A TRIP TO CHANDIGARH

"Okay, I'm leaving." And with these parting words, I set off from my house. Anon I reached the bus stop. I had to catch a bus bound for Guwahati.

I managed to reach the Railway station just in time to board my train for New Delhi. I was booked in the A.C Compartment of Rajdhani Express. Accustomed to journeying by second-class compartments amidst boisterous co-passengers, the cool, Air-conditioned bogey had an uplifting effect on me, well maybe just momentarily.

I was going to Chandigarh, a well-planned beautiful city of India built by French architect Lee Corbusier to attend a workshop.

Travelling by Rajdhani A. C was quite an experience. Unlike in the regular second-class compartment where I had to order for every meal, after careful evaluation of the costs of different kinds of meal served ( e.g veg/fish/egg/chicken etc.) and the strength of my pocket, I was spared that routine this time. Meals were provided. I was not required to pay for these meals, as the cost of my rail-ticket have accounted for these extra overheads. I touched New Delhi the next day after travelling twenty-four hours by train.

On reaching Delhi, I searched for I.S.B.T ( Inter State Bus Transport ) depot andd soon reached there. Then I took a bus bound for Chandigarh.

It was a five hour journey. When I reached Chandigarh, I began asking people in order to reach my destination.

I was booked in the Guest House of IMTECH ( Institute of Microbial Technology). It was the Institute which was conducting this workshop to which I was invited. I managed to reach the Guest house without much hassles.





After freshening up, I took a stroll of the Institute campus during the evening. The campus was neatly maintained. I met Mr Soni of the Institute, who works as an accountant there. He told me, "our Institute receives most of its grant from Department of Bio-Technology, and actually is very well-funded." After talking with him I returned back to my room after a while.

At night I took meal from the college canteen and after watching TV for sometime in the TV room, I went back to my room and slept.

Next morning, I got up early. I went to the canteen for breakfast. I met a few friends who had also come to attend this workshop. There were a couple of good-looking girls too amongst them.

My closest friend for the next few days was Raju Paswan. Soft-spoken but extrovert, Raju could mix freely and endeared himself to all of us.

It was a four-day workshop. Today was our first day. After properly dressing up, we made our way to the Institute bldg where the workshop would be conducted.

The workshop started with a brief welcome speech by the Director, Mr Amit Ghosh, of the Institute. And then the programme coordinator took over. He introduced us to the topics that would be covered, the duration of each session, and the lecturer for the very first session -- a guy from RCC, Chandigarh who covered the entire block on " C and C++ Programming" in a single lecture of two hours.

And so it continued. For four days. It was divided into two sessions. After the first session, we were provided delicious lunch by the Institute. It was an enjoyable experience because we all sat in a big hall, chatting while devouring our meals. I came to know, rather became friendly, with about fifteen people who had come to attend apart from the teachers and the staff of the Inst.

The Programme coordinator, Mr Raghav, a very jovial person, took outmost care of us. An ex-student of IITD and a computer engineer by training, he has worked for the last fifteen years in this Institute and has a large publication list against his name. He has also done extensive work in areas of protein modelling and protein databases.

The Instructors were young and dynamic. Apart from the classes, we were also taken on a tour of the whole Institute and apprised of the various kinds of research work currently undergoing in the Institute. Most of the research were in areas of Life sciences. Most of the researchers appeared very hard-working. They also told us, in a simple language, what they were doing.

On the penultimate day, we went to visit the places of tourist interest in Chandigarh. The Institute provided us with a bus. We saw the famous Rock Gardens, Rose Gardens, Lake Sukha, Pinjore Gardens and a few other places. One of the Instructors, Mr Rajesh Solanki, who accompanied us acted like our tour guide.

We were highly impressed by the Rock Gardens, and marvelled at the ingenuity of Nek Chand, who took all discarded stuff and crafted so many delightful items out of it. We took several photographs inside Rock Gardens, as we did elsewhere. We also took a group-photograph.

Four days passed away in a jiffy. Soon it was time to bade goodbye and returned back to our places. The programme coordinator had arranged for transport to reach us to the station.

Though it was for such a small duration, yet I learned so many things from this workshop. I made several new friends with whom I still correspond via email, I learnt quite a few new concepts involving INTERNET technologies from the workshop. And as a bonus, I got to see Chandigarh, one of the cleanest cities of India.

Workshop fosters interaction amongst people working in a particular field, and provides us with a sort of relief and diversion from the routine life of a professional albeit for a small period. After this enriching experience, I have decided I will definitely try to attend more such workshops in future. I am also pressurizing my boss so that we can also conduct workshop classes for benefit of the students.