The Bachelor of Arts

By RK Narayan
Nelson publication

The Bachelor of Arts (1937) by RK Narayan is another masterpiece which I feel lucky to have read. RK Narayan is one of the few writers who truly represent India and Indian ethos in his writings. Characters in his books are real - they can be from any one of us. The places in his book (from much celebrated fictitious Malgudi) are for real - they can be from any state, in any part of India. This is why if you have to name one Indian author writing in English to your friends abroad, you can safely recommend RK Narayan. Also, after reading his books which were written decades ago, we get amazed that the soul of India in his books is still intact in the 21st century. Thanks God that we had brilliant writers like RK Narayan to capture it.

The Bachelor of Arts is the story of a young man and his journey through academics, social obligations, dilemmas, infatuations and learning. It is the story of a man who possessed Bachelor of Arts and the learning that life teaches him and takes him from fantasy to reality and maturity. The story is set in Malgudy. It is sheer pleasure to read any of the books of RK Narayan, including The Bachelor of Arts.

- Rahul

Narcissism in MBAs

I felt it in some of my colleagues during my MBA. Narcissism can be defined as an exceptional interest and admiration for oneself. A study presented at the Academy of Management in Montreal approves that it is present in MBA students more than in others.

http://alturl.com/erz4i (Redirects to Business Week website)

The researchers measured the narcissistic tendencies among the students by using a metric named Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI) score. And they found that business students had the score much above the other graduates!

Should we say, Watch out, MBAs!

- Rahul

Hen Vs Cow: Is it same to eat Chicken and Beef?

Someone asked if there is any difference between killing a hen (chicken) or a cow (beef) for our food. His underlying challenge was to prove both were equal because both have souls. Here is my reply:

“No one justifies killing hens for food. But when you are forced to eat non-veg because nutritious veg food is not available to you, you would obviously choose the lesser evil. A cow, in its utility and in its service to us, is a far superior animal than a hen. I am sure you would know this too.

Spiritually too, we can’t say that since both cows and hens have souls in them, both are equal. I believe, and I suggest you should think about it too, a cow is a much more evolved animal than a hen. We keep on rising as species of higher evolution along our birth cycle if we do good karma. Therefore, it is a lesser evil to kill a hen which is much less evolved animal than to kill a cow which is much higher on the hierarchy.”

Personal: Memories as a Class Monitor

I have been appointed as a class representative in most of my schools and colleges. I think it was because I was always a more sincere student than most others. In school, my important role was limited to maintaining the attendance register and making some announcements. But in the high school, perhaps my role reached a pinnacle. I remember the days very well.
 

That was first year of my high school days, means I was in class 8th. I had done best in the exams and that made my teachers appoint me as the class monitor. In those days very less things interested me apart from studies. I was a serious student, exceptional for others, very introvert, very well mannered and these qualities definitely make us favourite of teachers. In those days whenever a teacher was late to report for the class, the class would become a pitched fish-market and the noise would reach even the Head Master’s cabin. So our class teacher fixed my major role as maintaining discipline in the class. In between two classes, no one would make a noise and if one does I would note his (it was all boys’ school) name on the blackboard. The next teacher who comes to the class would punish those guys. I came out as a very strict monitor. I didn’t allow anyone even to make a minute noise. For example, no one could even ask another for a pencil. The boys asked me to allow them to chat with each other in the lowest of voice possible, but I won’t accede. Some guys threatened me but I won’t budge. In those days it was not uncommon for some guys to even beat up opponents. But what came to my support was that I myself was always high on moral sense and always practiced what I preached. But for sheer sympathy towards the guilty, some times I would erase all the names before the teacher came. But many times I won’t show mercy and the guys would be punished, mostly by being made to keep standing up in front of the class. I can feel the silence that prevailed in the recess.
 

I now remember those days and can laugh at myself. I had taken the role so severely which my class mates didn’t deserve. If I allowed them to talk in whispers or to move around a bit by asking permissions, no great indiscipline would have happened. And I feel it was important to allow them to unwind in between the classes. What I did was to discipline them at the cost of them losing their humour and fun. And I now wonder at the patience of my class too – why they never revolted!

