Paramathma - The movie could have been better

Today I had been to the movie "Paramathma". I was eagerly waiting to watch this movie from quite sometime. I am great fan of Yograj Bhat from the time I saw Mungarumale and then Pancharangi made me his die hard fan.

The story of Paramathma basically revolves around a guy and  his friends. The hero of the movie has a pure heart and he follows his heart. The hero falls in love with a Gal and follows her everywhere even to her native. This is where most part of the movie is shot. Among the hero's friends one gal likes him a lot and she tries to convince the hero also to like her.But Punit marries his love and then they have a baby, 1 year after baby the heroine dies. Even after her death hero feels that she is alive and lives his life with her memories.To show that hero follows his heart Bhatru has shown many things like hero climbing Mt.Everest , doing several Business , Learning Kum Fu at China , goes in search of God and then finally taking up agriculture.

Let me start with good things in the movie, the strong point of the movie are its songs, the songs are brilliantly choreographed  the lyrics are great , the music is very catchy and Punit has danced awesomely. In most of Yogaraj Bhat's movie songs are really good (lyrics and music) so is the case with Paramathma . The dialogues are funny ,witty and meaningful . The movie is picturized in beautiful places , mostly in and around  South Canara.

The weakness of the movie is its story , it looks quite messed up.Director has tried to show too many things. In many places the story does not seem to be complete,many situations remain unanswered. Two fight sequences (kumfu and betting fight ) were completey unnecessary. I think director has tried to to show too many concepts like: following ones heart , love, friendship, death of a loved one,emotion of a dad towards his son , emotion of a dad towards his daughter , differences between culture of people from South Canara and Bangalore , education system etc.... and this is the thing which has messed up the movie. Even the "Life Estene" movie which was one of the outcome of Yograj production , seemed to be quite messy .

I truly feel this movie could have been definitely better with a better filtered script .For me both Life Estene and Paramathma were disappointing . This is because of the expectations I have with Yograj  Bhat's movie and the above two movies were below my expectations. 

Aarakshan - Reservation

After Rajneethi, Prakash Jha as tried to direct another catchy, fast paced, political, dialogue centered, and character oriented movie. The first half of the movie is great, the dialogues are superb, particularly the dialogues delivered by Saif Ali Khan. I should say Saif has acted brilliantly; it seems that he is made for the role he plays.

The movie revolves around two important concepts, reservation in education system and money minting tuition business. First half of the movie talks about reservation and second half concentrates on tuition. This is one of the weak points of the movie, it would be better if the director had to concentrate only on the first concept of reservation. The main character of the movie is played by Amitabh Bachan, who has given a solid performance. He is the principal of one of the leading institutes of the city and he is poor pro, who believes in inclusive growth of the society. Saif, who is from the backward community is one of Amitabh’s favorite student and is also the topper of the university. Some of the scenes and songs in which Saif’s and Deepika’s affection is shown are brilliantly shot, so is the friendship between Saif, Deepika and Prateek shown.

The film takes turn when reservation system is introduced, due to Manadal commission report and Supreme courts approval for the same. There starts the rift between Saif, Amitabh and Prateek. Circumstances force Amitabh to resign from the college he built, and Manoj Bajpai who is full time into tuition business becomes the principal. Manoj Bajpai has the support of some of the dishonest members in the College Board as well as some culprit ministers. Due to unforeseen circumstances Amitabh is forced to stay out of his own house, which will be in procession of Manaoj Bajpai. To get back the house as well as to teach the tuition mafia a lesson Amitabh starts a free tuition class in a cow shed just opposite to Bajpai’s class. Here starts the showdown between Amitabh and Bajpyee. The film gets little boring here, may be for another half an hour. Finally the film ends happily, with Amitabh’s tuition class surpassing the results of Bajpai’s expensive tuition class and he is made the principal of the college again.

