It was with great expectations that the students of ACE Engineering College geared up for the visit to the Infosys campus, having heard a lot from the students, who had already visited the campus in the year 2009. “It’s a company to die for. I was waiting and waiting for the visit to Infosys to be announced ever since I got to know of a visit being planned by our college” says Sai Kiran Joshi, a 2^nd year IT Student. The students had heard quite a lot about the Infosys campus from their ‘seniors’, who already had visited the campus the previous year and the boom of Infosys in the year 2009 also made a huge impact on the imaginations of the students.

The students were informed on 5^th February, 2010 that they would have to report to their respective bus stops by 7.45 on 6^th February 2010 and they would have to follow a proper dress code i.e. neat and ironed formal pants and formal shirts with their ID cards tagged. A total of four college buses were provided by the management for the trip to Infy and an approximate of 15o students took part in the trip to the Infosys campus.

The buses were bang on time and it was a sort of an excursion for the students during the journey by the bus. Many of the students were glued to the window seat as it was a route new to them and were transfixed by the sights they got to see in the heart of the city on a busy morning. The one hour journey came to an end in Gachibowli where the magnificent building of Infosys stood towering all the other buildings next to it.

“What a sight! I will never ever forget the first look of Infy which I’ve had. Now that I’ve seen how great this place is, I’ll work doubly hard to make sure that I become one of its finest employees” pledges S.Anirudh, a 2^nd year IT Student of Ace Engineering College. A swarm of employees all wearing the Infosys ID cards made their way into the building while the students were assembling near the entrance, with their faculty members making sure that everyone were properly dressed and had their college ID cards. Finally, at the stroke of 10 ‘O’ clock all the students and the faculty of ACE Engineering College entered the premises of this giant company.

It was a sight worth the wait and the expectation. The infrastructure was magnificent and the place was enormous. A total of four buildings constituted the empire of Infosys. The place was buzzing with activity even with Saturday being a holiday for the staff.  Two staff members of Infosys acted as guides for the visitors, showing them around the place.  The students and faculty of ACE Engineering College couldn’t have asked for a better guide to show them around as they went about the tour in a pretty organized manner and provided the visitors with the importance, function, departments of each building and also provided the visitors with interesting snippets.

In front of the INFY building. Credits: Insanity Personified

Then the students were asked to congregate in the seminar hall of the building where  they were introduced to the Infosys by an executive officer Mr.B.Subba, who also provided everyone present there with a wonderful insight of the company and answered every question put to him with quite an enthusiasm and zeal. The introduction session went on till 11 a.m. followed by a brief ‘tea’ session where a round of biscuits and tea were on the offer. Soon after the tea session, everyone was made to reassemble in the conference room for a different round of session. This time, the students and faculty alike were in for an interesting, interactive session where everyone was asked to come up with ideas of their own to implement something new. This session was the most enjoyed sessions of all as each one of the students came up with amazing ideas of their own much to the applause of everyone. This session went on till 1 ‘o’ clock followed by lunch in the Infosys canteen.

After an appetizing lunch session, the visitors were in for an exciting time as a ‘photo session’ followed it where everyone had a gala time posing at various places in the campus for the cameras. This went on till 3.00 p.m. after which they were given a complete tour of the Infosys campus.

The wonderful trip to the Infosys campus came to an end at around 5.00 p.m. where the visitors were presented with a small bag bearing the Infosys logo as a token of appreciation. It was a trip that would stay in the minds of the students and faculty alike for a long time as Anirudh, a student of ACE Engineering College quips, “It’s not everyday where you get into a company as big as Infy and while we were in it we were being treated as employees. I just felt like I was a part of the Infy family and enjoyed that feeling to the fullest.” His comment echoes the feelings of the two hundred odd students who had been a part of this wonderful visit and will cherish this tour for days to come.

Preparations for the workshop started from as early as the last week of November. The workshop was mainly for the faculty of various colleges from all over the world and preparations for such a kind of event had to be spot on, and thankfully they were devoid of any kind of hiccups that might have occurred if not for the fluid management of the organizers. The workshop was originally scheduled to take place on the 11^th and 12^th of December, but due to the Telangana bandh it was postponed to the 18^th and 19^th of December 2009. The workshop was conducted two days prior to the re-opening of the college and as a result of it not many students turned up for the event. In fact, only 30-35 students turned up to the college on the day of the program.

