Who solves a problem anyway?

I had got an interview call from 3 to 4 good (tier 2) MBA institutes of the country last year. In order to convert them into admissions and do well in my interviews I had met a lot of people who had done MBA from better institutes. One such meeting was with one of my seniors. She was to take my mock, practice (mild and fun sort of) interview.

I met her at one of the café coffee day outlets. First question she asked me was why do you want to do MBA?

I almost knew that this was to come, so had prepared that really well. I quickly snapped at that saying that MBA is the only programme that prepares one to solve the problems of the real world. It gives one an approach and a knack to solve problems!

Fantastic, was replied. Arguably one of the most good looking and successful (if you measure success by the kind of B-School you go to) ladies of her batch was floored by this answer. “Really well thought” was her reply.

She cleared a few more of my doubts and then we ended our small, interactive and enriching meet.

It has been more than one year to this meeting and I often wonder if I truly mean, what I had told that day.

This thought gives rise to couple of profound doubts.

Do we really, know what problems are out there in the “REAL” world? If by any chance we do, are we really able to solve these problems?

As an intern in a micro finance cooperative and a volunteer teacher at one of the support schools, I thought that that was it to the problem solving front.

That was certainly it, only if one wants to flaunt about his contributions to the society, however with the kind of realistic people around me, I can hardly be caught in that trap.

“The space between two of their houses is even lesser than the space between two rooms of our flat, we help those people buying better houses” I told in high pride to one of my flat mates, and a close friend.

“But you can never increase land though” Was his modest reply.

I have not tried to judge if that was a comment out of mere cynicism, or a sarcastic statement, or just a sighing remark.

But at times I wonder if we can really SOLVE any problem?

The thought provoking policeman!!!

Under a scorching sun of hot summer afternoon, an old man, was trying to cross a road. The place was one of the busiest crossroads of the city, so even at that hour, when sun had almost laid a curfew on the entire city, that place was reasonably crowded.

The old man tried crossing the road however the traffic had its own rule and he could not just get across. At that time, a traffic cop came to his rescue and took him by arm, guided him across safely to the other side of the road.

It would have been very easy for the cop to scoff at the old man for having moved out in such a hot afternoon, without adequate capacity of course! He did not do that, he did what was required of him. A help, to the right person at the right time, is indeed a good thing. I am not sure if that was a part of his duty as a traffic cop, but I am sure had he wished, he could have surely neglected the old man.

This incidence made me think of something. The cop did what the son of that old man would have done had he been with him. I.e. to help him cross the road. Similarly there are so many instances where people who are nowhere related to us, play the role of nearest relatives, at times even more. The old man did not even thank the cop perhaps, nor will he remember him. But there was something very basically good about that whole episode.

And that good was the fact that good people help other people as if they were their own, when they see others in need.

This goodness can at times be taken granted for, and that does trouble good people a lot. But that does not stop them from doing what they think they should be doing!!!

To take responsibility, to care, to love, to protect, to nurture, without any relation – is perhaps the basic goodness the world stands on.

Injustice

In the little world where children have their existence, nothing is so finely perceived and finely felt as injustice. - Pip from Great expectations, a novel by Charles Dickens