After seeing the movie, I felt the reservation system for economically backward people is required. May be I had this thought earlier itself but I never bothered to ponder about it. It is definitely not easy for a student from poor family background to match the scores of students who come from sound families. They have so many issues to face and problems to sort out rather than just studying. They do not have anyone to look up-to for guidance. The reservation system if utilized properly for bringing up social justice is one of the best things that can happen. After all our country cannot become developed nation because of only rich people, it will happen only if inclusive growth takes place , and for this to happen we need to give special support for students who come from difficult backgrounds and have an urge to do something in life.

In one liner this movie is definitely one time watchable, but may not be as good as Rajneethi. For me the movie gave a concept to think about and made my thoughts a bit clear on reservation system.

ICFAI - Part Time MBA



This Picture is taken from ICFAI webpage



ICFAI University Tripura is one of the universities in India that provides Distance/Part-Time MBA.  Large numbers of students from all over India enroll to this part time MBA program. I seriously doubt if at-least 50% of the students enrolled clear the first phase of the MBA (Diploma in Business in Management, now this is second stage I guess first stage being Certificate in Business Management). And I do not think even 25% students enrolled complete their MBA.

I joined the ICFAI part time MBA course in January 2008 and I completed my PG Diploma in Business Management recently in July 2011. I could not take some quarterly exams due to my onsite trips and due to office commitments. The ICFAI university guys advertise saying one can complete the MBA in 2 or 2.5 years, according to me this is not at all possible. One requires atleast 3 years to 4 years to complete this MBA. The subjects are really vast, and all papers till PG diploma in business management are objective and most of the answers look very similar. Most the subjects in MBA are theoretical, and this makes life more difficult as we need to remember many things to answer objective questions correctly.

If one is ready to spend somewhere around 15 hours per week then he/she will be able to clear all the papers with good marks and some understanding of management subjects. But I am very sure if one goes to exams without any preparation then he will flunk, particularly in the objective papers.

ICFAI University is very regular in sending of the text books, study guides and work books. Each subject will have a text book, a study guide and work book. If one revises the study guide or text book once or twice and is confident about the questions in work book then, he can be sure of clearing the papers. Only thing I want to say is "one cannot take the exams of ICFAI very lightly".

ICFAI MBA is suited for people looking for extra MBA degree with some understanding of management topics. The ICFAI MBA degree is not so easy to obtain so it has some value in industry, particularly it is useful if one wants to move up the ladder in one existing organization. It is definitely of no use if a person wishes to make a career change from one domain to another. Also MBA is all about study of case studies and class room discussions; definitely ICFAI part time MBA lacks all of these.

According to me there are several other good certifications that one can take up to get some basic understanding of management topics like CBM , ABM from APBM organization or PMP, CAPM from PMI institute, then we have Management Development Programs which run from 3-4 days at reputed B schools like IIM's, ISB and XLRI . Even IISC and IIT's have some very good training programs for Project management in IT industry.

Also there are part time MBA programs offered by IIM-B, IIM-K, IIM-C which are definitely more worth also more helpful to understand the intricacy of management topics.

I d'nt think ICFAI part time MBA is a bad option but I would definitely say there are many other good options to get sound knowledge of management topics. One needs to analyze all options available and get to know their pros and cons before joining any part time MBA program. Also we should join part time MBA programs only if we are serious about it and we are sure of devoting at-least 15-20 hours every week, else it would be very difficult to complete the course also it will be mere waste of valuable money.

SISO Times

Tomorrow is July 14th 2011. It was exactly four years back that I entered the corporate world fresh from the college life. My software engineer's life started at SISO. So I thought I will pen my memories about it.


It was February of 2007; three more months were left for my graduation. I wanted to get into networking companies. I was interested to get into Cisco, and no one other company sounded interesting to me then, so I had let go many opportunities. Cisco was one of the last companies to visit PESIT in the Tier 3 slot, and when it came I could not clear the written test. Only consoling thing was that all my close friends at PESIT were also in the same state, and we use to crib about not getting into the product company now and then.

