Bold Blogs – Series1 (Only for BM-B)

Disclaimer : Again the same one, All the characters in this blog are not at all fictitious and they are deliberately added to resemble the real ones. Adding to this, the comments mentioned are restricted to my limited knowledge about each person. Left-over ones may be targeted in the next series :-)

One fine day in Nov… LH-7 seems busy, a lecture going on. But as usual, every student is dreaming in his/her own world. Lets try to get into each one’s thoughts… Here it goes..

Abhishek: I hope I am allowed to shift into girls hostel…the moment it is done..I will fly like a kabootar to LH..

Shruti: Only 15 pages of notes completed in this lecture..something’s wrong…

Stuti: Topping in St. Xavier's College was far more easier…

Angshuman: Hope that the facilitator takes a surprise test today..

Abhinav (reading Angshuman’s mind with his divine capabilities) : Even I hope the same as angshuman is besides ;)

Pratima: I wonder what Pankhuri might be doing..

Pooja: When is the next wet night?

Raashi: When When When When When When When When When When is the next wet night?

Swapna: Finance padna padega..nahi tho Finax ki naak kat jayegi..

Mohita: 31..no 29..naah 30..yes that’s the number of days left to go back home :)

Amit: Market 300 point neeche gaya hoga ab tak..Aur abhi 302 point…303..304…

Kalanidhi (topper of first QT test): Will I remain as only one test wonder.. :(

Vasudha: Something seriously wrong.. only 22 times CP from morning..

Syed: Make me dean..and i will show how many girls should be selected for BM..

Vinay: Do I really look like an Uncle?

Puneet: Sir says Indian justice cant act beyond land boundaries but it can enforce law upto 12 nautical miles in sea too..CP starts..

Chubby: Madsam Dosa soon after this lecture..

Khemka: Kehte hai ishq mein neend ud jaati hai..koi humse ishq kare..kambhaqt class mein neend bahut aati hai..

Ishneet: Today, Bhajji is the man of the match for sure..

Manan: This facilitator can very well sing a song with me..even his lecture takes me into rhythmic dreams..

Gayathri/Ashish: Good that Himanshu is jotting down everything..

Alok: I used to teach a lot better in my classes..

Shwetank: Will Subprime crisis affect P2P solutions?

Suhasini: Good that system, AC, fans.. all are working fine. And most importantly blackboard is clean..

Rohini: Prathik mera hairclip kab wapas karega..abhi tho baal bhi gaye uske...

An Imaginary XLRI Interview

Disclaimer : All the characters in this interview are not at all fictitious and they are deliberately added to resemble the real ones. But again No offences meant :-)

Interview Panel : BFA Prof, CSE Prof, QT Prof, OB Prof, PR & OM Prof
Interviewee : Myself :-(

Interview Starts:

PR : ok my friend…tell me what is the bottleneck of you entering XLRI??

I : err…err.. Sir, you people over here.

(Laughs all over)

CSE : ok tell me what is carbon trading?

I: err..Sir is it selling carbon for money…

QT : Are you interrogating us??

I : Sorry Sir, I was answering actually.

CSE : I am not convinced.

BFA : yes yaar, you can help me over here. Will the money that came from carbon trading reflect in balance sheet..if yes, where??
[I cant help myself at this point, how can I help you :-( ]
I : ????..Sorry sir

QT : You have 3 blue-colored balls and 4 red-colored balls…

CSE : Sir, Please specify that eco-friendly colors have been used.

QT : Ok. You distribute them into 7 urns. What is the probability that at least one urn is empty.

I : Sir, To simplify things, I assume that one of the urns is closed with a lid. Now I can safely say that the probability is one.

PR : Ok my friend, You have ordered a dosa at some dosa center. What is it – A made to order, made to stock, assemble to order or an engineer to order.

(I thought, finally an easy one….My eyes glew and I started answering in great confidence)

I : Sir, As I am an engineer and I have ordered it…So it should be an engineer to order :-)

All Profs : ????

BFA : Ok. So once you pass out from XLRI and become a manager and then order a dosa…what will you call it…

Myself : err..Sir I guess there should be some more classifications in your question such as manager to order, doctor to order, B.SC to Order, BBS to order….

