When I entered the campus for the first time, I was mesmerized by
“THE RED BRICK WALLS” and “THE
GREEN AMPHIETHEATER”. You can say that was one of my first love at sight scenes. While coming from the main gate of the campus to the hostel block, in my mind I planned my entire two years inside the campus with location all from where I will study ,all the sports activity to morning walk which happened in a different way but never the way I planned that moment.
So after hostel allotment, I came to my room. Due to network issues, I was not able to call my home and tell that I got the room and everything is fine here. I went to one of my floor mates and asked if she could give me her phone to call home, she gave her phone and I called home. After the call got over I came to give her phone and started talking casually thinking she was my batch mate. After some time she told me she is not my batch mate but actually is my senior. Being an engineering student and from Lucknow, all of sudden “Tum” turned into “Aap” and instead of calling her by name the habitual “Mam” was in conversation which was followed by the struggle to address her by name and not Mam. Our hostel block is three floors and each floor has six rooms. She told me out of six rooms in our floor four are seniors and only two are juniors in our floor. At night, induction part started and she was the part of team inducting us. So as per induction tradition, juniors were not allowed to talk or get informal with seniors during induction and therefore I had only one person on the floor to share all the induction fun and stress.
Induction got over and real IIM fun started. We were welcomed as IIM Kashipur family and now we were allowed to talk to everyone without mailing. I came to the know the real purpose of e-mail in IIM Kashipur only. The first term was a roller coaster, apart from academics, other curricular activities were there to give us IIM rigor.
One night I was talking to my best friend over phone and was deeply involved in our conversation when I stood infront of the mirror and took the hair roller comb and started combing my long hairs. I didn’t realize when I entangled front section of my hairs and that too from roots and not tips around 12:35 AM. If it was back section of hairs or tips I wouldn’t have panicked but front section, deep in my heart, the first thought came that I will have to cut all the front hairs and I was imagining myself without hairs on my head next morning which was more than nightmare for me. From 12:35 AM to 5:00 AM I kept on trying to get my hairs out of the hair brush. I did all the possible things that I could do but the damage was beyond control. In between all thoughts how to justify whatever I have done to my hairs and how to escape that situation were going in my head. Around 05:15 I heard my neighbor senior playing song on the laptop. She in her entire PGP never woke up at 5 in the morning but that day she did. I went straight to her room without knocking, sat on the floor and started crying loudly with all tears. It happened so suddenly that she actually got scared what had happened to me, she didn’t notice my hairs as lights were off and there were curtains on her window. She turned on the lights and burst into laughter but seeing me, she controlled herself and consoled me and asked me to calm down. She then searched all the parlours nearby and which will open earliest but none was before 10:00 AM. I was crying continuously so she decided to call up parlours and ask if someone could open before the scheduled time. Fortunately, one agreed and she took me there by 7:00AM covered my head in a scarf so that no one sees me in that condition. We went there and after the struggle of around 4 hours, some damage was controlled. That hairstylist managed to give a decent look to my hairs and I survived. Later on that “Baalon ka Qissa” became one of the trending discussed topics among seniors.
They used to help us academically. I hated finance but cleared all finance subject just because of one of my senior who was doing majors in finance. During one of my finance exam, she had placement process next day but instead of preparing for that, she taught me finance whole night.
Late night chats with Maggi and coffee on terrace became part of our life. Star gazing in amphitheater gave us most peaceful, meaningful and memorable moments which we will cherish for our entire life. Each Sunset during winters is breathtaking moment in IIM Kashipur campus. We used to have tea on the terrace of the mess or go on evening walk so that we don’t miss any sunset here.
Time passed in a blink and college days of our seniors were about to get over, we all started getting those gloomy feelings. They started packing their luggage and pass on their property to their juniors like gym equipment, bikes, fish tanks etc. I too got the ancestral property. We all were spending as much time as possible together and create as much as memories possible.
Then came the D-day, convocation day, 19 March. Parents of our seniors started coming to campus for attending the convocation. The real struggle started for seniors then. All secrets hidden from parents were being ensured not to be leaked at any cost. Some bought bike without telling their parents about it, some started eating non-veg and some never told they learnt driving and now own a driving license too and bike trip is their hobby. Many were able to keep their secrets while some were leaked too.
On the convocation day, we juniors were busy in successfully conducting the event. The moment our seniors were on stage and officially became alumni of the college, we all juniors felt a void in our heart. We all were somewhere going through the same emotion. Instant availability of someone we can complain, someone who would guide us anytime was now going to be missed from the college. Their presence in the campus was that of someone elder in our family who would be backup for all the experiments and mistakes we made. But they had to leave this campus to started another memorable journey.
Next day they all were leaving the campus and we went to see them off. We got emotional while seeing off each other and our eyes were moist while bidding good-bye. The campus was empty by noon and our floor which was filled with our loving four seniors was today completely empty. The locked doors were making us gloomy.
Our end term exams were starting next day, being too much busy in past days, we had only classroom learning, but exams need more than classroom learning and therefore we got busy with peer learning and after our end term exam we all came home and started preparing for summer internship which was starting for most of us from April first week. After the internship, when we came back to campus, only we juniors were in campus and we were missing all our seniors but now our juniors have joined the campus. We all want the legacy of senior-junior relationship keeps on going on the campus. Yes, we still compare ourselves the way we behaved when we were juniors and the way we behave when we are seniors in the campus. Now we are seniors, we hope all our juniors feel the way we felt when our seniors were in the campus.
Aditya Birla Group: I am familiar with Aditya Birla Group specially the logo since my childhood as my house used to have calendars that were given free as part of the promotion with Fertilizers and cement from Aditya Birla Group. I now want to be associated with Aditya Birla Group and keep impacting life of others as Aditya Birla Group has in my life. I would want to join HINDALCO INDUSTRIES LIMITED or GRASIM INDUSTRIES LIMITED and help India become a better community.
-Ankita Verma