Bengal government to allow non-science students to pursue Engineering

Kolkata. In a landmark decision that could change the face of the state’s Education Industry, the West Bengal government has decided to open the doors of engineering colleges for the students coming from Arts and Commerce background. Up till now only those students who had pursued Science in their plus two (class 11-12) were eligible for Engineering curriculum.

The decision comes close on heels of earlier announcement of allowing engineering admission to students who were either disqualified or did not appear for the West Bengal Joint Entrance Examination (WBJEE).

“This is to ensure that maximum students of our state get opportunities for higher studies. It guarantees a booming software industry for the future and a flourishing education industry for the present,” said Mr Suporno Lele, the Minister for Adult Education.

Engineering colleges are going to be fun again

He assured that the lack of science knowledge will not affect the students, “Firstly, contrary to popular beliefs, Science knowledge is never a pre-requisite for completing modern day engineering. Moreover, we are coming up with Arts-Commerce friendly disciplines like ‘Historical Engineering’, ‘Economics Technology’, ‘Electronics & English Communication’, ‘Journalistic instrumentation’, Fine Artsytechture, etc.”

However he avoided answering other questions, like “If seats are vacant will the government also consider allowing Pre-school students?” and “The reason behind government’s apathy towards other courses”, stating that these are out of scope of the press conference.

A certain pony tailed social activist/reporter/educationist was seen particularly irked by the fact that the government is still not ‘daring’ to think beyond engineering even after his repeated requests.

“This is ridiculous; what benefits will students get by studying Engineering? Will they get a free laptop? NO. Will they get a foreign travel to exotic locations in Bangladesh? No. Then what good is this curriculum for? In this way we will never discover the diamonds from them, I mean in them,” he fumed.

“After watching ‘3 idiots‘ my life’s aim was to become an engineer,” said M.A final year student Miss Shikhsha De, “Now I have ways to fulfill it. Once enrolled, I can crib about the unbearable stress, sing songs about the pressure, sometimes I can even be suicidal and all this will now look perfectly natural. Oh, it’s such an exhilarating feeling!”

Several English-medium schools in the city have welcomed this move. “It’s a positive step towards development. We are also planning to add a new subject of ‘Engineering’ in our curriculum from class 5 onwards. Students can opt for this course by paying a minor fee that will be taken against Apron, Development and Transport charges,” said Mr. Frank Orally, the Principal of GReen English Education Day (GR.E.E.D) School.

The engineers and the engineering students are the only people who are frowning upon this decision.

Some like MaiGan Durani, 1st year engineering student of newly opened ‘Om Har Sai Halwai Institute of Technology (O.H.S.H.I.T)’ is concerned that if the trend continues then his father’s constant threat of admitting a donkey in his class might come good someday. Whereas others like ‘95 batch IIT Kanpur Mechanical Engineer Mr. K.L Padnis laments the lack of lateral thinking in Indians.

“We always like to follow rather then get followed,” he said, before leaving the country on an onsite assignment for his Software Company.

Number portability in education mooted; retain your marks, change institute

New Delhi. Union HRD Minister Kapil Sibal, who is also the Telecommunications Minister now, is planning to introduce the number portability service in the education sector as well. Mr. Sibal is reported to be too impressed with the idea of Mobile Number Portability (MNP), a service that was launched in Haryana today by him, and thought it was pretty relevant to the education sector as well.

“Imagine a meritorious and hardworking guy, who studies earnestly and tops the merit list of IIPM,” Mr. Sibal said setting the premise of the proposal, “He’d still be considered an ordinary and fraud candidate for a job by many employers just because he has this IIPM tag on his certificate.”

“It’s just like you are stuck with a bad service provider even though you have a decent looking and well publicized mobile number,” Sibal added.

Kapil Sibal thought of the idea while launching Mobile Number Portability service in Haryana

If the proposal is implemented, such IIPM guys can pay a small fee to the institute of his choice and get a new certificate with the same marks. The service is being called Academic Number Portability (ANP).

“Yes, IITs and IIMs too would be brought under the ambit of ANP,” Sibal informed, though he clarified that the basic terms and conditions of the service was still to be worked out and it was still at the proposal stage.

But the news has already outraged many students, especially those at IITs and IIMs, who feel that ANP would rob them off of their hard earned reputation and social status.

