The beginning......

It has been observed in the numerous episodes of Star Trek that uncharted roads either invite catastrophe or create memorable rendezvous. 15^th June 2005 was one such day when the paths of fresh recruits from premier Engineering colleges of India found place in a small conference room called Saphire those days.  It was a nicely assembled mosaic from IIT D, IIT R, IT-BHU, NIT Kurukshetra and MNIT Allahabad. But before I proceed further I would like to take a small detour as the date 15^th June was initially fixed on 4^th July 2005.

I was supposed to join Baypackets (a Silicon Valley startup with Noida based development centre) on 4^th July 2005 along with my fellow batch mates from IT BHU – Divya Alok Agrawal (CS&E 2005) and Ravish Sunny (EC 2005). My final semester ended in early may and I was enjoying some time off from college life and before starting my career. But destiny had decided something else. In first week of June, my mother got a call from HR Manager Baypackets, Miss Shikha Verma (now Bhatia, an extremely professional and humble personality, and a good friend)) requesting to prepone the joining date from 4^th July to 15^th June.  All that my mother could understand was the word Neeraj despite of best effort by Shikha. My mother suspected something fishy between myself and Shikha, later my father took the call and he understood that it was about Baypackets. I will never forgive Shikha for this preponement as she prevented my participation in the celebration of my sister’s birthday. Now my sister shares her birthday with start of my career.

As expected of me, I reached office almost 30 minutes before reporting time of 9:00 AM. Vijay ji (Office helper) was the first person I saw in office. Few minutes later I saw Sonojoum Abhishek (a friend from Manipur) sitting on opposite sofa. Few minutes later the whole office heard the cacophonous sound of 5 member strong NIT K gang led by Prashant Kumar. Sandeep Chouhan (IIT R) completed our 100% attendance. At 9:00 AM, I saw a smartly dressed lady and I thought her to be Shikha but she was Shubhra (another fresh recruit who joined few weeks ahead along with an IIT D grad). Shikha took us to the Saphire conference room where we had our first interaction with corporate world.

The music of zara zara song (RHTDM) still gives me a lot of joy along with similar stories from my newly friends. I still remember saying that when asked about the aim of my life “to decipher Indus Valley script”, what an arrogant fellow I was! That day I made very good friends and the friendship continues till today with more warmth and more faith.  

Since the day I started preparing for Civil Services, I can recall not paying even a single penny even after having numerous dinners at the most expensive restaurants, the last being at Radisson (late May 2015). I am really lucky to have found friends like Prashant, Mukesh, Suresh and Deepak. One can make friends at any time and at any age the only thing required is honest intention.

After 10 years we all have changed a lot; we have aged and have become bald or semi-bald, some are married and some (only one) still bachelors. May the rest of our lives give much more joy and success and may our friendship endure all challenges and catastrophe. Let the beginning continue to evolve in a great story.