The Shivalik Circuit: First Short RE Ride

Finally after lots of swinging thought i decided to get my own Royal Enfield, 29th Nov'2011 early morning i reached my home town, travelling in  bus from Delhi. I decided to finish the purchase work as soon as possible. I had already enquired about the availability of "Teal Green" color. Got into a crowded bus from Nahan and started my journey to Chandigarh. Met Guddu at Chandigarh and finished all formalities at the RE store at Sector 27, returning back to Nahan on NH72 was amazing experience. I was careful to keep speed below 40kmpl. but that was some injustice to machine. i changed my mind and set speed bar to 60kmpl. I never experienced such an easy and comfortable travel from Chandigarh to Nahan on 2 wheeler. I was so fresh. No tiredness. Infact i was not satisfied with this 80Km journey so i included Trilokpur Temple in the journey. Though it added only 10km but visiting temple mean a lot to me. Now i was waiting for weekend so that i can go on a little more long drive.

Friday evening finished my office work very early {All IT guys do that every friday :) }. and planned to go to Parwanoo. I had not visited my sister from a long time, also i knew her son Ketan would also be happy to see the machine, as he was constant motivating person to get C500. There two ways to reach parwanoo. one way is I can travel to chandigarh and than take shimla highway, which is all time best way to travel, but to make it adventurous i chose another way this road goes all into Shivalik mountain ranges, with all curves and what not. I knew that this road is getting renovated and some construction work is going on, but i still preferred that.

Chosen path snapshot taken from google maps

At 8:30 i was on my bike. Enjoying the nature i was riding up in Himalayas with earphones playing soulful numbers of Mohit Chauhan. powerful engine was crossing all mountains smoothly which made me realize the actual power of the machine. On this route i was bound, can never cross 60kmpl in this region. Reached Saranha in minutes. Sarahan is a small town with lovely people. Before my schooling i was brought up in this town, i still have some faded images of my childhood. i wanted to stop here and meet my friend but desire to ride couldn't let me do so. I stopped at roadside and captured nature in my camera and continued my ride. Upto Sarahan road was damaged and i was having hope that a spot will come where some PWD people will be seen and then i would be able to see transformed road after that. It was few more kilometres after Sarahan and i observed they are working for widening the road, there was no point of transformation .. all road was dusty and big big machines were working for betterment of road. so this time it is not just putting another layer of charcoal on the road, its is little more. i observed road widening is in progress which will result in double width of road. at some places huge side wall were cut down to make remove sharp curves . at some places road was dig to lower the surface and some places they have raised the level. Hope things go well and new better passage comes up. This road is time/fule saver for people visiting shimla from DehraDoon side. Travelling all the smart villages i reached Kumharhatti. I mentioned smart because i have observed Panchayat putting up hoardings saying "This village is open defecation free". Good thing.

Picture Taken at Sarahan Valley

After KumharHatti it was all NH 22, which is counted among busiest roads in India. this portion was awesome to travel road goes along with the historic shimla-kalka railway line. i never thought to stop and take pictures. in 15 minutes on this highway and i was at my sister's home. Ketan liked the bike and we had lot of chat over chai-biscuit. Visited another friend Kanika at Parwano. as per plan i had planned to continue journey at about 5PM. but later i called up my cousin Ankur at Shimla. Got to know that he is also going to Nahan. He told that he will start from shimla very soon and reach Parwanoo and we can go together. i was in no hurry so i stayed at there itslelf talking to Jeeju and didi. Oh i forget to mention about Uncle, He was Jeeju's friend visited their house at about 6 in evening, and after that we all were listeners, It was amazing to listen him, he shared lot of good experiences with us. Later didi told me that he is HAS officer. It was nice to meet him. We had dinner at didi's home. Ketan informed us a shortcut to connect to newly coming up Parwanoo-Kalka bye-pass road. and believe me this road was wonderful. i ignored seeing the speedometer because it would have restricted me from speeding up on the nice road. within minutes we reached chandigarh, a left turn and we were on NH 73 and later on to NH72. Though we were all packed in sweater and jacket but whenever we crossed rivers we felt freezing cold in the legs. from Parwanoo to Nahan it took around 1.5 hours. I was sure i have not speeded up to extremes, therefore this distance can be covered in less time. Odometer is showing 450Km done so its time for first service for Bike.

Hunger Strike at National Institute of Technology

This blog post is not just a story . This is a true incident happening in one of the premier institutes of India. I being a student of NIT know the happiness and dreams of a student when he/she gets admission to one of the NITs in India. Student gets excellent facilities and brilliant faculties and lot more that better education.

