Shashi Prakash's Blog: Connecting The Dots, page 5

She

I was just born in this world of lies,
I hadn’t moved and so close were my eyes.
But your care and warmth kept me alive,
You came as my mother and always remained by my side.

I was haunted by creepy letters and darkness,
I was scared by those lovely benches and blackness,
You consoled me, loved me in the best way you can
You came as my teacher and offered your caring hands.

And there was a time, I was low and wasn’t fine,
I needed a friend; someone who could be mine.
You came then but as lovely sis this time,
It was magic, care, bliss and alike of dime.

I moved on further but got stuck in a problem this time,
My dreams got shattered so was my soul and my mind.
You came as caring friend this time,
Regained my confidence, in my life and in my regime.

And then the stage came for the success and the fame,
I was alone in the light and alone in the rain.
My wife holded me close; close was her heart and soul,
and my world went round and perfect were the goals.

I was matured soul alive, filled with regrets and hopes,
I was now a tired soul alive, filled with happiness and nopes.
You came again this time but as my daughter on my ship,
And u became the laughter in my eyes and smile of my lips.

I am still a young soul, inside an old clay,
living with regrets and surviving off the bay.
I just want to thank; I just want to say,
As woman indeed, they changed my way and made my days.

Lastly, I want to sign off with a fact to thee,
its raw, it’s simple and firm like a sea.
I don’t like to hype but it’s true.
The best thing that happened to me is you.      

                                                                                      - Shashi Prakash

Dedicated to all those ladies and girls who made me feel more precious, more lucky and somehow made me feel more motivated. 

Are You An Intelligent Investor?

Now let's answer a vitally important question. What exactly does Benjamin Graham mean by an "intelligent" investor? Graham defines the term- and makes it very clear that this kind of intelligence has nothing to do with IQ or SAT scores. It simply means being patient, disciplined, and eager to learn; you must also be able to harness your emotions and think for yourself. This kind of intelligence, explains Graham, "is a trait more of the character than of the brain."

There is a proof that high IQ and higher education are not enough to make an investor intelligent. In 1988 Long-term Capital Management, L.P., a hedge fund run by a battalion of mathematicians, computer scientists, and two Nobel Prize-winning economists, lost more than $2 billion in a matter of weeks on a huge bet that the bond market would return to "normal". But the bond market kept right on becoming more and more abnormal- and LTCM had borrowed so much money that it collapse nearly capsized the global financial system.

And back in the spring of 1720, Sir Isaac Newton owned shares in the South sea company, the hottest stock in England. Sensing the market was getting out of hand, the great physicist muttered that he "could calculate the motions of the heavenly bodies, but not the madness of the people". Newton dumped his South Sea shares, pocketing a 100 % profit totalling £7000. But just months later, swept up in the wild enthusiasm of the market, Newton jumped back in at a much higher price- and lost £20,000 (or more than $3 million in today's money). For the rest of his life, he forbade anyone to speak the words "South Sea" in his presence.



This article is an excerpt from the book "The Intelligent Investor- Benjamin Graham ( Revised edition updated by Jason Zweig). This book is by far the best book on investing ever written according to Warren Buffett. I have been going through this book for the last couple of weeks and found this particular excerpt worth sharing. You can check out this book here- https://goo.gl/k5vbr7
Know more about me @ www.shashiprakash.in 

The Blue Umbrella By Ruskin Bond

There were three things that prompted me to order this book:
1. Ruskin Bond
2. Catchy Title
3. My Amazon pay balance was just a bit more than its price :D 

The package got delivered on 25th September 2017 and I was so disappointed. It had just 88 pages with font sizes of somewhere between 14-15 points. Even the dimensions of the product that Amazon shows were not anything near to okay.  There were pencil sketches on few pages just to illustrate the developments.There were seven chapters or parts of the book.

 I read it in one stretch. And in the end, I was more than just satisfied. It was a great, short and sweet story. After reading the book, I googled the same and that was when I came to know that a film based on the book of the same name had already been released in 2005. It was directed by Vishal Bhardwaj.

Plot:

The story revolves around the girl named Binya. "Binya belonged to the mountains, to this part of the Himalayas known as Garhwal." She lives with her mother and her brother - Bijju. She often grazes her cattle around valleys and returns to home by evening. One day she finds 'holiday-makers from the plains' picnicking on the spur of the hill. She spots an umbrella. "The umbrella was like a flower, a great blue flower that had sprung up on the dry brown hillside" She trades her pendant (tiger's claw) for the umbrella and finally she owns it. The only shop owner of the village 'Ram Bharosa' gets jealous of the umbrella and wants to seek one. In fact, everyone in the village wants to have an umbrella of that kind. Binya never leaves her umbrella and always carries it wherever she goes.  Ram Bharosa offers money to Binya for the same but she refuses it. After a while, Ram Bharosa employs a boy named Rajaram for all washing up and various errands. He senses his masters' desire for the umbrella and asks whether he would pay him extra if he managed to get him the umbrella. Ram Bharosa agrees and Raja Ram plots to steal the umbrella.

But it ends in a fiasco. He is ultimately caught by Bijju and Raja Ram speaks up about Ram Bharosa and how he wanted the umbrella so bad. Everyone in the village cames to know about the evil plot and they stop going to Ram Bharosa's shop. Villagers now used to walk an extra mile to another shop for their daily needs. Ram Bharosa repents over his actions. In the end, Binya herself walks into his shop for toffee and then gives her umbrella to Ram Bharosa. She says that she doesn't need the umbrella anymore. In return, Ram Bharosa gets her a new Tiger Claw pendant. The villagers' starts to walk in his shop again.