(Profs start laughing)

CSE : ok, Where is Tirupur located??

I : Sir, Its in Karnataka I guess…err tamilnadu…Kerala most probably…

QT : My friend, you are mentioning mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive elements of the set.

[ I could not figure out whether finally my answer was taken or not but I played safe and kept quiet]

BFA : yes yaar, you can help me yaar… I have taken 20,33,262 from my friend at an interest rate of 10% p.a. I used it for starting a firm. I refunded 2,23,121 at regular intervals. Then after third year I gave 2000 debentures of Rs.2,100 each to my friend. Then I converted these debentures into shares and finally to preferential shares.
Now tell me yaar… what do you appreciate in this??

I: Sir, I appreciate your memory of recalling everything and your honesty of returning the loan.

CSE : Ok, tell me whats the average water consumption at your flat for a single day.

I : Sir, it depends on how many of my flat-mates take bath that day.

CSE : Ok. Lets assume all have taken bath.

I : Sir, then it depends on leisureness of the people as this determines how long they would like to take bath.

OB : hay-lo, hay-lo…What would you mean by a HALO effect.

I: It’s the effect of making people quiet when they go out of control by just saying HELLO two times.
(I was happy that I started my flow of correct answers)

QT : What is the probability of you getting into XLRI provided that I haven’t selected any student in my last 10 years of interviewing experience. Will you apply exclusive probability or conditional probability?

I : Applying conditional probability, Answer would be Close to zero.

QT : Finally You gave a correct answer my friend. You can leave now.

I: err…err..

BFA: Don’t worry…God is great and Life goes on…

(I leave sadly :-( )

FRAXER Identification simplified

FRAXER identification simplified:

Well friends, its high time on campus and till now many of us might have seen, liked and disliked fraxers. Here are some qualities of a fraxer:

1) A fraxer is the one who gets surprised the most in surprise quizzes. Moreover, even announced tests take him by surprise.
2) A fraxer has the capability of getting a glimpse of a 50-page case through his friend by the time he reaches learning center from mess.
3) A fraxer is the one who can be seen only changing the slides throughout the presentation.
4) Most difficult question for a fraxer on any Monday “ What have you done in last two days? ”
5) A fraxer knows the safest position in a typical BFA lecture so as to get one of the easiest questions. He also accurately estimates the question that he can get while his row is being interrogated.
6) A fraxer is the one who knows which professor concentrates on which area of the class and hence always tries to sit where the prof’s attention is the least.
7) A fraxer is the one who carries a laptop to library even during quiz time.
8) A fraxer is the one who carries 5 text books to the library just to keep all of them in locker and have a good time with his laptop. Seems like there are too many thieves in hostel.
9) A fraxer is the one who always does the appreciation job in group meetings which helps him not to scratch his grey cells for new points.
10) A fraxer is the one who is always on toes in any group meeting trying to find the best time to freak off.
11) A fraxer is the one who is clueless about text book and notes until quiz is announced or a rumor of surprise quiz floats.
12) Every professor has his/her timing of entering a class for lecture. Some enter prior to the lecture timing while some enter later. To know the exact timing of any prof, consult a fraxer.
13) A fraxer is the one who can give you exact time in seconds for reaching from any place in campus to learning center.
14) A fraxer is the one who is the happiest after any quiz as he always feels that he has done better provided the effort given by him in studying.
15) A fraxer needs just one notebook throughout any term. Not to mention, this notebook contains weird drawings and quotes at the end of the term.
16) A fraxer is a one who expects a wet night even in day time.
17) A fraxer is the one who sleeps in a class and still has the efficiency to discuss what was taught in class.
18) Given a dilemma amongst various priorities of work, a fraxer adds one more priority of sleep and brings it to top.
19) A fraxer can easily identify sincere and hard-working persons in class and forms a project group with them.
20) A fraxer is the one who wont jot down a single point in the whole 90-minutes lecture. He instead searches for the person who is noting down all the points who can help him later.

Tribute to John Nash (Bollywood Ishtyle)

Tribute to John Nash (Bollywood Ishtyle)

Finally, I got the time to write a blog.

