Inside Those Red Bricks of IIM Lucknow

Arnab Goswami might damage his voice after engaging in a two hours long verbal battle with a politician, but the students of IIM Lucknow can scream out loud enough to break records and statistics. Such is the enthralling crowd of the best brains in the country. And such is the rare occasion when these unlikely and uncommon quintessential would-be managers do get together to shout.

 The 29^th batch of PGP entered the gates of IIM Lucknow with a population of diverse background from lawyers to musicians to cricketers to pharmacists… and a smile on each of their faces. Their eyes, wide with self esteem for getting the IIM tag, were awaiting tears of anxiety and tension in the recent future for the two years ahead. First there was the CAT… which they could all bell. And there they were, more indifferent than ever, about any reason why IIM L could be called Hell.

And with the morning alarm on the 18^th day of June, the Induction programme began. The Director and the Dean welcomed the Governor of UP, the chief guest of the day. The students in their business formals were already feeling the warmth of being a CEO or, for lesser ambitious people, a VP of some high-paying enterprise. That was a Monday.

A week passed with inflated ego lurking behind wide smiles… only the selfdom to be crushed mercilessly by the Monday that showed up. Thus began the sleepless nights, the “hell”thy and strong night mess coffee and chicken rolls, the management jargons and… hold on your breath… the classes… that got more sleepy than ever. The eyes those were once as wide as anything could now barely remain open. With their heads as heavy as lead… they decided to sleep instead. They hung in slow simple harmonic motions (SHM). And then suddenly, like a bolt in the blue, a surprise quiz was announced. Boom! The SHMs ceased and the sleep disappeared.

The quiz got over and the heads hung low with zeroes running in the mind and the heart pumping fast. And with a bunch of high spirited people around and given the fact that 99 of every 100 persons think they are innocents, the blame was passed on to the professors for being cruel, atrocious, barbarous, vicious, brutal, bloodthirsty, or any other creative complimentary or visionary substitution for these words … the atmosphere was back to normal… the same sleepless nights, the night mess coffee and the drowsy classes. The thoughtfully gullible, the willingly clumsy, the skilfully frenetic, the woeful survivors on milk and cornflakes make IIM L (read Hell) Hellarious… an unbelievable combination of always-in-a-hurry nerds and unpredictable times.

What Lights up your Life... All India B-school Writing Competition

As the last hint of orange falls beyond the faraway mountains and darkness shields us under its shackles, I sit at my table with a pensive state of mind. I look up and the ceiling stares back. I begin an unusual thought process in my otherwise stagnant mind… has light, the source of my motivation, merged with obscurity? Have the golden rays of the glorious sun hid behind oblivion? Did I take light too much for granted? Did it tempt me to do so? The room is closed. The walls feel like coming closer with every moment of apprehension. On such rare occasions, when I give light so much of thought, after split seconds, I feel like a moth to the flame. I ask for light. I crave for energy. I yearn for hope. I cry for direction. And then a violin starts playing from somewhere when the hero of the night appears. It bathes me in milky white rays and then I shower all my gratitude to the fluorescent lamp above my study table, for being what it is. Finally, I feel complete… as if good has won over evil. I sit back and salute light for a lightless world would be such a gloomy place.

And then at some point of time, hunger strikes hard. Being as lazy as a sloth, I usually prefer staying in my room to continue my life as a woeful survivor on powdered milk and cornflakes. But sometimes I do get rebellious and come out of the four walls. I walk down the short cut road, leading to the Mess. The trees at IIM L are well maintained, but at night, they look quite creepy. They bend front, back and sideways… dancing with the air in the darkness. I keep my concentration on every little detail on the road lest I may step on some reptile! Well, good things come in short packages and as soon as I am at the end of the shorter road… wow! I feel like out of a dark dungeon after days. The Not Just Tea stall dazzles in the yellow light… the Gossip n Bite in the white… the Nescafe shop… the Juice Corner… and the queen of all places, the Mess. And behind all the festivity, the glamour, the light, the food, the happy faces of the otherwise serious, nerdy or always-in-a-hurry crowd of students… behind what makes the night life of IIM L what it really is… are fluorescent bulbs and incandescent lights?(!!!!!!!!!!) Unbelievable as it may seem, a set of 5, 8, 11 and 14 watt energy saver lamps brings smile on the faces of hundreds of people in the campus. Small as they may look, they light up the campus that is spread over one hundred and eighty five acres of land. And there is light and love all around since “Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that”.

CAN YOU SPOT ME???