"She walked home through the darkening glade, singing of the stars; and the trees stood still and listened to her, and the mountains were glad."

As of now, it's of Rs 50 on Amazon.in. It is worth of every penny spent.

Cracking Campus Placement

Cracking Vedanta Resources Plc; Larsen and Toubro (LnT)

The following post is about my experiences and views about the company selection process. Basically, I would be writing about the dos and don'ts that I got to know from my brother, friends, and seniors that aided my preparation.
The writing pattern isn’t conventional. If you just want to know the answer to any specific query and want to jump directly to that section skipping the rest of the verbatim, then this post wouldn’t help much. I request all to be patient (something that we are losing in today’s time) and go through the wordings. It may help somehow to you. It doesn’t mean that I have got all things figured out. I just want to help if I may. Don’t try to trace the aroma of arrogance from this post. There ain’t any. There are hundreds of people who can advise thousands time better than me. I am just trying to share as much as I can within my capacity. I also urge my friends, seniors, and colleagues to add up any valuable information/experience on any part in the comments below. That may help.

1. Should I go for this company?

One of the major questions that you need to ask before applying is that if you really want to go for this company. Don’t go for the company just because your friend or roommate is applying for the same. Get to know the exact job profile that the company is offering. Get to know the locations where the company would be demanding you to work, given that you got the job. Get to know about the work culture; get in touch with any senior and ask them about the tasks they are being asked to do. Is there any bond? If yes do you think that you would be able to make it in the same company for those many years? Why am I emphasizing on the same? Getting on campus placement is an easy work than getting it through off campus. That’s a blunt truth. Once you would get selected or even applied for the company,  it means that you can’t skip either of any rounds even you want to. You need to go for all of the rounds till you haven’t made further. There are few students who apply just to get familiar with the pressure and question pattern in the apti round or similar alike. The worse part comes when accidentally they make it to the next round and they just don’t know what to do next so that company would stop them in penultimate rounds itself. Those candidates either don’t speak in GD round or try to spoil the interview deliberately. There is a policy of 1 job per student unless it's not a dream company. Even you make it then it just means that you are not going to go for any other company in most of the cases. They ultimately land up themselves where they don't want to. So make decisions wisely. You need to work for it. Don’t just apply for the post just because everyone else in your batch is going for the same. Let me switch it to the other aspect too. You can only choose when you do have options. The irony of the fact is that; we aren’t left with many options nowadays. The core placement stats are poor. The above factors decisively change from branch to branch. So if you know that there aren’t so many options for you out there, then just go for each one out there.

2. Analytics or Core?

One of the most often asked question. Let’s directly come down to business. Get to know what it means to be an Analytics company or a Core company and getting to know about the company means to do more than spending time on Merriam- Webster or Google answers. Talk to people who are already there and try to differentiate. Go to https://www.glassdoor.co.in and similar sites to know about the reviews of the working professionals already working out there. Getting in a core company doesn’t mean that you need to be very sound in technical studies. You need to be good and I accept that but most importantly you need to have that learning attitude.

3. Preparation

You need to live the company for the next few days. You need to think only about the company for the next few days no matter where you are and with whom you are. That is one of the things that one of my senior Tarun Kaushik sir and Himanshu Wadhwani sir had asked us to do while giving theirs placement talk in 2016. You can even change the wallpaper and screensaver of your gadgets with the company’s logo or branding. Getting On campus placement is a big deal. It is one of the important milestones of your life. There would be few seniors who would just brag that they just made it and no preparation was required for the same. Don’t just watch out for the weeks of preparation that he/she did or does. Getting placement and cracking interviews demands skill sets that you gained over so many years of inhabiting this civilized world. Don’t listen to those who say that they just went for the company and made it. I don’t disagree with the fact that there are talented people who are able to comprehend things 2x or 4x faster than you are capable of. But skill always beat talent. Just put in all of the hours you got and believe me you will make it. While other people are wandering you need to work; while others are playing, you need to work; while others are going to check out latest weekend releases, you need to work. There isn’t any easy way around pals. All these hardships will be worth it when you would call your parents and tell them that you made it. All those hard times will come as a bliss to you. So preparation is a tough time indeed but what you get in return is completely worthy of the hours that you are willing to put in.

a. Resume: Most of the students have their resume sorted out in their 3rd year itself. They need to send their resume to companies for internship and all. So this section is all sorted out for them. Still, there are few branches and students who are not done with their resume. There are few who think that they would draft it only if they get ahead of the apti round. There are few who think they would draft only if they clear GD round. There are few students too who think that HR wouldn’t even open up their file during interview and resume doesn’t matter at all. They just sneak in any A4 paper which got their name in the heading or asks their friend to print it out fresh while the candidate waits for their his/her turn to come up on the day of. I mean what’s wrong? Few people behave this way only because they want to sound ‘cool’ in front of their batch and circle.

