Agreed that IIT is considered one of the best institutes in the world, but the grass is not always green. There is a grey side to everything.
Ever since I can remember, I have seen people around me talking about IITs, as the ultimate destination. What do you want to do in life? I want to go to IIT. Where do you wish to pursue graduation from? I want to go to IIT. What do you want to be? I want to be an IITan. Seriously? Agreed that it is considered one of the best institutes in the world, but the grass is not always green. There is a grey side to everything.
The other day I was talking to a friend of mine, who is a pass out from one of the IITs. And I was a little surprised to know about things we hadn’t really given a thought to. Here are a few…
The Grass is not always green
Though they bask in being an IITan, only they know how tough is it coping up with studies. “You know all about the being-an-IITan hype. But let me tell you, passing out of there is as difficult as getting admission into one of them,” my friend, an IIT alumni said. While I wondered about how difficult could it be, as all the engineering colleges have almost the same curriculum, he enlightened me on the quality of questions they are expected to answer in the exams.
Presentation skills
This comes from a personal experience. Most IITans are below average when it comes to presentation skills; which also include the ability to interact with girls(wink).
Living in own shell
Compared to other colleges, which involves a lot of socializing; some even have more socializing than academics(wink), IITans don’t socialize very easily. They prefer living in their own shell. This is probably because they are too much into academics.
Lack of extra curricular activites
You might get to see participants from IITs when your college hosts a tech fest. But don’t expect to get the same outcome while hosting a cultural fest or event. Only a countable number of IITans wish to participate in cultural events. However, the case is not the same everywhere. IIT Mumbai stands as an exception to this.
Receptiveness
The ability to listen to everyone is perhaps an issue with most of these techies. An ex-IITan quotes that they have a number of issues facing up to the non-IIT crowd after they graduate. Obviously, they are expected to be in some extraordinary place. Finding themselves between colleagues who are a pass out from different institute brings out the ego factor in most of them.