Book Review: Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy

Father Sergius is a wonderful story of human dilemmas in front of divine expectations. It is the story of an ordinary man on which greatness and sainthood was thrust upon. He continuously faced dilemmas of life, also because he had a genuine and pure heart which always did introspection. At the end, he found the true peace in most unexpected place and way, which he never got in the Church. During the course of the story, the book details what is wrong with the Church, and also with the organised religion in general.
 

When I finished reading the book for the second time, I wondered if Leo Tolstoy was inspired by Hindu philosophy. The crux of this story can be summed up in what Father Sergius realises in the end. He realises that one small act done without selfish intent is far better than prayers. “One good deed — a cup of water given without thought of reward — is worth more than any benefit I imagined I was bestowing on people (by praying for them)” This is exactly what Bhagawat Gita teaches us. Also, there is a comment which tells God is within us. “The less importance he attached to the opinion of men the more did he feel the presence of God within him.” Now this is Hindu philosophy which tells us not to seek God outside but within us. That we need not worship or believe in those who claim to be God’s only son, or real prophets, but each one of us have God inside us, waiting to be realised by our own efforts. 
 

Some excerpts:
 

“But as soon as he left the church the crowd of people rushed to him soliciting his blessing, his advice and his help. There were pilgrims who constantly tramped from one holy place to another and from one ‘starets’ to another, and were always entranced by every shrine and every ‘starets’. Father Sergius knew this common, cold, conventional, and most irreligious type. There were pilgrims, for the most part discharged soldiers, unaccustomed to a settled life, poverty-stricken, and many of them drunken old men, who tramped from monastery to monastery merely to be fed. And there were rough peasants and peasant-women who had come with their selfish requirements, seeking cures or to have doubts about quite practical affairs solved for them: about marrying off a daughter, or hiring a shop, or buying a bit of land, or how to atone for having overlaid a child or having an illegitimate one.” 

“So that is what my dream meant! Pashenka is what I ought to have been but failed to be. I lived for men on the pretext of living for God, while she lives for God imagining that she lives for men. Yes, one good deed — a cup of water given without thought of reward — is worth more than any benefit I imagined I was bestowing on people. But after all was there not some share of sincere desire to serve God?” he asked himself, and the answer was: Yes, there was, but it was all soiled and overgrown by desire for human praise. Yes, there is no God for the man who lives, as I did, for human praise. I will now seek Him!”

Robustness of Software

Recently I read someone saying that he preferred a particular piece of software over the other because the former was more ‘robust’. That made me think for a moment about ‘robustness’ of software. Robustness of a tangible thing is easy to comprehend, but how do we understand robustness of software? And more importantly, how do we measure it, or compare robustness of two pieces of software?

Robustness of software is a very important concept. Robustness can be defined as the property because of which a piece of software runs and functions correctly even with unexpected or invalid inputs or in stressful environments. So every time your laptop’s Windows stops working (is hung), or a program crashes and stops working until you restart it or reboot, you witness poor robustness of the software or a program!

The main reason for software crash is that it comes across situations where the programmer’s or designer’s assumptions have been violated. Every piece of software has a number of errors. It is virtually impossible to debug and clean it from all errors. There are errors which occur in unusual circumstances which are beyond a human mind to be predicted. So now the question which comes to mind is: How can we ensure robustness in our software?

Unix philosophy says that robustness results from ‘transparency’ and ‘simplicity’. If a programmer can examine the source code and comprehend easily how it works, there are more chances that the errors would be fixed in advance. Another obvious way is to write codes accommodating a wide range of situations. Having small, modular programs which are connected to others is also a good way. Another very path breaking method makes use of ‘redundancy’ to ensure robustness.

Errorfree programs and hustle free operations are not only good but also very critical in many situations. Do you know that Ariane 5 spacecraft exploded 36 seconds after its start because its software contained an error which changed its direction and the spacecraft broke down due to aerodynamic forces? Therefore, the best thing to do is to let the software undergo a proper robustness test. Or should I say a ‘robust’ robustness test?

- Rahul


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Magic of Questioning

Yesterday a question came to my mind. We had noticed since childhood that whenever a fan is run slowly through what we call a 'regulator', the regulator gets heated. Why does it get heated? I knew the difference between AC and DC motors and difference between variable speed vs. fixed speed drives, but I was not sure what kind of motor a fan had. I called up my younger sister who was more qualified to answer this. But she too was not sure. She promised to read about it and tell me.