 ‘Resume bana liya’, One student asks the other.
‘Arey chd na yaar…… kal bana lunga na ….. waise bhi kaun sa woh HR mera file padhne wala hain’

You should be sure that you are going to make it to the interview round. You should be sure that you are going to be selected in this company. You should be confident from your side and you should send this clear message to your subconscious mind that you are going to make it. If it doesn’t happen then that’s another part of the story but what if it happened. You need to be prepared to your best that you can show. Get your resume done today as it takes time. If it didn’t take time, then trust me you didn’t make it fine. Try to strict it to 2 pages. You should be knowing what’s there on your resume. The interviewer may ask you to recite yours career objective. There are 98 percent candidates who copy this thing just from any site, seniors resume, friends or any other source. There is nothing wrong in copying but try to mould it a bit. Try to know what these wordings mean in actual and try to memorize it. You shouldn’t be blank if you are asked about your career objective. There have been instances when the candidates have answered completely different with what is written on paper. That doesn’t make a good start for sure. So try to be a bit cautious. Every resume format is nice. Don’t spend much time in thinking that with which format should I stick with. What matters is that it should be neat and there shouldn’t be any blunt mistakes.

b. Study part: Questions related to your training is going to be the nub of your interview session. There are several students that would have just gone to their home skipping their training part. They may have got the certificate but they did lose few things. Though let’s focus on what things should be done. Get your training report briefed many times. You should know the technicality of the subject. One of the basic question that interviewer is going to ask you to tell him/her about the things that you saw in your training period. Now you need to prepare this question a week beforehand. We will cover this thing in the Interview section.Meanwhile, let’s focus on our study part. You should study your current subjects followed by the important subjects of last semesters. Now, how you are going to get familiar with the all the subjects that you studied in last 2-3 years? Get the syllabus in your hand of any certain subject of any semester and see if you are familiar with all the chapters that are mentioned in the syllabus. There may be few topics in certain chapters about which you would be completely blank. Get the basics done and then move to another subject. Once you will clear basics of all chapters, make a priority order. The important subjects needed to be focused first and then the rest of the subjects. In this way, you will be familiar with each and every topic that you studied so far in your all of the semesters. It may sound tough but only if you get into much detailing. I just asked you to get the basics done. It means that you need to be able to answer a 3 marks question on that certain topic. In the maximum of the case, the interviewer is just going to ask you to explain a certain term or if you are familiar with this topic. Neither you should be blank nor you should answer anything absurd. So studying is a vague part and it isn’t much you can do except putting lots of hours and getting your basics done.

c. Aptitude/Reasoning part: Get all the arithmetic topic done. Don’t indulge much in the geometry, maxima-minima, modulus and similar alike topics. Don’t go for many shortcuts. You are not going for CAT. You just need to clear the Aptitude round. Vedanta doesn’t have any apti round either. What you need to make sure is that how you are responding to questions in given time frame. Suppose there is 2-minute timer left onscreen and you need to solve a basic upstream and downstream question. If there wouldn’t have been the timer, most of the students would solve the same in a minute or a bit more than that. But because of the fear, anxiety, nervousness: all compounding to uncertain level, they fail to sort out the answer to the same question even they have got more time than required. Take a reading comprehension for example. They spend 4-5 minutes reading the passage and in the end, they conclude that the passage is too tough to solve, ultimately skipping it. They lose 6 minutes without scoring single marks. What needs to be done is that you need to be familiar with time-bound question-solving ability. Take online apti tests and it would much help you. There are so many sites out there. Just search ‘LnT placement paper’ and you will so many sites to help you out with. Don’t go for too many shortcuts unless you are going for CAT or any competitive exams. It wouldn’t be of much help if your prime objective is only to clear Apti round.

d. Group discussion: Students spend thousands to improve their speaking ability. I am just talking about ability here as there are so many students that aren’t even able to speak in front of a panel. There isn’t much that can be done except the practice. Try to have mock group discussions beforehand. One of the most important that you need to have to clear this round is CONFIDENCE. How are you going to get confidence? Having certain attributes apart from your league is going to give you confidence. You score the highest in your class, that helps you with your confidence. You have a great personality and everyone in the college knows you, that will help you with your confidence. You are very well in any sports, that will help you with your confidence. You are very good with Photoshop, that will help you with your confidence. You are dating someone for whom you craved for, that will help you with your confidence. You have a lot of money at your home, that will help you with your confidence. Basically, if you have something that others are craving for and you know the importance of certain stuff, then it makes you feel confident. In the end, gain some skill sets. It comes with putting hours in certain things. At this moment when the time is less, try to know the basic dos and don’ts of this round. Get aware of things going around. You should be familiar with burning topics. If you don’t know anything about the given topic, let the others initiate. Let others speak and then you will get to know what the given topic is about. Try to contribute. NEVER EVER BE SILENT. Try to speak up. Work on your posture. Everyone knows it but less work on this stuff. Sit on your chair in your room and try to imitate your eye coordination and things are you are going to do and avoid at that time. Reach out to the GD room a bit early on that day and get familiar with arrangements of the chair. Try to think that how things are going to change if you have not got the centre chair and instead you have got the terminal chair. How eye coordination and your way of addressing the whole panel is going to change with respect to the change in your position. Dos: Phone on silent; You pen should be in your shirt pocket. Don’ts: Never sit crossed leg. Still few will and you would be reciting the same stuff to your juniors.

e. Grooming: Let’s take the fact that it matters and let’s take another fact that engineers are very bad at it. Borrowing formal pants to shirts; from tie to file; from pen to shoes; from even socks to resume blueprint, engineers borrow out everything. In the end, let us be frank, we shouldn’t be proud of these things. Try to get everything sorted ahead. It has happened that candidates have forgotten to take their pen along while going to the interview round. Even when they got a pen from their friends, in rare instances, it was not working. So take things seriously.