“I was in my native place when the workshop was being conducted as the holidays were going on, so I had to give it a miss” says Srikanth of E.C.E 3^rd year. A lot of other students too had a similar predicament as most of them were either out of town or were still in a ‘holiday’ mood to take part in the program. “I wanted to come to the college on 18^th, but my friends had already booked tickets for the movie ‘Avatar’ and who on earth would prefer to attend the workshop to a movie like ‘Avatar’” says Shyam, a 3^rd year student with a roguish grin. Indeed, the only dampener of an otherwise nearly faultless program was the absence of the students and it lacked a bit of luster without the usual attentive and enthusiastic faces in the crowd while the workshop was in progress.

The Chief Guest presiding over the event. Credits:Insanity Personified

The college wore a festive atmosphere from 16^th December onwards with preparations going on in full swing for the upcoming event. The student volunteers from the respective associations made sure that no stone remained unturned in making sure that the event was a success. 18^th December dawned as a beautiful day and the volunteers were seen to be frantically making last minute arrangements before the program commenced. All the participants taking part in the workshop were transported to the college in the college buses at 9.30 a.m. The registration process lasted for a full half an hour where the participants were registered and presented with a bag containing a few notebooks, pens and other stationery along with a lunch coupon.

The program commenced in the seminar hall of the College at 10.00 a.m. Prof.K.Subbarangaiah, Director, VEDA IIT was the Chief Guest and Dr.S.Ramachandran, Prof.CSE,OU was the Guest of Honor on the day-1 of the program. The Principal of the college Dr.S.Venkatachalam and the General Secretary Prof.Y.V.Gopala Krishna Murthy also adorned the dais along with the chief guest and the guest of honor. The program commenced with a prayer song sung by Ambika Rani of 3^rd year E.C.E. The lighting of the lamp followed it and then the principal, who also presided over the event, introduced everyone to the objectives and the aim of conducting this workshop. The General Secretary and the other dignitaries also addressed the gathering, emphasizing the need to think out of the box to survive in this competitive world.

Little time was spent on the speeches by the dignitaries and the gathering was dispersed for a tea break after which the participants for the Multilayered PCB designing were asked to assemble in the seminar hall itself while the participants for the Middleware Technologies were made to congregate in a classroom in the 1^st floor of the college. The tutors were quite experienced and the workshop was a total success with respect to its objectives. Lunch was served at 1.15 p.m. and the meals were a total contrast to the usual ‘luncheons’ at Ace Engineering College. “If the lunch at the canteen was as good as the lunch served today, then there’s no stopping a 100% attendance to the college from my side” says Pavan Kumar Reddy, a 3^rd year student after an unusually good meal in the college premises. The tutorial resumed at 2.00 p.m. sharp and the tutors remained as impeccable and spot on as ever. The second session carried on till 4.15 p.m. with a tea break at 3.00 p.m. The day-1 of the workshop concluded with session 2 and the participants left the college on a high after attending exceptionally good tutorial sessions.

The college buses advertising the event. Credits:Insanity Personified

Day-2 of the program began on a rather promising note. After being part of a stupendous workshop/training session on day-1, the participants were more than eager for the session-3 to kick start. The tutors did oblige them by making the session even livelier by practically demonstrating the working and construction of the multi layer PCB. The representatives from the company ‘CADENCE’, Bangalore tutored the actual working of the software and clearing any sort of query in a most patient manner. The same routine was carried out even on the day-2 as on the previous day. Finally, at 4.30 p.m. the entire workshop for multilayered PCB was wound up and all the participants of the workshop, irrespective of the branch were congregated in the seminar hall for the Valedictory function. The Chief Guest for the day-2 was Sri Rayyappa Mayakunthala, Director, NETENRICH and the Guest of Honor of the day was Sri R.VInay Kumar, Director, Delegate Technologies. Like the day-1, the Principal and the General Secretary adorned the dais with the chief guest and the guest of honor. The Chief Guest praised the college management for coming up with such a brilliant workshop and expressed his wish to see more of such events in the future. The guest of honor livened up the crowd by giving genuine real life examples of people who made it big in their life by treading paths which others had not dared to. The Chief Guest and the Guest of Honor were then presented with mementos and participation certificates were handed over to the participants. The participants were then asked by the Principal for their feedback and a few of them went on to the dais to express their opinions and also provide the principal pointers about the kind of changes that could be made and the shortcomings if any. The national anthem was played as the evening drew to an end.