After the Cisco episode I had learnt my lesson and I had decided that I will give some serious tries to get into one good product company. At this point, the savior “Samsung India Software Operations” came into the picture. SISO had come for campus placements at PESIT for the first and last time (as they believe no other college other than IIT, NIT and BITS is good enough for their campus placements).The presentation given by HR and the work at SISO seemed to be interesting. The salary was another attractive point. So with one written test, one tech interview and one HR round I got into SISO. The best thing was my very good friends, Raghu, Dada and Mohan also got through. Half of my bench was in SISO now. For me this is how the life at SISO started on July 14th 2007.

First three months at SISO was fun, this consisted of 1 week training at Royal Orchid, 1 month C and C++ training and then another 2 months networking domain ramp up as I had chosen Telecom and Networks division at SISO. From the time I joined SISO until I left, I have worked at Telecom and Networks division itself , in various projects in Wireless and Core networks.

Samsung Electronics is a very diverse company, working on TV, Ovens , Mobiles, Printers, Memory Chips to System LSI chips. You name a electronic gadget and Samsung will have its presence. SISO being Samsung Electronics largest overseas R&D centre works on all these products except for home appliances and digital cameras. According to me the best division in SISO is SAIT (Samsung Advanced Institute Technology) Labs or ATD, now even Telecom and Networks is part of this group. This is because ATD generally works on advanced technologies and standardization, where the scope for research is more. Work life balance is quite high in this division.

Mobile division in SISO is huge, it is the largest group in SISO with almost 75% of employees working in this division. Mobile division at SISO is very dynamic, where change is the only thing which is certain. There is generally little more pressure in this division compared to any other divisions at SISO. This division mainly concentrates on commercialization, which brings in lot of revenue, so one can expect lot of onsite and better hikes at this division. There is also large amount of politics that needs to be faced in bigger teams at mobile division; it is one of the toughest parts at SISO. Some teams in mobile divisions are actually very badly managed, where the average working hours is the only thing that is counted. But yes there are some very good awesome teams also present in the same division.

SISO's advantages are in its pay, onsite, cutting edge technologies in consumer electronics domain and job security. SISO also provides lot of freebees like free breakfast, lunch, dinner, cab facility, annual gifts, and discount sales. As a fresher if one joins SISO, there are lot of things to learn and also lot of opportunities to go onsite in a short span. Also one can get involved in many of extracurricular activities like Casa-Fete, Football , Cricket , Chess , Rajyostava celebrations , Dandya Nights , Singing, Short Story , painting, Floor decoration etc...

As every coin has two sides, even SISO has. It has a very strict security policy; one has to go through metal detector every day. A person cannot work from home at any cost. A person cannot be flexible in his work timings. Employee should be in office for 9 works irrespective the amount of work one has. The organization is bit of autocratic type, where everything is decided by our higher authorities and we need to just follow them. Taking leaves is not that easy, particularly if it is for more than 3 days, even though the amount of work one has is less. One thing is for sure, according to business requirements one can be moved from one domain to other in a short time , and we should be ready for the continuous change that takes place. Some teams in SISO work very hard , going for night outs continuously for months together, particularly when employees are at Korea or USA for mobile commercialization work.

I at SISO had a good time. The job was cool, not much hectic mostly into R&D of wireless networks. Going to Korea twice a year for the demo of our prototypes making patents and writing papers was definitely special to me. I made life time friends at SISO like Arjun , Dhinesh, Somu, Aman , Manju, Sunil, Sharath , Suresh , and Jithu. Being with friends was the best part at SISO; I had lot of fun with them at the office as well as out of office.

But yes I was not happy with everything at SISO, particularly the now and then change of projects being done now and then, the timing policy during 2010, the strict security policy, the lack of value for employees feedback, the rigid rules and lack of confidence in employees ability and skills all made me to think for change . And out of box, from nowhere I got a very good opportunity at HP to work for processors, that also for one of their leading servers, with a decent hike. I never gave a second thought before taking up this opportunity because from my engineering days the two subjects I liked a lot were Microcontrollers and Networks. I had worked in the networks already for 3 year and 6 months and now the second most interesting thing was beckoning me , and I just sent the acknowledgement ..........