4. Interview

If you are still reading this post, then congrats. Many would have just reacted to the post and then went on to read other stuff. Let’s move on further. This is the most important stage for sure. Going through interview round is like driving a vehicle. Whether you want to ride along the smooth trail or rough terrain, it depends on you. The first question that the concerned person is going to ask is about you and your background. Most of the students feel very confident about this question and finally, they sabotage the whole process by taking a pause in the middle allowing the interviewer to shift to technical questions most of the times. Why not prepare the same question in writing ahead of time? Just write the stuff that you are going to spill for the answer to this question on the day of the interview. Get that stuff printed. Edit it, rectify it, groom it, fix it and perfect it. It takes time my friend. Memorise it. You don’t need to spill everything like a robot or make the interviewer feel that you have mugged up. Get it a bit slow and get it natural. The next general thing is going to be asked is about Training. You would be having minimum 2 industrial pieces of training in 2 years. Emphasize on the one you feel confident about. Let’s virtualize a situation.

Me: There were 14 dumpers in the mine sir. The drill rigs were of Atlas Copco.
Interviewer: What was the capacity of the dumpers and what was the depth of the holes.

He asked me about the capacity of the dumpers only because I let him do that. He asked me about the depth of the holes only because I talked about drilling subject. Whatever you are going to speak may lead to another question. So speak wisely.

Interviewer: What is your favourite subject/ which subjects you had in your 5th semester

You shouldn’t take a pause in answering these questions. You should be prepared.

Interviewer: You are good at singing? / You are a poet?
Me: Yes, sir
Interviewer: Sing me a sing/ recite me a poem.

Keep in check what you are speaking of your intro part. You may need to meet those demands. Which song are you going to sing in case if you are asked to? Which poem are you going to recite? You must have all the things in your mind. There are many questions that you know it has been asked in the past and so. You know many things already. Where we lack is in preparing for those things. Let me tell you one of my HR interview experience.

Interviewer: Tell me about yourself Shashi.
Me: I spoke for less than a minute and he asked me another question
Interviewer: Tell me something about India- Russia relationship
Me: I spoke for another 20 seconds.
Interviewer Thank you.

It lasted hardly 90 seconds. I was a bit surprised in the last but I too thanked him for the opportunity and then came out.

Prepare your best and that is what I would suggest each and every one of you.
Make sure that you do believe that getting campus placement is not the most important thing in life. Be ready to brace yourself for any situation and circumstances. Study as much as you can. Work as much as you can,. You need to give time to your friends, committees, batch, juniors. You just can't skip everything and sit in your room preparing for the job. The balance between things. You may not be talented but you may excel in ridiculous, sickening, work-ethic. So keep hitting and keep punching.

Last advice: You should always know what you are going to do on the very next day of your interview, no matter you get selected or rejected.

Views and Reviews are warmly welcomed. All the best for everything. Feel free to ping in case of any help.


About the Author:
My name is Shashi Prakash and I graduated from NIT Raipur in Mining Discipline (Batch 2017). For more details, you may visit www.shashiprakash.in

Read It and Feel proud to be an Indian.

“If I were to pick one field to focus on, it would be that of mathematics, India invented modern numerals ( known to the world as ‘Arabic’ numerals because the west got them from the Arabs, who learned them from us!). It was an Indian who first conceived of the zero, shunya; the concept of nothingness, Shunyata, integral to Hindu of culture and Buddhist thinking, simply did not exist in the west. (in the history of culture,’ wrote Tobias Dantzig in 1930, ‘the invention of zero will always stand out as one of the greatest single achievements of the human race.’) The concept of infinite sets of rational numbers was understood by Jain thinkers in the sixth century BCE. Our forefathers can take credit for geometry, trigonometry and calculus; the ‘Bakshshali manuscript’, seventy leaves of bark dating back to the early centuries of the Christian era, reveals fractions, simultaneous equations, quadratic equations, geometric progressions and even calculation of profit and loss with interest. Indian mathematicians invented negative number: the British mathematician Lancelot Hogben, grudgingly acknowledging this, suggested ungraciously that ‘perhaps because all the Hindus were in debt more often than not, it occurred to them that it would also be useful to have a number which represents the amount of money one owes.’ (That theory would no doubt also explain why Indians were the first to understand how to add, multiply and subtract from zero- because zero was all, in western eyes we ever had.)
The Sulba Sutras, composed between 800 and  500 BCE, demonstrated that India had Pythagoras theorem before the great Greek was born, and a way of getting the square root of two correct to five decimal places. (Vedic Indians solved square roots in order to build sacrificial sophisticated altars of the proper size.) The Kerala mathematicians Nilakantha wrote sophisticated explanations of the irrationality of ‘pi’ before the west had heard of the concept. The Vedanga Jyotisha, written around 500 BCE, declares: ‘Like the crest of the peacock, like the gem on the head of the snake, so is mathematics at the head of all knowledge.’ Our mathematicians were a poet too! But one could go back even earlier, to the Harappan civilisation, for evidence of a highly sophisticated system of weights and measures in use around 3000 BCE.
Archaeologists also found a ‘ruler’ made with lines drawn precisely 6.7 mm apart with an astonishing level of accuracy. The ‘Indus inch’ was a measure in consistent use throughout the area. The Harappans also invented kiln-fired brick, less permeable to rain and floodwater than the mud bricks used by other civilisations of the time. The bricks contained no straw or other binding material and so turned out to be usable 5000 years later when a British contractor dug them up to construct a railway line between Multan and Lahore. And while they were made in fifteen different sizes, the Harappan bricks were amazingly consistent: their length width and thickness were invariably in the ratio of 4:2:1.”

