“Class at 8? Wake up at 7 30, brush your teeth, comb your hair (optional), wear your jeans and off to class. No breakfast, no early morning shower or even a look at the mirror.”
Such is the state of us MITians here in Manipal. This routine is usually followed up by rushing out of our hostel rooms and then onto a bus which has absolutely no room in it. If its not your lucky day, which is mostly the scenario for those living in 14th and 15th blocks, you’ve got to run to class or else take an auto from KC, which would burn a Rs. 20 hole in your pocket. Worst case scenario is you’ll be locked out of class, if you are lucky you’ll be allowed to enter as the professor gives a lecture on punctuality and how he will not tolerate such behaviour in the future behind your back as you find your place in the classroom.
Since Day 1, even before we set foot in that classroom in NLH, we knew about the 75% rule of attendance compulsion. We did not need a calculator to estimate the maximum number of classes we can miss or ‘bunk’ as we like to call it. The figure comes down to a lowly 12-13 per subject. I am sure most of us know the value of that ‘one’ attendance of that particular morning class. You might want to save your attendance for some other time to catch on that precious sleep, after all those endless hours in the night, playing counter-strike, watching TV shows or catching up on the latest college gossip till dawn have to take a toll on something, right? Hence, we run, jog and use those few means of transport at our disposal to get to that one morning class.
The argument that I have woken up and hence I ‘must’ get attendance keeps going through our minds and is more often than not quickly replaced by a “Aargh, I could have easily slept through this hour and gone for the next class” when you are not allowed inside that class. It doesn’t matter if the authorities decide to shift the morning classes up by half an hour, the way we see it is –“ sleep half an hour late!, Yay! more Facebook time”. If you want to see a rather empty looking food court, I would say go for breakfast. You will never crib about inadequate mess space for quite some time after witnessing the scene at about 7 15 in the morning.
Its not as if the authorities have not done anything to curb this. They have tried rather valiantly I would say. They tried cutting the internet at 12; they tried to check rooms so as to make sure we are not playing games late at night and even put up notices regarding the same but all to no avail. The notices put up became a joke and curbing internet usage did not help students from not missing classes. We sure are hell bent on showing them on how that 25% leverage can be utilised ‘optimally’ and ‘judiciously. ‘
After analysing all of this, I came to this conclusion that no matter what happens, all of this certainly would not stop. Students will remain students and that generation gap between us and the authorities will always remain. That’s how it is supposed to be. I have seen our college pass outs fondly recollecting such memories with their teachers, both having tears in their eyes while recollecting them.
Of course, you’ll have that grudge with that one odd teacher from time to time, but it’ll pass. Its moments like these that we’ll recollect when we pass out. I am sure you will cherish the memory of running from your hostel all the way to college, making it just in time for that double attendance class rather than narrowly missing out on that A grade just because that teacher wasn’t particularly fond of u. Many of us are rather envious of our friends in other public sector colleges having no such rule about attendance, but rather than cribbing about it we should learn how to deal with it and enjoy every last second of these precious four years in our college life. These will be one of the happiest memories that we will cherish for many years to come because who knows what life has in store for us in the coming years.
-Rohan Tuli.
Edited by RamSharat Reddy.
Manipal The Talk.Net 