F.A.Q June 12, 2009
Posted by Karan in Personal.23 comments
I have shamelessly picked this up from Neha’s blog, because I have nothing better to do 
1. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?
I am looking like a bear and need to get a shave.
2. How much cash do you have in your wallet right now?
253 bucks.
3. What’s a word that rhymes with DOOR?
Bore.
4. Who is the 4th person on your missed call list on your cell phone?
My sis.
5. What is your favorite ring tone on your phone?
Smack that by Akon.
6. What are you wearing right now?
Shorts and tee.
7. Do you label yourself?
Nah. Karan is good.
8. Name the brand of the shoes you’re currently own?
Lee Cooper, Reebok and Hush Puppies.
9. Bright or Dark Room?
Dark. Anyday.
10. What do you think about the person who took this survey before you?
Neha: Came across her blog while blogging through PagalGuy. It’s a nice blog.
11. What does your watch look like?
Fast Track. Typically sporty.
12. What were you doing at midnight last night?
13. What did your last text message you received on your cell say?
“Dude.. wassup?”
14. What’s a word that you say a lot?
Ok. Cool. Alright. Hello. Damn. F.
15. Who told you he/she loved you last? (please exclude spouse , family, children)
A friend. Wont name the person here.
16. Last furry thing you touched?
A dog. Just yesterday.
17. Favorite age you have been so far?
This age.
18. What was the last thing you said to someone?
You suck.
19. The last song you listened to?
Seventeen: The Sex Pistols.
20. Where did you live in 1987?
Ranchi.
21. Are you jealous of anyone?
Yeah.
22. Is anyone jealous of you?
Yeah again.
23. Name three things that you have on you at all times?
The sacred thread on my hand, my chain and my attitude.
24. What’s your favorite town/city?
Bengaluru and Hyderabad.
25. When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper and mailed it?
Four years back, to my parents.
26. Can you change the oil on a car?
Damn it. No.
27. Your first love/big crush: what is the last thing you heard about him/her?
Have no idea where she is
28. Does anything hurt on your body right now?
Yeah. Took Hepatitis shots yesterday on my arm and it HURTS!
29. What is your current desktop picture?
A photo of my cirlce (Trailblazers).
30. Have you been burnt by love?
What sort of a question is that? Course no
I tag Himank, Maruti, Aniket, Sharat, Daka, Sanrag, BitGeek, Namrata, Ankit, Rohit, Sashidhar, Arctic Monkey, Kulbir. Most of the others never care, but do buzz me if you need a tag
Adieu May 21, 2009
Posted by Karan in General.12 comments
As I walked along the hostel wing, it seemed to echo with eerie silence. As I trod out of it towards the mess, I noticed that I walked alone for the first time. There was no pillion rider in the bike I rode, I drank my coffee all alone.
Getting the no-dues certificate signed seemed like stoking nails into the coffin. When asked to submit the identification card, I did not want to let go. This same card had accompanied me for four years, getting me a safe passage at unearthly hours and places.
And then there were the little gifts, and the memorabilia unearthened while packing. The ICL tickets, the placement lists, the Felicity posters, the ragging letter, the lost pen drive.. They were all there. Each of them had a story to tell. Each of them was screaming for attention, for those lost memories.
The memories which bound us together, the memories which will stay, come what may. So what if we cannot be together, the spirit lives on. Ten years down the line, when I walk into this place, it will welcome me as if I’d never left. Because this place belongs to me and I belong to this place. A piece of me will be here forever.
Such a bitter sweet symphony is life, isn’t it?
Farewell Speech April 26, 2009
Posted by Karan in IIIT centric.Tags: Farewell, IIIT-H
12 comments
This is the text of my farewell speech yesterday:
18th July, 2006. I took the letter in my hand and looked at its contents. Tears slowly trickled down my eyes as I walked towards my room. Terrible thoughts gushed through my mind. What had I done to deserve this? Why was this happening to me? What now? It was as if the world had come crumbling down around me..