 This excerpt is from the Novel- “The Elephant, the Tiger and the Cellphone” by Dr Shashi Tharoor.  I strongly advocate and advise you all to go through this amazing piece of work. 

My Neighbourhood

My neighborhood is full of bright students. One was pursuing DM from International Medical University, Malaysia. His father had said hundreds of time that it was one of the most respectful professions of medical field. Well, all guardians brag in the same manner when their son excel. I had still not given that sort of opportunity to my father.
One was in China doing job in Zhengzhou Coal Mining Machinery Group CO. LTD... The other one was a teacher in University of Dallas and was very well settled in America. And finally there was a local guy in my locality who was in India itself and that made me feel to fly to some foreign countries. In fact he was a good guy but his achievement, and that’s too in my field of interest had embarrassed me. I was the victim of inferiority complex. He would quite often visit my house and as soon as he entered from the front door, I would exit myself from the back door. He was a strange guy. He loved to find errors and that’s too in every sort of thing.
“One who enjoys finding errors will then start creating errors to find”

 My father would insist me to have a talk with him but I was reluctant. After preferring me a couple of foreign author books, he would wrap up saying, “Ho, jaega. “

I knew how easy it was for him to say that. He was in his final years and he used to have more than 0.4k likes on his DPs. He would never forget to put his location in any of his status. In his early years he was so dumb.

‘Ankit Sharma was sleeping with Vaibhav Prasad and 99 others at IIT Rorkee.’
‘Me eating Maggie with Abinav Shukla and 102 others at IIT Rorkee.’

He used to tag almost every of his friends including me. His location used to make me reluctant to like his pic. However in his penultimate year he had uploaded a pic of mine with him and to my surprise he had tagged only two of us. I was happy as that publicity stunt soared my likes within no time frame.
But still, I hated him.
Sometimes I would think that he was just like King Midas. But unlike his gold capability Ankit Sharma had unique ability to crack every exam he even thought to attempt. Once in a life time, I had cleared the first level of Science Olympiad and had got an opportunity to go for the next level. However few months after when my father was telling Ankit my success story, he came up with his own. He had ranked 2nd in International Mathematics Olympiad and had even got an opportunity to visit Israel. I had never felt so small. I was jealous.
“Jealousy is rather an enjoyable emotion to watch”- Chetan Bhagat
My father never told my success story to any other after that incident.

.............................................................................................

“Prabhat Singh, 64
Shanker poddar, 56
Khitij sharma, fif……. “.
She began to adjust specs and my heart almost stopped beating literally.
“Fifty”
My Physics teacher gave me a dirty look. I don’t know why, but she hated me bad. I had come to know that some work of hers was delayed by my father’s office. And that was eventual. Well she had tried to clear her file by saying that she was the teacher of the DMs son. And that statement didn’t go well with the concerned officers.
One day I saw Ankit walking through my school corridor and I just got startled. What the hell was he doing in this corridor leaving the other several ones? He began to approach my class room and I shrugged myself for not getting noticed through the door. I was on the first bench of the first column from the door. I had grabbed that seat so that I could see the girls crossing by. I was so damn wrong.
Finally he had gone. Why had he come to our school?  He was an alumni of our institution but he shouldn’t have come.
“Oh Ankit beta …”
Shit??? How he made it to our room. Over the few hundred rooms he had got only ours to visit and that’s too in 6th period. The probability of such incident was even less than signal digit percentage but he had beaten the odds. Meanwhile I thanked my Math’s teacher Verma mam as she she had done a good job in probability.
I shrugged myself further.
“Guys, meet Ankit Sharma, one of the brightest student of our school.”
How she was able to remember his name so crystal clear.  She always stammered to call my name even when I was the humor imparting element of her class. There are always some guys favorite to some teachers and no matter whatever happens they are always made to stand up to answer a question followed by a huge round of laughter in the class. I was ‘THAT’ guy in her class.
“He is currently pursuing B-tech from IIT Roorkee and he was even the state topper of his batch”
I just wanted to kill that guy who had clapped from the back for Ankit Sharma. We had to follow the ritual. Many eyes of our classes had got lightened up after seeing him.
“Ok ma’m, I’m sorry for disturbing your class.”
“Yeah you should be faggot.” I said in my heart.
And finally he winked at me before leaving that class. He may have slapped me or had beat me with his bare fists but that wink cost me more dearly. And finally I heard the best sound in my ears.
(Ting Ting)

Back benchers surrounded me. The guys from the penultimate bench hovered to hear my call.
“Hey Kshitij, how do you know Ankit sir?” asked one of the students with very decent lunch box in his hand. I didn’t know his name in fact.
You see, how you garner reputation when you do something apart from the queue. And now they had started calling him ‘sir’.
“Let’s forget these things guys. He is just my neighbor. “, I said as I tore apart the chakravyuh and went outside the class.
“He is so lucky!!!” said a guy as I was already out of their audibility range.
“Luckyyy…” I chuckled as I began to move down the stairs with hundreds of others students. ”
 