On the whole, the workshop was a total success with only a very few minor lapses. “Rarely have I seen a more organized and a disciplined event from a college that’s only 3 years old” were the exact words of the chief guest while commenting on the way the college had conducted the whole program in such a professional manner. His statement throws light on the amount of hard work put in by the students and also the staff members in ensuring that the whole event was carried out without a hitch and to see that it was a grand success which it was.

Four different banners of the four student organizations namely, Tektronix (ECE), Phasor (EEE), Infotrace (IT), Cybertronix (CSE) were hung from the college building, welcoming the juniors to the college. Popular songs were played on the music system in the morning till the buses arrived for the benefit of the volunteers, who either stayed back at the college overnight or came as early as six o’ clock in the morning to make arrangements for the D-day. It was quite a tough job making all the arrangements as there was another fest in the college on the day after the orientation day. So, it was quite a commendable job to have made all the arrangements without a hitch, a fact much appreciated by the faculty and the management.

The day dawned perfectly without a trace of cloud in the sky, spreading out sunshine all over, unleashing an aura of goodness on the newly joined students of the college. For a change, the freshers weren’t petrified at the prospect of coming face to face with their seniors, as they had their parents beside them to ward off anyone, who cast an eye on their precious wards. A few of them had a boring look on their face, which quite surprised a lot many people. On enquiring, Hardik, a fresher says, “This college is quite ok, but I expected the college to be just like the college from the movie ‘Happy Days’”, bringing about a tiny smile or a look of understanding on the faces of the 2nd years as they too had this popular notion that every engineering college is just like the college from ‘Happy Days’.

On September 11, 2009, the seniors didn’t dare to venture anywhere near the freshers, lest they be interrogated by the parents of the very freshers they wanted to rag. Anti ragging posters were put up in the college campus a few weeks prior to the orientation day and students were warned of dire consequences if they were caught in any ragging incident. Says Pavan Kumar, a 3rd year student, “With such a fuss being made about the whole ragging thing, only a fool would want to rag anyone and I certainly am not a fool”, making it clear that not many students in his year are either in a mood to rag or have an inclination towards it. The management was very strict while making it clear that even if anyone is found in the vicinity of ragging, he/she would mercilessly be handed over to the police. Such was the stance of the management towards ragging that the general secretary of the college Mr.Y.V.Gopal Krishna Murthy repeatedly made it clear in his address to the students that any form of ragging would not be tolerated and they needn’t worry about it.

The freshers were first made to go to their prospective classes to fill out their registration forms and carry out the other routine procedures. “Man… I find it very amusing to serve the juniors lunch and to try and be nice to them”, says C Anil Kumar, a 3rd year student from Ace Engineering College. Then everyone, including the parents assembled in the seminar hall to attend the address given by the principal, general secretary, chairman and the vice-chairman. All the words spoken by the dignitaries were quite enlightening and were worth the wait, as each one gave their own insights and anecdotes to the audience present there.

The principal of the college, Mr.S.Venkatachalam started the proceedings by lighting up the lamp along with the other dignitaries. Then after the lighting up of the lamp, he introduced everyone present there to the who’s who of the college. Then he began his address by highlighting the achievements of the college so far, which were mighty impressive. Then, the general secretary Mr.Gopal Krishna Murthy took over the proceedings by beginning the address with a popular telugu saying advising the students to always stick to the right path, however hard it might seem to be. This is generally the sort of advice the General Secretary often gave in his address to the students and every time he manages to enthrall the students and the faculty alike with his thunderous, dynamic speeches. This time was no different, as the loudest applause was reserved for the general secretary‘s address.