“Many girls would not mind accepting my friend request on Facebook just because of my institute’s name in my profile,” a student from a premier institute confided on conditions of anonymity, “Now one can befriend beautiful girls just after paying 19 rupees? Bullshit!”

Experts believe that the fee for ANP would not be as low as 19 rupees, which is the case in MNP.

“This could be a nice source of revenues for IITs and IIMs, which otherwise have to depend upon government grants for meeting their expenses,” said Pratham Pandit, an education sector expert, “I believe that the transfer fee should be made as high as 19 lakhs rupees or more.”

Institutes like IIPM, which are being seen as the major providers of users for the ANP service, have hinted that they could accept the proposal if the students were required to pay a fee to the old institutes as well.

“Let them pay the same amount as severance fee to us and go to any of those ubiquitous IIMs or any other institute, which are intellectually far inferior to us,” IIPM Dean Arindam Chaudhuri said and promised all support to the HRD Minister.

The proposal would be discussed in the parliament, once it (parliament) starts functioning normally.

Scientist develops special gene to help students score over 100% marks

New Delhi. A geneticist has isolated the gene for academic excellence, Faking News can reveal. Professor Mohan Bhatt successfully found the gene after ten years of collecting DNA samples from tea cups at Jawaharlal Nehru University (although not those from the Arts Faculty).

“This is my life work,” said Professor Bhatt, “and it’s very safe – I tested it on myself,” he added, giving an interview whilst reading classical Chinese literature, doing calculus in the margins, and drafting a new Lokpal Bill with his free hand.

The scientist first isolated the academic gene and then travelled to Switzerland to shoot the new discovery at the speed of light at CERN. He had originally hoped this process would create an all-powerful “faster than a speeding bullet” Superman gene, but in the end he settled for thought processes faster than a Brett Lee bouncer at Perth.

After analyzing the logo of Delhi University, Professor Bhatt had earlier tried to fuse the genes of an elephant with that of a student, but the results were not so encouraging, he says.

Professor Bhatt is now offering injections of the gene to next year’s Delhi University applicants in order to boost their marks. “With my academic gene injections,” he said, “students could get 105% or even 110%”.

St. Stephen’s College said that although all current cutoffs are less than 100%, they “would not rule out” a 100%+ cutoff in future to trump SRCC, while Pune University has already announced a cutoff of 102%.

The current “drug policy” for exams only requires students to be neither drunk nor high in the exam hall (these states are traditionally an advantage for creative writing tests.)

“I’d love an academic injection,” said Sandeep, 17, “at the moment I have to waste time with a tutor and actually learn things! Forget that! I want results fast.”

The breakthrough has many more possible applications. Faking News called the Low Intelligence Association of India to tell them about the new discovery, but they failed to see how the breakthrough could be of use to them.

Professor Bhatt had previously sought the gene in the DNA of government officials. However, after being injected with those genes, some of the test monkeys forgot how to peel bananas.

Engineering students protest appointment of “honest” lab-assistant

Kanpur. Hundreds of students of local Imperial College of Engineering (ICE) are protesting against the appointment of Lokesh Pal, an honest lab-assistant who is refusing to “help” students in their practical examinations. Students have threatened to go on a fast unto death in front of ICE Dean’s office if Ganesh Gupta, the old lab-assistant of the Power Electronics lab at ICE for the last eight years was not brought back.

Senior management at ICE took this extreme step last week after they received repeated complaints from lecturers about the unethical ways Ganesh used to adopt to let students cheat in the practical examinations. Ganesh’s sacking was quickly followed by the appointment of Lokesh, who came with very positive recommendations.

Things were going unexpectedly smooth for the new lab-assistant until he turned down a student’s demand to slip in a chit with a circuit diagram on it.

“Would you believe what he told me? Practicals reflect your true understanding of the subject!! I mean who talks like that these days, and who is he?” said Kapil Birbal, a shocked final year student who claims that Lokesh Pal’s ideas were in direct conflict with the noble ideas on which ICE was founded.

Kapil claimed that the “constitution” of ICE didn’t allow any lab-assistant to pass judgments on students.

