CHAPTER 3 : THE BACK BENCHERS.

There are always some students in the classroom who are representatives of the class - one type is first benchers who represent the academics side of the class (on record) and other type is back benchers which represents the face value of the class in the college. There is something about that back bencher group which sets them apart from entire class - a strange kind of fearless attitude.

 Well sometimes they do go out of which is not acceptable but otherwise they are mandatory in the class for entertainment. There is a basic difference in sex ratio of India and it can be seen most evidently in engineering colleges and even more clearly in mechanical and civil branches nearly as 1 girl to 15 boys in some colleges but it is less for IT, computer and electronics departments. Well what education to pursue in life is fairly personal choice but the backbechers are the people who have had no say in the decision making for their career choices as their dad filled up engineering form without their consent and thus all the 4 years of engineering they try to take that lost chance to rebel back by being the way they are. 

Paras was first bencher in first year but till last year he became last bencher on the other hand Riya was first bencher for all the four years.The last branch students got special attention from HoD of the departments and even the Principal because they are always on the hit list.

There are some specific characteristics of last benchers - They like to take a washroom break in between and also after every lecture. They like to fill up their water bottle every 2 lectures. They love to do all kind of clerical work of teachers because by that they can bunk lectures and still get attendece. They have skills may be magical skills by which they maintain minimum attendence somehow. Actually at the start of the month they derive a mathematical equation based on attendence calculation formula and consideration of all factors like which teacher is very strict or which teacher is very linient which they call coefficient of strictness. Also festivals , clubs quota, free lectures, extra lectures etc and come to a conclusion that they can bunk these many number of days in this month and they bunk every bit of it but are still on edge never get into defaulters list. Another feature is they have this unique Instagram prefix to their id like king dude, hamdsomehunk and girls have queenofhearts , princess, pariofdaddy etc !

Paras was fully engrossed in extra carricular activities by that virtue he could never complete '75%' quota of his attendance which was required to stay out of defaulters list but by some magical method he never became defaulter because he had these amazing friends who would take the risk to keep Paras safe by themselves being punished. They liked punishment because the teacher always said  "get out" and that is what they wanted - to indirectly bunk classes after they have got their attendance signed - going out that way surely makes them outstanding students .There were some amazing proxy tricks - like proxy sign, proxy roll call etc. which they used. Keeping Paras safe was beneficial for everyone as he represented the image of class infront of HoD and the Principal.

Once Paras had sat on last bench and he desprleratly wanted to go out for a meeting so the plan was the last bechers will start talking and teacher will get angry and thus ask one of them to stand up and ask a question to wich all the last benchers will purposely prompt wrong ans which teacher will notice and ask all of them to go out. Thus mission accomplished - the outstanding students going out and taking Paras with them. Then Paras would go his way and the other backbenchers will go for a regular tour of college.

Most of the times Paras got away from getting in defaulter list and got out of class with help of his last bencher friends in this way. In return Paras had to give them free snacks from any event in the college and also allow them to take selfies with any filmstar who would came to college fest for their movie's promotion. It was a good deal!

There were many fundamental changes in these last benchers throughout 4 years as many of them found their passion outside engineering while doing engineering. They later went on to pursue their dreams. Maybe they were gathering courage by being the fearless way they were all the four years which they could not be before they joined engineering so that they could finally tell their dad with fearless courage what they want to do in their life.

How has life turned out for everyone after college is a great example of "success is not defined only by marks". Even the one who score great marks know that. The one who works hard eventually reaches success if not in college then in later life. 

The most important thing college can give is courage and prepare you for the brutal world. While Paras believed alot in great marks will make his great future he eventually throughout four years learnt that it is actually a great attitude that will make his great future and he gives a lot of credit to his last bencher friends from whom he learnt to stop caring about failures in life and have a fearless attitude of come what may we will deal with it. 

CHAPTER 2 : WHEN THEY MET !

They were 90's kids grown up watching movies which portrayed romantic love stories of modern India. The 90’s was an era when the hero and heroine fought with societal norms to live together. It was different from the 70’s when marriages were decided by parents and children had no say in the choice. But 90’s was surely better than todays generation because maybe it was last generation to believe in true love, todays generation has started to hunt for instant sexual gratification rather than strong commitment and true love.

The sad relaity is -The 70’s generation is not able to believe what is happening in today's relationships. The 90’s generation is not able to manage what is happening in today's relationships. The new generation is not able to understand  what is happening in today's relationships.