After all the dignitaries addressed the gathering, it was time for lunch to commence. The hungry students and parents made a bee-line towards the lunch counters, which thankfully was organized to perfection by the students and management. The senior students played charming hosts to the freshers by serving them lunch and directing them to their required rooms and halls. After the lunch was done, the students, seniors and juniors alike were asked to congregate in the seminar hall yet again. This time, the students belonging to different groups were asked to go to their respective rooms, like, all the students belonging to EEE were asked to assemble in a separate hall, students of IT were made to sit in a different hall, etc.

Then started the orientation program, where the faculty members of each group introduced themselves to the enthusiastic bunch of students staring at them. The HOD’s of various groups began the session by introducing everyone to the subject/stream they chose and explaining the current scenario of the particular stream in the world. Gradually, the students were also asked to introduce themselves on the dais to the crowd present there, which was a rather enjoyable affair as most of them were quite nervous and a couple of girls broke into tears for reasons not known to anyone. “This was the first time we had ever been on a dais and we couldn’t just get ourselves to talk in front of you all people”, confides Sneha, a 1st year student, who was petrified at the very prospect of facing the huge crowd.

Student organisers of the Orientation event. Credits: Insanity Personified

Thereafter, a few parents also recounted their experiences, which made them opt for Ace Engineering College and also shared a few valuable insights on the present day education. This session was supposed to wind up by 3.30 p.m, but such was the enthusiasm and the response of everyone present there, that it extended up to 5.45 p.m and the buses were readied by that time. Soon, it was time for the students, faculty and the parents alike to end the orientation session for the day.

The orientation program for the year 2009, at Ace Engineering College was quite an enjoyable affair and the first day at the college started off on a high for the juniors and they couldn’t have asked for a better start to their engineering career. Also, they certainly have got a thing or two to prove to their seniors and the faculty, who have reposed such an amount of faith on them.

Owing to the recession and slow down in the industry, it’s all the more important this time to weigh the options carefully and select a course and college based on a thorough analysis of the what’s and when’s of the college. The recent ICFAI fiasco might have served as an eye opener for those, who don’t give the credentials of the college a great thought. The first and the most obvious step for anyone seeking an admission into a college is to verify if it has been approved by the necessary board of education. Then come the questions regarding the faculty, infrastructure and the placements the college has got to offer in the 3^rd year. Again, it all comes down to the student and his/her performance after getting into a college. No matter how good a college or the faculty is, one can’t be expected to come out on top if there’s not a great deal of enthusiasm from the student. Also, just selecting the desired course and letting time do the rest is a very wrong notion, which is seen a lot among students, who are relieved getting into their desired course that they just don’t bother about their current academics.

Class in progress. Credit: Insanity Personified

ECE (Electronics and Communication Engineering) is the hottest stream at present owing to its demand in various specters of the organizations. With 120 seats being introduced in ACE Engineering College, it’s a chance for many to rejoice, as the faculty in the ECE department is touted to be among the best in the whole state. The laboratories, equipment and all the other stuff related to it are maintained to thorough perfection and are updated from time to time. To cite a recent example, the CROs (Cathode Ray oscilloscopes) were changed immediately and were replaced with a much better and superior CROs when the students complained that they weren’t up to the required standards.

The last rank to get into ECE without the reservation quota last year was around 20,000. This time it could extend to a higher rank as the number of seats have been doubled in the ECE department. The activities going on in the Electronics department are way too fun, enjoyable and prove to be a thorough learning experience for the students right from the first year onwards. The urge to participate in all the fests conducted by different colleges is encouraged by the staff of the department and the students are entrusted with ideas to come up with, while organising any fests in our college.

With Mr.P.Satyanarayana as the HOD of ECE and distinguished professors like Mr.R.Murali Prasad, J.Nageshwara Rao in the ranks, the teaching staff can’t get any better than this. These three professors together have an experience of more than 50 years in the electronics field and have given invaluable ideas, suggestions and shared their knowledge with the students everytime it was required of them to do so. Regular trips to various institutions and sites are among the hallmarks of the college. A visit to the Infosys campus in the very first year of the students was something that was very appreciable. Also, the students had been taken to the Nagarjun Sagar Dam by the college authorities to get to know the generation of electricity in a practical manner.

