Everyman's City

In the ancient land of India, there once was a parichalan gurukulam. Now, nothing out of the ordinary with that- there are millions of such gurukulams in that venerable land, so many, that at times it stood a fair risk of turning into a nationfull of parichalaks parichalan-ing each other. However, this was no ordinary gurukulam- far from it, because it was powered by the whiffs of coconut oil emanating from The Ponytail, the most potent chicken counting entity in the universe. Or it might have been the other way rounds, but that's rather a chicken and egg problem, so we shall let that pass like all good fairytales. Anyhow, to go back to the story at hand, this was no ordinary gurukulam- for it dared to think beyond. Beyond what, you ask? Why, beyond those crusty old pettyfoggers- the bharatiya parichalana sangsthas, who thought parichalan was all about, well, parichalan. What? you thought so as well? You neanderthal, don't you know parichalan, the new-age parichalan at least, is all about dreaming (and counting chickens, of course) - for who can deny the power of a dream? It is at the heart of every great human achievement. "Who is John Galt?", you ask? He, obviously, was the man who dreamed. And still dreams- of swimming pool embellished campuses, of three-million rupee plus salary packages, of a posse of international parichalan luminaries dispensing their pearls of wisdom. What, those dreams are opium-induced, you say? A plague on you. The devil take thee. You must belong to that very brood of Cain, the antarjalik roznaamchakaris. So it is all a mass of manure, you say? The rankings, what about the rankings? The 4-th for cleanest toilets, the secnd for variety of potted plants, the first, no less, for quality of photoshop art in virtual campus tours? What, those numbers are as imaginary as the number of copies sold of that watershed in the realm of human thought, "count your chickens before they hatch," you say? I'll show you, you journalist, you. I'll burn a million computers, you &(&*(&*(^*%^*(&)*()()$#^%&^, you &(&(*(, you blogger. I'll sue you for e exp(i.pi) + 1 billion rupees, I'll ravish your unborn greatgrandchildren, I will unleash the full dreaming potential of His Ponyness, you just wait and see. Just you wait, pesky blogger, just you wait.

Note: In case I have not been blatant enough in the post, let me remove any vestiges of doubt here. Based on the many newspapers advertisements released by the Indian Institute Of Planning and Management, as also the material on their website, that I have come across, I have reached the conclusion that their grandiloquent rhetoric is nothing but a malicious attempt to mislead and dupe the public at large. None of the many tall clamis made by IIPM, about the facilities they offer, about their panel of visiting facculty, about their exemplary placement record, appear to be substantiated in any of their own websites, or elsewhere on the web. The credentials of the dean of this institute, Mr. Arindam Chaudhuri, also appear to be highly suspect, and no documentation of his contribution to any branch of management or any of their allied fields thereof are available, except epithets such as "management guru," "personality of the decade" etc. which are only to be found on Mr. Chaudhuri's personal website and those under the aegis of IIPM. Even Mr. Chaudhuri's academic credentials are rather suspect. In view of the above facts, it is my personal belief and opinion, which I am expressing here in this website managed by me, on the domain blogspot.com (reference blogger.com) that IIPM is a perpetrator of false advertisement ammounting to fraud, with the express intention of achieving moneytary gains from the said advertisements. As a citizen of India, I believe it is my fundamental right to hold and profess these opinions. I invite IIPM to initiate any legal action they deem appropriate if they think otherwise.
However, that is not all. I stronly condemnt the dastardly way in which IIPM has reacted to the recent criticism against it by JAM magazine and by Mr. Gaurav Sabnis on his blog. I particularly resent the way it has acted (as I believe) in forcing the chain of events to such an impasse that Mr. Sabnis was left with no recourse but to resign from his position with his employer, thereby depriving him of his means of livelihood. In view of the above facts, I propose that the community of Indian bloggers, en masse, file a PIL against IIPM, asking for damages to the tune of Rs. Ten Billion, ( One Thousand Crore), an eighth of which is to be paid to Mr. Sabnis, an eighth to Ms. Rashmi Bansal, and a fourth to be utilized in setting up an trust for research into the social impact of blogging as an organic medium of communication and also the creation of a fund to indemnify bloggers against future harassemnt from any source, individual, corporate or otherwise. I propose that this be named "The Arindam Chaudhuri Foundation for Blogging Rights and Research Into the Importance of Blogging." The remaining Five Hundred Million Rupees should be donated to any trust, fund, etc. working on relief operations for the Kashmir earthquake victims.

Further, as one of the founders of the Bangalore bloggers' community, I ask all members to join in a peaceful protest march and demonstration in front of IIPM, Banglaore, to culminate in the delivery of a formal letter of protest to the campus director, or anyone in an equivalent position. I further urge bloggers' communities in other places to carry out similar protest marches to the nearest IIPM centre/office.

Arka Mukhopadhyay

cross-posted on kaashyapeya.blogspot.com
Please leave your thougts/ideas about the proposed protest march and letter of protest/other forms of protest there or here.