ME, MUSIC AND MTECH

 six months back i had posted about the big turn in my life that is creating a new way of life for me. having spent one full semester at IITD, it was time to sit down and look deeply at how things went. on the whole i am very happy to have reached here, not just this institute but this way of life. one major change that i went through was to be myself and to do things genuinely rather than just saying that "i am genuine". i realized that primarily we have to be a good human. everything else follows. though its difficult to put everything in words, still i will make an attempt at this! but before that i have something interesting to share!!

     all these blogs would seem lifeless if i dont mention the presence of love in my life. for the initial part of my life i had felt extreme lack of belongingness to the world. sadly our world seems crumbling down. but something mysterious still holds it firm. this mysterious force lies in all the souls and expressed by those who clear of their minds. this is how the force of love seems to me. love is the very essence of life and the source.
      in our teen years, sexual attraction is a predominant part of our thoughts and its quite interesting to explore this whole new world of uncertainties and excitement. god has wired us like that but it seems that our way of living has an effect. think of this student who was never asked what he wants to do but he is probably studying science and on the way to be an engineer. he wont be enjoying the process and how much will he be distracted in his thoughts (though this applies to both genders). it is generally said that people have become fake but isnt our lifestyle fake?? rather than becoming able, we have been focusing on getting degrees. the whole structure turns fake then and that is the tragedy of life today. this has transcended into our consciousness and corrupted it. yesterday i saw a video which said do what you will do if their was no money! ironically most of the people will say, why is their a need to do work if their is no need to earn. it seems obvious but deeply it shows how mechanical we have become. nevertheless, knowing the truth becomes utterly important then. for me love is the way to truth, the process. love doesn't come naturally these days because our minds are blocked.
      so as i entered my college more than 5 years back, i was immensely attracted towards a classmate on the very first day. she was in red (my favorite color :) ). lets not get into that! i enjoyed following her, trying to listen to her, noticing her expressions!! what an excitement! and in few days i could contact her and she was unaware in her innocence about what i was conspiring :). and soon i proposed her. i have always liked this habit of mine to just go for anything i feel right. at that time this was the best thing to do. obviously their was no positive reply but with all dedication i was determined to "get" her. and slowly we got into a relationship. this was the peak but after the peak is the downfall and this was very steep. almost all of a sudden i realized "what the hell is this" for past so many months i have been using the word "love" without even knowing what it is. i communicated this to her. this was not a phase of excitement and fun but a phase of realization and that struggle to know oneself and to actually love..out of nothing love developed like grass grows from the soil. cutting the remaining story short, so much has happened and what has remained is love and the experiences later were so fulfilling that no pleasure, monetary success seemed to matter. love saved me from a depressing phase of life. and now wherever i am she is there. their is no "peaking" excitement as was their years back but i still wait to listen to her, her voice still seems as fresh as ever. but now i know it is love that gives sense to everything. through her i became what i am. their is no want of possession as was their but peace. the reason i mentioned about her is because it is through her that the world makes sense to me, that i became aware of myself, that i could think openly, that i could think of my relation to my family and others, that i could follow my dreams and be myself and to write this blog and everything. lastly, my music sir, who has been like an elder brother and great friends at the music class have become so important to me. and love is not confined to people and i could relate to everybody as part of the supreme soul.

      aha! too much of philosophy there! so coming back to IIT, it was a very interesting time. i got my new bicycle making sure that its light weight and i am continuing going to music class on it around 30 kms to and fro. it has been an enriching experience in itself. in academics, we had 5 subjects and a lab. the good part was that i was able to learn about many fields which opens up ones mind. the bad part was that some of the teachers were not making sense. those courses went normally like a routine job. they were like the wasteful education we generally receive. it was an eye-opener to see that in IIT. but this one teacher, prof. s.c. mullick was just somebody i was looking for! i never missed his class (he taught heat transfer) and his philosophy and way of teaching and expressing was marvelous. i would sit in his class with total attention (obviously because i was at peace as mentioned above) and would follow him word by word and that was like a one hour ride. my imagination was at work then and he kept up this excitement in me throughout the semester.there are so many things i learnt from him that i am still not able to inculcate them. my belief in the role of a teacher (which i aspire to be) was strengthened. another great teacher was dr. abhyankar who taught power system protection. i had been interested in this area. he was quite interactive and open and the way he portrayed the subject matter was much like an interesting story. i was learning the art of protection and the art of teaching. the classes took a small part of the day and somehow music started gaining importance and i practiced more and the realization that was coming was this: why do i feel so perfect at my music school. i had tried learning music years back but it didnt work. now IIT has some good teachers and environment but overall it was not making sense to me. later when we were asked to read research papers, i realized that india is not the land of technical research (research in basic sciences has been world-level). i started thinking of universities abroad being their for centuries. they have a process of technical research which is following a natural process of evolution. whereas as my institute is around 50 years old and in a country where research is like a last option for people. in classical music, like great technical universities, the process of evolution was present over so many centuries. that made my music school (established before IITD) much more important for me. recently i also realized that technical research doesn't make sense to me. i am passionate about music, psychology and science research. and i dont know how, but everything is complete when i do music and unlike an urge to reach somewhere in music, i am happily moving on my path of evolution with music. it was great to be in IIT also because it gave me the view of the bigger picture of life, of both the material and spiritual world.

