Guesswork does not work (at IIM Indore) - Part II

Recap: (Refer the previous post) I go to Vashi for my IIM I GD/PI in a miserable condition. The GD is relatively good coz it was equally miserable for everyone except one guy. Waiting outside for the PI to start. Random numbers being called in....

......my impatient friend was imploring me to beg the panelists to take me in. I was dissuading him from encouraging me towards such drastic steps when I sensed the presence of P1 in the waiting room.

P1: “Ankur Saraf”
Me: “Yes Sir”

Followed him to the sanctum sanctorum, the interview room which I had left 3 hours ago, just after the GD. My eyes were brimming with nostalgia on being reminded of this peaceful, Gandhian gd. But I controlled myself somehow.

Me: “Good morning Sir” (To both of them)

P1: “Please hand me your certificates”.
Me: “Sure Sir” (Handed over the ‘certificate’ file with a grand total of two certificates)

Me waiting. No questions for 20 seconds. Me smiling and staring. P1, P2 reading.

P1 suddenly realizes that in an interview, they are supposed to ask questions. He sort of nudges P2 (Like saying, “Arre I don’t know what to ask him, you start. I want to do a doctorate on his two certificates.”)

P2:(In a tired tone) “So what does your father do?"
Me: Repeated same old answer. Since he just asked this question to gain time, he didn’t listen that carefully. Carried on for about a minute.

P2 suddenly sees my hobbies page and does everything short of jumping with excitement. (which for an IIM prof. is a wry smile). With this also starts my extensive exercise in grave-digging. (Warning: No useful information ahead. Read further only for the purpose of entertainment.)

P2: “So you like listening to ghazals?"
Me: (F***, he knows what ghazals are? Mar gaye yaar! Band baja dega! Arre sir, just above that I have written reading books. Please read that.) “Yes”

P2: “Name all the ghazal lyricists that you know."
Me: (its high time I started screwing up my case, and I do not disappoint myself) “Gulzar, Hasrat Mohani, Daag Dehlvi, then Ghulam Ali Sahab writes his ghazals, even Mehndi Hassan writes his ghazals…”

P2 (surprised) : “Mehndi Hassan writes ghazals? Are you sure”
Me (pretty happily) : “Yes!” (have dug a 2 feet deep grave by now)
P2 : (I gave you one chance. Now don’t blame me.) “Name one ghazal which Mehndi Hassan has written.”
Me: (Abey yaar, woh sahib aisi urdu mein gaate hain ki padhne sunne ka waqt hi nahi milta) “I don’t listen to Mehndi Hassan but I have read on an online forum that he has written some of his ghazals” (6 feet deep now)

(Let me clarify a bit here. Mehndi Hassan and even Ghulam Ali are basically trained classical vocalists and do not write ghazals. What I had actually read was that they had composed some of their work. What they had actually done was compose music. I didn’t know that during the interview.)

P2 : “Have you ever heard of Javed Akhtar?"
Me: “Yes. He is one of the most famous lyricists of Bollywood.” Take a stupid pause of 1 second. “If you want to think of other ghazal lyricists, then there’s Ghalib, Faiz….”

P2: “Tell me about the writing style of XYZ."
Me: (Never heard that name. A bit shocked)”Sir, I have no idea”

P2: “You have heard the name or you have not even heard the name?”
Me: “I have not heard the name.” Thought lets clear all the muck up. Otherwise I will only move into deeper shit. “Actually, I started listening to ghazals only about an year ago. I was introduced to this through the internet. I usually go to online forums to get recommendations about which albums are good and then go and get those. I usually listen to Jagjit Singh and my favourite album is Mirza Ghalib. I have gone and read many of Ghalib’s ghazals on the internet as well as listened to other recitations of his ghazals.” (Forgot to mention the main thing that holds attraction for me here, the structure of the ghazal. With that I also lost an opportunity to steer the PI towards safer waters.)

P2: “What is the organization concerned with preserving Ghalib’s heritage?”
Me: “I don’t know”

P2: “What was Ghalib’s full name?” (The condition’s real bad now, he is asking me names!!)
Me: “Mirza Assdullah Beg Khan. Some people say its just Mirza Assadullah Khan as Beg was the name of his father.”

P2: “What language did Ghalib write in?”
Me: “He thought Persian is a better language compared to Urdu, so his early writings are in Persian. But in his times, no one understood Persian, so he turned to Urdu. His most famous work, the Diwan-e-Ghalib is in Urdu. But Ghalib always believed that Persian is superior.”

P2: “So what was the time he wrote all this? Which period?”
Me: (Thinking about whether it was early or late nineteenth century) “The nineteenth century”

P2: “What is the lane where Ghalib lived in Delhi called?”
Me: (Arre Sir! I have not yet completed my Phd. on Ghalib. Will inform you when I do that) “I don’t know.”