Disclaimer : All the comparisons and statements given in this article are light-hearted comments and has nothing to do with the original work of these two legends. And moreover these are being given by an immature person who knows little about economics or application of mathematics in economics.

Adam Smith, I first came across this name in 2003. I was watching Beautiful Mind and the ever charming hero John Nash (Russell Crowe) concludes in one of the scenes that Adam Smith was wrong. I perfectly understood that Adam Smith was a legend but I didn’t care to get any more information about him.

To give you a background about the scene that I am talking about :
A blonde comes into a bar with her friends. Nash’s friends, as usual, come to him and start bullying him. But finally all of them notice that the blonde is looking towards Nash and that’s when you can see sparkle in Nash’s eye. Of course, not because of the blonde but because of his brilliant idea. I am saying it brilliant because I am going to use this idea as my reference for comparison with Adam Smith’s idea. Anyways, the dialogs go as below :

Sol: Nobody move...She's looking over here…She's looking at Nash.
Hansen: Oh, God. He may have the upper hand now, but wait until he opens his mouth. (Laughing) Remember the last time?
Bender: Oh, yes, that was one for the history books.
Hansen : Recall the lessons of Adam Smith, the father of modern economics.
"In competition...individual ambition serves the common good."
- Exactly.
- Every man for himself, gentlemen.
Bender: And those who strike out are stuck with her friends.
Hansen. I'm not gonna strike out.
Sol. You can lead a blonde to water, but you can't make her drink.

Nash : Adam Smith needs revision.

Hansen : What are you talking about?

Nash : If we all go for the blonde...we block each other. Not a single one of us is gonna get her. So then we go for her friends, but they will all give us the cold shoulder because nobody likes to be second choice. Well, what if no one goes for the blonde?
We don't get in each other's way, and we don't insult the other girls.
That's the only way we win. That's the only way we all get laid.
(Laughs)
Adam Smith said the best result comes from everyone in the group doing what's best for himself, right? That's what he said, right?

Others : Right.

Nash : Incomplete.
Incomplete, okay?
Because the best result will come...from everyone in the group doing what's best for himself...and the group.

Hansen : Nash, if this is some way for you to get the blonde on your own, you can go to hell.
Nash: Governing dynamics gentlemen. Governing dynamics. Adam Smith...was wrong.
Nash leaves the bar.

I was able to hear about Adam Smith recently again and it just reminded me of the movie. I tried to search Nash’s papers and theories but I could not really get this idea but lets assume that this is for real and Nash has worked on this part.

Now, the background is set and I am about to compare these two legendary ideas with reference to Bollywood movies. Yes, Bollywood movies, because these movies have everything in them which may just help us to get more insight about this competition and common good.
And effectively we are going to compare the following two theories:
Adam Smith : Individual ambition and selfish motives serves the common good and brings out the best result.
John Nash : The best result will come from everyone in the group doing what's best for himself and the group.

1) Lagaan: Lets get into this great Oscar nominated movie. Organization can be considered as the village of Champaner and the common good would be to get tax free for next 3 years. According to Adam Smith, if every village person takes it as a competition and apply their own selfish motive, common good should be achieved.
Bhuvan and others worked for their selfish motives and it almost helped them to achieve the common good.
Lets take the case of Lakha. Yes, the person who was involved in the match fixing. Lakha’s selfish motive was to get Gauri as well as to be more famous in village than Bhuvan. And it could be seen in the movie that the common good could not be achieved in the first half. Adam Smith’s theory looks incomplete in this case
It was later in the movie when Lakha understood what is best for him as well as team when he helps the motive to be achieved. And Nash’s theory works out.

2) Rang De Basanti : No need of any introduction for this movie. This dialogue says it all “There are only two ways to live life: Tolerate things the way they are... Or, take responsibility to change them”. Here I may raise some controversial matters. Organization was definitely India. Common good was to free India from corruption.
All the characters worked with their own selfish motives to achieve common good. Yes, there were selfish motives behind their sacrifices which may not be the same as the common good. For eg: Sidhharth had the selfish motive of trying to get rid of his father’s sins, Soha had the selfish motive of getting tribute to her husband’s sacrifice, Sue had her own little motive of making the film throughout, Amir had his motive of helping Sue, Sharman had his motive of being with his friends come what may. However, at the end it was the common motive which was driving them.
Anyways, was the common good achieved? There wasn’t any flaw and all worked what was best for their own and team. At the end, it looks like generation has awakened. But in real life, when the same incident was happened due to the sacrifice of an IIM-A alumni to get rid of corruption, it helped little. It may be because every citizen has his/her selfish motive and they work whats best for themselves rather than team.
However I would not give a point to Adam smith or John Nash in this movie as I feel both the theories were not effective completely.