One of my friend Zango was also happy to take admission in NIT after he has scored a nice rank in entrance exam 3 years back. He had some choices for selecting but he gave me a wonderful reason to chose NIT Srinagar among those options. I would like share it here. Zango selected NIT Srinagar with a feeling of patriotism and brotherhood for kashmiris, he had a feeling that people are moving out of kashmir with the present issues which is like moving away from the problem. Admiring the beauty of Kashmir he wanted to live in there, He has a feeling if people will stay there, do some constructive work with fighting the terrorism. J&K will again be one of the progressive states.

Unfortunately situation at Kashmir is still same. Two days back some video clips, tweets and emails on internet showcasing hunger strike at NIT srinagar .. It was only after i called up Zanjo, i got the real situation over there. After talking to him i felt very sad. They have to do a hunger strike for sitting in placement interviews. What kind of NIT is this ? Why HRD is not removing administration if they are not able to maintain the NIT standards? 

Unrest in Kashmir Valley has caused serious problems for final year placements. Protests happening in Srinagar has targeted NIT students many times, but institutes's administration is sleeping taking unrest as holiday. No steps being taken to smooth functioning of academics . After students contacted HRD ministry, Director was questioned and all anger came back to students. Earlier Students were assured to have a placement week at Delhi, starting 20th Sep where companies will be doing campus recruitment for students, but at present situation director's response is rejection with words 'It was never authorised or approved  on papers'. Its third day of hunger strike but no action has been taken. In return administration is trying to break up student's unity using ragging punishments. They tried to contact Media but security is not allowing media people inside the campus boundaries. Most of the media is busy with all party meet happening at Kashmir there is no one to help the students situation. Here is youtube channel of NIT students showing some videos of the real situation at NIT Srinagar. Some action is seriously required before students following gandhigiri turn into angry protesters. Please do comment your views to help Zanjo .. Zango and some of his friends are presently hospitalized and are on glucose.

Adding EMAIL UPDATE sent from NIT Students 

Respected sir/madam,

This is to bring to your notice that our institute has been intermittently functioning since 11 JUNE 2010 because of the unrest in the 'Kashmir valley '. This has affected our academics, placements of the final year. No steps have been taken by the college administration to ensure smooth functioning of our academics and placements.

We have been trying to communicate with the director for the past three days but he was unavailable to address our problems. After having called by the HRD ministry, when pressure began to build on the director, the best response we could get was that he came to college after two days of persistent hunger strike and still did not communicate with us directly. Instead he briefed us through the chief warden that the matter of our studies and degree is out of “syllabus” and he is not responsible for any of it.

We are now into the fourth day of our hunger strike and neither a single demand of ours have been met, nor is there any hope of his acting for the same. Regarding the placement of the final year students, we were told by the director that a placement week would be arranged in Delhi from 20^th September 2010 which would continue for about a week, but later he forthrightly rejected it saying that the talk was all verbal and was not authorised or approved, thus it could not be held.

Yesterday (16-09-2010) college authorities have tried to communicate through police personnel, which has not given any fruitful solution of our demands and they were threatening indirectly. As the HUNGER STRIKE continued in biting cold, many students are been hospitalised and are running on Glucose with mere medical facilities in college.

Today (17-09-2010) it has been reported to higher authorities by the college management that ‘college has been running smoothly without any hitch’, but nothing of that sort has been happening.

In the afternoon, Dean Student’s affair, Chief warden and other authorities have met students and instead of sorting out the problem, they are threatening the students that ‘the degree of students shall be withheld forever and it won’t take much time for them to rusticate everyone and send them home forcefully, which has been also done in the past. And they have no concern with us whatever we do, and they don’t even care if they shut the college forever and jeopardize our career’. 

After that in the evening when media (CNN-IBN) came for the covering of the ongoing hunger strike and to communicate with the students, they were not allowed to enter the college gate, but somehow students managed to talk to them. During their visit many students were even not allowed to get out of their hostels and were locked in. Authorities and some faculty members were restraining and threatening the students for attending media persons.

Meanwhile, including those students who were hospitalised earlier in the college medical unit many other students who fell ill were sent to Rainawari government hospital for further medication.

The Dean Student Affairs’ (Amberdar), has threatened the students who are on hunger strike to call off their strike or else police will come into action to dissolve the situation.

In spite of all these catastrophic events, still director is not paying any attention towards students’ demands (which are logical).

Thus this is our humble submission that you in the best of your capacity carry our motive further for an appropriate redressal.

Here are the demands from the college administration by the students,

WHY HUNGER STRIKE???

Specific Demands

1.         As academic is of utmost importance to the institute, our classes should commence regularly from 15^th September 2010 at 9:30 am.

