Miles to go...

Well, career dilemmas are a part and parcel of the life of any person who dares to think beyond what comes easy to him on a platter and who nurtures higher ambitions. This is that time of the year, when the dilemma have crossed me with a volley of questions, since past few years, which I have always tried to answer with a bit of nervousness, yet a firm conviction for where I want to see myself, a few years down the line. This post is not meant to convey my thoughts on different career paths I could have taken, nor is it to undermine any one of them or to eulogize another. It's more on the lines of an answer to my own self, a self strengthening address that I consider extremely subjective, an answer to the almighty question - 'To be or not to be'.

Tomorrow, the newspapers will be full of the hefty pay package figures that students from the prestigious IITs were offered on day 1 of campus placements today. The multinational corporations that would figure in the news items would range from the flamboyant consulting firms, to the mighty financial industry and investment banks, the IT giants that have become indispensable in our lives and other technology big shots. The names of course had been latecomers to my vocabulary, just like IIT was. In India, unlike many western developed nations where the youth chose a career path that they see to befitting their aptitude and attitude, students here are fed with dreams and destinations, right after they start comprehending speech, by their parents. It is certainly not a tradition if not an exception for a person to look beyond the world their parents live in and show to their children. It is for this very reason that one may find lawyers' children often opting for law schools, doctors' children becoming doctors, bureaucrats' wooing their children to join civil services and big businessmen and industrialists laying down the red carpet for the entries of their children, however qualified, into their legacy sooner or later. Then there remains a fraction, who are unable to pursue the above mentioned few career professions, and they are more likely to guide their children towards engineering studies. Coupled by an insatiable demand for the technologists in today's globalised knowledge economy, it comes as no surprise that India produces almost 3 lakh engineers every year. Of course there are numerous exceptions to this more or less generalized scenario (which happens to be my personal observation, with not a lot of empirical evidence to support with, yet would be acceptable to many). I have for the time being chosen not to take into the ambit of this blabber piece, the non professional courses to avoid further digression from what I really wanted to convey when I began.

So, I happen to be in category of the second fraction mentioned above. I, having schooled in humble schools with a humble peer group, never ever cared to worry a lot about life beyond a student life. With no specific reason to be particularly attached to any common or uncommon career, I took my studies as they happened to come, pursuing them passionately being my only duty. It was only when I chanced to clear NTSE, that I started hearing rumblings of making to some good institution, from my parents and teachers. After matriculating with flying colors, the question of choosing one of manifold path for higher studies never became a huge and cumbersome one to select an answer to. I made an easy choice into engineering stream. I was till then, not one of those few who knew what they want to do with a clear and concrete aim. Being inquisitive about hows and whys of everything, and a so called scientific approach, I dreamt of becoming a scientist or join NASA when I was small, endless skies always took over my imagination. But I feel so naïve to think back, that those dreams were never substantiated with the information of what it actually took to be one. Anyways incidentally for me, but deliberately on part of my parents, I started taking coaching for IIT JEE, which I eventually cleared.

It was then, at IIT, that I was out of the boxed life (not that I despise it) for the first time. To begin with, I took over this place's curriculum also in a mundane school-like way. But sooner than I realized, I came across the window to the real world. Blessed by ambitious nature to excel and succeed, an enlightened group of seniors ready to act as guiding light, and a more exposed peer group, I happened to see what lies beyond a students' life, and the notion of making over to the next phase of life started hitting me.

I did everything I felt a serious student and a person with opportunity to learn should do. Knowing well, that the rat race is ubiquitous, and just being in IIT doesn't matter any longer, I tried to maintain a profile well suited (at-least this is what I think, as it was not put to many tests) for making to any of the promising careers, either in the firms that are going to be mentioned in tomorrow's newspapers, or to the even higher institutes of learning, which might as well have got me into NASA, who knows!!

It is here that I would like to look back again, in times when one seed was sown when I was small. I remember the long evening walks my father used to take me for. It was during those  walks that I got to learn the important lessons of life and world as seen by my father. My father had always admired civil services as the best career profession, for himself and also aspired the same for me. His aspirations perhaps were even strengthened by his trust in me and my capabilities. He used to narrate me the incidents exemplifying the grandeur and prestige associated with the services. Perhaps, he himself never considered private jobs as a very good option, especially at that time, when IT revolution was just starting to take massive dimensions that were to be manifested a few years later. I personally had never got into close contact with civil servants, but the sight of occasional red beacon light cars zooming in the town, the grand red walled limitless mansion of district collector guarded heavily by alert policemen, used to catch my attention. I covertly did start to dream of such a future for myself too.

But in IIT, these thoughts took the back seat when I got acquainted to the more glamorous, and sought-by-all, day one jobs from the campus. Perhaps, in fact this may be true for quite many others, my liking for the big shot and often two or three abbreviated company names was due to the distinction gained by those who cracked these, their inaccessibility for most others, and just like a class rank for a school going kid is the ultimate aim, these tags became a parameter for me to judge my achievements.

Sooner than later, however, the old resilient idea came back. It may be difficult to single out the reasons for its revival, but parental persuasion, due to their perspective on (then ostensibly 'limited' but highly 'judicious' in hindsight) recession and a long experience of life, I was again made to think of considering civil service as a career choice. I certainly had the liking for it since ever, but I needed more to convince me. I got a chance to spend a semester on exchange in France. Perhaps the long stay away from India stirred a patriot in me, and perhaps a lot of other events on a personal front and a broader view of the outside world during that period made me study more of the opportunities I would get as a civil servant. Opportunities, to serve better, myself, my folks and my nation, that would allow me to make an impact on lives of millions, a success in terms of satisfaction indeed. I juxtaposed them with other alternatives I had and found every 'zarra' now conspiring to bring me closer to the old dream.  Out of curiosity for the work in private sector, I got a short stint in the corporate world during my completely non-technical technical internship at the end of my third year. This was the turning point indeed, as I came to know what I never wanted to do. I was certainly not prepared to live a life, without much diversity, a monotonous, fixed-hours job, with loads of money, but hardly any time to spend it. It was glamorous indeed, more youthful, but ill-suited to my nature at least.

I took the decision not to opt for the campus placements last year, and here I am today, back in the horde of aspirants, earlier for securing a place in IIT and having succeeded in it, now for getting into civil services. This brings me back to the theme I started with. A dilemma. This dilemma is certainly not because I am not sure what I want to do, but certainly arises out of the fact that the path of a civil servant aspirant is full of despairs, as numerous as hopes. It is a long one, with immense uncertainty. Preparing for this exam becomes even more strenuous when the burden of taking up responsibility of bearing up oneself starts piling on. I do not doubt the fruits of success, but the dent of failure can be devastating. At this juncture, when the path ahead is vague and indistinct, the thought of taking up the more common path would appear sensible, especially when I would read through tomorrow's newspapers, stopping to think what I missed.  But having written through this piece of blog, I have relived the moments of my life that made me take the decisions I took, and now I know again that I took them for a reason. It may take some time for the efforts to bear fruits, or they even might not. But for sure, irrespective of the consequences, I won't lament in grey years of my life, when the gains and losses of present would become irrelevant, that I did not do what I always wanted to do, or at least tried for it - to pay back to my people in a way I feel it is meaningful.