Stop Wasting Petrol !!

Hi folks, though most of my posts have had a hint of intended humour in them, in doing so I don’t intend to disregard some of the serious issues that we should address but we fail to, because of the common myth that they are not our concern.
The other day I happened to be part of a discussion on the so called failure of the Central Government to curb inflation. The problem with most people in India is that they believe - in a Democratic Nation - it is their birthright to criticise the Government without any factual or statistical knowledge. I once read somewhere a statement enunciated by Bal Gangadhar Tilak. It said, “Be true in your facts and be just in your criticism.” And the message struck home the moment I read it. If we abide by this rule of the thumb, a lot of our problems could be understood, if not solved, for understanding the problem is fundamental to its solution. Drifting back to the discussion, a lot of emphasis was reposed on the hike of petroleum products. People were blaming the Government for being incompetent and even claimed that the only solution was a change in the Government. I understood at once that people were choosing the easy way out, choosing to fix the blame rather than fixing the problem, for the simple reason that it required the least effort on their part. Speaking without thinking or foreknowledge is what some people are best at. However I chose to listen rather than speak, for my opinions were different and I wanted to do some research to find out the statistically accurate figures before concluding anything.
I had read in novels long ago that the world was facing a power crisis and the situation was bound to worsen over the years. The conventional resources of energy were waning away and only the nascence of a new source could bring about some respite. But I was not sure of the current state of things. Therefore, I did tad research and did some calculations, which a sixth grader can efficiently perform. I’ll show you the stepwise calculations.
Oil is internationally traded in New York and London and denominated in US Dollars only. Crude oil is distributed in barrels which hold 42 gallons of oil ( when converted into litres comes to about 159 litres per barrel). The petrol content of crude oil is about .48 litres per litre. Excise, taxes and raw material refining also add to the cost of petrol per litre.

Cost of a 159 litre barrel of crude oil (as on 3rd July) : US $145
1 US Dollar = 42.975 Indian Rupees ( as on 11th July )

Cost of a 159 litre barrel of crude oil in Rupees : 145 x 42.975 = Rs. 6231.375
Petrol content of a barrel : 159 x .48 = 76.32 litres

Cost of 1 litre petrol = 6231.375 / 76.32 = Rs. 81.65

Taxes, refining costs and transport etc. amount to about another 10 rupees per litre

Therefore, the effective cost of petrol per litre is about Rs. 92

I hope nobody had any problem understanding my calculation. As it is evident, our country gets petrol at Rs. 92 per litre and we get it at say Rs.54 per litre. Obviously the Government is incurring a huge loss by paying a subsidy of about Rs. 38 per litre. And we blame the Government for not being able to control inflation.
What we do is misuse petrol and put more and more pressure on our Government by increasing the loss incurred by it. We cause our nation to be poor and put the blame on our economic policies.
This is just one chapter of the whole story. This is just about oil. There are various other fronts where we are weakening our nation, with our not-my-business and I-don’t-care attitudes. If we make efforts to understand the root of our problems, we might be able to actually contribute to the solution of them

Hi Folks !Good News for all my college mates at IIIT H. I did some turning of stones on the AIEEE website ( aieee.nic.in ) to find out how our beloved IIIT H was faring this year in the AIEEE Counselling and I am publishing my observations here . In fact, I plunged into their records and collected the data pertinent to the six most prestigious Institutions associated with AIEEE , and on the basis of these observations, you could help me to draw some sort of a conclusion as to where our college stands in the list of the most coveted institutions.

Note 1: On account of my personal opinion and statisical support, I believe the CS and IT departments are the first ones on the choice sheets , and so I have only collected the Opening and Closing Ranks of these two branches and chosen to leave out the rest .

Note 2: Only the Opening and Closing Ranks of the seats offered to the General Category as part of the All India ( AI ) Quota have been considered. This was a necessary protocol because the closing ranks of seats offered through the Home State ( HS ) quota are way low and don't represent the All India Struggle truly and it would have given an undue advantage to the IIITs over the NITs. Now the rules of the game are the same for every college without any wild cards.

The Data Sheet :



Note ( only for IIIT-H students. Others kindly ignore ): For all those who believe that CSD is a pain-in-the-butt , kindly subtract the opening rank of the CSD from the opening rank of the CSE . Now take an equivalent number of pen drives and shove them up your a**e . ( Joking. No offence intended to the CSE geeks. Such stunts are to be performed by trained professionals. Don't try this at home. )

ENGINEERS ARE NOT COOL

Its been a long harboured belief ( though I'd have used the term myth, I realise that the time is simply not ripe for that ) that Engineers ( I'm talking about those who get into the top colleges in the Nation, not just any Random person on earth who has gotten into any Engineering College ) are not fun loving people ( or in other words are nerds). They're viewed by others as a different species altogether. That they've no sense of humour, that they're book-wormish geek-like pain-to-be-with types who seldom have the time to say anything apart from polymorphism and recursion, that they're pre-absorbed in wondering if there was another solution to the Tower Of Hanoi , that they don't love parties in happening places , that they are short of confidence and still send friend requests to girls on Orkut, feigning insouciance, and that they're uncool. For all people who have such RATIONAL beliefs , I'd really appreciate if someone came forward and explained to this humble and ignorant prospective engineer what according to them was the definition of a cool person.

