessary. Today their Kolkata editor rang and said that the edited material is sent to Delhi for broadcasting, expected to be some time in the evening.

Got lot of congratulatory phone calls, emails. The cardiology dept. Head of one very renowned Hospital rang (got input from Aaj Tak reporters), congratulated and inquired more about the product. My thanks to all our well wishers. We sincerely belive that by God's grace and your kind support we'll overcome many more innovation related challenges in future too.

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One for my Master

Yesterday will be remebered for few other reasons too. It was a last day as HO.. for Prof. D... and he is leaving IITkgp in a few months. In the morning, he came to my room and when he announced that we felt very nostalgic. A man with a heart of 24 carat gold, he worked hard for the department in a very passionate but unselfish way. Always aprroachable, a cool headed person, he led by examples. True, that I had many differences with him but I am happy to say that I was wrong in most of the occassions. But he was kind enough to allow others argue or place their views without inhibition and then explain why he did what he did.

We moved out of the room and headed for Bha.. 's tea shop. Then he took me and R.. (another as.. pr..) to the courtyard at the back, the one he painstakingly built into a garden. Asked us to take care a few Bakul trees which he planted. It was very moving! In time to come, he expects the trees to provide natural shade in the form of a canopy. He expressed happiness that all the toilets are renovated. Then he took us to the new parking lot where some more things still need to be done. Called Pra.. (another as.. pr.. ) who is looking after that.

He invited us to his Kolkata residence. I am sure he'll like our presence. And with Boudi present there one will always feel at home, pampered. He has some bright idea of certain future projects. Asked for our support. It will be an honour to be associated.

In between, in his usual style he presnted us few words of wisdom. He equated life like climbing a hill. Though at a global scale the slope is positive, occassionally the climber need to climb down to overcome a ditch or so. Without that he cannot advance. One should not judge a person only by what he is at t=t and look for an average over some length of time. Similarly, positive slope at t=t does not necessarily mean that it is a uphill journey. Going downhill, one may come across a rock which he climbs not to maintain that positive slope throughout his journey. He gave an interesting example. There are 1000 families in a locality. 1000 TV, washing machine, house maid etc. Now each family had a divorce. It became 2000 families. So 2000 TV, washing machine, maids. The local economy boomed. But what is the overall picture? What happens to the kid? No wonder that Prof. is taking early retirement for her daughter who is now studying in Kolkata. And it is true that except the IIT in Kharagpur there are no options available for quality higher education. And almost no one from the campus makes into IIT!!! Why so? It may be discussed in some other posts.

He also said - "One cannot be both happy and great. A happy life is a set of few good compromises". On another occassion he said that betweem 'dictatorship' and 'democracy' he prefers the later. Because though democracy makes more mistakes but it does not make big mistakes. Regarding IIT students' single point objective of having a better career he said that one does not learn till he experiences it himself. Very, very few can learn from observing others or analyzing things objectively. He gave example of Vivekananda. How could he do so much by the time he reached 39. He received great shocks from the world which can become unbelievably cruel. The rest Vivekananda learnt observing and analyzing.

He went on saying. If you think of ten people around you, those ten people will think of you and you will have a great support system. How could one miss that? We'll really miss you, an elder brother in you, De..da in IITkgp. But definitely we'll remain in touch as Kolkata is not very far.

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And one for the ...... outgoing students

The farewell function started late, past 7:30 p.m., may be due to lack of audience and as expected many things were cut short, the students' feedback etc. The skit was scrapped. However, we had synthesizer play from Prof. M... (piecewise continuous), Prof. S.. rendered a soulful Rabindrasangeet, Prof D.., H.. surprised everybody by singing a song. We never knew that he could also sing. And the student presentations though few, were of course qualitatively better than us. Ku.. spoke for a while about their social initiative. Few of the Prof.s gave inpiring speech. P..., the UG f.a. appeared not to enjoy much of the interactions he had with students. The high note with which he started fizzled out somewhere because the students did not reciprocate. The students however aprreciated his effort, project supervision etc. Then there was usual presentation of memento for all the outgoing students. Some students felt that the MTech students are missed out somewhere.