P2: “I asked that because it’s near a very famous monument”
Me: “Actually I have read a book on Ghalib and it does not mention any great monument in his lane. So I have no idea.”

P2: “Tell me universities which have their names based on a religion.”
Me: “Banaras Hindu University and Aligarh Muslim University. Then there’s also Maharishi Veda University in the US but not too sure about that. However, I am sure about Banaras Hindu University and Aligarh Muslim…”

P2: “Where is Aligarh?”
Me: “In UP”

P2: “Varanasi is also in UP. Tell which which river flows through both these cities?”
Me: (Cursing my lack of foresight while studying geography at school, I venture with a guess) “The Ganges”

P2: (in a playful mood since my Mehndi Hassan answer, is smiling) “ Are you sure? Is it not the Yamuna?”
Me: (Geography shud really be made compulsory reading in college!! Accept my guesswork) “I am not sure. I took a guess. But I still think it’s not the Yamuna but the Ganges. You see Varanasi is a place where it’s considered holy to get cremated for the Hindus, and it’s also considered holy for you to immerse the ashes in the Ganges, so…”

P2: (Guesswork!! Let’s see how far it can take you?) “From where does the Ganges start?”
Me: (still left with a trace of bravado, I am trying to recollect where Gangotri is situated, UP or Uttaranchal) “The starting point is called as Gangotri.” Stop here like a dumb idiot

P2: “And where does it end?”
Me: (having utilized all my risk taking capabilities by now) “ I don’t know.”

P2: (He is really enjoying himself by now) “Arre take a guess. Any guess.”
Me: (Thinking about how geography can be included the already heavy engineering syllabus) “If I take a guess, I am not sure, but think it would be that it goes through West Bengal and then meets the Bramhaputra and then goes through that big delta.”

P2 is apparently satisfied that he’s tried and tested all my guesswork skills. He starts giving me a smile, as if I have just made a big joke. I think he was thinking, “How did this idiot get such a CAT Score?” Now he has his answers. Indicates to P1 that he is over and done now. P1 has also finished admiring my two certificates by now.

(Now starts the acads part. And for once, I think I did not do that bad. Reason being, all acads asked were out of syllabus ;-) )

P1: “Ankur you must have seen tubelights. (No I haven’t. I prepared for CAT in moonlight! That’s how I became a lunatic!!) Now new tubelights have come up which have no chokes. How do you think a tubelight can work without a choke?”
Me: (Control the urge to shout out of syllabus. I am also thinking that chokes have probably choked themselves out of existence. What else do you expect with such a suicidal name?) “A choke is necessary to provide the initial high voltage to start the tubelight. So all tubelights would need a choke. We cannot make a tubelight without a choke.” (Bright answer that, seems I have started with my coffin)

P1: “But chokeless tubelights exist. So as an engineer how do you analyze it?”
Me: (Me – engineer – Thank you sir!) “They may have made the choke small and must have hidden it somewhere. Behind the tube, on the sides, maybe even inside the tube. The choke cannot be done away with.”

P1: “It cannot be inside the tube. The tubes are the same as normal tubes.”
Me: “Actually I have only seen one advertisement of chokeless tubelights. That was a long time ago. But I would still say, they manage placing the choke out of sight rather than totally removing it.”

P1: (smiles slightly) “Tell me how fuzzy logic is used in washing machines?"
Me: (I know of fuzzy logic. It rings a bell. My logic is always fuzzy-wuzzy. But it’s used in washing machines! That’s news!) “I do not know the answer. Fuzzy logic is not part of our formal curriculum (finally blurted that out) but I would still like to think (better word for guess) of how it would be used. (P1 encourages me here to go on with the all the b******t I had in mind.) In the conventional digital logic we have only two levels 0 and 1. Fuzzy logic defines levels between the 0 and 1. So here I think the complexity of the circuit would increase but the no. of bits required would decrease. There would be better computation. It’s used in microchips in the washing machine.” (By this time I knew I cannot even guess properly, was smiling all the while as I answered)

P1: (Gave a spontaneous smile. And he really smiled. It was not one of those artificial inhibited ones but a full-fledged from the heart smile at my feeble attempts in reconciling fuzzy logic with washing machines.) “Let me give you a hint. It’s also used in refrigerators. Try to think of something”
Me: (refrigerators, washing machines, what are they? I live in the technical Stone Age. Questions should be scrapped as being discrimatory towards disadvantaged applicants.) “Sir, actually the only thing I know about fuzzy logic is a one line definition on the internet. So maybe its used for defining different levels where multiple levels are used. Like you can have different levels of washing or temperature in a refrigerator.”

P1: “Ok. What would happen if I leave the refrigerator door open.”
Me: (The rich fool who does dat deserves a fat electricity bill!! And he should buy everything from me. I wouldn’t need to go to an IIM to earn money then) “It would put a lot of load on the compressor. A refrigerator has this whole system with the coolant being used to take heat from the inside to the outside the refrigerator, transfer the heat energy. The load of maintaining the temperature falls on the compressor. So the life of the compressor will decrease.”