Lets end it at a happy note. The evergreen movie DDLJ. A perfect example:

3) Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayange : This movie makes life simple for us and I would like to ask you to apply adam smith’s and nash’s theories before moving further.
Organisation being Simran’s family (excluding Satish Shah’s family : this assumption ought to be here). Common good : Welfare of the family and happiness of each and every individual of the family.
Selfish motive of Raj (SRK) being marrying Simran and Selfish motive of Amrish puri being marrying his daughter to Kuljeet.

Applying Adam Smith’s theory here just means that both of these people have to act selfishly for their motives which clearly indicates that common good cannot be achieved in either case. Either Raj elopes with Simran leaving whole family shattered or Amrish Puri gets his selfish motive accomplished leaving behind Raj and Simran shattered.
Now lets apply John Nash’s revision to Adam Smith’s theory. Raj has to do what is best for himself and the team (family in this case). Raj does the same and decides not to elope with Simran. And finally everyone knows that it was a win-win situation for everyone.
So, conclusion is DDLJ was a straight adaptation from John Nash’s principle :)

Finally, Nash scores 2/3 points in the 3 movies i have compared and Adam Smith Scores 0. It may be added here that Nash just revised Adam Smith's theory and hence Smith has to be given a lot of credit.

Comments regarding the flaws in the theory and some additons in the theory are welcome.

Mystery of Dognizant (Name Changed) Bomb Case Unveiled.

Aao sunaau pyaar ki ek kahaani,

Ek thaa Ladkaaa,

Ek thee Ladkee Diwaanee.

Naaaah!!!!



Bahut hogayi pyaar ki ghisee pitee kahaaniyaa…

Ab aap log yeh sunoh………..



Mystery of Dognizant (Name Changed) Bomb Case Unveiled.



5 Sep, Pune

Few days ago, a bomb was found in Dognizant and surprisingly police diffused it on time. After watching Hindi movies, I could grab one conclusion that police never does any job on time. This doubt forced me to form a detective agency and unveil the mystery. So heres it…the shattered plot of a deadly gangster and the way it was shattered.

First and main character of the story Lallan:




His name was Lallan from Katni (name changed) computer sustems. Government has a reward of Rs.10 for the person who catches him alive and Rs.2 for the person who catches him dead. And this Rs. 10/Rs.2 is because wives of police have long forgotten Kadva chaut cos now-a-days they observe Lallan ka wrat for safety of their husbands.

It started long back in an interview of Katni computer systems where Lallan got recruited. Katni’s professional relations with Dognizant got soured and they were in search for a person who would take revenge. Lallan wene for the interview and seeing 1,000 people for a single job, he started shouting “Hazaar log aur sirf ek post….bahut naa-insaafi”. Lallan with his tremendous dialogs and revealing the reward on him by police grabbed the job easily. But to bluff people, he started living with some S/W professionals and pretending as if he is a S/W engineer in Katni systems.

The plot got thickened when Katni’s CEO informed Lallan “Loha garam hai”. Lallan started asking his fellows “Christmas kab hai…kab hai Christmas.”This was the time when Lallan planned of a bomb blast in Dognizant killing more than 5,000 innocent people.

Finally the day arrived and Lallan sent out the bomb through courier post (quite a modern way) which entered Dognizant as per Lallan’s plan and it is about to explode in 15 minutes.



And here comes the second character of the story





Long ago, there was a scholar called Gangadhar in Khamgaon district. Lallan was his class-mate and he used to outperform Lallan everytime in every field. Zealous Lallan used to rag and beat Gangadhar quite often. But Gangadhar never used to complain this to anyone as he used to be scared of him or was he pretending to be scared. We will come to know about this soon.

