The mission of admission

It still makes me laugh when i remember the incidents that took place when i went to M M College for admission. The long queue which reached outdoor!! Actually I had to wrack my head over and over a lot before I got the final admission, and i used M M College just as a safety valve (in case i didn't get chance in Govt. College). I had applied for Honours course in this college, where the total number of seats were 40. Yes, some seats were reserved for SCs, STs and OBCs (keep in mind my words). Now, on the day of counseling, I went there. It began on time. I still remember the face of an idiotic fellow there. He was repeatedly warning from the beginning that we'd not get admission if we didn't obey. For example, 'don't break the queue or else you won't get admission', and even the tone of our dearest SXS teachers, 'don't shout in the queue or else u won't get admission!!' This threaten, of course, made me very angry, not because it was a lie, not also because he was talking to us as if we were kids.... I was angry just because these words were liked by me only when our teachers said them at school. We had given the right only to them to threaten us for this!!

Anyways, after a lot of struggle, I finally entered the counseling room, which was a mere dirty classroom, with spider webs on the corners. The counseling began with a long speech of a great celebrity..... The Principal. He had come out of his AC room, for his long speech. My heartbeat kept increasing! The idiot threatener was rotating like a supervising examiner. We, the candidates, with our files, were sitting there.

I suddenly noticed my big mistake.... My form's receipt!! I had left it somewhere!! Did it fall down from my pocket while i entered in?? Or did I leave it at home?? Shit!! My heart beat increased.

The counseling began. First came the list of SC, then ST, and then OBC. Out of the 40 seats, only 29 were for them!! They were called one after the other according to their aggregate marks. The lowest mark was 202.

Now came the turn of we, the generals. 11 seats for us!! The highest ranker was called. Then, the next one. The absentees were cancelled, and the remaining ones got benefitted. Despite lower marks, they were admitted. I could feel the 'lubb dubb' inside me. High tension!!

But my tension came to a full stop when the idiot said, after a fellow with 380 marks got admitted, 'our 40 seats are filled up. So no more admissions'.

Today I thank God I didn't get admission there. But that time I was under a grip of several negative thoughts. 'Will i be left with washing dishes?', 'will my studies stop?', 'I can't stand in front of my SXS batchmates', 'what will i tell my friends n relatives??' bla bla.... ran over my head everytime.

A fellow of the same college told me to come for admission in general course on a particular date. But the chance was 50-50.

On that day I went for the admission. The Long queue would even fail the length of the length of Rajdhani Express!! But I had to get into it. Why did that 'manhoos' idiot boy come again? He still said those empty threatens, and told to split the line into two.... Boys and girls. This ate our two minutes. Again one elderly fellow came and told 'Make a single line itself'. The outcome was, the queues remained two itself, but some confusions made us go a few steps backward!! (Grrrr!!)

And then, the queue would defeat even the person running a slow race. Every individual took around 15 minutes to get admission! The fellow behind me got brought a Kurkure packet. I too got some from him. My mum n aunt, who had come with me, bought cakes, and ice-cream. Similarly, many others in the queue got some food items. We joked that the line was so slow that we could sit down there and have a picnic!!

Joke come true!!!! The queue was extraordinarily slow. A time came when we were tired of standing. We squatted, and later sat down with legs crossed, eating our 'kurkure's, and cakes.

The girls' queue was longer. They were admitting a girl, and a boy. But due to the requests of a kind lady who was with us, the system changed to 'two girl, and one boy'.

As a result, the girls became very happy, but boys just frowned. I could see the fair young girl parallel to me on the girls' queue. She was chatting with a guy standing beside me, with a helmet on his hand (he was not in the queue). The girl drank water from her bottle, and passed it to that guy. I too got a share of the water on request.

We were getting slower. Girls became faster. The fair young girl soon went forward, still chatting with the guy, at times teasing and making faces at him. (Later i came to know they were on the verge of getting married. The girl's parents had sent the guy as her bodyguard, may be to test if he'd be able to guard her body once they were married).

I was, by now, dead tired, with sweat all over my body. Same was the condition of the others standing there. A time came when we sat down again. Our 'picnic' continued. Then, the same old idiot guy came once again, this time with a bundle of pages. He distributed them among us. It was a fresh form. This time too, the idiot's words came, "if you shout, i will not give you the form!". At which cursed moment was he born?! Anyways, We had to fill it and deposit it along with the new one.

To fill the form, we had to get out of the queue. I filled it. Amazing! The 'blood group' option was not known to many. They didn't know what to write there. Some randomly wrote A or B or O, and put + or -. Thanx to God that i had brought my photo with me. I had to paste it there.

When i joined the queue again, I was very careful not to go further backward. But i went back by around 3 steps. I couldn't stop this. But many went back around 10 steps in this procedure.

This time, the situation became unbearable. The persons who accompanied us, (parents, guardians, groom(s), etc) went forward and saw whats happening there. To their (and later, our) surprise, the present students, who were of the ruling party (trinamool), took their near and dear fellows with them, and got their admission done, while we struggled at the queue.

What could then be left behind? We raised our voices. What an irony!! We, the 'ordinary's, were raising voice against the guys belonging to the ruling party!! I could hear my mother speaking to one of them, "you are working for (mamata) didi, right? Did your didi tell you to do THIS?!"

Ultimately the partiality was towards its end. The guardians strictly didn't allow any more partiality. When the girls' queue became of same length as that of boys' queue, the process of 1 boy and 1 girl began again. Everything went smoothly thereafter. I submitted the documents and money, got my receipt, and came out. The queues, i saw, were still very long. Might be the last fellow could get admitted at around 8pm.

I felt greatly relieved! Finally I could get it...!! But I had no wish to be in this college. I remember, in the counseling, the HOD had told, "students never came here to study. They were repeatedly absent. On being asked, their parents said their boy/girl came out of the house everyday for college". Such is the college! And secondly, meeting HOD was an 'Eid ka chaand'. He sat in his closed AC office, and seldom got out.

Later when I got admission in Govt. College, I was overjoyed. I've heard, this college is far better than the previous one. Here, the teachers are from Jadavpur University, and many such named institutions.

I'd never be able to forget that 'war' in the MM College. I'd also not forget the huge preference given to the reserved class. The mission of admission we had, has, but taught me one thing:
You can't get fruit if you only have patience. Patience is good, but too much of it is never good. If it crosses the limit, we have the whole right to violate and protest!!