M A I L B A G

Streamline admissions in B-schools

IN his article “Allow IIMs to manage themselves” (Perspective, Dec 14), Mr Tarun Bajaj has made a good analysis of the present B-school admission scenario. Two of his conclusions, one, the title itself and second, to do away with GD and Interview in second rung schools are supported by solid arguments and need immediate implementation to maintain the standard of management education.

However, one aspect left untouched by Mr Bajaj is that the CAT rank is used by many B-school other than IIMs for their MBA admissions. There are more than 50 such schools, many of them ranking among the top 20 B-schools. Students are supposed to apply to these schools well before the declaration of CAT results. Otherwise, they can’t get admission there. Now the CAT exam is extremely tough and the result may always remain unpredictable for a student, howsoever prepared he or she may be. Thus, a student can’t ignore applying to these schools.

The cost of the prospectus and application form of each of these schools is around Rs 1,000. The students have to incur an extra expenditure of Rs 30,000 to Rs 40,000 on purchase of application forms besides wasting time in their filling up, submission and so on. This expenditure can easily be avoided if the last dates of submission of application forms are kept beyond the date of declaration of CAT results.

Sufficient time remains available with B-schools to carry out their admission process after the declaration of CAT results. Most of these schools allow applying online and sending the application money of Rs 1,000 to them by post after applying online. So more time is saved here. A student should, therefore, be allowed to choose and apply to the B-school where he or she can get admission according to the CAT rank instead of groping in the dark and applying to all schools.

— Er Jagvir Goyal, Chandigarh

Poetry is spontaneous and beautiful APROPOS of Darshan Singh Maini’s article “What is the truth of poetry?” (Dec 7), I wish to express my agreement with the writer of the article. Yes, poetry is a spontaneous utterance. It is automatic. It is beautiful. Catharising the poet’s powerful emotions and relieving him, it becomes the best therapy. Poetry undeniably carries the deepest truth, the eternal truth, enabling the poet to touch the hem of sublimity. It thus becomes a medium to salvation, the Nirvana. The following lines sum up my own feelings regarding the birth, the pangs and the truth of poetry. As the powerful emotions flood in, Upsetting the inner recesses Of my mind With the joy of elevated thoughts, An idea flashes in, Dispelling all sham and falsehood, With the torch of truth To sparkle in black and white On a paper. And I am relieved; And I am awakened. — N.K. Oberoi, Department of English, DAV College, Amritsar

Religion as nectar

Mrs Vimla Patil, in her article “Partying with God, too!” (Windows, Nov 29), rightly held that “more and more young people are leaning towards religion and spirituality.” All swear by prayer and meditation. India is a land of religious pursuits. Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira, Nanak all preached tyag and tapasya (renunciation and worship). I appeal to religious hawks — pujaris, gyanis and granthis, mullahs and maulvis, pirs and fakirs not to mislead people. The ultimate aim of all religions is to reach out to truth, love and affection.

— S.S. Jain, Chandigarh

Partition problem

The review bearing the caption “A riot of queries on Partition” (Spectrum, Nov 30), carries factual errors which need prompt correction. It wrongly mentions (i) “the March 1946 Panjab disturbances”, (ii), (Mr Attlee’s) announcement of February 20, 1946, setting July 1948 as the date of British departure, and (iii) the resultant March (1946) riots “finally” broke the resistance of the Congress to the division of the country.

The easily verifiable actual sequence of events, however, gives a lie to these statements. Following the British Labour Government’s announcement on December 4, 1945 of an all-party fact-finding parliamentary delegation to India, the delegation, on the basis of its 6-week stay in India (January 2-February 14, 1946), submitted its report which eventually formed the basis of the Cabinet Missioon Proposals in may 1946. Rejection of the proposals led to the Muslim League’s call for a ‘Direct Action’ on August 16, 1946, which precipitated the first communal riots in Calcutta that as a reaction provoked similar eruptions in Garh Mukteshwar in Bihar.

Communal disturbance in Punjab, in this context, occurred for the first time in March 1946 in Lahore to be echoed mildly in some other parts of the province in the following weeks; acceptance of July 3, 1947 Mountbatten Plan of Partition stoked the disturbances into a raging conflagration in August the same year.

A definite date for the British withdrawal from India as July 1948 was incorporated in Attlee’s February 20, 1947 announcement at the insistence of Mountbatten, who claims to have made it a pre-condition for accepting the assignment in India. What with being the King’s first cousin and all that, the Labour Government had to agree to it, maintains His Lordship, Earl Mountbatten of Burma.

The assertion that “the resultant (non-existent) March 1946 riots” frightened the Congress to agree to the country’s Partition is not only totally untenable factually, it is a gross oversimplification of a highly complex skein of forces and phenomena that brought forth Pakistan.

— Dr Madan Mohan Puri, Former Vice-Chancellor, Panjab University, Chandigarh

Love to live

This has reference to the write-up “In love with death” by Khushwant Singh (Window, Nov 10). No one can be in love with death. Death is certain, but its moment is uncertain. Death is acceptable but can’t be loveable. People are afraid of its untimely occurrence. But if it is predictable, it would rather affect human psyche more deeply, and people would lose the charm of their present life.

Suicide is not the solution of any problem. Hard faces knock every door but it doesn’t mean that every door is opened with suicidal crime. One should rather try to cope with the hard faces lively as considered to be the past of life. So love to live.

— Anju Anand, Chambaghat (Solan)

Not on Suraiya

Apropos of Devinder Bir Kaur’s article on Tun Tun, (Spectrum, Dec 7), Tun Tun’s most famous song “Afsana likh rahi hoon dil-e-bekrar ka” from the film “Dard” (1947) was not picturised on Suraiya, as stated by the author. Suraiya herself was an eminent singer-actress of those days. Therefore, she did not need anyone to playback for her in films. In fact, this song of Tun Tun was picturised on Munnwar Sultana, who had a second lead role in “Dard”.

Moreover, it is wrong to say that Suraiya was a new heroine at that time. Suraiya had started acting as heroine in films in 1943 when she was just 14 years old. So by the time she came to act in “Dard”, she was already an established heroine. n

— Kamlesh Tuli, Delhi