How would one respond to a terrorist?

Under the light of current events, let us focus on the story below:

A bunch of terrorists barge into a 5-star hotel at one of the most crowded tourist spots in the financial spinal cord of a tolerant (Oh! I mean it) country. They breach the security as if there did not exist any. Rifling, literally, their way through the lobby they force the guests (all rich and some foreigners too) as hostages and lock them on one of the top floors. Owing to the high level of planning and specialized training, they pick their spot nicely to get a better grip on the situation. While on the top floor, they wait for the news to spread (you don't need to wait for long, really!!) through the news channels. After a short while, the place is surrounded by police and para military forces who are eagerly waiting for the terrorists to place their demands. And here it comes. One of them broadcasts a message using his Blackberry (Yes, they got it.) to convey their stand -

"We have held all the guests of this hotel as hostages. We dont want any of you to move into the hotel or the consequences will be unfavourable. On one condition, these hostages will be released. We want you to release all the Mujahiddins (I sometimes wonder what this means exactly.) under arrest in India. You will also provide us safe transportation out of the country. Failing to do so will cost you a lot of lives. Of your countrymen as well as others. I make our intentions clear. Death is the penalty. No Mercy!!"

OK. Lets hear some people talk on the cameras about this:

Chief Minister's response: "We are concerned about the lives of our citizens and guests. This is an emergency (People would never have known this had he not said it). We are considering their demands."

Prime Minister's response: "This response is assisted by foreign help (You know who!). They will face serious consequences if they do not explain their stand (He really did say that)."

Defence Minister's response: "Calls have been traced to Karachi. We know Pakistan is involved in these attacks. (Oh my God! That's a discovery)."

Commissioner's response: "We are trying our best."

Intelligence agencies' response: "We had informed the government of a possible attack SIX months ago (Again, this is not made up)."

On-site police officer's response: "We cannot take any action until the higher authorities finish negotiation with the terrorists."

America's response: "How much?"

Army's response: "Forgiving the terrorists for what they did is God's decision. Fixing their appointment with God is our job (Credits - Suhani's status message). They have already made it clear - No Mercy. No mercy it is!" (I salute.)

Pakistan's response (not on camera): "Let us all pay a tribute to the selfless service offered by our fighters (read as.. Terrorists)."

Another terrorist's response: "Insha Allah!!"

My response: "Lets just say - WTF!!"

Your response - ?? (comments please)

Lost In Bangalore

Hi guys,
I have recently returned from a trip to Bangalore with my project group. It was perfectly smooth except for one evening that we spent on sight-seeing (we were very close to actually doing that). It all started with the fundamental question " Where shall we go now? ". Our project work for that day was over and it was just around 5.30 in the evening. We thought we would look around Bangalore and see if there is something interesting. Then, one of us gave an idea. It was a girl from our group who had popped up and said, " I had looked up the map of Bangalore. There is a musical fountain in Cubbon Park near Nehru Planetarium. We should go there." We ofcourse agreed because she was the only person who had any idea of what we can do. We should have thought twice.

Nevertheless, we went ahead with the plan, four of us. The first problem - No one there knew where Cubbon Park was. But, we had a daily bus pass and ofcourse there must be a bus to a famous tourist spot. Going by this assumption, we inquired about it at the bus stop. There was good news and a bad news. Lets take the good one first - There WAS a bus route to Cubbon Park. The bad one was that we had to switch buses at an intermediate stop (you will come to know why it was so bad, in some time). So we took the bus to some stop in front of an Air Force dental school or something like that. And, we started waiting for the next bus. Ohh yes! we STARTED waiting. We confirmed that the bus we were waiting for comes to that stop. A sigh of relief? Not really. Each and every bus that came to that stop for the next 45 minutes was overloaded. People were just hanging on to the bus somehow. Since there were two girls with us, we really couldn't think of getting into those buses. So, we waited. And waited. One of the girls was really irritated and wanted to ditch the idea of going to the musical fountain. And, it was the other who had given the idea of going to the fountain. So, there were small catfights between them. I really cant complain because that was the only entertainment we had then.

Finally, after an hour or so, the peak hours were over and we got an empty bus. The journey was pleasant except for the fact that we had to bear with a Kannada movie and its AWESOME dance sequence on the TV inside the bus and we had to stand for the whole of the journey (around half an hour). We got down at the desired stop, or so we thought. We were getting closer to our destination. But, we still dint know where exactly to go. So we asked a lady who seemed to be a localite. First of all, she dint know that there was something like a musical fountain in Bangalore. Secondly, she told us Cubbon Park will take 20 minutes by a rickshaw. May the IITian spirit live for long, we decided to WALK. We were on one side of a huge circle and we had to cross the road to go to the other side. There was sufficient traffic on the road for us to be cautious but not everybody shared the same opinion, I guess. Ms. X (one of the girls) walked straight across the road. When in the middle, she realized there was a car approaching her. And, she froze right in the middle of the road. She was really lucky to stay alive until she gained back her senses and crossed the road completely. But I just couldn't help shouting at her for being so careless.