‘Luck has a way of evaporating when you lean on it’ - Brandon mull      

Eavesdropping

Eavesdropping is secretly listening to the private conversation of others without their consent. In order to understand about the etymology of the given word you have to understand about the Back formation and lexeme.
Lexeme:A lexeme is a unit of lexical meaning that exists regardless of the number of inflectional endings it may have or the number of words it may contain. It is a basic unit of meaning, and the headwords of a dictionary are all lexemes. For example, in the English language, run, runs, ran and running are forms of the same lexeme, conventionally written as run.
Backformation:In etymology, back-formation is the process of creating a new lexeme, usually by removing actual or supposed affixes. Back-formation is different from clipping – back-formation may change the part of speech or the word's meaning, whereas clipping creates shortened words from longer words, but does not change the part of speech or the meaning of the word. Examples:1.       Babysit from babysitter.2.       Bicep from biceps.3.       Biograph from biography.4.       Burger from hamburger.From the above examples it just means that the word ‘burger’ has got originated from the word ‘hamburger’. So this was the example of back formation.
Etymology of the word ‘Eavesdropping’.The verb eavesdrop was originally a back-formation of the noun eavesdropper ("a person who eavesdrops") which was formed from the unrelated noun eavesdrop ("the dripping of water from the eaves of a house; the ground on which such water falls"). An eavesdropper was one who stood at eavesdrop (where the water fell, i.e., near the house) so as to overhear what was said inside.
And I found it worth sharing. References:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eavesdroppinghttps://www.google.co.in/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=eavesdrop