List of Best B Schools Providing Full Time Executive MBA in India

One year Full time Executive MBA caught my attention some time back and I conducted an extensive research on them. Executive MBA is generally for professionals with prior work experience, there are two types in this, part time executive MBA’s and Full time 1 year MBA’s. Full time Executive MBA’s will help to bring considerable change in one’s career like change in roles, responsibilities, and in some cases change his domain itself like software development to finance, where as part time MBA’s will mostly help to move up the ladder in one’s organization however they may not help to give a break as full time MBA’s can provide.

I personally prefer Executive MBA provided by best B schools in India rather than International B schools, because of the reasons given below

• In India one can get very good Management education (from B schools like IIM, ISB, Great Lakes, XLRI, and SP Jain) in par with very good international institutes at very affordable prices (compared to MBA cost in UK and USA). In India one year full time MBA may cost 20 lakhs INR where as one has shell out 35-40 lakhs INR to do MBA in reputed B school in Europe or USA.
• If one would like to work in India after MBA then the top B schools in India are the best bets to get challenging and quality roles and responsibilities in very good companies in India rather than International B schools which can provide very good opportunity in their respective nations.
• The Business education provided by Indian schools will be more relevant to Indian business scenario than International B schools.
• Also to get into best Indian B School one has to put huge amount of efforts which will definitely boost one’s confidence.

I will give the list of colleges which provide 1 year full time MBA in India along with some relevant information like Fees, prior work experience required, specialization and placement. All schools look for the good GMAT scores and most of them expect GMAT scores to be 700 or above. I will list the colleges, in the order of Best to Better (in my opinion), remember all these B schools are really good and definitely worth pursuing. One has to take up these programmes for the career change they offer rather than taking it up only for the sake of fat salary package.

1. ISB Hyderabad provides one year full time Post Graduate Programme in Management. ISB has been ranked 12^th in the world by financial times and this is huge achievement for any Indian B school. This programme requires minimum of 2 years of work experience average work experience being 5 years. The average GMAT score is above 700 and the fees for the programme is around 22 Lakhs INR including accommodation, tuition fees, books etc. The average salary offered is 16 lakhs.

2. IIM-A and IIM-B are next two B schools which provide 1 year Executive MBA’s at a cost of around 20 lakhs INR. Their average GMAT score is also almost 700. This programme is only for people with 7+ years of work experience and average work experience of the class is above 10 years. The average salary offered is 20 LPA INR in case of IIM- A.

3. IIM-C also offers 1 year Executive MBA’s at a cost of around 14 lakhs INR. They need an average GMAT score of 700 and above with at least 5 years of work experience. They offer very good career change and average salary is 18 Lakhs INR. The average work experience of class is 8.9 years.

4. XLRI provides General Management programme for people with 5 years of work exp. The average work exp of class is above 6 years and the cost of programme is 14 Lakhs INR. The average GMAT score of the class is 700 and average salary offered is 15 LPA INR.

5. IIM Indore provides 1 year Executive MBA’s at a cost of around 18 lakhs INR and work exp required is 5 years. The average work exp is around 6 years. The average salary offered should be decent but as of now it is not updated on their web page. The average GMAT score requires is 700 +.

6. SP Jain provides three different programmes for people with 3 and more years of experience. One of them is Global MBA; other one is Post Graduate Programme in Management (PGPM) and the third programme is Post Graduate Certificate in International Management (PGCIM). All have varied GMAT requirements and different fees. All three are good depending upon the student’s interests. The Post Graduate Programme in Management (PGPM) is offered at the SPJIMR itself where as SP Jain Global MBA is provided at their global campus and Post Graduate Certificate in International Management (PGCIM) which is the latest programme is provided with some part in India and rest of the part in Germany.

7. Great Lakes Institute of Management the brain child of Prof. Bala V. Balachandran is one of the very good institutes with less branding. Great Lakes Institute of Management offers Post Graduate Program in Management for people with at least two years of work experience. The average GMAT score of the class is 690 and average work exp of the batch is 46 months. The programme fees is 13 Lakhs INR and the average salary offered is 8.7 LPA INR.