“Look what it says on page 23; only professors will have the right to assess students,” Kapil showed the constitution of ICE, a copy of which he was given when he took admission four years ago. Kapil has been using that copy to dust off his bed and cupboard till now, but realized its importance once Lokesh rejected his demands.

ICE students want Lokesh Pal to go back as soon as possible to protect institute’s cultural traditions

Following this revelation, students on ICE campus have come together shouting slogans to bring back their old idol cum friend 2G, as they used to call Ganesh Gupta lovingly.

Deepu Chauhan, a third year ICEian recalls Ganesh, “He was more than just a lab-assistant who would shell out resistors and capacitors on demand. He was to us, what VVS Laxman is to Indian cricket team. Why would anyone keep him out?”

“What many forget is how good he was with strategies and counter-strategies. The way he used to take the external examiner out of the lab with some genuine-looking excuse was a work of genius,” adds Deepu, “Lokesh is no match to him. He doesn’t even have popular support.”

While all the lecturers maintain that the sacking of Ganesh, while unfortunate, didn’t in any way deprive the institute of someone who could have brought laurels to the community, students continue to miss 2G, who according to them was a joyful and accommodating guy, who loved to fag, booze, and occasionally eve-tease.

“Eyes! Yeah, he had beautiful eyes. Eyes, which were full of life and hope. I would never forget the way he used to guide me using only his twinkling eyes to the chit having the easiest experiment,” said Abhishek, who once shared the phone number of his female classmate with Ganesh as a “reward” for Ganesh’s helpful ways.

“I know many would remember him for his modesty, others for his gleeful eyes, but what I would remember him for will be his contribution to my good health. Allow me to put things into perspective. On the eve of the practical exam while majority would be resorting to pot smoking and other such measures to ward off tension, I would just relax with the image of him in my mind handing over the cheat sheet secretly. If it was not for him, I would have been an addict. I owe it to the great guy! He is my angel,” said Jamil, who recently started the anti-corruption chapter of ICE to support Anna Hazare.

Batsmen to stop running completely to oppose ICC ban on runners

Mumbai. Various batsmen, cutting across country and club lines, have threatened to stop running between wickets altogether and make every match a low-scoring match if ICC went ahead and imposed its ban on runners in cricket. These batsmen, led by Pakistani cricketer Mibah-ul-Haq, have declared that they will execute their “no running” policy from 7^th July onwards if ICC didn’t withdraw its “no runner” recommendation by then.

“Remember my batting against India in World Cup semi-final early this year?” Misbah referred to his enigmatic approach while chasing 260 runs posted by India in the knock-out match at Mohali. The Pakistani batsman, now captain of the team, had steadfastly refused to run between the wickets and kept blocking the ball untill the asking rate climbed beyond reach.

“Every batsman will play the game like that; we will refuse singles and doubles and hit only boundaries and sixes, that too far and few and when it’s almost pointless to do so,” Misbah threatened of the future of cricket if ICC went ahead and imposed its “batsman unfriendly” decision.

Photographers are concerned that if batsmen refuse to run between the wickets, they won’t be able to capture such moments celebrating a batting partnership.

“We all are with him on this,” Indian batsman Gautam Gambhir, otherwise known to be not on good terms with Pakistani players, extended his unconditional support to the “no running” movement.

The group of batsmen supporting the “no running” movement comprises of almost all known batsman who are either injury-prone or run-out-prone. Sources inform that Indian batsman Rahul Dravid refused to join the group while the group refused membership to West Indian batsman Chris Gayle.

“Dravid thought that the whole movement was ‘stupid’ and he would better concentrate on his batting that included running, while the group thought that Gayle’s inclusion could send ‘wrong signals’ and ICC could impose ‘no running’ rule as well,” a source informed.

Cricket administrators have reacted cautiously to the news with some of them promising to look into the matter.

“I know running might not be enjoyed by many of the batsmen and they’d like to outsource that role to a runner,” ICC chief Sharad Pawar told Faking News, “But they have to understand that on many occasions we have to discharge duties in a role that we may not enjoy that much. See, I’m also Agriculture Minister of India.”

Pawar said that personally he didn’t think running was so important in cricket.

“Even cheerleaders don’t dance after batsmen take a quick single,” he pointed out.