10th February, 2008. I’d often heard of tears of a different kind, but never experienced it. But here I was, unable to hold them back, unable to stop them. It had to be the best moment of my life- a feeling which I had never experienced before. And then, the DJ played “Yaaron Dosti..”
Good evening ladies and gentlemen! Respected director sir, dean sir and other professors, and my dear friends. I am standing here to talk about what defines our batch.
In the first incident, when I had broken down in my room, the entire batch had gathered in the basketball court to show solidarity. While I was shattered, they had decided to take collective responsibility for our actions, who were caught in the ragging case. Having never seen something like this before, I was truly touched at the unity and benevolence shown back then.
On 10th February, 2008; when the song was played, everyone had come together in a circle to celebrate. After all, this is what Felicity stand for- building trusts and relationships and celebrating it with the same spirit. It was not just about proving comments like, “Yours is a useless batch- You can’t do this” etc wrong, rather far from it. It was about the consonance and harmony which we were able to achieve. A mail from one of my seniors summed it up beautifully. It read, “I have never witnessed this kind of energy or spirit permeating the entire campus.” From Felicity, what else could we have asked for?
When I look back at these moments today, I see that in the depths of despair and the heights of happiness, we’ve all been together. I know that my batch was always with me; and so it must be the case with many of us.
When we muffed up during the batch trip, people did not throw stones, but accepted whatever we had with a smile and tried to work around it. When somebody wanted to stand for a post, people only encouraged him.
If there is one thing which we’d take back from Jeevan Vidya, it’ll be the point about trusting others intentions and not judging them by their actions. Good relationships, both within the students and with the faculty has been the bedrock of whatever we’ve done. If we were told that Felicity was always full of skirmishes with everyone, we tried to build bridges. So what if we don’t blog about the issues we have, we always go and sort them out.
We have faced so many issues as a batch- changes being brought about, admin issues like hostels, a recession during placements, but we’ve been together in all this.
As Aniket rightly pointed out in his blog, we were never brilliant or exceptional, but we’ve built from scratch. Be it not having touched a computer to reaching the ACM finals and becoming the system administrator; or never having seen a basketball to breaking into the college team. Improvement and excellence in our fields through collective learning is what we’ve looked for.
The great Baha’u’llah had once said that, “So powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the entire world”. I dare speak in behalf of my batch that this should be our legacy. I sincerely hope and pray that our juniors ensure that.
I take this opportunity to thank our juniors for having walked shoulder to shoulder as equals in all our endeavors. I’d thank the faculty for having placed their trust in us.
Two weeks from now, we’re going to be missing all this. As I stand here for the final time in my college life, I just have two clichéd words for my batch. Thank you.
Top Playlist March 12, 2009
Posted by Karan in Personal.Tags: favourite songs, Playlist
29 comments
Music is always in the air. Here, I am trying to get a feel of the taste of what people are listening to besides getting them to lift their bums out of their chairs and blog.
Here’s the top 10 playlist according to playcount. Playcount number in brackets. Thank you Windows Media Player!
1 ) Latika’s theme – Slumdog Millionaire (52)
2 ) Guzarish – Ghajini (43)
3 ) Aankh Micholi – Dev D (37)
4 ) High Hopes – Pink Floyd (35)
5 ) Crystal Planet – Joe Satriani (34)
6 ) Jaane Kyun – Dostana (31)
7 ) Masakali – Delhi 6 (30)
8 ) Nayan Tarse – Dev D (29)
9 ) O… Saya – Slumdog Millionaire (28)
10 ) Californication – RHCP (27)
I tag Himank, Aniket, Ankit Garg, Kunal, Daka, Tifosi, Ghost Runner, Obelix, Zenwalker, Gaganpreet, Bhargava, Sashidhar, Neuron, Deepti, Prateek, Namrata, Saini, Kulbir, Shark, Arctic Monkey, Sid Chandra, Mythalez
PS: Anyone else want’s a tag? Please ping me, I’ll add it
IIM-I gdpi experience February 13, 2009
Posted by Karan in Personal.Tags: GDPI, IIM Indore, Management
41 comments
PROFILE:
Acads:
X (CBSE) – 91.6%
XII (CBSE) – 91.2%
Undergrad- B.Tech CSE (IIIT Hyd)
GPA – 8.43
Work-Ex: Nil
CAT %ile:
DI : 84.92
Quant : 99.88
Verbal : 99.18
Aggregate : 99.86
Others: Lots of extra curriculars- quizzes, debates, cricket, blog, writing for newspaper and college mag, blog, organising events etc.