Fun at ACE. Credit: Insanity Personified

The college also engages some of the finest and distinguished professors from the state to handle a few particular topics as  guest faculty. Many superb and wonderful lecturers all over Andhra Pradesh are a part of this project in the ECE department since the conception of ACE Engineering College. Also the fact that the ECE section has made it to the top 30 ranks all over the state in the year 2009, shows how dedicated and focused are the faculty towards the academics. Faculty from the ACE Institute (which is considered to be the top institute in India for GATE Coaching) is also a part of the esteemed faculty with at least two professors from the institute handling the junior sections.

All in all, it’s a wonderful learning curve to belong to the ECE stream as it’s considered to be an ‘evergreen’ subject and the interests can be progressed further to the maximum extent possible if the management and the faculty is very encouraging with regard to the student’s interest. Anvesh and Suraj (names changed) are of the opinion that Ace Engineering College is the place to go for if one’s genuinely interested in E.C.E and wants to spend the four years of B.Tech in a carefree and an enjoyable manner. Though, they are a bit apprehensive about using the word ‘carefree’ in the same line as ACE Engineering College, rest assured it’s a pretty good college to belong to and they opine that anyone who’s got a rank between 7000-20000 can consider this branch in ACE seriously. Such an environment can be found in ECE @ ACE Engineering College much to the relief and happiness of the students, who despite getting a bit higher rank in the recently concluded EAMCET examinations hope to get into ECE in a decent enough college.

Students of ACE Engineering College were treated to an almost breath taking spectacle on the 23^rd of July, 2009 when the ‘Guru’ of hacking, Ankit Fadia demonstrated a few examples of how easy and realistic hacking was. The students and faculty alike were spell bound by the demo. By using a simple yet a very effective language, Ankit Fadia not only demonstrated the steps to be taken to counter measured cyber attacks, stalking, crime, but also demonstrated a few live demonstrations by hacking the BSNL website and also cracking a few passwords of IM users. Everyone was so thrilled by these demos that they just wanted the seminar to go on and on. The seminar began at 2.00 p.m in the conference hall of the college. Many banners, hoardings welcome flags had been erected in the morning to welcome the maestro.

A festive atmosphere gripped the whole college on the day he was scheduled to come. Those, who hadn’t heard of Ankit Fadia simply ‘Coogled’ his name and were quite amazed to get more than 10 pages worth of information related to him. So absorbing were these facts that almost the entire college got to know of his latest breaks, career, his works and other stuff related to him. Classes were suspended on the day he was to arrive in the college as the students had to register with the authorities before the program could commence. Such was the enthusiasm and anticipation that the registrations continued up to 1.30 p.m. However, the students of ECE and EEE were more than disappointed as this session was only for IT, CSE and MCA students. This didn’t deter them from sneaking from the backdoor and listening to the seminar once regular classes were finished.

Ankit Fadia arrived at the college at around 2.10 p.m in a sleek, black Mercedes Benz. Quite a few heads turned to catch a glimpse of the suave car. Dressed in casuals, Ankit Fadia entered the hall to a tumultuous applause from the crowd gathered there. The seminar began with the lighting up of a lamp by the college Principal, Secretary, Ankit Fadia and the Vice President of Reliance mobiles Hyderabad. An introduction of Ankit Fadia was given by Sreenesh Reddy of IT, 3^rd year, highlighting the importance of Ankit Fadia to the world and his achievements so far. Then the stage was handed over to the icon himself, Ankit Fadia. He began the proceedings on a rather somber note by explaining the serious misuse of the internet prevalent among the youth now.