The Same Old Story

DelhiDay 1, 12:15 pmHe saw her and he knew that she was someone beautiful. From the preface, he had somehow rated the book. ‘Do you know her?’ asked Kiara while she sipped her drink. Rishaan and Kiara were final year engineering students studying in IIT BHU and they had come to Delhi to attend Rendezvous- culfest of IIT Delhi. Rishaan was a CS student while Kiara was in IT. The proximity and closeness of their branches had acted as a catalyst for their bonding.‘Ah… yes….. I mean that I think....’‘Is she Diya?’ she had interrupted Rishaan in the middle. Rishaan was used to that.He smiled. He had told her about Diya a year ago and Kiara still had that thing in her mind.Kiara hit him lightly with her elbow. She meant to tease him.‘Don’t you think that you should talk to her?’ asked Kiara. A girl asking his boyfriend to talk with another girl doesn’t usually happen in India and that’s why Rishaan was still confused.‘C’mon… I ain’t that typical kind of girl wanting to be over possessive for you. You loved her. Admit it.  And you loved her madly.’Rishaan nodded his head in reflex.‘She was in your school for 5 years and she was your best friend. And then you had to move out of that place for higher education. You loved her and still you didn’t have the courage to utter anything. You both belong to Bokaro but still you still didn’t have the courage to go to her home and talk to her. And now after 10 years after that incident when she has come in front of her, you are repeating the same mistake. Of course, I don’t mean the ‘love’ thing but you should, at least, talk to her.’Rishaan absorbed her intention.
Day 2, 3:30 pmRishaan couldn’t help himself from staring at Diya and that was making her uncomfortable.‘Hey ….’ Kiara snapped her fingers in front of Rishaan. Diya smiled and Rishaan felt a little bit embarrassed.‘I presume that you have to order yourself in this place. Right?’  The ambience of the Karki Hotel was little unique in its own way.‘Yeah….. ahem…. Ok, tell me what would you want?’ Rishaan asked Kiara as he couldn’t help himself from keeping his head turned towards Diya.He went for the order.‘Hey, Diya! Are we boring you? Because the matter is that……’ ‘No Kiara …. I am perfectly comfortable.’Diya had cut Kiara in the middle.‘I was just …… see I know that we were friends for many years. Yesterday when Rishaan approached me in the canteen, I was in complete shock. I am feeling good from inside but I don’t know how to behave and what to talk with him. I think you would understand that. After all, we are meeting after approx...a decade.’Kiara laughed and then gave a glance to Rishaan who was at the counter.‘You didn’t get it Diya.’Kiara sounded mysterious and Diya looked confused.‘Rishaan loved you and he loved you like a hell.’Diya looked shocked but she didn’t seem that surprised.‘Yeah…. That’s another fact that he couldn’t tell you anything because he is one of the shyest guys in the world. He moved on but couldn’t forget you for the next 6-7 years. And then he met me and somehow he just got over you. But the fact is that he loved you more than anyone could ever love anybody. That sounds little a bit incomprehensible but it’s the truth.’‘And trust me, you sometimes made me feel jealous.’Kiara concluded as she laughed. Diya didn’t enact. Her expression had changed. Maybe the latter words had darted her heart more ferociously than the former ones.‘Here we go... This one is for your honey.’ Malav said as he served Kiara.‘And this burger for you, Diya.’‘Thanks.’, said Diya with a more politeness. The intonation of Diya’s voice had changed. Rishaan was about to make his big bite but suddenly felt the warmth of pairs of eyes on him. He stopped for a while.‘What’s wrong?’Kiara switched the topic and she was best in that.
Day 3, 4:00 am‘Hey, baby... I am going to take a quick nap. You guys be alright without me? I can’t make it anymore Diya.’‘Yeah, its fine. We will wake you up later.’ Diya assured Kiara as Rishaan nodded his head.They were in a room in Taj Palace. It was Kiara’s father who had made all the accommodation. It was still the third day but now it seemed to be the last one for them. They had enjoyed themselves to the full. Kiara was sleeping and the rest of the two were in the balcony remembering the good old days.“Hey, Diya…. You remember? You used to be our monitor and the class teacher used to assign you the job to write names of the noise making students on the blackboard. And every time Himanshu used to land himself in an argument with you because each time you used to write his name and used to skip mine.” Rishaan laughed and then continued. ‘Though I used to sit just beside him on the same desk.  You remember, huh?’‘Ofcourse…. Rishaan.’ She had started laughing too. Marilyn Monroe had said that if you can make a girl laugh, you can make her do anything. Rishaan believed Marilyn.‘But I didn’t use to skip. I just didn’t wish to write your name. I kinda liked you and...’Rishaan had stopped laughing and he had a strange seriousness in his eyes.‘What?’ Diya asked arguing the seriousness.                                                                        ‘I mean to say that you were the popular guy of our class. None of the girls wanted to see yours name on that board.’ She blushed and tried to contaminate Rishaan with the same.Rishaan held her hands. It was cold and fair. She didn’t withdrew her hands and finally Rishaan confessed his love.‘I don’t want to talk Rishaan.’ She said as she withdrew her hands.‘I thought that you were going to take our friendship in a matured way. I thought you different but you proved me wrong. I don’t want to create a misunderstanding between you and Kiara.’She moved towards the door.‘I don’t love you Rishaan. You should know that.’ She made a strange curve on her lips.‘You can fake your smile Diya, but not your feelings.’She had already gone. Rishaan opened his Whatsapp and changed his status. There was nothing much he could do.
Day 3, 11: 45 pm‘Hey baby….. I do have a plan. Why don’t we ask Diya for the Goa trip? I think she will enjoy. And we too have a vacant seat. Thanks to your friend Santosh who will not be able to make it here by tomorrow morning.’ She had sarcasm in her voice.‘But I don’t think that she will say yes to it. I know her and I don’t think that she will turn up for something like International Film Festival.’‘You talking serious?’ Kiara raised her eyebrows.‘She is a conservative girl Kiara. I don’t think IFFI will …..’ “I am going to her room and I need you to be nice to her in the trip.’She had already gone.‘You know nothing Kiara. She is never going to agree. I spoiled everything’ He murmured as he recalled his argument with Diya.  
Day 4, 4:14 amThe SpiceJet was scheduled at 7:00 am from IGT and Rishaan had no clue of Kiara.‘I had to do a lot of drama to convince her. She will be reaching there before us. Let’s go.’ She shouted as she entered the room.‘One minute…’ Rishaan held her hand. ‘Diya said yes for the trip?’‘Of course baby. Why wouldn’t she?’‘But …….. What she said…… I mean how……?’‘Cut the crap. Get me my lip gloss. And please do help me in packing these mess.’Rishaan was still thinking about Diya. Why she said yes when she knows the fact that her agreement for the trip could complicate the matter. They billed out and headed for IGT. It was just 7 km away from The Taj.In the middle of the flight, Kiara woke up to go to the washroom. When she returned, she was too lazy to push her way into the middle seat. And with Rishaan readily offering to shift seats, the seating arrangement changed. With 20 minutes still remaining for the flight to land, a sleep-starved Kiara took another power nap, this time holding Rishaan’s right hand more firmly. Rishaan’s other hand, though, nervously moved to touch Diya’s. Her heart skipped a beat. Diya pulled her hand away. But a defiant Rishaan held her wrist again, this time firmly and more reassuringly. The changing behavioural dynamics between the three perhaps gave out a foreboding of what was to come in Goa.When the flight landed at the Dabolim airport, Rishaan felt uncanny… his excitement seemed replaced by an unknown fear that he found very difficult to decipher.

