An irrelevant view of life at IIMs: Joker in the Pack

I bought this book at XVIII World Book Fair, Delhi (2008). My affiliation towards ‘campus dairies’ forced me to own this one (though it took my 195 INR in the process to own this one…circumspecting if 150 would have accelerated its sales).

After IITians Chetan Bhagat (5.sum1, ON@TCC) & Tushar Raheja (Anything for you’ ma’am), novelists here are IIM graduates (Ritesh Sharma, Neeraj Pahlajani).

This read is not like Five Point Someone, which gives a total campus feel; rather it’s like a tale. Best way to describe is to say ‘it’s an autobiography of a guy named Shekhar Verma’. Shekhar is a boy in which you can find many shades of yourself (until he gets into IIM-B). Book speaks about his life; childhood to graduation to post graduation.

Within the first few pages, nostalgia strikes in full force once he talks about DD serials, Mummy kasam, ice-pice and other bachpan ki yaadein (memories from childhood). As he gets older, he becomes non-serious, he becomes non-sincere and he gets multiple unimpressive grades (free with a girlfriend). Then a day comes and the phoenix is released. The boy gets into IIM-B (one of the factor which influenced me to buy this book).

The author narration about IIM-B is descriptive explaining about various clubs, committees and how they process & refine their resumes from infinite iterations to impress world-class companies (ones having surplus capital). Another very interesting sub-plot within the book lies at the time of summer placements; in which he gets into a domestic FMCG and is asked to travel tier-two cities of UP (Rampur, Meerut,…) and West Bengal (Kharagpur, Midnapur,…). Story attains pace and becomes fascinating as our IIM-B hero deals his work with people having diverse backgrounds (his Banglore boss, UP bhaiyas and Bengali babus). All this was done to get a PPO, which again was aimed to act as another bright point in his resume (Wondering!! the importance of resume??). However, the disappointment arises as book reaches its climax ‘final placements time’, which is stretched at some points.
Also climax of the book reveals the justification about the title ‘Joker in the pack’ and the tagline ‘An irreverent view of life at IIMs’, which seemed a bit strange to me at first look, but after the read, they are apt.

One thing which was very annoying sometimes was the names of the protagonist’s friend…Champak, Chummi, Thoku…are they funny?
Lastly, every campus book reminds you about the past. Some lines did the same to me. So I decided to present awards to some lines…

‘ghar ghar ki kahani’ award

“And the best way to do that, for them, was the ‘safe way’ of an MNC job, as a ‘government job’ had been before liberalization. This philosophy prevails despite the fact that some of the richest and the most popular people in the world have been entrepreneurs or skilled artists who backed their talent and, consequently, money became incidental. It would, I realized, be some time before kids would actually be encouraged to purse their interests rather than test scores.”

‘gender biasing’ award

“in the trainees’ room, somebody announced that it was Nitika, another intern’s birthday. It seemed some of the guys were happier than she was.”

‘Illusion in a zip file’ award

“How we managed to fit into that already packed bus is still a mystery to me – it’s no wonder India is a magical land, we pull off tricks everywhere.”

‘Biggest Problem of IIT-Guwahati Males’

“Take a look around, thirty five girls in a batch of two hundred. Out of the one hundred sixty five guys, one hundred fifty have never had a girlfriend. Out of these one hundred ten have never had a female friend, or worse still, female interaction. How can you call these people desperate…they’re needy!”

‘Mithun Dada ka Dialogue – A Tribute'

“Waqt se phele, aur kismet se zyada, na kisi ko kuch mila hai, aur na kuch milega”
(Nobody gets anything more than what’s in their fate, or before it’s their time)