Column

Or, at least, had come under some quota to get my daughter admitted to college

I am trying to have my daughter admitted to a decent college. But it is a dispiriting campaign because she does not seem to qualify for any of the 900 quotas that almost all of the city’s best colleges have set aside for special cases. For example, one college was willing to offer her a place provided she lived in a tribal area. And the college form told me that she did not have to belong to any of the recognised tribes of India to qualify for tribal residence quota.

Unhappily, she has let me down. She lives with me in Powai, which despite being home to a large tribe of indolent youths, does not meet the college’s unique domicile policy. Another college has a quota for “project-affected people”. It does not, however, indicate what “project” means. But when I asked the college administrator if my ill-conceived pasta-making experiment could let my daughter sneak into the “project-affected” slot, he shooed me away with a shotgun. In
my time, lunchboxes of college administrators was much smaller.

Anyway, the last college I went to has a fairly expansive leeway for admissions. Well, at least that’s what the principal told me. I don’t know whether my daughter will make it here. I reproduce the college’s (can’t recall the name, I think it was Hogwash) admission questionnaire so that you can use it as a general test to determine if your children can make it to what is touted as the easiest college-admission challenge in the city.

Students, study these questions carefully. You are allowed to cheat. You can use your cellphone to call your parents for help. If they are too dim-witted, the invigilator will be glad to help (you will be charged Rs1000 per question). After answering each question, give yourself five marks for each “yes” answer. You get zero for “no”.

1) Does you father whip you with a serrated belt, procured after protracted haggling from Linking Road, for disobeying any of his injunctions?
2) Does one of his injunction state, “You shall never
contradict me.”
3) Does he consider sniggering to be the said act of
contradiction? And did you, in the said sniggering manner, ever contradict his assertion that the “ozone layer is what probably comes after onion rings and mayonnaise in a club sandwich?”
4) Does you mother use the serrated belt on your father, especially when he is caught watching FTV at 3.30am?
5) Is your kitchen full of takeaway containers?
6) Is it the case that your kitchen has nothing but
takeaway containers?
7) Was the first book you received as a gift from your family called “Mein Kampf, Illustrated, In Vivid Colours”?
8) Has your grandfather promised to bequeath you with all his 248 watercolour portraits of Marquis de Sade?
9) Is your grandfather famous for writing the bestseller, “How to prolong the painful death of stray dogs”?
10) Do you visit him regularly at the Agra asylum?

Results:
Those who got 50 marks, congratulations! You pick any course you want. Your invigilator will escort you to the admissions committee (you will be charged Rs20,000 as escort charge).
Those who got anything less than 50, are awful pampered brats. You don’t need college, you need a good whipping with a serrated belt.

raghu@dnaindia.net