Interview with Ved Prakash Lal: Study Days @ IIITM Gwalior : A jaunty Journey …

Ved Prakash Lal: No intro Plz …

Batch: IPG2001-06-M.Tech

Location: Bangalore

Organization: IBM (an IIITM & IIM B alumni)

Your Intro
Senior se intro mangte ho!!! Ab tak seekhe nahi ho kaise baat karni chahiye... Chalo tab bhi kucch bol hi deta hun.
I am from IPG course, known more by my nickname than the full name, somehow fallen into IIITM from Bihar in the search of future, friends, fortune and fame. “Fallen” is the most suitable word because when I arrived, there was only one and half hostels were there majestically standing over a barren land. I am a (day) dreamer, rebellious and try to live at my own terms.


Define IIITM in your word
I saw IIITM through its developing phase from having one and half hostel into a full fledged green campus, so the word means differently for different time. But at all times it was a place of fun and freedom.

The most memorable moment @ IIITM
It is very difficult to single out the most memorable moment. There are many which still bring smile. I describe one of them.
In the beginning there was not a well-established system and so we had to resort to creativity and courage for even some essential works to get done. One of them is get food! In 2001 there existed only one considerably completed hostel (present day girls hostel) (say hostel no 1) and a half built one (present day Sindhu Hall) (say hostel no 2). In H. N.1 senior PG students were staying and in H.N. 2 IPG-2001, our senior IPG-2000 and some PG first year people were there. Mess was run only in H.N.-1. There was no good connectivity between them and during rains the campus around used to become muddy. Most of the students go to mess from HN-2 by bus to avoid mud. One day there was huge downpour and the campus became so flooded and muddy that even bus was not able to reach to the H.N.2. It was lunch time and HN 2 residents were hungry, but no way to reach to HN1 for lunch. Proudly I say that, then only I and my dear friend Mukesh Kumar 'Danda' had the courage to discover a path and tread to HN1. We braved our way into the flooded campus through huge mud and hidden ditches for lunch. It was very adventurous!

Technology and Management in IIITM perspective
The concept is good, but I think good amount of publicity and branding are still needed to get the industry aware of these things. Integrated MTech is well known, but not the integrated MBA.
2-year MBA students too face lot of problems if they do specialization in traditional areas like marketing, finance etc. It is difficult to attract and convince industry in these areas for placement. The location only aggravates the problem. I know many engg/mgmt colleges in Bangalore/Mumbai etc which are substandard to IIITM, but get better placement because of their location advantage.

Your experience and strategy @ your work place
Owing to the course structure, engg colleges give lot of free time to students to do things as they wish. IIITM is one step ahead, gives much more time :)). I think it follows St Rabindra Nath Tagore's principle to give freedom to students to learn what they want. This system leads to development of leadership in the students. It also promotes team building. The frequent presentations improve communication and speech delivery skills. Communication of knowledge is as important as the knowledge itself. And here IIITM has advantage due its culture of presentations which no engg college in India has.
Since beginning of my stay at IIITM I used interact a lot in class. It improved knowledge as well as communication. 'Class Interaction' is the key to my performance there.

A message to your all juniors
Do never feel having low morale. Develop desire to succeed. Believe me, intelligence is secondary to desire for success ( I do not mean that IIITMites are less intelligent, my intention is to emphasize the importance of desire). It does not matter whether you are intelligent or not, what matters most is an intense desire to do something, to succeed. Spiritual people say, if you want something intensely other forces in the universe come forward to fulfill them without your conscious knowledge.

IIITM on lighter note
Greener, hehe, in which sense please clarify!!!

8th Aug'09: Prof. VARUN ARYA in Campus!

The SH2 Syndrome:

SH2 during lecture

around 143 chairs, 3 sofas, 1 podium, 1 LCD projector, fully wired echo proof sound system, one white board, 2 markers with a spare duster in 50'x60' syndicate hall with one Balkishan (:P) have witnessed many speeches on various issues from interfaces of every walk of life. Podium remains the same, people keep changing.

'The SH2 Syndrome' once again witnessed the presence of an eminent personality of education sector in India. Prof. Varun Arya graced the gathering of budding managers on pious evening of Saturday 8th Aug.

Prof. Varun Arya, a product of IIT Delhi and IIM Ahmedabad has over 16 years of experience in the senior positions with the leading companies. He holds a strong expertise in Sales & Marketing, Business Development and Profit Centre (SBUs) Management. For the last eight years he is associated with the shaping up of Aravali Institute of Management as a world-class management institute at Jodhpur in Rajasthan. In this capacity, he has also been the member of the Consultative Committee of FITT (Foundation for Innovation & Technology Transfer), the Institute-Industry interaction wing of IIT Delhi and the Academic Council of Global Business School, New Delhi. He has also been a part of the advisory committee in leading educational institutions and NGO’s. He also imparts his educational and industrial experience to the young minds through his lectures and workshops. Prof. Arya sincerely believes that people who have done well in their career and life should go back to their roots at a suitable time to do something constructive and substantial for their home state. This led to the birth of Aravali Institute of Management (AIM) in April 2000 which is the first management institute in Rajasthan having affiliation to the Common Admission Test (CAT) conducted by the prestigious IIMs.

Prof. Arya giving lecture

The jammed jamboree of SH2 was hypnotized by inspiring lecture of prof. Arya.The way he was presenting the things with his reallife experiences, we rarely see.

Yesterday when i saw a guest lecture notice in mess notice board, i thought this is going to be another normal boring lecture and hence erased the schedule from my mind just after noticing the notice.

In the evening, around 4 a phone call disturbed me with intimidation to attend the gathering.(Don't ask who intimidated !)
Anyhow i was brought.
Believe me or not the effect of the session on me is so mesmerizing that now I'm feeling happy in spoiling my weekend in silly writing for IIITM blog.

Even if an idealist would remain abuzz on seeing a person for whom president of India make exception. A man who made J.M Lingdoh to do exception for him; A man whose educational initiative has got F.M as no. 4 in BoG members. :O ; A man who has gone everywhere from nowhere; A man who has a novel for every question; A man who bent the tide each time he tried; A man who adamantly says 'no' to a chief minister; A man who made Rahul Bajaj to wear formals for his occasion; A man who used to spent times with Kiran Bedi during her troubled times; A man when her daughter went to an US university for higher education and during introduction she said my name is *** Arya and I'm from Jodhpur, then she was interrupted with reply, "are you daughter of Varun Arya ?".

Director, Prof. S.G Deshmukh presenting the memento to prof. Arya

Prof. Varun Arya is the man of Values, a true face of ethical networking, a man with whom PM wish to spent his spare time, a symbol of simplicity. On entering in SH2 i thought he might be a parent of some newly admitted student :) .

Gosh! i'm on way to finish a novel !
I think i should take a brake.

Keep updating...
Gud nite!