Mahabharata: The New Beginning

Course of action

Days became weeks, weeks became months, months got converted into years as I soaked into and drank nector of knowledge with best of my abilities to the extent which I can garner. Due to my busy schedule, I recieved fair amount of concerns regarding my health and wellness from my colleagues and well wishers. My parents were already departed to heavens early and other immediate and far families were....you know sort of ungrateful and treacherous fellows. I have provided them adequate amount of help and support throughout my career even though I was aware of the fact that I garner inadequate to no amount of true respect and gratitude. I was honest and disciplined regarding my conduct and behaviour throughout my career and even after that, partially due to my ideology and partially due to compulsion attributed to my ambition to reach higher & higher unimpeded despite the turbulent office politics and variable political wind outside my office. That is why neither have I amassed exorbitant amount of money/assets other than what I rightfully gained/earned nor I requested help for me or my family members ( intermediate/ far) from my contacts in unrightful manner. Then.... well you know that it somehow made to become your responsibility/burden to help your family relations no matter how close or far they are, even if it's not right if you are someone in position. Well we all do that little smoothening of edges or circumventing difficulties, even I have used it to my advantage but in my case it only played the role of speeder not even catalyst or accelerator as every other conditions necessary for successful reaction were always present but in their cases even reactants or raw materials were missing. So when these requirements/advances as you may like to call, don't result in fruitful outcome; waves and waves of resentment, abuse and bad mouthing comes knocking right at your door. So my communication with them became less and less. I have always begged and prayed god for many things and one constant request was that I should be able to earn so much that instead of taker, I should be giver; of course subjected to the condition that I should not be at the short end of stick. So after I had laid my foundation in my multi disciplinary knowledge quest, I started to look for advance material, courses and papers to supplement my knowledge bank. While in my investigation for all these things, I decided to head to foreign universities and institutions for better and in hand field experience because knowledge without application is like vehicle without fuel and real scenario is always different to varying degrees from idealistic theories stamped in books. I can also gain these things from India and in more smooth and relaxing manner albeit the fact that it's quality would be a notch lower in many fields. I made by mind to go abroad for various reasons whose majority proportions is covered by three concerns. First I was aiming for best of what I could get and not settle for lesser for mere comfort; secondly thanks to some appeared uniqueness in my body since the day of dream as it started to get somewhat noticable if looked carefully and compared from past so to avoid any mishaps even one in thousands; and thirdly I somewhat wanted to experience that custom and lifestyle as well. So I started to activate my communication network to get government subsidize my travel, living and learning expenses for abroad. I know that such perks and facilities for further learning and experience from abroad and well known institutions is available to officers and I have also benefitted from that during my service. But I don't know if such conditions exist for retired officers even if they were in high positions in Central secretariat or ministries? Most probably they don't exist but I is me, I will make it possible through one way or another.
When I contacted my colleagues and friends who are still in service at High positions they were surprised and somewhat shocked by my intention. They probably thought what the hell this oldie is even thinking?? Learning such fields( I only mentioned that I wanted to study physics, mathematics and phychology....) at this age. Almost all of them thought I was joking and looking for some environment change and some even joked that I was going to foreign trips for fun and what not( they knew I was bachelor and have no family to take care of); some closed ones even paid me visit to check if I'm mentally sound or not. After these incidents, I decided to take another route to achieve my purpose. I met with my few friends from college days which are teaching in university or somewhat related to someone who is professor at Universities. I also selected open University and contacted professor of respective departments of physics, mathematics and phychology. My Idea was to get them make the question papers on the undergraduate level while I attended these papers and get good to excellent marks and use it to convince my colleagues and friends in office that I'm serious about it and let them make some arrangements so that my expenses abroad can be subsidized by Indian government. Through some twist, turn, pursuassion and some exchanges as although these practices are not prohibited/illegal they are also not norms, I were able to convince them to go ahead with my idea. As I was well versed and prepared and I had put my almost whole time after day of dream to study, I was confident that I will achieve excellent results. Professors whom I met and persuaded, after taking around 2-3 months as these results would be shown to my colleagues and if possible concerned departments in unofficial manner to reflect my seriousness and sincerity so there was no need of approval from Head of departments, academic affairs office and University directors for that matter and this made process faster and less cumbersome. During the process of examination, I made arrangements to record the whole exam session to authenticate, of me giving exams seriously and no shady things is going on through whole ordeal. As predicted, I aced my exam papers set at undergraduate level and even professors were surprised and astonished by my talent and attitude of lifelong learning even in old age that some even made close contact for further discussion on respective fields. Winding all the process, I sent these results and explained all ordeal to my friends and colleagues. They were surprised and aweful that I have done some wonderful thing, obviously after they confirmed authenticity by respective professors secretly. First step was completed and second step was in progress. To my disappointment which I had already expected to fair degree, there was no such facility or arrangement of subsidizing education and living expenses of retired officers for studying abroad. It's not that I have no money to achieve my goal but as I never fully explained my purpose to anyone that it's not only matter of 4-5 years, it will atleast take 12-15 years as I have so much to learn and in different countries; so with this much long period of time, I will not be able to let go without worrying about money. I was disappointment that although there was no such facility existed before, even government is not ready to subsidize because according to them although I am the only person requesting such support and even for first time till now but once they support me, others will also ask for such benefits for purposeful misuse and such things will become norms. I said well if they can also produce such amazing results by giving exam why not do it as type of welfare for retired officers of high position afterall they have also given there blood, sweat and life for country. Some were supportive, some were opposed to my argument as govt. was not ready to set up this kind of welfare fund and to some extent I also understood the fact and was aware of thin possibility of success. I was firm of my decision to go abroad for study and field experience and there were some ways to liberate me of money problem for whole 12-15 years of my stay eg. Some friends suggested me to accept the solicitation of private corporations as advisor or senior manager and recieve funding or subsidy from them as they would love to spend money for my talent, work experience and contacts. I would have probably excepted their offer if not, partly due to my hesitation over their work ethics, business conduct and past friction; partly due to the fact that I genuinely not willing to spend my time doing such office job even if some relaxation were made here and there and also due to the fact that they would assume that it will take only 4-5 years which is not true; and mostly due to the fact that somehow God provided me with an excellent opportunity to cash on. Well this excellent opportunity was actually new program initiated under e- governance policy of Indian government for transparency and improvement in efficiency of government working at ministerial level. I was more than eligible for this post and so as it was aimed at specialist and experienced personnel with more than 20 years of work experience. As soon as press release for this notification was released I knew that opportunity has come. I immediately contacted the department and immediately got recruited due to my work experience and excellent internal review report made during my service. As I was again employee of government of India and with my constant efforts and connection I was made available of paid leave and subsidy for studying abroad until my education is completed. It was not easy as this specially created post for oversight and suggestion is not included for these perks but resistance was very small compared to first time as I was again part of system. With second stage being completed, I applied for Visa for US, Germany, UK and France at the same time and got accepted fast due to me having government sponsorship. This things took almost a year but during this time too, I sprinted my efforts to fill my knowledge bank and skill set as much as possible whenever I got time. With Last step also being completed, I boarded for USA as my first country to visit and applied for admission at Princeton University for mathematics, physics and psychology at masters level. During my stay at Princeton, apart from these courses I will also ransack their library to fill my bank.