From 601/MPA/01 to PGP/11/132

These numbers may look strange to many of you, at least one of these to most of you. But for me, these define who I am today and who I will be later in my life. The first of them is my engineering roll number and the later is my current roll number at IIMK.

Roll numbers have a greater effect on a person than a prisoner number. Roll numbers decide whom you sit with in the class, roll numbers decide who would be your group member for a team presentation, roll number decide your sitting position in the exams which greatly influence your chances of passing the course, and sometimes roll numbers end up deciding the person you are going to spend your life with. Actions are also defined by roll number; people sitting in the front row due to roll number behave in a certain way which lucky chaps sitting in the last row don’t need to. Sitting with a pretty girl makes you study for a quiz so that you can help the damsel in distress and score some brownie points, not to mention the sober look on your face throughout the day irrespective of the professor or the course.

But for me, these numbers have a meaning far beyond this. For me these numbers represent the institutions I belong to. A part of me is not Alok, its either 601/MPA/01 or PGP/11/132. I become 601 whenever I see a lathe machine or an engine assembly, curiously wondering why am I not working on this. Opening and closing gates of a metro train remind me of the pneumatics and hydraulics learnt as roll number 601. I still remember that a single phase motor drives a fan or a cooler and why diesel engines make more noise than a petrol engine. I am no longer baffled when I see new inventions around me, I know exactly how rotating things rotate and moving things move. 601 made me a computer hardware engineer expert also making me dexterous in installing new RAMs or adding a friend’s hard disk to copy some nice and new stuff. It taught me to live in a hostel and enjoy with people from different parts of India. It gave me my best friends who are still with me sharing my joys or sorrows.  4 years at 601 made me an expert in writing exams and acing them without slogging hard. It made me a decent presenter and speaker, and it also made me a gossiper. Being 601 was my first head-on encounter with life.

Life as 132 is a bit different. Life is more complex, more hectic and more confusing. But 132 brought some changes in me nonetheless. Sleeping in the classes is something 601 never did but 132 does it almost every day. 601 bunked classes but 132 cant. 132 is more aware of his surroundings and is no longer an easy target for manipulation. 132 fights for what he feels is right while 601 generally did not know what was right. 132 is more mature while 601 enjoyed with the child within him. 132 will make more money than 601 but 132 has lesser friends also as compared to 601. 132 can blurt out gas for hours while 601 could speak on technical stuff for hours. 132 is hollow while 601 was as solid as stainless steel. Teachers still remember 601 but hardly anyone would even recognize 132.

Many times 132 envies 601, for the innocence and the freedom 601 had. And 132 misses 601 too. In the end, it was 601 who made 132 and not the other way around. And hence, Alok will always be an engineer before an MBA, no matter what he does or for what is he paid for.