In our childhood whenever we went to naani-ghar (maternal grandmother’s place) our nana would ask us some very practical questions. When we would be around bonfire on winter nights he would ask us questions from history, science, or mathematics and we were always fearful of the ones which we were not able to answer. He did it with the grownups too whenever he met some family member who was highly educated. I guess they always dreaded him because he would put them in very embarrassing situations with his smart and practical questions.

I think questioning and quizzing is a very useful method of learning for anyone. The trick is to try to explain every doubt that comes in our mind. We should also realise that if we don’t find answers to our own doubts then someone else would challenge us sometime. And we should also ensure that our children take such questioning in the right spirit. In case they don’t answer, we should try to encourage them rather than causing humiliation in any way.

Magic of questioning comes to play when a scientist or a person with master’s degree is not able to answer a naïve question from a kid. Magic of questioning shows it when a child develops the spirit of reasoning and fact-finding from very early stage in his/her life.

Btw, I found answer to the fan regulator question here http://2wayswitch.com/terminating-the-fan-regulator-wires/

- Rahul

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Cynicism

Many times our friends and relatives ask us for suggestions. I hope we give suggestions without any hidden intentions or bias and our suggestions are made to only benefit our friend from our knowledge of the matter. It is up to the seeker whether to accept or discard the suggestion.
 

But I have observed a new trend these days. In many cases, the seeker takes decision which is opposite and in conflict with the suggestion one has received. The underlying cynicism is that the suggestion must have some hidden intent.
 

I think I can guess the reason behind such cynicism. Some times we come across people who give suggestions which are either biased – made keeping in view the selfishness of the person giving the suggestion rather than the one seeking it, or they are conspiring – made to confuse and harm the person seeking suggestion. If we come across many such persons then we start thinking negative about the process of suggestions itself. (We still ask for suggestions because it is human nature.) And this negative thinking makes us see hidden intent even where there is none.
 

I think we should be careful in this regard.

Sushma on Price Rise

I could listen to parts of Sushma Swaraj’s speech in the Parliament on the issue of price rise (or high inflation) yesterday (Aug 3). And I was thoroughly impressed by her vision and her awareness to the ground realities. I would quote two very good points she made.

In the rural areas, previously when the women used to cook on earthen ovens (chullahs) they used to suffer from the unhealthy smoke. With economic growth in India, they started cooking on gas-ovens. But now the price of cooking gas has become so high that they are going back on wood as fuel. They say that they would make only minor items like tea on the gas-chullahs and would rely on wood or charcoal based chullahs for cooking, because these fuels come free or are very cheap. In a way, our government is forcing them to go back on the timeline.

Sonia Gandhi had accepted that the big projects and welfare schemes (like employment guarantee scheme, waiving loans, etc) require huge funding because of which petroleum prices needed to be increased. There is a phrase, “Aaj raat jiyenge to kal shahar dekhenge”. The poor are starving and not getting nutritious food because of high prices. They won’t be able to get medical treatment too because of the high costs. In such conditions, first they have to survive the price rise; then they would think about taking benefits of welfare schemes!

What Sushma Swaraj said was so true. I have always held that it was our governments incapability to plan properly and failure to recognise the problems and plug the loopholes which led to this situation (it has been going on since high inflation in 2008, then India becoming undue affected by global recession in 2009, and now again we are suffering from price rises). And it is a shame that in these challenging times our government is focussing on trivial issues like caste based census, quota for Muslims, debating on women’s reservation bill, or having talks with Pakistan.

- Rahul

Sushma on Price Rise

I could listen to parts of Sushma Swaraj’s speech in the Parliament on the issue of price rise (or high inflation) yesterday (Aug 3). And I was thoroughly impressed by her vision and her awareness to the ground realities. I would quote two very good points she made.

In the rural areas, previously when the women used to cook on earthen ovens (chullahs) they used to suffer from the unhealthy smoke. With economic growth in India, they started cooking on gas-ovens. But now the price of cooking gas has become so high that they are going back on wood as fuel. They say that they would make only minor items like tea on the gas-chullahs and would rely on wood or charcoal based chullahs for cooking, because these fuels come free or are very cheap. In a way, our government is forcing them to go back on the timeline.

