Mars needs MOM(s)

Photo Credits:- Abhinav Jain

“Let’s stand here” Tarun said after making out the silhouette of the crudely drawn lines beneath us.

“I guess that’s pretty much the ISRO logo” I replied to him, and took my place next to him; soon Pankaj joined us with a banner held above his head congratulating the ISRO scientists on their success.

I was dripping wet as I stared up at the main building where the photographers were poised to capture the students who had formed ISRO logo in the quadrangle as J N Tata stared down at us, drenched but equally proud, clutching the main building close to his chest.

It was a festive mood as over hundreds of IIScian’s had turned up to celebrate the successful entry of the Mars Orbiter Mission into the Martian orbit that too on the maiden attempt, a feat unachievable by the attempts made by many others. Already tagged as a cost effective mission that has mocked the movie “Gravity” for spending more money than the amount invested by India in this mission, our little invention will soon be in proximity with “Curiosity”. 24^th September from this day hence shall mark a day that witnessed a historic moment that has by all means satisfied those Indians like me who wanted to witness atleast one trice of our country’s rich history.

The unexpected and unfathomable surprise of the day occurred when a few of our alumni who were scientists now at ISRO turned up and excitedly shared their triumph with us. The hundred is not a mistaken figure as it was evident from the rapidly vanishing sweets that I was distributing along with the others. One last sweet was left in my box and I gave it to Javed, who commented “half-half” and gave me half of it back which I happily ate.

The thrilling prospect of exploring the red planet, our closest neighbor and the quest for extra-terrestrial life, possibilities of which have been over exploited by authors and directors, is soon a reality! The proud Indians finally dispersed back to their labs, where there knew one day soon, an achievement awaits them, that will serve as a turning point as today had been for our country. And with high spirits they would work now.

Everyone was gone, the faculty hall was locked, it was time for us to leave too. I and Tarun started walking away from the main building.

“I guess the posters we put up in the mess really helped” I commented beaming.

“Yeah! So many people turned up, inspite of the rain” 

We were walking back to our hostel, proud and with a silent promise and overflowing excitement to meet Dr. Radhakrishnan, chairman of ISRO during Samanway 2014.

Road to Reality

The road was overpopulated with vehicles; it was a hard ordeal to maneuver my bicycle between autos and cars amidst angry honking, as I hurried to catch up with Sabreesh.

“You can write about today in your blog” he mentioned.

“I intend to” I replied and had already made up my mind that I would, as we hurried back into the campus to attend our humanities class.

It was my second visit along with the members of the Notebook Drive (NBD) to a school nearby to teach kids.  I was very proud of what my fellow students did as a part of NBD and I felt this practical interest in educating the children of our country should be one of the elementary obligations that devolve on every thinking man in India.

Once, inside the classroom, I could not help thinking about the new little friends I made today, the buzzing activity, their excited voices, the pleading innocent eyes that wanted us to stay for some more time, the hesitant goodbyes and the silent promise to meet them again the next week.

In retrospect, I was reminded of my own childhood and it made me wonder, have they got dreams like us? Do they tell their mothers that one day they want to make rockets or a time machine? How would their mother respond? Does she smile and nod her head in agreement? Or does she kiss her little child and reassure him saying “I am sure you will”? Or was she so busy with her chores or doing some odd jobs to raise a little more money for her family that her children lay neglected. What about the Father?  Would he be a kind and an understanding man? Was he a man who could look beyond the misery of the present day towards a better future for the prodigy? Does he understand the value of education? Or is he a hated man who maltreats the family in a fit of drunken rage?

How was the ambience at home? Was there a possibility of learning any lessons at home or was it just restricted to what little the young citizen learns to read and write at school? How was the influence of the teacher, how were they perceived at the child’s home? Were they highly spoken of or were they being denigrated so much so that the child is more inclined to insult the teacher and disregard respect for the human surroundings?

And in this process what happens to their dream? Was fate so cruel, that it tiptoes in, at first unheeded and wearing a prosaic scabbard from which, later, emerges a fiery sword that cuts the last thin thread that holds their small dreams above the ground. Was there any hope to escape the clutches of the goddess of fate that firmly held them in her hands and threatened to crush them any minute now? Whatever happens to our next Dr. Abdul Kalam and his wings of fire? That is when one starts to look out for something to reprimand and that is when you tag them as the victims of a system, and the natural scape goat happen to be a politician.

Politicians had promised to fight, fight illiteracy, fight poverty, but of course, they cannot fight, because you fight for something you love, for loving something you must respect and in order to respect, you must have knowledge of it. And this knowledge cannot be attained from the heaps of folders jam-packed with mathematical figures and diagrams dumped on the desk of a man too busy fighting for his own survival. Nor could it be gained by ”visits”, for which so much hype is created about. Such conventions lead only to superficial talk and sentimental delusions. The former never ventures into the root of the problem while the latter simply evades it. Both meaningless and unnecessary and therefore would serve no better purpose than for a heart touching campaign speech to move voters with a meticulously stitched glitter of words.

Were we politicians, we would have probably left the kids to their own fate or would have made them the instruments to highlight the inefficiency of the Government to propagate our own cause for the elections. Fortunately we aren’t. We are the ones who have realized not to rely on the men with power to act, for they are too busy trying hard to stay in power and in this course have marred their own sensitivity towards the others.

Our actions may go unnoticed; our actions may not bring about a grand change; our actions may have little significance on a longer scale but atleast we ACT!