Date and Place: 13/2/2009 (8:30 AM), Hyderabad.
GD: Find it here
The GD was a fish market for the first 10 mins and quite peaceful after that. I think I did quite well. I started the GD and gave it a direction, pitched in a lot of times and gave quite a few original points. I was satisfied with my performance.
I was the first one to be interviewed. Lets call the professors P1 and P2.
Ask for permission to enter the room and sit. Wish them.
P1: So Karan, How’r you doing?
Me: Fine sir, Thank you.
P1: So you’r doing your B.Tech?
Me: Yes sir.
P1: You want to shift to management?
Me: Yes sir.
P1: Why?
Me: Sir, I think the possibility of leading and guiding businesses excites me. It’ll give me high levels of accountability and responsibility which I cherish. I believe that I am a natural leader and have in me to give vision and lead the fortunes of a company. In the future, I would also like to set up my own venture.
P1: What are the qualities which make a good leader? Why do you call yourself a good leader?
Me: Sir, a leader should have qualities like 1) visionary (elaborated) 2) good himself (elaborated) 3) inspirational (elaborated).
Then spoke about how I fulfill these qualities. How I was elected coordinator for my college fest, a 1.5 million INR event. Then spoke about the challenges I faced during the fest and how I handled them
P1: What is network security?
Me: Talked about the definition of network security and what are the different types of security issues: 1) impersonation (elaborated) 2) interception (elaborated) 3) viruses.
P1: How do you make sure that a network is secure?
Me: Talked about asymmetric and symmetric cryptographic algorithms. Elaborated on the differences between the two, which is used in which situation and why.
P1: But are they effective? Whatever is available in the market today?
Me: To a fair extend sir. Then I spoke about RSA, RC4, DES, SDES, AES and how they are being used today.
P1: Then what is a virus?
Me: Sir a code written to make sure that the computer program performs in an ineffective way.
P1: Can you name a famous virus?
Me: Sir, Y2K..
P1: (Cuts me) No no..
Me: Sir, the “I love you” virus. It was started in Thailand in 2000. (elaborated)
P1: Ok. Now tell me something about database management systems.
Me: Spoke about what is db and dbms. Then spoke about issues facing a database, distributed databases, database admin’s role etc.
P1: What is a relational database?
Me: Defined.
P1: Ok.
Now P2 takes over
P2: What is globalization?
Me: Spoke about the definition, the types of globalization- economic, cultural, social etc. Elaborated on each.. Gave examples like western culture affecting countries in Asia etc.
P2: What are the types of economic globalizations?
Me: Sir 1) Trade , imports and exports (elaborated) 2) FDI, when a company invests (elaborated) 3) Joint ventures between companies.. Gave the example of Vodafone Essar. 4) Acquisitions.. (elaborated) Tata-Corus acquisition.
P2: How many people in India below the poverty line.
Me: Sir, according to one dollar a day definition around 30%.
P2: What is the FDI cap in telecom in India?
Me: 74% sir.
P2: Banking?
Me: (Hmmm.. 49 ki 74?): Sir 49%.
P2: Insurance?
Me: Sir its been raised to 49% by the cabinet.
P2: Asked about some economic term.
Me: No idea, sir.
Back to P1
P1: Karan, what do you know about IIM Indore?