As 90’s kids they held all the characteristic traits of a 90’s kid should hold like- playing with cassette video games like Contra and Mario. The first game on PC – Roadrash. The most luxurious car Maruti 800. Using Telephone and its long spring wire to talk to relatives. Playing snakes game on that Nokia mobile. Eating Boomer chewing gum and drinking Rasana. Listening to slow radio with parents during light cuts. Using camera with fixed number of pictures in a roll. Time pass food – peppy and uncle chips and our evergreen Parle-G with tea! Cofee was rare back then. When windows file transfer of pages flying from one folder to another took ages to complete. Cable network before dish antennas for our television sets. Playing lagori, lappa chuppi, sakhli, and beyblade too. Using colgate tooth powder. Watching shaktiman, shaka laka boom boom, Bob the builder, Oswal, Takeshis-castle, Powerpuff girls and also DD NEWS.

Talking about romance every 90’s kid must have passsd through some of these romantic adventures – back then no mobile phones were given at young age unlike now! So the boy would SMS from his dad’s phone on the girl’s elder sister’s mobile at a very specific time and within 2 minutes the SMS used to be deleted on both sides. Then the Samsung and Nokia phones were the norm then! That too maximum 1-2 sms in a day or it would go out of budget and no calls at all, only missed calls at the max because family was always around. Then came cyber cafe and Orkut and somehow chatting evolved fast into multiple messages. Then came the facebook era and internt at home now chatting phenomenon got matured. Now we have whatsapp and even video call ! Thus a 90’s kid has passed through a long spectrum of communication technology to sustain romance. These things have made up the characteristics of people born in 90’s decade.

And just like any other 90’s kids – story of Paras and Riya was love at first sight in their second year of engineering. Paras a multi-talented and sincere student of Mechanical engineering branch and Riya the typical mix of scholarly and pretty student who was from Computer engineering branch.

It was during their annual sports festival ‘enthusiom’ – semifinals of football match between mechanical vs computer engineering. 10 minutes were left for final wistle and score was 3-3. A player got injured from mechanical branch by a rough attack from computers. Till the time he stood back up all players took a drinks break and that’s when Paras saw Riya. His eyes got fixed at her as he was sipping water. She was talking to her friends. Suddenly the refree blew whistle to resume the game.

Paras was the goal keeper for mechanical and he was the best goalkeeper any team could have. He played very well throughout the tournament. Now, last 5 minutes were remaining for the game to end, scores still 3-3. Computers made an attacking move with 4 players entering into defense zone of mechanical . The defenders of mechanical somehow tried to stop the attack. The ball got to a defender of mechanical but he had 3 computer attackers in front of him. He thought he can’t kick ahead because it will be blocked by one of computers player, only two minutes remained and it was very important for both the teams to win this match to reach the finals. The only option he had was to pass back to goalkeeper Paras.

The crowd stratted to go mad cheering for their departments and in that noise Paras heard a lovely musical note. It was Riya cheering (for computers). She was nearly at an angle of  forty degrees on right side of Paras and his eyes slowly turnd to her side and at the same time his team player pased the ball from his left side to him, which Paras had no clue of. The scene formed a perfect equilateral triangle from areal view at one corner Riya at other corner Paras's team player passing the ball back and Paras at the centre. The ball came towards him and as the cheering of Riya was increasing Paras could not hear shouts from his team members to look at the coming ball and ball passed by him and went inside the goal post behind him.

Own goal !!!!!!!

Paras got back to senses on listening the sound of whistle just to see refree giving goal signal to computers. He looked at his team members all were looking at him, even the opponents were looking at him, the entire crowd was looking at him, Riya was looking at him. He didn’t understand why everyone was looking at him. He looked back to see ball inside goal !

After 10 seconds of of shock for everyone the computer department started celebration. All the mechanical  players were sitting on the ground sobbing on their loss and their supporters in the stands were in shock. Then the formalities of exchanges of “well played” went on for some time. Paras knew he had to give an explanation of what had happened in the last minute to his teammates and he was ready to take on the firing in return. It was heartbreaking for himself too to lose this way as they all had practised for so long and played so well throughout the tournament.

But in midst of all this he saw Riya walking towards him. He was standing still and silent, she came and said “You played well throughout the tournament, and it is fine now you guys still have many other games in the festival. Sometimes it’s just badluck, best of luck for next time.” and she shook hands with Paras and stared walking back. Paras was silent all the time with a confused smile stuck on his face. He didn’t utter a word, his brain was trying to compile so much of information together.

While Riya was walking back her friend Shruti asked her “You never really talk to boys by yourself  how come you went to him? And by my girly intuitive power I knew you were blushing from inside while talking to him” to which Riya said “Well it's nothing like that, everyone knows about Paras in college about how good he is in studies as well as other festival activities.  I just took an opportunity to wish him luck it’s how you must treat your competitors in the festival when you win so they too don’t lose hope.” She winked at Shruti and blushed. Shruti said  I think you are hoping for something else" and she winked back too.