The power of Asumption!!

This is where I study and subsist.

And this is what we are drinking these days.

This place is called Jaypee University of Information Technology. As the name suggests, it is a University for technical education. I am a hostler, which means that I have preferred mess food, hostel rooms and bathrooms and college internet connection over paranthas and Chickens, PG rooms with attached bathrooms and “24*7” internet connectivity.

I have never calculated my IQ but my intuition and experience tells me that it’s fairly high. To cut a long story short, I am certainly a human being with above average intelligence (The average word is a bit ambiguous and misleading in nature. While talking average, it is very important to note that what the samples whose average was taken were. In my case the samples were hand-picked from NASA Research and Mathematics department. ), and thus there is certainly a very strong and cogent rationale behind my preference.

My decision serves me well almost the entire year barring the time when there are heavy spells of rain. During heavy showers the rains bring a lot of silt along with them, and that silt gets mixed with water flowing in the rivulets amidst the hills. These rivulets are the principal founts of water to our university and nearby villages. The filters fail to filter the silt, which most of the times is very fine, and hence muddy water gushes through them.

Now, you may say, that why I did not see it coming instead of my astuteness. Why did I not opt for a quibble free option? The answer is simple! There was no such option available.

But, even if it had been available, I would have not opted for it, because then I would have overlooked the power of assumption.

Confused? – Let me explain!!

This whole incident has made me realize that assumption is the most potent, insidious and ubiquitous belief on this planet. Had it not been assumption, life would have been insipid. After all, the water that you see on the screen is nothing but a quintessence of reverberations of assumption. Assumption made the colorless water colorful.

More confused? – Let me explain further!!

It all started, when our founders assumed that there is plenty of water around, and hence decided against water harvesting. It rains here in profusion, but we can’t harvest rain water.

Then, they assumed that a conventional filter plant would work fine in these conditions, undermining the convolutions of mountainous topography.

They further assumed that conventional water purifiers will do the trick here, too. The supposedly decontaminated water does not even suit bathing purpose. Look at the picture for further vindication.

Even our parent assumed the exorbitant fees as a reassurance for at least basic necessities. Itnaa Paisa liya hai – Pani to peene layak aata hi hoga!

And on the top of that, the managing committee is perhaps assuming that this mess will fix itself. It’s been three years, and the status quo is still maintained.

It’s ironical, how these assumptions which scientists and mathematicians use to simplify complex problems have actually complicated things here. However, assumption itself is insufficient to describe this behavior. It is an intelligent and fancy word euphemistically used for shying away from responsibilities.

It becomes even more perilous when people start turning their blind eyes to grave issues which could decide the fate of humanity. Water crisis isn’t a pity parochial issue of our college. It’s pervasive. It’s omnipresent and so is the penchant to assume. We assume that water crisis will not affect us. Water harvesting measures are assumed as profligacy. Nobody wants to accept the reality, nobody wants to fight. It’s not about foreseeing anymore, now it is just about seeing – and acting.

Goofy (Guest Author)

Ghaate ka Sauda!!

“Bilkul ghaate ka sauda hai” (it’s a completely unprofitable endeavor) said my gardener when I asked him about agriculture. My gardener was a farmer once, he no more is. He whines that it doesn’t rain these years and thus agriculture hasn’t remained a lucrative venture. He earns more through gardening.

My father who is an entrepreneur and runs a business hugely dependent on monsoon explains that it’s not the quantity but the quality of rain that has suffered. He believes that rainfall has gone erratic and it has gone extremely difficult to predict it. He further adds that every foray needs planning, be it cultivation or business. For planning one need to foresee, and if your prediction goes wrong, your venture fails. Since the rain has gone haywire thus entrepreneurs are unable to predict it and are incurring losses.

Some scientists argue that it is not because of global warming, it’s a confined phenomenon. The excessive pollution in cities and the deforestation around has caused local disturbances in weather and there is no pervasive threat to the world climate due to these local activities.

But does it matter what is causing it? Does it make any difference if erratic monsoon is caused by Indian coal industry and not by American? The changes are palpable, they are happening in real, affecting real people. It doesn’t matter we die tomorrow or day after tomorrow, die due to local causes or global, for die we will. What matters is we are dying!

Every living being has got his own story of climate change, everyone is noticing it yet there is a dire dearth of collective and effective efforts to combat the changes. To me anything that will push us more towards the climatic doom is a “ ghaate ka sauda”( non-profitable endeavor).

Goofy( Guest Author )