We walked some distance on our route to Cubbon Park. Or did we? After walking for some time and seeing no signs of a park like structure, we consulted someone at a petrol pump. Well, we were told that we had walked the wrong way and we had to go back to that circle and take the next lane. Of course, we did that. We entered a gate which did look like an entrance to a park. And wow!! it was the entrance to the Cubbon Park. Now, we only had to find a fountain inside a park and we were there!! well.. not really. This park did defy our notions of a park. It was big.. huge.. and it was a bit dark in there. It was already 8 'o clock by then. We met a person near the entrance who told us that the fountain closes at 8.30 and it is quite far. But again, we thought we would at least get a glimpse of it. So, we walked. And kept walking. It was like a march, which dint seem to end. But, it did. Not with the fountain but with a building. An enormous structure of bricks and mortar across the main road. Frankly, the building was intimidating but really awesome. We soon realized that it was the Vidhan Soudha. So, we had actually done some sight-seeing. We took a few snaps of that area.

But, we had had enough and we all reached a consensus of ditching the idea of the musical fountain. We all wanted to go back to the hostel. It was dinner time so we thought we would eat somewhere and then go back. We asked a policeman the nearest place to eat. He pointed in a direction and sadly, we dint question further. We took a bus in that direction and got down at a place where we saw a restaurant. But, we dint look closely enough. It was a meat market. None of us really wanted to eat there. We walked under the flyover to see if we could find a better place to eat. And suddenly, I had to pull Ms. X off the road or she would have been knocked off by a bus. She complained that she was walking almost on the footpath and it wasn't her fault. Well.. we walked ahead. This time, something stranger happened. A bus came from the road towards the so-called footpath and Jhonny saw the headlight beam into his face before he was dragged to safety by Ms. X. Ah! he was frightened, but fortunately alive. This time he was walking ON the footpath. It really wasn't his fault.

And again, we were desperate to leave that place and go to a more recognizable place. We got a rickshaw to M.G. Road and finally felt safe. We ate at the food court of Garuda mall and did a bit of random chitchatting about things which will not be disclosed here as it is not the topic of this blog. So, we ended our roller-coaster ride on a more hearty note (read as.. good food) and we went back to our hostel. Another hour or so was spent discussing the day's adventure. Although we never made it to the musical fountain, we had a memorable journey.

Mehul

P.S - Ms. X is not hypothetical like chemical X. The name has been kept secret on request. However, you are free to PM me to know the name.

Faculty Reservation!! WoW

WoW here stands for Word of Wisdom. Having said that, it is obvious that the word comes from me. The blog deals with my perspective on the recent developments in the field of politics (read education) i.e implementing a faculty reservation of a nominal 49.5 percent which includes 15 for SC, 7.5 for ST and 27 for OBC. This is really a remarkable feat by our very own (read out loud) HRD minister Arjun Singh who is rejoicing back to back successes of the OBC quota implementation in students and faculty of all the IITs. And before I begin talking in detail about it, I would like to congratulate honourable Mr. Singh on this elating moment.

Being a student of IIT Bombay myself (from general category), it took me some time to digest that the OBC student quota of 27% is to be implemented asap. The news of faculty reservation seemed less surprising, but rather more disappointing. But, as a very optimistic person that I am, I would like to throw light on some of the positive aspects of this decision. One of them, ofcourse, (though less important for this blog) is that the not-so-qualified teachers of the not-so-high castes and classes of the not-so-modern Indian society will get to teach in Oh-My-God-Its IIT. This is one of the reasons given by the cabinet minister. Well, what if they dont deserve it.. that is no reason to deprive them of a chance chance to teach in IIT. After all, they are the socially NEGLECTED ones.

Another direct consequence of this will be in IIT department. Now, in this new era of reservation, they will see people they have rarely got a chance to meet and work with. And they would never have got this (not-really-very-sought-after) opportunity but for this splendid move. New recruits adding new flavour (which the department was lacking.. thankfully) to the teaching methodology of IITs.

One very intricate indirect impact would be on student life. This will very strongly tend to promote interaction between students. The inevitable discontent and confusion arising from the classroom teaching would invigorate new enthusiasm in the very curious minded students of IIT to find out what the truth is. In the process, they will interact much more and learn . This would also discourage their attendance in classrooms giving them more time to innovate and work on more important things (e.g. sleeping, CS etc.).

In view of the above mentioned advantages, I would really like to appreciate the very deep and intellectual decision of introducing reservation for faculty. Although there are some minor issues which a lot of people are worried about like degradation in quality of education, decline of IIT market value, lack of infrastructure, decline in funds from alumni, large communication gap between students and faculty, unfair advantage to caste over merit, use of reservation by the creamy layer of the reserved category, decrease in overall placement, credibilty issues of IIT education, suicidal tendencies of underperforming students etc. These petty things are no good to deter ARJUN "OBC" SINGH.

So, in my opinion, coming up is the reservation in security staff, mess workers, canteen tenders, and other non-academic staff of IIT. And, ofcourse, how can i forget the tumtum drivers!!

think about it
concerned authority