GoaDay 4, 11:50 amThey had finally reached Casa de Morgado, the hotel where they had booked their rooms. And before Rishaan could plan up anything, Kiara bumped into his room, flipped her iPhone and squatted next to Rishaan.‘What happened Kiara?’ asked Rishaan, carefully watching his words. “My father had called me. He has seen someone for my marriage and he wishes me to meet the guy.’‘What you said?’ Rishaan was disturbed but tried to remain composed. He feared losing Kiara.‘I didn’t say anything but I wanted. I wanted to tell my father about you. I wanted to tell him about us. I wanted to tell him Rishaan but……’Rishaan stroked his index finger on her lower lips and then hugged her. He convinced her to go to her room and take rest.  Rishaan was a confused soul but the disturbing part was that, now he knew that.
Day 4, 12:40 am‘Hey Rishaan!! What happened?’Diya had entered Rishaan’s room, and that too without knocking the door.Rishaan was silent. He was calm. He was wrecked.‘See Rishaan. I love you and I loved you too. But I always feared a lot. You know my family. My elder sister too went with her similar decision but she is not happy today. And my family fears and dares the same.’Rishaan was still and Diya sat next to him. He was all her ears.‘At least speak anything Rishaan. I beg you. Please.’ Diya had started sobbing.‘It doesn’t mean anything Diya. Kiara would definitely convince her father about me. I wouldn’t be able to confess to her my feelings about you and my dilemma in such awkward situation about.’Rishaan explained the whole incident to Diya.‘But what if she agreed to his father?’‘Kiara’s father has never disagreed with his daughter. He will come to an understanding this time too.’‘You can go Diya. You should. I don’t want you to hang around me. I don’t want you to jeer my past and my emotions. I……. I am sorry Diya……’ Rishaan had a voice laden with fear of losing his love. He had a voice laden with grief and anguish.Diya was gone, for the second time and perhaps for the last time.
Day 5, 7:30 am ‘What happened Kiara?’ asked Rishaan.‘Where were you? I came to your room multiple times and found you nowhere.’ Rishaan said expressing his concern.She looked into his eyes. ‘Let me get it straight Rishaan. I don’t know how to say this but I said yes to my father…’‘What???’‘Please baby. How could I deny him? My father never asked anything from me. He never insisted me for anything in my life. How could I deny him? And so I said yes to him. But I just didn’t know how to tell this all to you.’‘Please Kiara!! I have loved you. I ask only one thing from you and that’s your happiness. When you are leaving for Raipur?’‘Tonight itself. I will meet you later, most probably in college.’ Diya raised as she tried moved towards exit. ‘Hey Rishaan… can you do me a favour?’ asked Diya.‘Ahem…’‘Why not you take Diya seriously. I mean that she is good.’‘C’mon Kiara… what are you saying???’‘I was awake Rishaan. I heard you.’ Kiara moved closer.  ‘I heard you confessing your love to Diya in Delhi.  But that didn’t startle me a lot. I know that you like her but I needed you to demarcate the difference between love and mere ‘attraction’. I asked Diya for the trip even after knowing all that stuff. Her ‘yes’ was in fact a ‘yes’ for you Rishaan.’‘She went to Bokaro Kiara. It’s too late.’‘I had talked to her yesterday night Rishaan. I convinced her to talk to you. She didn’t go. She is in the lounge.’Rishaan didn’t know how to react. Perhaps he was too happy.‘She is a nice girl Rishaan. I wish good for you both.’‘I wish the same for you too.’‘I don’t want any wishes baby. Just bill me out!!!!!’ said Kiara as she laughed.Rishaan too joined her. He smiled and smiled with laughter in his eyes. Kiara was finally gone.
Day 6, 4:35 amFor the last 5 hours Kiara was at Dublim airport. She had missed her flight.Her phone begin to ring.‘Hey sis… hows you doing? When is Rishaan coming to Bhopal? I heard the same from mom that Papa had finally gave up….’“Alia…. He is not coming home.”Her voice had become heavy and her sister felt and knew that. Alia was the only girl on the whole planet who was Kiara’s best friend and sister, both at the same.“What happened sis? Please at least speak to me...” her sister insisted.“I was happy Alia. Initially father was reluctant to meet him but after few arguments he finally gave up and told me to bring him on a weekend. I was so pleased. I rushed immediate to tell Rishaan about the same. But when I went to see him, I found that he was having a conversation with Diya and he was telling her to leave Goa immediately. I finally realised that Rishaan was still in love with Diya and he was trying to be fake with me. He was broken from inside sis. For the first time, I had seen him shattered and I didn’t want him to be feel like a loser because of me. So I decided to tell him the lie.”Kiara had started crying. She cried not because she was weak but she cried because she had been too strong for long.

Discipline

I had passed my std. 4 with bright marks and my father had planned to get me in a new school. I needed to get my transfer certificate. And as I was standing in the principal chamber, perhaps for the last time, my principal got up and came towards me and instructed me to have discipline in my life. He could have said me to come closer or he could have said that aloud. But he didn’t do either and showed himself instead. He knew the importance of the word. He knew that I would need that thing. I walked outside of the chamber and there was a sentence written in slogan alike fashion. It said, ‘Discipline is the most important in our life.’ The smudges on the wall and the pale colour couldn’t prevent my mind from capturing those intact words.

Open Cast Mining: An Overview

Confucious - "He who says he can and he who says he can't are both usually right". The way we think has everything to do with what we can achieve. We work for our dreams. We work for our hopes. We work for things we love.We work for our ambitions. In fact, We work very hard leaving all the pleasures of our life aside. But in the end, everything seems to be worth it to it every bit.Check out our book on Amazon : Open Cast Mining- An Overview.https://www.amazon.in/Open-Cast-Mining-Shashi-…/…/B01KC5OKDKThis book mainly focusses on practical aspects of mining operations carried out in Open cast metal mining.I would like to especially thank Rahul Tripurana and Prateek Kumar for their invaluable contributions.Without them this content couldn't have been possible. Thanks a lot to Rajan Lad for such an elegant book cover. Perhaps he was the best man for the job. I would like to thank Alekhya for her continuous morale support. She really had been a true friend. And in the last, I would like to thank my brother Ravi Om for his ineffable dedication and concern for my work. He is a better critic but best brother one could find in this world. I am fortunate to have him along and I wish that everyone may get blessed with an elder brother like him.Do check the book. Views and reviews are warmly welcomed.Meanwhile, you can even check out my first novel: The Cut-Off List.https://www.amazon.in/Cut-Off-List-Shashi-Prak…/…/B011BY9PBSMy author page : amazon.com/author/shashiprakash‪#‎DoWhatYouLove‬
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