P1: (thinks a bit.) “That is right. What else will happen?”
Me: (stare stupidly while contemplating if I should reveal the get-rich-quick plan his question inspired)

P1: “what happens to the temperature… of the room?”
Me: (Great. Where do you think I have come from? Kindergarten. No one will say its gets cooler!!) “Sir, as I said before, the coolant only transfers heat from the inside of the refrigerator to the outside, so the effective temperature will remain the same. Maybe temperature just outside the refrigerator door will decrease but nothing else will happen!”

(Again a bit of clarification. I very confidently gave the wrong answer here. The temperature of the room increases due to heat produced from the compressor’s working. And this is supposed to be a famous question. And there I was…. thinking of kindergarten questions)

P1: “How do air coolers work? How do they cool the room?”
Me: (assuming air coolers is air conditioners) “It’s the same principle as the refrigerator. Only here the coolant transfers the heat to outside the room. So the room becomes cooler. It takes in air, cools it and then gives it back in.”

P1: “The cooler works this way? It only gives air out. Does not take it in.” (He has a puzzled look on his face.)
Me: (tubelight jali. Remembered the coolers I had seen in Rajasthan at age 5, when life was cool) “By coolers, do we mean air conditioners?”

P1, P2 shake their head in unision.
Me: “Then are those the coolers found in Rajasthan?”

P2: (Cautiously) “What kind of coolers do they use in Rajasthan?”
Me: “The ones with the straw mats drenched in water and a fan behind the straw mat.”

P1,P2 both nod in unision. “Yes that’s it.”
Me: (Thinking furiously as to how they work.Want to figure it out at any damn cost.) “Sir, I was very small when I had seen those. They have pretty dry summers over there and so this provides some humidity” (Dimag mein ek ghanti baji… Continue without breaking the flow..) “and when the water evaporates, it takes some heat with it. So the room gets cooler.”

(Got it right this time. P1 was satisfied.)

P1: “And how do air-conditioners work?”
Me: (Happy at getting a repeat question. Harped again about coolant, air going in hot and coming out cool funda.) “…… So it transfers the heat from inside to outside the room.”

P1: “That’s why you have that thing jutting out of air-coditioned rooms.”
Me: (So you came to know how I guessed this one! Big deal!) “Yes, that is the reason.”

P1: “In a cpu, you have different circuits requiring different supply voltages and only one main power supply. You have seen the inside of the cpu, right? Like you have the ram, the….” (started thinking… I was happy I am not the only one at a loss for words)
Me: “Like the fan, the hard disk, the microchip..”

P1: (continues) “Yes yes, so how do we provide different voltage supplies for all these different voltage levels with the one incoming supply.”
Me: (Sir, I am not electrician, as you said I am an electronics engineer. Why don’t you come to GSM/CDMA, AM/FM, TRAI and the rest of the things?) “We can use a rectifier and a voltage-shifter to provide all the different voltages.”

P1: (Didn’t understand me) “How will this take care of different voltages?”
Me: “See, we can use a rectifier for converting ac to dc and then the voltage shifter to shift dc levels. That way all voltages can be provided for.”

P1: (He is smiling again. But this smile is merely an amused one, not like the spontaneous one he gave earlier) “Have you ever seen this circuit inside the CPU?”
Me: (smiling again..) “No Sir. In fact, I don’t know how it’s actually done. I was just thinking of one way in which we can do it.”

P1: (He was apparently enjoying a display of my guessing skills.) “Tell me what would happen if a chip receives more than the maximum voltage specified.”
Me: (Again thinking furiously, time for some creative guesswork, I guess) “With the voltage, the current inside the chip would increase. So, the power dissipated would increase and the chip would burn out.” (Not quite satisfied with this, both P1 and me, so I start guessing again) “And the transistors in a chip are placed in such a way that electrons do not cross over from one area to another. But with high voltage the electromagnetic forces (sometimes I surprise even myself!!) become stronger with electrons jumping across regions and this will lead to chip malfunction” (Wah! Wah! Kya thoka hai! No one would think this is an IIM interview going on.)

P1: (Looking towards P2 for implicit approval) “Thank you Ankur. And best of luck.”
Me: “Thank you”

Now you would think I would be happy that this ordeal came to an end, but I was mighty disappointed. There was a plate full of biscuits infront of the panelists and the biscuits outside were over. So I was more of expecting a “Thank you and please have a biscuit”. But this didn’t happen and I was getting up, pretty dejected.

P2 : (kind of sensing my dejection, pointed towards the biscuit plate.) “Please..”
Me: (I was so goddamn happy. I gave a big spontaneous smile and picked up a cream biscuit, of the two present.) “Thank you!”

This sorta of woke P2 up. He returned the smile and I started with the biscuit as soon as my back was towards them. Even before I left the room.