Or let me make a wild guess : a cool person uses - in trend - words like wassup ,yo baby , stylo which elude all attempts at capture by those compiling a dictionary ; messes with the conventional ways of spelling english words by spelling my as ma and life as lyf , physics ( if at all he/she uses the vestigial word ) as fysix ; wears self designed apparel that defies the plain un-materialistic human comfort ; has piercings and tattoos in strange places ; dances in discos thrice a week ; drinks to the tune and smokes to the flow of the surging adrenaline ; misbehaves and calls it attitude ; moves around on modified sports bikes ; does many a thing beyond human understanding . Well my apologies if I missed out something that should've been mentioned as part of the comprehensive definition. And I agree that engineers ( you know whom I'm talking about ) are uncool , for they can hardly meet the QUALIFICATIONS of a cool person , even if they fulfil some parametric requirements like drinking like a pro does ( but I've seen them lose their colour after a single shot though. See, they don't practice enough .) So , on the basis of our definition , we conclude that engineers are UNCOOL . Fair enough. But it still remains a fact that engineers are gifted, specially in the areas of logical deduction and scientific thinking and that they are not afraid to contest any belief if they don't believe in its authenticity. And the world bears a testimony of such people and their attempts to question even the most OBVIOUS statements. Time and again we've seen them rise from anonymity and challenge Gods of the modern times - Newton and Einstein - and then get lost in oblivion. They have their 15 months of fame and then years of degradation, which goes on to prove that even if Engineers are uncool, they are simply not ORTHODOX. And being a prospective Engineer, I am but no exception to the rule . At this point of time, I'll not say that your definition of a cool person is flawed. I'd rather say that different people have different ways of defining words that are branded as being slang and no suitable meanings for which are found in any of the Dictionaries.

Well, Engineers are uncool if you go by the mythological definition. But I am UNORTHODOX and I choose to mould the definition to suit my needs. I believe that being UNORTHODOX is cool. I believe that challenging some law, knowing fully that your opinion will - more or less - be crushed in its infancy is super COOL. Standing up for whatever you believe in , even if no one else does , that is cool. Facing the dire realities of life ( or lyf or whatever ) and choosing to see them rather than shutting the innate perceptive abilities is COOL. Accepting your flaws and not trying to sweep them under the rug of nonchalance, that is cool. Humility is cool. I'm fine with it even if it shows a lack of the conventional attitude. Isn't respecting everyone cool ? Wouldn't it be cool if someone respected you ? I believe that profanity of language in an attempt to appear cool is highly UNCOOL. Richness of language is cool. I happened to be with some CONVENTIONALLY COOL people the other day. I was shocked to see one of them misspell "opportunity" and no one was able to locate the error even after my reprimand. Illiteracy is definately not cool. Literacy is cool. Wearing whatever you are comfortable in , even if it is not in fashion, is cool. I disagree that Engineers lack a sense of humour. Its just that people don't understand their jokes when they say that " the name of the Rock Band Infected Mushrooms is derived from the symptoms of a water borne disease prevalent in the Rain Forests of the equatorial region". Intellectual humour is so Cool.

Engineers are deprived of the "Cool" tag because they are different. Being DIFFERENT is cool.Its true that they've strived hard to make it to a good college, and its also true that it requires some sacrifices and self-restraints on their part but what is not true is that they don't have the necessary ingredient in them that others pursuing law or management or arts or say fashion designing or whatever possesess , that makes them cool. I believe that anyone on Earth can be cool and we ENGINEERS are no MARTIANS.

Hey

Hi,I am Siddhartha Chandra. I come from a place called Allahabad. Right now I am doing my B.Tech. 2nd year in Computer Science from IIIT Hyderabad. I am 20 years old. I am fascinated by the concept of a profession profile . Therefore I aim to be a writer, a singer and a cook. But as a safety net I'd first like to be an engineer and then maybe try for an MS in Finance. Most people are scared at the thought of having a Boss ( a single one ) in Office, but if I succeed in getting to work in all the fields I want simultaneously, I might be gifted with as many as half a dozen different Bosses. Then - in an engineer's language - I'll be doing multi tasking and my Bosses would be doing time - sharing. Enjoy !