2.       In case college is unable to arrange the classes during day hours, arrange night classes from 15^th September 2010 as it is open outside from 7 pm to 7am.

3.       Placement week must be arranged from 20^th September to 27^th September 2010 as the Director of the institute ensured us about the same in the meeting held on 1^st September 2010 in the presence of Prof. A.H. Mir.

4.       As per the statutes results must have been declared within 7 days after the completion of examination but it is not even compiled yet. So result must be declared latest by 17^th September.

5.    We need written assurance that our degree will be completed by July, 2011.

6.   Ensure security in the campus for all the students.

7.      If college administration is unable to meet any of our demands, give the same in written to us so that we can approach higher authorities through proper channel.

Note: The day scholar students are willing to get accommodated in the college for the smooth run of the classes and they also are in the favour of Placement week which was cancelled by college authorities.

Name of the students who are hospitalised,

1.       Shashikant Shekhar,

2.        Rajesh kumar Rajwar,

3.        Puneet Tiwari,

4.        Subham,

5.       Amarnath,

6.       Yagyan Prasad Sahoo,

7.        Saroj Yadav.

Here is the link to our HUNGER STRIKE videos on youtube :

http://www.youtube.com/user/NITsrinagar10

Threatening video link:

College meeting with police:

Interview of a student:

Glimpses of strike:

Thanking you in anticipation of adequate action from your side.

NIT Srinagar students

The Dinner

There was a time when we were together all the time during college days, myself and my friend were great with each other, we used to share all our life with each other, sometime fighting on small small things and sometimes caring for each other. Those were wonderful days of life. One day we had a clash of opinion over a matter and we stopped talking to each other, and following this series of things happened that we never got chance to speak to each other because of some misunderstanding, though we never said bad to each other, but never got  chance to say good also. Whenever we tried to talk to each other it had happened all bad, later with time we got mixed up with other friends and time passed on. Many times i thought to talk to this friend but i never got the perfect chance. 

Finally college ended up and we all moved on to our paths. Now years after we are working into company for earning for self, we both were aware of the fact that we are in same city, but being afraid of others reaction we never tried to talk to each other. The priorities in life were changed, but a feeling of missing each other existed in some corner of heart.

One fine day i get sms from this friend with same attitude saying that i am angry with you, and i was like waiting for something from his side, i also replied to sms with same manner as i did when we were very new in the college. Yes, our friendship had started over sms in the college days. then some more text messages from his side and more replies from my side, next day morning i started day with a "good morning" text to him, but i didn't get any reply.. now at this point of time i was worried to loose him again, i immediately wrote up a big email to him saying him to forget all old things and lets continue as friends, but i haven't got any response to that email also.  finally at night i got sms reply and we had long time chatting over sms. 

Days passed on with sending sms to each other, finally i called him but he rejected with a sms saying i am still angry with you, i remained calm thinking similar things has happened in college days also, whenever i approached him he was into some other thing and whenever he tried, (rarely :) ) i was into some other situation so i tried back after some more days this time talked for hours finishing balance of our prepaid mobiles. It was good to talk to each other after a long time. I offered him to have lunch or dinner on some weekend, but again i got no good response. 

I eat once on every thursday. Last thursday i had planned to prepare rajma for the dinner, whole day we were sending sms to each other and i returned back to my house at about six in evening, now i started asking him to join me for dinner after some no he finally showed some signs to be interest in meeting. Now i also started giving some more offers as a sales executives does all time, I offered him to take on a bike ride, though i knew he likes rajma i tried to bribe by making special dish kheer for him. now he was close to say yes and i was losing my patients out of hunger, in between i got a call from some other friend and i didn't get chance to reply for his sms. He took this time delay as if i am angry and not replying. After i finished talking to my other friend i had 3 messages first one was normal second one was "u there?" and the final one saying bye almost, i called back him and explained that i got a call, same time i convinced him that similar time mismatch has happened many times and we missed lots of things in past, i again said better not leave this chance of having dinner together and reply  i got was "come outside office i will join .."

The very first thing i did is switched off my mobile, i don't wanted to let him call me back saying "no" for this dinner and i zoomed to his office on my friend's bike who stays quiet near to my house. After reaching his office i confirmed that i am outside his office. He came out of office with a nice smile and we came back to my house, i never felt that we were meeting after years, i prepared rajma and rice for both, he had picked up fruit juice from office for me. and i had a chocolate in my fridge for him.

Talking about the time passed since we met last time, we shared some major things that has occurred and i found we were always aware of what is happening in each other's life. Though it was not a long time to tell many stories but was enough to share all major things of our life. and the dinner was over.  It was to find my friend back. I dropped him back to his house with a hope to meet him again sometime.