Phatela jeb sil jaayega!!

jo chaahega mil jaayega

Tere bhi din aayenge chhote,

achcha khaasa hil jaanyega

And so goes lyrics of one popular Hindi number, which Ganja and I used to sing along around 8 years back. Year was late 2001 and we were in final year of engineering at REC Warangal. IT slump of 2001-02 saw fewer and fewer companies visiting us for campus recruitment and most of my batch mate, including me, were left high and dry. Cut to 2009, things have changed for all of us, settling in life now.

Christmas holiday of this year resulted in a long weekend and gave me an opportunity to have a short trip to my alma-matter, now NIT Warangal. Early morning on Christmas day I, along with my wife and a close friend, started for Warangal. Once we reached there and were inside the campus I was like wow, all old memories of college days became live in front of my eyes. I felt like I am reading stories from an old book. College was being given a face lift after becoming NIT 7 years back, but the underlying essence remained the same. All the places in the campus had some or other memories associated with it. We roamed around entire campus, I reliving those good old days.

First year classroom reminded me that I used to sit on the first bench, without fail. One day I was little late to class and Kiran had occupied that place and I was like how dare he. Being holiday classrooms were closed but I could open windows. Opening each window and peeping inside the classroom brought some memories or other from that room. Second year’s room reminded me of Robot, who used to teach, no rather read out from the book in very robotic manner, and hence the nick name. By the time we were in third year my regular sitting place has almost reached to the last bench (one of the reason, among others, was my tallness :-O). A chalk fight in classroom on back of IAKR, third year. And HOD asking me to leave the class for not attending his previous lecture, final year. Krishnanand caughting Jhakki in his attempt of proxy, drawing class. Mistaking a professor for support staff, design class. We standing outside the examination hall and many of us still trying to cram, before commencement of exam, civil department, usual venue of our exams.

Entrance of our department, where we posed for photograph during last few days in college. The graveyard abutting the boundary wall of college , where we ventured late night about 1 am when we were returning after watching a night show of some movie. The audi , in front of which Chaudhary and I sat and discussed our future. SAC, spring spree of 2002. Main entrance to the college , we were stopped from entering as it was way beyond permissible time of 11pm. NCH and NSH , attending PPT from companies. Boy , there are quite a lot of memories from those days. I would not go on recollecting memories from our hostel area , essentially most eventful of all places.

By 3 in the afternoon we were through with campus. Then we ventured into the town. There was this Kalinga dhaba where we dined for 50 bucks (those days we hardly had money). Public garden , the usual venue for intro after ragging. Amrutha hall, where we used to watch movies in just 16-18 bucks in the comfort of AC.

After reliving all these and many more memories from college days for an entire day we came back to Hyderabad in the night.

Attending this college has influenced me in many ways.All the four years attended here were enriching. I was getting prepared for the real world. My thought processes were refined here, my world view changed, interacting with people from all parts of India helped me broaden my horizon. Few of my beliefs got strengthen, others got shattered.A significant part of me is only because I attended this college. Getting a degree and helping me start my career were just bonus.

Going forward, Rukne ka nahin, thakne ka nahin, life mein chalte rehne ka