   in the initial months an interesting thing happened. most of my friends in my class wished to enter engineering services or other government jobs, one like i had left. this gave me an undue attention right from the beginning. and everybody made assumptions regarding me. somehow i didnt like that as this differentiated me. right from childhood i have this hate for the unhealthy culture prevalent around. male dominance was one such problem i disliked including male ego. a cheap way it manifests in a male is when he starts looking at the female sex and an "object" of sexual fulfillment. i believe love saved me from that. other problems also bother me. i had been believing that females are the ones being opperesed and hence to be supported. so there were these two girls in our class with whom i started interacting and all my frustrations came out and i expressed my frustration over that way people have become including some of my classmates. there was something more that was happening. the want to prove ourselves right and others as wrong has been there in us and this was playing with me at that time. i was presenting an ideal picture of mine trying to gain sympathy and importance from a female. this episode ended with the exposure of what all i had talked about. and everybody was shocked also because lot of exaggerations were incorporated. i didnt try to justify myself as it was time to accept. i had been thinking about the faults in others but i was at fault myself and this was a great lesson for me and i remember, i smiled the moment i totally realized this. i also felt happy that my false image was broken and that people can see me as just another person. and it was because of strength of love that i could have the courage to accept. i realized that the wish to show-off is harmful to our own happiness and growth. with her immense support i could gain a more peaceful state of mind.

  at my music class, music lessons continued and relations strengthened. after the class, we would go to "rao sahab's" tea halt just close to vidyalya. he sits on the sidewalk and what is different about him is that he is a writer and while managing other things has been able to write books and novels which has been his passion. he sits there everyday with his unique expressions. he has his biscuits and mathis which we enjoy with tea. i had been observing him from month and we havent talked much. he just sits there, makes tea with his books showcased for sale and his photos with the president of india, in the background. i always think of him with all these ingredients. sitting there, sometimes when i am alone, i think of him, his life (he shared his life in a ted talk) and what has been his journey. he has taught me without saying anything much more than those some of those teachers at IIT. yesterday i bought his book. he suggested me to read raamdass (a novel). interestingly the story is about a great teacher and his student. i told him that i will read it soon and discuss with him. that place gave a space for us to talk of music and life and it served as "food for thought". one day sachin bhaiya asked me there if i wanted to go to hazrat nizammudin dargah. i took some time but just to realize how much i thought of going there! sachin bhaiya is no less that a celebrity, atleast he has interviewed and met much more that we know. he is a RJ for last 16 years and almost everyone knows him in delhi. he is there on red fm between 2 and 5pm. it was a great place to visit and i was feeling fortunate to have come. we sat and taked about life. then we met the dargah head who also knows him. he goes there on every thursday. yesterday we heard qawalli. music makes sense to me in these forms. it gives much more strength to follow the genuine path.

i have discussed less about IIT because physically and mentally i wasnt much involved and their is nothing new in exams and classes and proxies...i had been thinking about people like steve jobs who were doing nothing and were homeless at a point. was it an option for me to leave everything and do music? then i realized that i have to be genuine and do what i feel right. i never opened books and was only attending classes. staying in delhi is very difficult unlike now when we are not to worry about funds due to scholarship. and like rao sahab, life can really be balanced and one must not think of just setting an example. one has to be himself and not compare with others. one must grow and compare with what one was yesterday. the end of the semester was good for academics. i could secure an sgpa of 8.67 (the only imp. thing was to have above 7 to save the scholarship !) with my only A grade in heat transfer. i could perform well in its last exam. i went to see prof. mullick to seek his guidance and thank him. i told him that what all i used to imagine while following his lecture was surprizingly there in the question paper and that this has amazed me. he was happy to listen..we talked of many other things like music and psychology. i shared my confusion about the major project that we have to do in the 2nd year. he told me that he will do something after giving a good thought. it was an enjoyable interaction. this reminded me of my habit of just doing what i feel right without thinking on the negativities! i also had a brief talk with abhyankar sir. he could understand what i was doing as he has been indirectly associated with classical music and he suggested me to keep exploring life. i hope to interact more with these professors who have kept up my hopes high!

this post has to end with something about music. in last weeks , we had been doing raga malkauns and it has a pentatonic structure and i was getting messed up in the notes sometimes. this helped me to practice more. i had heard a composition in coke studio of a qawalli group wherein a small part comes which was in raga malkauns. i studied that and the fusion seemed great with the main piece. i discussed it with my music teacher also. few days later sachin bhaiya told that the same qawalli group knows him and they are performing in delhi.. after our music class we went there and another famous sufi singer was performing. then the qawalli group performed. listening live music is always great as we become one with the "field of sound" created there. later, we were able to meet that group and listen to them as we went with sachin bhaiya and i was thinking about how i was admiring that composition some days back and now i was sitting with them. the jist of the talk was the "roohani contact" which refers to the spiritual connect which is there with the supreme. life is magical with these experiences and events that pop up now and then and yes with love!!!