Saturday, September 24, 2011

Indian Institute of Devdas (and other forlorn and depressed creatures)

Yes, I am flogging a dead horse. The collective voice of the nation has gone hoarse discussing the suicides at premier institutes of higher education in India. I shall do the same! I am going to be totally insensitive while I move with the herd- please find below a non-exhaustive table of suicides in IIT's and IIM's this year:


I am aware that nobody would have given a rat's ass if these students were not from IIT's or IIM's. Students from all over India, from large and small institutes alike, take their own lives in alarming numbers. Of course it is always an impulsive reaction. Part of the blame lies on the age of the individual. After all, we are like that when we are in our teens and tweens- Impulsive, naive and vulnerable.

As far as students from the IIT's and IIM's are concerned:  You have been a top student from your school days. You burnt midnight oil to get into a top institution. Your marks are sufficient for every premier institution to open its doors for you. You have probably not faced too many setbacks in life. 

How can such a person handle failure when it comes unexpectedly? When the top student discovers that studying engineering is something totally different from passing that entrance exam; he falters, but naturally.

Your friends idolize you and your family adores you. You are placed on a pedestal by every Indian Pappu. You are the apple of everyone's eyes. Everyone wants to be your friend. How can such a person handle rejection in love?
On top of that, there is the highly competitive atmosphere of the institutes which doesn't help things at all.

Point is, if you can't handle things like these, then I am sorry my friend, you are just not fit for the game that is life. This Pappu is usually not philosophical. But it saddens me to see young people, who have worked so hard to get to places where most of us only dream to reach, taking their own life on being faced with setbacks.

Strange are the ways of the invisible man in the sky. He makes them intelligent. He makes them industrious. But he forgets to give them resilience, which, after all , is more important than anything else.

2 comments:

  1. Actually, that makes loads of sense. Sadly, it is true. These people are born with a silver pen in their brain, or anything, for that matter, facing no set back, in what-so-ever form, till they manage to face the ones of the same intellect in these premier institutions, which is also one of the major reason for these suicides.

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