Me: Spoke about the vision of IIM Indore- thought leadership, world class entrepreneurs, managerial excellence, social awareness etc. Then spoke about the logo of IIM Indore, what it mean etc. Also told that it started in 1998. Spoke about integrity, excellence etc.
(All smiles)
P1: (smiling) So you’ve gone through the site?
Me: Yes sir.
P1: What did you find special about IIM Indore?
Me: Sir, the fact that it stresses and fosters thought leadership. It is in sync with the vision in life I have for myself. Spoke about how I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I also spoke about Iris, and the other fests of IIM Indore.
(All smiles again)
P1: Do you know someone in IIM Indore?
Me: Yes sir and named him. Spoke about Indore 360 the mentor system and how it has helped me.
P1: Why have you been moving from one state to another?
Me: Spoke about how family moved from Ranchi to Vizag for personal reasons, then about why I moved to Puttaparthi (spoke about Satya Sai Baba) for my 10th and 12th, then about why I dropped a year for JEE, then about my engineering in Hyderabad.
P1: Asked about something like
Me: No idea sir.
P1: Ok. What does your dad do?
Me: Sir, business.
P1: What business?
Me: Answered.
Both look at each other.
“Ok thank you, Karan. Please take your certificates”.
Me: Thank you sir. Good day sir.
Overall, the profs were pretty cool. Enjoyed my first GDPI experience.
My Googling Stats January 30, 2009
Posted by Karan in Personal.Tags: Google, Stats, Tag
add a comment
I thank Zenwalker for tagging me
Observations:
1 ) Account created only in July
2 ) Sleep hours around 1-7
3 ) Afternoon sleep at around 3
4 ) Peak activity at 5-8 in the evening and 9-1 in the morning
5 ) Search activity down in October and November, when I was preparing for CAT
6 )Search activity at its peak in December, when I was preparing for placements
7 )Search activity low on Sundays.
8 )Search activity highest on Tuesdays, in fact much higher than other days. Thats probably when I relalise that Sunday is over 
Now I tag:
Mythalez, Kunal, Ankit Garg, Aakanksha, Deepti, Pankaj, Sambhav, Daka, Aniket, Arctic Monkey, Sainani, Siddharth Chandra, Rohit.
(Anybody else wants to write? Just ping me, I’ll add the tag )
Beyond The Blues: A review January 27, 2009
Posted by Karan in General.Tags: Aakash Chopra, Beyond the Blues, Indian cricket
4 comments
“Being an Indian cricketer is hell in many ways, because of the intense scrutiny you are subjected to by a billion people. But not being an Indian player is worse”.
In more ways than one, this is the defining statement of Aakash Chopra’s first book, “Beyond the Blues”. An assorted collection of Chopra’s diary entries, this is one interesting read for all cricket lovers. It’s quite different and surprisingly frank & on your face. Without being concerned about ruffled feathers, Chopra gives a frank assessment of the domestic cricket structure and system in India, something which most viewers would have no idea about. It is certainly not a rosy picture that’s portrayed, and that is where Chopra needs to be commended.
Weird selection policies, unimpressive umpires, callous associations.. the book talks about them all. Without naming the guys, it more than gives a hint about who is to blame (from the author’s point of view). The book does get dry at times, with too many details about domestic matches, but well, doesn’t that show our general attitude towards these tournaments? We lap up anything written about international cricket, but who cares about the domestic cricket tournaments? It is this attitude that Chopra laments, and rightly so. After all, it’s the domestic structure of a cricketing nation which gives it the players to represent her for international tournaments. The other problem with the book is that Chopra ends up rambling about too many things. He comes across too cynical a person at various phases in the book. But apart from that, the book is an eye opener in more ways than one.
All in all, a good read. Indian team or no Indian team, Aakash Chopra is a decent author.
PS: I’ve personally always felt that Chopra has been given a raw deal. I think he deserves to come into the national team, maybe at number 3.
