PART 1: First Year
A journey that started on 22nd July 2008. That was the day when I reached Mesra to live my dream in reality. Yes, it was my dream and I always wished to study here. I was allocated 'Hostel No. 3; Room No. 63'. It was a long lobby and where that ended was my room and perpendicular to it was another small lobby. I was happy 'cos it was a single room and a big window through which I could see the jungle behind the hostel. I was impressed with the campus since my first visit during counselling and admission process 'cos of its location in the middle of a jungle and far from the city. But there was an unusual silence over there at that moment which I had never felt before during my earlier visits. The silence was kind of disturbing and was making me feel uncomfortable. One more thing that I worried about was 'Ragging'. That's the term which makes every fresher shivers down to the spine. There was a lot of people in there like me with their parents. Everyone was busy in cleaning their rooms and trying to settle themselves. But still the silence prevailed and it was broken by this guy, Ankit Goyal. He came by to say 'Hello' and then we had a little chat. He told me that he is from nearby Ranchi area and was preparing for entrance exam from Kota. I was never good at making friends and I was happy I got a friend. Later in the evening during snacks time I met other guys of my lobby and those were Deepanshu Ujjain, Prateek Jain, Ranjan Kr Rahul, Sparsh Sinha, Riju Chatterjee, Subhradip Saha, Anchit Jain, Aditya Ujjwal and Shailesh Kejriwal. That was the friend circle and I had so many friends on the first day only. This was the new start of life at a new place.
The induction phase
From the next day, only the classes started. I realised one thing that there are way too many students in my branch, a whopping 120. During our initial days, there was no study pressure. We were taken by our professors to visit the laboratories in the college and there were many. At first, it was exciting to visit but later that proved to be boring as they started to explain everything related to a particular instrument and that was too much for a twelfth pass out student. One day we were asked to gather at the institute auditorium. That was an official introduction of so many clubs functioning in the college and that so many clubs counts to approximately 32 at that time. Every club was giving their brief introduction and was asking us to join. It was told that its necessary to join one technical and one non-technical club and at max one can join three clubs.
Ragging?
Ragging... That's the term which makes every fresher student live in fear. But, luckily I never faced any ragging and in fact nobody faced it in the college. The administration was very serious on this aspect. Our seniors had to submit a document stating that if they will be found indulged in ragging than they will be expelled. There were security guards in our hostel and patrol parties used to spy any such activity. The location of our hostel was also such that it discouraged anyone to come for ragging. But the downside of this was very less interaction with seniors and the result was we were not given 'fresher's party'. I was happy 'cos I never wanted to feel the heat of ragging.
PT and Games
I hated it. There was a dress code: white t-shirt and half pant? The instructors there used to think themselves as a professor. One of the instructor Mahendra Prasad aka Chaddi Singh used to boast so much about himself in games activity but that always used to end with him saying that he is having pain in his leg and can't play. That was not like a game period but more like NCC 'cos we had to do 'attention' and 'stand-at-ease' stuff most of the time. They never allowed us to go before time and that continued for two years. I wanted to switch to NCC or NSS but there was no such provision.
IEI club
There was a test conducted by this club. A set of questions were given and we were asked to submit it later. We all cheated. Our every answer were matching but don't know how I came third and was given a prize of 'One Hundred Rupees'. There was another guy, Antesh Singh, who came first and was given a prize of 'Three Hundred Rupees'. A total of four hundred rupees and all came 'cos of us cheating together so it had to be spent in a party at the canteen.
The Best Professor
...and the award goes to Prof A K Roy. He was kind. He was supportive. He used to teach us 'Engineering Mechanics'. It was a boring subject but 'cos of his style of teaching it used to seem interesting. Beside teaching us the subject he always used to tell us about 'intranet'.
The Worst Professor
Prof S K Chatterjee. No Doubt. His subject was C Programming. Either he doesn't know the subject or he doesn't know how to teach. Everyone was afraid of programming 'cos of that man. Those who were in 'Computer Engineering' started thinking of a branch slide while those who wanted to slide to 'Computer Engineering' dropped their idea. There was such a fear of the subject.
Technieek
The first fest in the college and the participation was huge. Everyone in the first year had participated. We had to participate in a team of five members. The name of my team was 'Fraternity' and that included Aditya Ujjwal, Deepanshu Ujjain, Prateek Jain, Ranjan Kr Rahul and of course me. Though we didn't reach the core night of the fest but it was fun.
Pocket Tanks
Our own little competition that got huge participation. An entry fee of ten rupees was kept and a cash award to the winner was declared. However, the plan was to make someone in our group to win and that actually happened with Ankit Goyal winning the title of first ever pocket tank winner. We had money, so another party but this time at Munna Dhaba.
Gauri-Gunda
An another name in the list of worst professor category. The man used to teach us 'Basic Electrical Engineering'. But I don't think he was teaching but actually harassing us. He was a self-obsessed and an insensitive human being. He was a frustrated soul and we used to pity 'EEE' guys of having such professors in their department.
...And somehow the first year ended with 'us' heading for the trip to Darjeeling-Gangtok.
A Happy Ending