Making a point. Credit:

To everyone’s horror, he went on to explain how a few teenagers got carried away by their prowess in hacking and ended up blackmailing a lady with pornographic images and other vulgar content. Also giving out a few examples, he told everyone about how a fifteen year old, sitting in his home, hacked the NASA website and leaked out precious information on the internet. “All of this was done out of sheer curiosity and a certain amount of innocence and we should exercise caution with curiosity”, was the stern yet valuable advice from Ankit Fadia. A few basic and obvious tips like never giving out our IP address, credit card numbers and other information to others over the internet was repeatedly stressed upon the gathering making it apparent that every person, however smart he/she may be, is gullible to fall prey to internet fraud and hackers.

Moving on, he actually gave everyone a true insight into what hacking was and if it really was so hard to crack codes and get access to blocked sites and accounts. The answer to this is both a yes and a no. It is ridiculously easy, once you get a hang of things like opening a proxy site and bypassing the main server. But it also is not as easy as it sounds, as most of the administrators have started to think a bit ahead of the hackers and making the task all the more difficult for them. The way he explained the rules and tricks of hacking was truly brilliant because he spoke in such a good language that even a computer illiterate person began to learn hacking in that session.

The seminar was so eventful and enjoyable that, rarely did anyone enjoy a seminar to such an extent in the college. Even the regular ‘seminar bunkers’ were spotted to be taking down notes as Ankit Fadia kept changing screens. Vivek Chavan, a 3^rd year student of ACE Engineering College said that he came to the college only to hear the seminar instead of bunking the college on that day as was his earlier plan. He says that the seminar was more than excellent and he was glad that he didn’t miss this lecture.

Ankit Fadia finished off the proceedings in a grand style by going on to hack the BSNL server in front of the whole gathering and making his phone bill come to 0.00. A wild applause followed this sensational piece of hacking. A few students actually began to ask him to change their telephone bills, but Ankit chastised them in a friendly manner saying that it was only a demo and things like that shouldn’t be entertained by anyone. The lecture came to end at 4.30 p.m and for the first time the students were quite disappointed for a lecture to come to an end.

Everyone was on their feet to give Ankit Fadia a thundering applause and it went on for quite a while. Even when the students were going back to their home, they just couldn’t stop discussing what they had witnessed and wondering if they could really crack any password or websites.

Even though Ankit has managed to have many speaking engagements, it is surprising that he has not made it to Black hat conference which is considered to be THE HACKERS CONFERENCE.

Also from Wikipedia :

Authenticity of claims

According to Wendy McAuliffe at ZDNet UK, Fadia’s Hacking Truths website was judged “second best hacking site” by the FBI, though no ranked list of “hacking sites” has been published by the FBI.^[3]

In 2006, Chennai Online reported that Fadia’s consulting clients included several of the largest technology and financial services companies in the world. No other source corroborates that report; were it true, Fadia’s client list would exceed that of many of the largest independent security consultancies. The same article reported Fadia’s involvement in decrypting a message from an Al Qaeda operative; no other source corroborates that claim, nor does any of Fadia’s published work involve cryptography or cryptanalysis.^[6][12][13]

In April 2002, Rediff.com published an interview^[14] with Ankit Fadia. Anti-India Crew (AIC), a Pakistani hacker group noted for defacing Indian Government websites, rubbished the claims that Fadia had made in the interview. Fadia had claimed that his alert to a U.S. spy agency had prevented an attack by Pakistani hackers. However, he never divulged the name of the agency, citing security reasons.^[4] AIC and another Pakistani hacker group WFD defaced an Indian Government site, epfindia.gov.in, and “dedicated” it to Fadia in mock deference to his capabilities to hack or prevent hacking.^[15][16] AIC also said that it would be defacing the website of the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC), www.cbec.gov.in, within two days and challenged Fadia to prevent the attack by patching the vulnerable website. AIC maintained that Fadia should stop calling himself a hacker, if it succeeded in hacking the CBEC website.^[15] AIC kept its promise and defaced the CBEC website after two days. At another defaced website (bhelhyd.co.in), AIC termed the claims of Indian media about Ankit Fadia as “Bullshit”^[17].

Some security experts in India dismissed him as just another fad^[18]. Ankit Fadia is listed on attrition.org’s Security Scene Errata: Charlatans webpage alongside individuals such as Steve Gibson and Carolyn Meinel. This page seeks to “point out a few cases of fakes walking among us“^[19][20].