“We could think of introducing rules like the ones in galli (street) cricket or drawing room cricket, where one, two, or three runs are added after the ball crosses a certain distance. This way the batsmen won’t have any cramps or injuries and ‘no runner’ rule could also be implemented,” he said.

The statement by Pawar has reassured some of the protesting batsmen, but a few are still not convinced.

“Have you ever wondered why ‘runners’ are never ‘substitute’ players?” Mohammad Kaif, a professional runner and batsman supporting the movement argued, “It’s because runners don’t ‘substitute’ any cricketing role at all! It’s an independent cricketing role and ICC shouldn’t try to change it. Cricket needs runners!”

Facebook to launch its own country to take on Google Plus

California, USA. While everyone is talking whether Facebook will be finally tamed and “killed” by Google+, trusted sources inform us that Facebook is planning a much bigger coup. The social networking website, which has over 600 million active users, is all set to launch its own modern republic next week. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg would head an interim government in the new republic till inaugural elections are held.

“While mentioning Facebook, various experts have been pointing out that if it were a country, it’d have been only behind China and India in terms of population size,” said a Facebook source, “Our team spotted this opportunity and decided to give it a go.”

Coming Monday, every registered user of Facebook would receive a mail asking to confirm if they’d like to become the citizen of the new country. If a user confirms, he or she would receive his or her passport of the new country, whereas those rejecting the offer would have to apply for “visa” to continue being a user of the website.

“Yes, those not willing to join the Facebook Nation will have to pay visa fees. We’d have different types of visas for different types of users. The social media consultants will have to apply for business visa, Twitter addicts would have to apply for tourist visa, while those who still prefer Orkut will be issued student visa,” informed our source.

Interestingly, since Facebook doesn’t yet own an independent piece of land in this world, all those who’d become the citizens of the Facebook Nation (FN) would automatically become Non Resident Facebookers (NRFs), and thus may need to apply for visa in their existing countries of residence.

“We are in talks with all the nations of the world to allow NRFs to continue living in their respective countries on immigrant visa or transit visa till we buy land and relocate all our citizens,” the Facebook source said, who further informed, “In fact, we may not need to buy land at all because countries like India are willing to offer dual citizenships for the NRFs at no extra cost.”

The new nation would uphold the freedom of its citizens, but is not so sure about privacy

“We are the fastest growing economy, so we believe we’d strike out a favorable deal with other countries, so the users willing to become citizens of the Facebook Nation should not worry,” the source added.

The new country FN will follow democracy and electoral politics with multi-party system. Any user, rather citizen, would be able to create his own party and ask fellow citizens to ‘like’ it. The parties with maximum likes (at least 10% of total population of FN) would be allowed to contest elections and form government. The first elections would be held in December 2012.

“It makes sense,” says sociologist Ashish Nandy, “people today spend more time online and socialize with virtual friends more than their real ones. Online business is growing exponentially and ‘e’ version of everything real is coming up. Soon, every action of a human being would be executed only in the online domain, so it’s better if there is an authority to regulate and govern all those actions.”

The minute details about how the new county would function are still awaited and could be announced next Monday, but experts believe that going won’t be easy for the new nation, especially if they don’t have a “physical presence” in the real world.

“Politics and business is fine, the e-country would be able to manage them,” says e-sociologist Pritish Nandy, “But what about the social aspects? Most internet users consider Google as God; they turn to Google for all their solutions. Will Facebook allow this practice or consider this as some heretic or traitorous action?”

“What would be the identity of this nation? The ethos? The symbols? Have they thought about these things?” Pritish Nandy sounded very cynical.

But our Facebook source claimed that all such issues had been discussed intensely within the team before they decided to launch a new country. The thumbs-up picture of the “like button” would be the national icon of the new country, FarmVille Cow would be the national animal, while poking would be the native way of greeting each other.

“There is a proposal to make one of the soundtracks of the movie The Social Network as the national anthem,” informed our source, who hinted that Beatles’ song “Baby, You’re a Rich Man” which appears at the end of the movie might win the race.

The not-so-cynical experts believe that the Facebook Nation would be a runaway success and would lead to creation of new e-countries, with Google most likely to follow suit and pave way for a bipolar but vibrant e-world.

“The real problem would be when companies like ibibo follow suit; it will create failed e-countries that might give rise to e-recession and e-terrorism,” warned an expert.