Sonia Gandhi had accepted that the big projects and welfare schemes (like employment guarantee scheme, waiving loans, etc) require huge funding because of which petroleum prices needed to be increased. There is a phrase, “Aaj raat jiyenge to kal shahar dekhenge”. The poor are starving and not getting nutritious food because of high prices. They won’t be able to get medical treatment too because of the high costs. In such conditions, first they have to survive the price rise; then they would think about taking benefits of welfare schemes!

What Sushma Swaraj said was so true. I have always held that it was our governments incapability to plan properly and failure to recognise the problems and plug the loopholes which led to this situation (it has been going on since high inflation in 2008, then India becoming undue affected by global recession in 2009, and now again we are suffering from price rises). And it is a shame that in these challenging times our government is focussing on trivial issues like caste based census, quota for Muslims, debating on women’s reservation bill, or having talks with Pakistan.

- Rahul

Appraisal

Today I happened to read some of my two years old conversations with some other fellow bloggers. And I was surprised at what I read and understood.

What one of them tried to make me understand in her writing, was really useful and so true. And my subsequent reply to her also appeared ‘wise’ and interesting. But now I could evaluate myself and see the conversation in a different light. I realised that at that time I had not properly understood what she wanted me to. It had created a bit of misunderstanding in the end. Today, by virtue of having experienced more I can understand better what she had said. This is also true about another conversation. What the person told at that time, still applies to me today but I haven’t thought about it properly.

I think it happens because many times we ‘read’ more and ‘understand’ less. We ‘speak’ more and ‘accept’ less. Now I also realise the virtue of speaking less; something that I realised I completely lacked in those days.

I think reading our own past communications can be liberating in some ways. If we observe properly we would note how we have been growing up with time, whether we are changing with time (which is very important), or whether we have been repeating the same mistakes again and again.

- Rahul

If you got it Easy

There are some universal laws which apply so perfectly to the human nature irrespective to the variations in culture or in background. One of them is that we value less what comes easily to us. To some extent we capture it in the Hindi anecdote “Ghar ki murgi daal barabar”. It can also be described by the tendency to undermine self possessions.

This maxim applies to all aspects of our life. What we get after much struggle, feels dear to us. But what we got by chance or by gift, loses its sheen after some time. It also applies to relationships to some extent. Friendships which happened by chance and without any efforts from our side may lose our attraction but for whom we ‘tried’ to reach out, no matter what the outcome, may seem dear to us. In the times of matrimony, if an offer came to us easily or without our efforts, we tend to be casual about it no matter if it was really perfect for us. In matrimony matters many times we realise later on that we had ignored some very good initial offers (we ignored, may be, because they came easily to us). Or a person who got unexpectedly better or superior spouse may also start valuing him/her less because of this very psychology. The sad part is that this tendency only makes our life more difficult because we ignore the true merit in most of the cases and don’t take decisions rationally.

This is why decision making remains the toughest task in any job or in any relationship.

- Rahul

Personal: Memories of those fateful days

In those days I was studying in the 12th. I and another cousin (brother) used to stay in the same room. It was winter at that time. One morning, while he was heating bathing water with an electrical heating rod, we had a discussion about the device. I said that I would check if the water was hot by touching it while power was on. He asked me not to do so otherwise I would get an electric shock. I had read about the heating effect of current and I said that I believed there should not be actual currents running in the water but it was the rod which was heated and conducted heat to the water. When he didn’t agree, I said that I would demonstrate it. I went ahead and touched the water. He didn’t stop me from doing so. When I touched the water I didn’t get any shock. He was surprised and checked the heater. And he said, “Rahul, God saved your life. The plug was not fitted well.” Later on, I realised that I had a near miss. I don’t know what would have happened if I really touched the water while current ran through it.
 

Afterwards, I had at least two serious near death experiences in my life. Once I had a close pass from a luggage train. And another time my motorbike slipped on a crossing of a highway, and thanks to my helmet I was saved because my head (helmet) banged on the road many times. Also, fatefully, there were no trucks on the road at that time.
 

Our life is full of uncertainties. No matter how much we try to control the events, we won’t be 100% successful. Those who think of themselves as too powerful should think about the kings who have died having fallen from a staircase or from a horseback. It makes us realise the importance of the good days in our life. We should be grateful to the fate or to the God that we are safe, alive, and in a state of peace. Because, the good days are neither permanent nor given.