Fadia’s earlier site, Ankitfadia.com, was attacked in 2003, by a cracker who self-identified as SkriptKiddie. Fadia explained that he was using a private web server for hosting his website and they were responsible for the lack of security. AnkitFadia.org maintains a set of documents questioning the veracity of many of Fadia’s claims.

Note : Since part of the article is a replication of Wikipedia article, this particular article is to be considered Creative Commons with attribution license.

This was the case of many 2^nd and 3^rd year students of JNTU on July 6^th, 2009 when the college finally re-opened ,much to the relief of the 2^nd year students who felt they had been given more holidays than they wanted.

Indeed, such was the boredom of the holidays that almost the entire student fraternity was very glad to be get back to college. Also, the fact that not many classes are conducted on the very first day  brought  out a very large and healthy attendance. There was almost a festive atmosphere in ACE engineering college on the day of the re-opening, where students greeted each other as would long lost friends. Greetings of  “Hey! Wassup… long time… how are you?” were heard throughout the campus almost the entire day as everyone caught up with each other after a long time.

A few students, quite cleverly avoided the faculty members for the risk of getting grilled about their percentages in the semester examinations. Sidharth, a student of ACE engineering college admits that he didn’t venture anywhere near his STLD professor as he had scored particularly low marks in that subject and didn’t want to risk getting grilled by his lecturer. Classes began on a rather serious note from the next day onwards with almost every faculty warning the students of dire consequences should they resort to bunking the classes or not taking the academics very seriously. Almost, as if to prove their point and to the horror of the students, every subject was introduced in such a threatening and a deadly manner that even the so called ‘last benchers’ had to sit straight and listen to the classes.

The scenario for the 3^rd year students was more serious than they had ever encountered in their B.Tech life. With many of the competitive exams like GRE, TOEFL, GMAT, GATE lined up this year, it was not so surprising to see many students getting serious and preferring to sit in the libraries rather than whiling away the time in the college canteen or in the ground. Y.Sai Pavan Reddy, a 3^rd year student says that this year is probably going to be the most challenging phase of B.Tech as a number of exams and also campus recruitments are lined up this year.

But not everyone has been thinking along the same lines as Pavan. A trip to Araku is being planned by the students of Ace Engineering college later this month. Rohit a 3^rd year student of Ace engrineering college says that this ‘seriousness’  is only a passing façade as the results were announced just 3 days prior to the re-opening. He says that everyone will be their ‘normal self’ once the shock of the results subsides. But he’s also quick to point out that not everything is the same in the 3^rd year as it was earlier.

Gone are the carefree days of engineering where classes and labs were attended only for the sake of attendance and fun. The students of the 3^rd year seem a little purposeful and bent towards their careers and academics, and a majority of the students of C.S.E and I.T branch are seen attending various software and designing application classes after the college hours. Praveen an I.T student admits that he has no choice but to attend these classes after regular classes as this not only provides him with an extra certificate but also enables him in getting an edge over the others from the interview point of view.

The scenario with the 2^nd year students is completely different. Barring a few, almost all the students are seen to be lazing around the campus, not bothering about the world. The attendance of the 2^nd years on the first day was particularly low with an attendance percentage of only 50%.  Priya (name changed) says that it is only fair for them to bunk the classes as, according to her, an abysmally less number of holidays were given to them after the end of their 1^st year and she feels fully justified in bunking a few days from the college.

To compensate for the low attendance on the first two days, the principal of ACE Engineering college decided not to start the classes immediately, instead, various workshops and personality development classes were conducted for them by emminent personalities in the college premises.

Yes, there is a certain gloom and a sense of restlessness in the minds of he 3^rd year students as this year might well turn out to be the deciding phase in the careers of the students. Also, the fact that there is only one year left after this and the 2^nd semester of the 4^th year hardly counts might be a reason for the impending nag in the minds of every 3^rd year student. But folks, its time to take life as it comes and one should try and maximize the last few days of what’s left of their engineering life. Also the old saying “Hope for the best and prepare for the worst” should be the mantra for the students appearing for the competitive exams this year.