Gangadhar finished engineering from the same college as Lallan and joined Dognizant. Now, both started living in same flat. This was one of the attempts from Lallan to disguise people. But what a co-incidence?

Today Lallan’s bomb is going to tear Gangadhar into pieces. Or is his fate going to change? Let’s see.








And here comes the last character of the story





Whole country is gripped in a new-sensation called Shaktimaan who has helped a lot in destroying these types of deadly plots. He is a national hero now but noone knows his origin and his real identity. Will he be able to destroy this Deadly plan of Lallan?



Lallan is aware of this super-hero but he is an over-confident chap who says this quote quite often “Lallan ka plan sirf ek aadmi fail kar sakta hai…aur wo hai khud Lallan!!”


Lallan, not to leave any stone unturned, entered Dognizant that day to see his plan doesn’t fail and planned to escape 5 minutes before the blast.

But as soon as he entered the campus, he saw very less people in campus and enquired “Itna sannata kyu hai bhai?” to which watchman replied its christmas day and Company has a holiday that day. Lallan shouted in anger “Nahiiiiiiiii ye nahi ho sakta…Chutti kisne di….kisne di chutti”. But Lallan then calmed down and decided that he would execute the plan and explode the building at least.



For his surprise, He saw Gangadhar in the campus. He was overjoyed seeing his counterpart and started ragging him by teasing and patting him on his head. Gangadhar as usual avoided him and left the place.


But he was sure there is some mystery seeing Lallan in his own campus. Cos Lallan was not one of those guys whom Katni would like to advertise and bring down their own image.



From Nowhere SHAKTIMAAN entered the campus, he thrashed Lallan. Lallan after saying “Sorry SHAKTIMAAN” informed him about bomb. SHAKTIMAAN diffused the bomb and got lost in the crowd again as usual. Police took whole credit but it’s high time, SHAKTIMAAN should be appreciated.

But as we know Lallan is not one of those who would easily forget his humiliation. He ran away singing “mai wapas aaunga…mai wapas aaunga”. We would be informing you the next plan of Lallan as soon as we come to know one.



Thanks to our Camera-man Chaitanya, Reporter Ashutosh and Editor Prathik without whom this mystery could not have got solved.





Part 2 soon to be released. Please let us know your comments about part 1 so that we can improve in part 2.

My XLRI Interview

Same interview with added smileys can be found out at following link:
http://www.pagalguy.com/forum/other-exams-xat-fms-jmet/29283-2008-xlri-pi-experiences-bm-4.html#post1016818

