Deepti Shenai

IT 2005, M.Tech IIT Bombay, Mumbai.

Worked with Wipro Technologies for a year and a half after graduation and then joined IIT Bombay in July 2007 an M Tech in Computer science and engineering. My technical interests include embedded systems and networking.

I belong to a small town in southern Maharashtra, so when I first came to Mumbai I felt completely out of place. With time, I began to get the hang of it. My classmates and my hostel friends were really helpful in that regard. At times, I felt that the college was not so good and then there were times I felt it is not all that bad. At the end of it what matters is what you learn from the institution and your contribution toward making the institution better.

When I joined, we did not even have a building of our own and half the energy went into walking from one building to the other. Over the years. I have seen the infrastructure getting better. Development is an ongoing process. We need to learn to make best use of what we have. The guidance and knowledge shared by teachers was indeed very helpful. Things like following protocols, presentation skills, fonts and formats looked subtle at that time, but helped me later in my life.

I was the CR of my class and also part of the student council. To be very specific, being CR means scheduling lectures, distributing photocopies, internal mark sheets, handling class level money matters and a host of small time consuming activities. At any time there are more than two groups with their interests conflicting and you have to make everyone equally happy or equally sad. Though you get to interact with almost everyone in the class and also with the teachers and the non teaching staff, it seems like a pain at the time.

Working with council takes you one level above. You interact with people from all classes and all branches. You get variety of experience as you work hand in hand with your seniors, juniors and other college councils. Organising an event helps you develop managerial skills. Be it the budget, the publicity or volunteer coordination, at the end of it you learn something that you will not find written in any book.

Under the pressure of completing one's own assignments, one might look at these things as a burden. You try to find an escape, either by not opting for the post or by not fulfilling your duties but that does not pay off in the future. Instead you face it, you make it.

It is good to start volunteering. This makes you a better coordinator next year and even a better event head. With time experience counts.

After all these years, what I miss the most is the Hostel. It is a whole epic in itself. I miss the attendance lines, the mess, TV hall, Juhu beach treats, monthly movie screenings. During rainy season, Big Audi looked beautiful from the window of hostel room. The late night chats went on and on as the chiwda and laddus in the plates vanished. Departments did not matter, regions got merged, with all united under one name, The SNDT Hostel.

The phase of confusion where one does not know what to do after getting the degree comes in every one's life. At such point, we are not sure of interests, priorities are not well defined and experience is too less. Talking to seniors surely helps in such situations.

Feel free to contact me at shenaideeptid@gmail.com