The dinner was good. Found that the juniors (2nd year mostly) took the outgoing seniors' suggestion to 'enjoy life' in the right perspective. Then we had few photo sessions. I circulated two reminder pads to the outgoing students to write their next destination, email id, personal webpage and blogspace. Few filled up there itself. The rest, I expect will complete before they leave the campus.

As people started leaving and it was past 11 p.m., like every other farewell evening of past few years I got engaged in some 'heart to heart' talk with some of the outgoing students. I raised two issues. One is about their social responsibility - how few tubewells in a village can make a huge difference. I wish they read my earlier post of 27th March http://gskgp.blogspot.com/2008/03/social-initiative-iitkgp.html and the discussion we had with Vinayak and Chiranjeev Maharaj http://gskgp.blogspot.com/2008/03/afternoon-with-vinayak-our-alumnus-and.html

The second issue was about removing peer pressure on the juniors by which they are driven in one direction only. This is not allowing the juniors to look beyond only a few options making invaluable loss to them as more promising opportunities remain unutilized. This is also keeping some of the research groups unfavourably positioned. I said few things from my Feb. post http://gskgp.blogspot.com/2008_02_01_archive.html The students argued that though there are better research opportunities available with other research groups but students folk one area as all the 'high' paying (They were missing the qualifier) jobs are from one area. Many of them do not take a job and go for higher studies but they want to play safe first by securing a position in a highly paid job. Fair enough! Indian Companies, Government or PSU jobs cannot match offers available at foreign shores or made by foriegn companies having foot prints in India. The scenario thus is pessimistic so far. May be an US recession can bring back few here. Or the new reservation policy may help in giving better access to the premier institutions like IITs to more students who will be rooted in India or serving Govt., PSUs, Indian Co.s . (It may not be out of place to mention that I, myself do not enjoy any reservation.) Also why no IIT BTech (even MTechs) opts for higher studies in IITs itself? There are many internationally known faculty members or research groups. We have a sizeable community of PhD scholars getting PhD degree from approx. 4 years of research through international journal (IEEE, Elseveir etc.) publications and one foreign expert examining the thesis. If without IIT BTech and MTech IIT research labs can do so much, how much more is expected if they chose to stay back? And there is no dearth of vacancies or anything like that. Some pass out students were complaining about the quality of research in IITs. That is grossly unfair. In spite of the best (IIT BTech), the second best (IIT MTech), the 3rd best (NIT BTechs), the fourth best (the best of pvt. engg. colleges getting good job offer) deserting us I believe we are putting reasonably good show with those research students who join us. Compare that with the manpower input of US university research labs. Let us swap the students and see who delivers what! I must also say that I am proud of my research students who in spite of their limitations work very hard and raise themselves so much in four years that their work get recognized. I salute their indomitable spirit. I salute their contribution to IIT research labs.

I believe all is not bad with brain drain. It cannot be. In this world all of us are different shades of grey. No issue can be portrayed fully black or fully white (Image Processing people may differ). May be our country cannot house so many graduates. That IITians are leaving, there are rooms available for engineering graduates from other institutions; there is increasing requirement in Indian Industries to think global in terms of compensation, opportunities. Even Government made its intention clear in 6th pay commission. Also our alumni have brought many laurels for the country and paid back in uncertain terms. They helped in developing positive world opinion about India which benefits the country in some way. And today the global boundaries are more notional than anything else. My best wishes to the would be alumni. Have a very very successful and meaningful life ahead. Be courageous. Remember 'I' for India. If you find some additional space, say time/energy, please spend it for the less privileged section of our country. It will give you lots of satisfaction. And you will enjoy your life in true colour and spirit.

Please keep in touch. Always feel free to drop a line or two, if not more. Wherever you feel like, contradict me and prove me wrong. Now onwards treat me not as a faculty member but simply a senior or your colleague in building the resurgent India.

My best wishes to you all, our brand ambassador. Let you all understand the value of life and live to its fullest.