Panel: Long hair guy (L), High Exp Prof (E), calm Guy (C)
Me (I)
Interview Starts:
I(wishing evry1): Hello Sir X 3
C: (Pointing towards seat) You can give your file to me. [was very much confused where to keep it]
E: oh, So you are from Sinhgad College.[Oops… no tell me abt urself….no why MBA…prepared this so much ][I was also surprised cos sum1 really knows my college ]
I [smiling] : Yes Sir
E: road to college has become nice after you passed out.[oh My god. These profs know everything ]
I : Yes Sir. Actually it started improving in my final year itself.
E; Good [Suddenly points towards my specs. My spectacles & tie being blue in color]Have you done any deliberate effort to match your tie color with your spectacles.
I : Not Exactly Sir Its pure co-incidence.
E : What do you work on?
I: Sir, I am into performance testing. I check the performance of a client’s website and deploy it online if it meets the requirements.
L [Interrupts] : So why do you want to do MBA then?[oh finally I was able to bring up this question and now see where it goes ]
I : sir, My present job interests me because it tests my analytical skills but its not giving me a platform to display my strategy skills.
L: STRATEGY [in a surprised manner..looks like time to grill me on strategy ]
Ok. Tell me what is strategy.[Oops.. I am weak at definitions..let me try ]
I: it’s a technique used to achieve any objective.
L: So, Strategy is a technique. Are you sure?
I : Yes [over-Confident me Little did I know that I am speaking to a person teaching strategic management at XLRI ]
L: ok. Why do you think you are good at strategy?[I wont get a better chance to show my credentials ]
I: Sir, I have participated in Robotic events and won several prizes in IITs, NITs and other colleges. I was a strategy planner and used to do SWOT [oh no. where from this word came up ] analysis of my robots and other robots & create a strategy which would help us win.[me..making innocent face hoping that everyone overheard the SWOT word but…]
L : Oh. So SWOT analysis. How did you do that.
I: Sir, SWOT means strengths weaknesses opportunities and threats. I can explain it better if I can take some strategy as reference that I implemented. Can I?
L: yeah Yeah. Sure
I: I would like to tell about IIT-Powai competitionStrengths and weaknesses are the intrinsic factors which I might know even before entering the arena or before going for the competition. Its like I can identify these as soon as I prepared the robot.
L: how do you determine weaknesses, I mean weaknesses of your robot or your team or your institute.
I: robot as well as team
L: Ok. Continue. Better list them down.[Oh No. listing means I have to think up the next points while describing the present as I was blank about opportunities and threats ]
I : ok. Strengths were 1) GOOD Speed of robot (described briefly)2) good maneuvering SKILLS (described briefly)Weaknesses were 1) Low Torque2) Not too rigid cktsOpportunity was carpet was provided for free fall of robot which we exploited.[almost completed..was satisfied till now..until i was interrupted ]
L: I am keen about threats. Tell me threats
I [blank for fraction of a second ]: Sir, Competitors were threats. We had 2 teams, one from Iran and other from Nepal. Both were very strong. So, it would have been sensible not to collide with any of these teams until final as each round was a knock-out one. So, we deliberately scored less points in some of the rounds to avoid the clashes with them.[bang on target ]
L: Oh my god. You already know so much about strategy management. Why do you want to do MBA. You have done so much, I don’t think you need this.
I: Sir, The thing is I knew in & out of robotics and hence I was able to apply strategy. Now, I want to learn in & out of business before entering into business strategy.[This one was the acer ][All look convinced]
L: So, tell me some strategy based companies.
I: Sir, Consultancies normally help out in mergers and acquisitions and prepare strategy for the same.
L: Agreed. Tell me the companies.
I: Lehmann brothers, DE Shaw, Mc Kinsey.
L: is it a deliberate effort that you said Mc Kinsey at last. Its evry1s dream company after allI; No sir, its just that I recalled it late
E: And how do you know about De Shaw
I: Sir, its into s/w too and hence I know it.
L & E almost signing me off,
C just completed seeing my certificates.
C: Ok, So you spoke about mergers and acquisitions. Tell me 3 recent acquisitions wherein some Indian company has acquired foreign one.
I [blank ]: Sir, tata is having talks with jaguar but not yet finalized. I don’t remember any other now.
C: ok. Tell me acquisitions from last 2 years.[Again me blank]
I : I am sorry but I don’t know
E: you know there is something going on in Pune Airport and it has been stopped
I: yes Sir renovation work is going on.
E: is it still going on.
[spontaneously]I: No Sir, it started operating from yesterday. Work is done.
E: So that shows that you read newspapers. Then why could not you answer that question.
L: its just that he started reading newspaper after getting this call [pakda gaya ][All started laughing. Me too joined ]
C: Do you follow any sport?
I: yes. I follow cricket
C: Ok. Tell me what is a flipper. I will give u a hint, Anil Kumble does it.
I: Sir, is it the wrong spin.
C: No. that’s the doosra.
I: Ok. I don’t know about the flipper then.
L: Ok. Tell me the difference between square drive and square cut.[Can we move out of cricket please ]
I(confused and again blank): Sir, I am weak at terminologies.
C: But you said you follow cricket?
I: Yes. I am good at statistics [I should not have said this but that was the only way I could have taken one more chance of answering a general awareness question]
L: oh. Statisics. Ok. Listen to this. Azharuddin in his period scored 3 centuries consecutively on 3 grounds in a series. Tell me 2 of these 3 grounds. Ok, Even one would be fine.[I was like…oh my god XLRI to gaya abhi….gaadi me baitho aur ghar wapas chalo ]
C(giving me a hint): One would be very easy
I : Sir, One should be Eden gardens.
L: oh. Good. Now tell me the second one.
I: I am sorry but I don’t know the others. I have to accept I am weak at general awareness.
C: ok. Then. It was good talking to you. You can leave
I: Thank you.