Heavy Wait (LXXV)

Reviewed by Ironmonkey.

Elvia was thoroughly overjoyed. There was no talk about any reunion nor did they continue their usual ‘love you sweetheart’ before good nights, yet she was very happy and excited. After Shantanu’s call many other friends of ours, who resided in the hostel for placements did call us, and told us about the schedule put up.

Elvia was more than just nervous, she was excited. She completed a couple regular books and half a dozen references for the top three subjects on whose knowledge will the future employees of Mic will be selected. Now she had nothing much to refer or practice.

She wanted to go to college now, but she was still afraid of facing Shantanu. He did call once in a while and spoke equally with both of us. I told him about our preparations. I told him about, how seriously Elvia took the placements, and how hard she worked.

He mailed us a dozen contacts of undergrads, who got placed in Microsoft. Initially I expected it would be our seniors, and we already had their numbers. To our surprise none of them from our college, when enquired about it he said that he knew we would have our seniors numbers. So he collected other contacts from IITs through internet.

Elvia has nothing to do now so, she just called those numbers, and bugged them about the placement procedures. Everyone seemed to know Shantanu well, and they responded quite politely. Meanwhile I made up for lost chapters, which I failed to cover for the sake of keeping in pace with Elvi.

Half the college got placed in the first 2 mass recruiters TCS and CTS. Almost the other half was covered by Wipro, Accenture and Satyam. The rest were mostly who didn’t attend placements like us, either because we were so confident about getting dream placements or people who waited for a particular employer, and as always a few unlucky ones.

Just 2 days before re-opening we reached hostel. We had Infy scheduled just before the re-opening. For some reasons it was scheduled in the 7th slot this time. A few people hopefully waited for Infy. Shantanu thoughtfully advised us to attend Infy, so that, we would have an exposure to interviews.

As it will not affect our dream placements in anyway, we heeded to him. All 3 of us attended Infy. Shantanu attended TCS, but unfortunately he lost it, and he was one among those, who waited for Infy. I was not sure, why he was particular about the two companies, and I never cared to ask him either.

We all took a written test, completely aptitude. It was just a cake walk, and we never even cared to check for the shortlisted candidates list, as we were so very confident. Shantanu dressed himself with a white shirt, black pant, black shoes and a velvet tie and was all set to give a pleasing professional look. We were in some decent Chudis, and were all seated before the placement cell with our files filled with resume copies, marksheets and certificates.

In Infy it was all about HR. One’s attitude is what they believe in Infy. It was all about whether someone could learn, instead of what he has already learnt. Shantanu conducted a mock interview for both of us. I wondered, what made him so qualified to do that. Anyway I didn’t question my big brother, and in those circumstances Elvia too didn’t.

Shantanu’s mock interview did work. He said he already had half a dozen such mock interviews with his seniors over phone, and couple even face to face. We all did the interview well, but I unfortunately got a bit nervous, which later was reflected in the results. Both Shantanu and Elvi got in, but not me.

They consoled me, saying that, this would be a learning experience, and I will be able to do better next time. I tried to take it that way. Nevertheless I was scared of my failure, right in the first interview.

We got our results for our 6th sem. We were nervous as usual. We ran to the department to check our results amidst the crowded hallway we fought our way to the notice board.