Will She Be Mine Read Online Free PDF Page B

goals…
    The undergraduates- especially those belonging to the first and second years- would sometimes stand in the dorms of hostel numbers 2 and 3- called Hall 2 and Hall 3- and jointly shout ' phuddaa, phuddaa ' while their victims dug their faces into their chins and hurried past to their hostel, hall 5. A good many of them aspired for selection to the IAS cadre, the country’s administrative services, and prepared for the allied UPSC entrance exams- called the civil services exams- using the well stocked MSIT library to good advantage for their mission.
    “RK, forget if any of these phuddaas have ulterior motives in using our institute library or campus or hostels- some people carry ulterior motives throughout their lives,” my best friend, PS, occupying the room next to me in the hostel, once said upon entering my room, “Much as we’d like, we can’t abolish the IAS exams in our country, but we can at least try promoting better information sharing and issue based discussion in our college.” He paused for effect. “Shall we start a newsletter and try building a literary culture in the campus? What are your thoughts?”
    I removed the headphones of the stereo cassette player from my ears to hear better what he was saying. I adjusted the pillow beneath my head and turned around to bring his face into better focus.
    “You said about abolishing something?” I asked.
    “Forget it. It’s not something that intelligent, honest people should waste time on. I came here to discuss a literary idea.”
    He went on to repeat his desire to start a newsletter on the campus. It sounded like a great idea! I’d already written a few articles for my high school magazine before joining college and believed PS had somehow recognized my literary prowess.
    I envisioned my name as an editor on the proposed newsletter (or co-editor since he too deserved some recognition for pioneering the idea). I imagined the introductory page of the newsletter reading like the casting on a movie screen in a cinema hall. Editor: Rajat Kumar, 3 rd year, Aeronautical engineering. Shalini might like that. She’d already liked my paintings! Perhaps she admired offbeat pursuits. After my painting, she might like my editorial abilities too, and think of me as the big man at my college. Somehow, I could never keep her out of my mind while considering the good things in life, but she never seemed to think of me or tried to understand my pains.
    “Which song is it?’ PS asked, indicating my music cassette player. Music pods and mp3 players were still not in vogue at that time. Portable music cassette players were more common among students. He sat down on the chair. “What I like is that at least you don’t use external speakers placed on top of earthen pitchers to amplify the volume, as some others do. I plug cotton into my ears whenever I hear their blast. They just don’t know the upper limit of volume. It’s nothing but terrible noise pollution.”
    “It’s a Kishore Kumar song,” I replied to his query about the song I was listening to. “The music is S. D. Burman’s- Phoolon ke rang se, dil ki kalam se . It means- with the color of flowers, I write to you with my heart. It’s one of my favorites, besides another by his son, R. D. Burman, Badi Sooni Sooni Hai , or, my life is too lonely. These two songs amply sum up my own life.”
    He laughed, but I frowned. I didn’t find anything funny in what I’d said and diverted his attention to the composer of the songs instead.
    “RD’s father started composing the latter, but fell ill, so RD took over and completed it.”
    I held out the headphone to him.
    He placed them about his ears and nodded. “Good song- though I like Sehgal’s nasal tone better.” He handed the headphone back. “Anyway, put this aside. I came here to discuss something more important. There’s a lot of planning required if we agree to come out with a newsletter. It would be the first of its kind in this