Repair almost nothing

On the eve of Independence Day, the tube-light of my room was not working. Whether the problem was minor or major, I simply had no clue. So,in despair I switched on the normal 15 watt lamp and stood in front of the mirror, which reflected a "Tube-Light", who cannot fix a simple tube-light, inspite of being armed with an Electrical Engineering Degree . This fact took me down memory lane to the summer of 2004, the day of the Joint Entrance Examination counselling when I had to make a decision whether to take up Electrical or Mechanical Engineering as a career option.

Finally the choice was made after a lot of dilly dally- Electrical Engineering, abbreviated as EE (one of the expanded versions of EE is "Employment Exchange", courtesy Dr Mainak Sengupta). One of the reasons which transformed the indecision into a decision was the aversion and abhorrence to 4 years of drawing which a student has to do in the course of Mechanical Engineering, which no doubt is considered as 'The Boss Department.' There were rumours stating that a Mechanical Engineering student having a perfect 6/6 vision in the first semester ended up with myopia, hypermetropia, retinoschysis and what not at the time of completing graduation!!!! However, the scarcity of girls in Mechanical Engineering Department was perhaps the coup de grace which tipped the scales in favour of Electrical Engineering. Little did I know of the high voltage shocks that were awaiting me in the next four years.

Electrical Engineering was considered as a versatile department, which offered the flexibility of choosing a plethora of career options, though to the young and innocent mind simply being good in the Electrostatics and Electricity section of Higher Secondary Physics (which had nothing else apart from Ohm’s Law and Faraday’s Laws), meant a bright prospect as an Electrical Engineer . But I fail to decipher why the common people still consider Electrical Engineering to be associated with the task of fixing bulbs and switches. Once I proudly say ‘I am an Electrical Engineer’, pat comes the reply, ‘Oh please fix my tube light. My fan is not revolving etc etc. Please Help!’

At the end of four years, after being confined in an educational system which emphasised mainly on cramming some formulae and pages of theory instead of focusing on the practical and industrial aspects, I realised the truth that an Electrician is much more knowledgeable than a qualified Electrical Engineer merely because of his acclimatization to practical situations and problems. Hence even now as a proud Electrical Engineer, when I am unable to sort out any minor Electrical issue like fixing a tube light or, I never hesitate in calling up the Electrician because doing that myself is a chimerical proposition.I couldn’t simply care less for the comments from the neighbourhood aunties who said, ‘Oh, I thought you had an Electrical Engineer at home.’ Blame it on me or blame it on the system, this in fact is the stark reality and it still remains unchanged. Even without a degree, and inspite of suffering from Asperger's Syndrome, Rizwan Khan could proudly say "I repair almost anything". But I can proudly say that, "I repair almost nothing...!!!!" :) . Happy Independence Day.