And the people in the houses all went to the university,
Where they were put in boxes and they came out all the sameThere’s a green one and a pink one and a blue one and a yellow one,
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.– Pete Seeger, Little Boxes
I was sitting on an evening train with a friend of mine, returning from Kharagpur (KGP) to Kolkata. It was already growing dark outside and with each successive mechanical drag, the outsides were fast trailing behind us. As my friend focused her attention on playing an arcade game where the avatar has to hop on the suspended platforms to keep itself alive, I started wondering about the platform I left behind myself. This particular visit to KGP was aimed at collecting the provisional degree from the institute as it wasn’t possible for me to attend the convocation. With this , all ties with the institute had been severed technically. Chances are bleak that I might revisit the place which I used to call home for the past five years.
Enrolling in IIT KGP under an Integrated Masters in Science program wasn’t a compulsion for me. I wanted to pursue an undergrad degree in basic science for a very long time. However, being a citizen of a nation obsessed with IITs and IIMs, and hitherto an outsider to the IIT system, I was fooled. I was tricked into believing that by joining IIT, I would be able to receive the best academic training and share my domain with a cluster of like-minded students which would facilitate me in realizing my aspirations. I was incorrect in my assumptions. But today as I sit back and ponder on last half of my decade, I can’t say I regret my decision.
In an extremely competitive job-market like that of India, where there is a morsel of white-collar jobs across a limited platter of sectors, choice of higher education is guided primarily by opportunity than passion. Students try to select, or as in most cases compelled by societal pressure to opt for courses which have decent job prospects. Although, this statement is a tad too ambiguous because a major chunk of these jobs require skill sets irrelevant to the actual specialization of the student. People cultivate and hone these skills as they come to determine their orientation or often guided by prospective financial dividends.
As I landed in the lush green campus of KGP which stood as an embodiment of independent India’s vision of self-sufficiency in training their own work force and of being a technological super power, I found myself beside a group of extremely determined students who were conscious of their toil in cracking the draconian admission test and now were on a mission to secure their professional leverage.
The freshman and sophomore year in IIT shredded my initial motivation to take up research as a career. In general, IITs have a policy of recruiting professors primarily as research faculty, with no due emphasis on the art of teaching. Since an outstanding research career has no correlation with the craft, sensitivity and creativity that teaching involves, good teachers are an exception, not a norm in the campus. Students are not willing to learn either and are happy to leave with a decent grade after last-night-mugging, further disengaging the professors. The system winds in a vicious catch-22 cycle.
Students here are extremely dispassionate and goal-oriented. And as I say this, I’m not being judgmental but sensible. During their duration of stay, people engage in various extra-academic activities ranging from recreational ones like sports, music, dancing, dramatics, quizzing to more professional activities like social entrepreneurship, business plan writing, hardware modelling etc. While the natural human tenacity of finding oneself in a social association remains a significant interest, strengthening the profile of the corresponding individual is always the primary motivator.
As I metioned before, classes were disastrous! Not only that, research as a career orientation instantly raised eyebrows and invited curious glances, and alienated you from the herd. Albeit inadvertent, it was an ongoing practice of silent shaming and almost coerced you to toe the line. I was utterly confused and I decided to experiment with every possible option before zeroing on a career path.
In the next few years, I tried at hand at almost everything. I worked with startups, volunteered with NGOs, took up courses in finance, joined student business forums, tried my hand at coding and became part of a team involved in social entrepreneurship. While the experiences were enriching, it helped me to eventually realize that these were not my cup of tea. On the other side of the spectrum, my inclination to academic research grew stronger with every scientific project I pursued. However, here too I took a significant detour as I shifted my inclination to Biomedical 
sciences from my actual major of Chemistry. To me, Biology was an academic epitome of ‘Despicable Me’ in high school. 🙂 But surprisingly, exposure to the interdisciplinary aspects of the subject changed the way I used to conceive it and I ended up developing my profile along that line. Today, as I am sitting back in my home waiting to join a doctoral program, I can’t say for sure that I am liberated of my uncertainties and concerns about my future. But I have a strong conviction about one thing. That it is an informed choice.
Our journey in IIT was not a standard assembly line where we were shoved in to churn mass-produced graduates. It deprived us of a strong classroom teaching. The peer pressure bogged us down, the divergent interests baffled us. But all these ‘difficulties’ had a potential to use them to our advantage. It gave us the necessary exposure and left the rest on our own.
In the end, we weren’t much different from the game of doodle jump my friend was playing to kill her boredom. My entire five years was a giant platform game; hopping on the right platforms and to steer clear of the obstacles was the only way to advance and stay alive!
Photo credits:
IIT KGP in macro – Ashay Gangwar
Manisit Das 