Cricket and Aakash November 8, 2008
Posted by Karan in Uncategorized.Tags: Aakash, Cricket, IIIT
8 comments
The journey that began more than three years ago ended today. And what a finish! We coudn’t have asked for something better. Having missed out a couple of years ago, it was a dream come true for me. Yes, Aakash won the inter house cricket tournament in a thrilling on-the-edge-of-your-seats finish.
There were a couple of fabulous things about today’s win. The first, of course, was that we got to kick Agni’s backside. Agni has a very talented team and to beat them was very satisfying. The second was the team effort and discipline shown by Aakash on the field. People stood up to be counted when it really mattered. Rishi’s athletesism, Arpit’s cameo, Ejaz’s stifling line, Ashwani’s comeback, Khatri’s wicket, Rohit’s sixer and of course, Pagare’s overs.. They were all efforts when the team really needed it. Oh.. And yeah, whosoever said that tight matches between top teams cannot be played without bad blood creeping in? Today’s match was played in the best spirits, with an ovation being given to Ruhela as well, as he was playing his last match.
Ahh.. Talking about last match, it was so for a lot of us. Pagare, Khatri, Rishi, Ashwani, me and possibly Pradeep have played our last match for our house. A terrific way to end it, of course. However, there is this tinge in our hearts that we’d never be playing for Aakash again. Playing for Aakash was a fantastic experience. The spirit and the camaraderie in the house was always amazing. Varun, Kochar, Alankar, Kiran… It was a good learning experience to have played alongside these guys. In a way it is reminiscent with a lot of things this year. Leaving the college, placements, CAT…. But hell, more about that later. This is the time to savour our win and raise a toast to all the future Aakash cricket teams!
Amen.
Salaam Ganguly October 8, 2008
Posted by Karan in Uncategorized.Tags: Indian cricket, Sourav Ganguly
15 comments
He caressed the ball through the offside as the bowler looked, bewildered. The only reaction I managed was a frown. He stepped down and lofted the looping ball into the stands. I glowered. I scowled when he had the audacity to make the best captain in the world waiting. How could Boycott call him the “Prince of Kolkata”… I would rather have it the “Bum of Bengal”. Did he always have to look like a clumsy oaf, spilling catches and running out himself, in the field? Did he have to get himself suspended on umpteen occasions with his antics? Did he have to look like a school kid while facing Pollock’s deliveries directed at his rib cage? Did the Indian captain have to take off his shirt (yeah.. you heard it right) in the stadium? Did India need that kind of needless aggression?
I was probably wrong.
In my view, the greatest tribute to Ganguly has been paid by his long standing adversary, Steve Waugh. In spite of all the bad things Waugh said about him, he said that Ganguly managed to get under his skin and unnerve the Australian captain. The Australians needed a taste of their own medicine, and not necessarily in the Australian way. The South Africans had already tried that unsuccessfully. For far too long, the Indians were seen to be of the meek and unresisting variety who could be bludgeoned over. For far too long, the Indians were seen as uncombative delicate darlings.
Not any more.
Today, to think about it, it is not just the Harbhajan Singhs of the team who represent this indomitable “Ganguly-spirit”. While Zaheer Khan, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Ishant Sharma, Gautam Gambhir and the like may seem different from Ganguly, they are every bit like the former captain. They can today stand up and look at the adversary’s eye. When I see Zaheer blow out two batsmen after being thrashed in the previous over, I see Ganguly in him. When I see the silent determination in Dhoni’s eyes while handing over the ball to a hapless Joginder Sharma, I can feel Dada. It will not be an exaggeration to say that the combative Bengali has effected a paradigm shift in Indian cricket and inspired a whole generation (and more) of cricketers. So what if he wears his heart on his sleeve?
To use the cliché, love him or hate him- you just cannot ignore him. Indian cricket can never forget him.
Warrior from Kolkata, I bow before you.
Protected: Are current IIITians spineless? September 4, 2008
Posted by Karan in Uncategorized.Tags: IIIT, Spineless
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