The Karma Of Life & B-School Prospects

   Of late I’ve been asked by some people who are waiting B-School admits / have got B-School admits on what to do once they begin the course. It is true, that unless you talk to people & find out what are the things that you should expect in a B-School, you might be in for a rude shock.The following are a set of things ( extremely personal opinion, I should say) that may help a new B-School entrant in his / her 2 year stint at the institute

1)  A lot of you may have come into B-School harbouring thoughts of a radical career change into investment banking / consulting from your monotonous IT jobs. I wouldn’t say that it is impossible. But keep in mind that a lot of things that you are keen to achieve are constrained by your life so far ( read, your gender, what you have in your ‘CV’   -  things you cannot change ). So, don’t get upset if you don’t get a McKinsey / GoldMan Sacchs shortlist in summers :)

2) B-School is not always a place where meritocracy rules. Don’t expect the exams / valuation to be always fair / expect rewards proportionate to your efforts. Infact , you would be better off if you realize now itself that life is not a fair game  

3) People ask me this - Does my CG matter ? Yes it does.. However I won’t advise leaving everything else in pursuit of CGPA. B-School is a place where you should experiment a bit. If you are a fan of photography, create/join a photography club. If you fancy yourselves talking to media persons, join your college’s media cell. If you want to try out managing a large set of vociferous student, try getting into SAC/Council..  And lot of stuff like that. Don’t do any of the above for just a thing called “CV Point” (Which, you’ll become familiar in a while). Do those things to develop yourselves as a person, stretch yourselves, strive for perfection..

            B-School is perhaps the place where you’ll find yourself in the company of peers with very high intellectual capacity..You would rarely meet people of such intellectual rigor (whether they use it rightfully or not is another question) in your workplace.. Use that environment, develop yourself. It is not that final placement’s CTC figure that you should take out of there. It is a refined & well developed personality. That should be your goal :)

Lokpal & Civil Society - Aren't we creating a monster ?

Unparalleled concentration of power in any pillar of the society is a recipe for disaster, be it executive, judiciary or parliament. That is one of the basic philosophies upon which Indian constitution is built. To be fair enough, all these three pillars have reigned in themselves when one of them was trying to enlarge their power. However, I would admit that this system of checks and balances have not forced each other into an efficient system. And that deficiency is the root cause of these civil society movements which we’ve witnessed in recent times. Even so, the systemic inefficiency cannot be a justification for creating another pillar of constitution vested with unbridled authority


I don’t intend to repeat all the arguments again. If you have not read those, it is a must that you read through these links

1) http://www.indianexpress.com/news/of-the-few-by-the-few/772773/1

2) http://calamur.org/gargi/2011/04/06/my-issues-with-the-proposed-jan-lok-pal-bill/

3) http://www.livemint.com/2011/04/11213538/Anna-Hazare-and-India8217s.html?d=1

And, those of you who support Lokpal on the basis of Scandinavian model should first understand what their system is http://www.allscandinavia.com/ombudsman.htm

My opposition to the Lokpal bill is summarized in this question

Q. If, I as a civil servant / politician in power, am convicted by Lokpal, do I have the privilege to challenge that verdict in a court of law?

a. If the answer is ‘Yes’, then how different is LokPal from a subordinate/sessions/vigilance courts?

b. If the answer is ‘No’, you are creating a monster which is not accountable to anyone

The idea that self appointed guardians of civil society can be the magic wand wielding angels to cure us of corruption is preposterous, if not Utopian. And, there can never be one agreement in the selection of such committees. Already discordant voices have come up in plenty – Republican Party of India needs Dalit representation in the panel, Mallika Sarabhai wants women representation, BJP wants opposition representation and so on.

To me, the biggest losers in this circus are BJP & Left Front. They have allowed a coterie of people to exploit the political spectrum that rightfully belonged to the opposition. In a sense, this brings forth the fact that the consumerist society has become largely apolitical or non-believers in democratic processes, which is a dangerous thing to happen. Political parties across the spectrum should introspect & address that as a priority

The entire political spectrum is now agreeing at least passively to Hazare because of their fear of losing out of support from the middle class. I’d say that some version of Lokpal will come into picture, but the high profile legal background based panel that UPA has set up ( Sibal , Chidambaram, Mukherjee , Salman Khurshid ) will ensure that it’ll be a toothless tiger - and rightfully it should be so because no one, including those of highest moral eminence should be allowed to hijack the process of parliamentary democracy.