I MA English - Reading File

S.No	Name	Book	Author
1.	AGNES EUNICE JASPER	Jesus > Religion	Jefferson Bethke
2.	AISWARYA SUSAN SAMUEL	The Diary of a Young Girl	Anne Frank
3.	ANNMARIA SEBASTIAN	Randaamoozham	M. T. Vasudevan Nair
4.	ANU M. VARGHESE	The Kite Runner	Khaled Hosseini
5.	APARNA R.	A Thousand Splendid Suns	Khaled Hosseini
6.	CHITRA S.	The Unexpected Guest	Agatha Christie
7.	CHRISTINA MARY GEORGE	Memories	Lang Leav
8.	FRAGRANCE PRAISY GEORGE	Hostage of the Sea	Cherith Baldry
9.	HANNAH CHANDRAN	Wide Sargasso Sea	Jean Rhys
10.	HARIPRIYA SREEKUMAR	True Believer	Nicholas Sparks
11.	HELEN ANN JOSEPH	Lord of the Flies	William Golding
12.	HELEN GLORY ROBERT	Tit for tat to Treat for tat	Dr. Pal
13.	INDUMATHI	Countdown	Amitav Ghosh
14.	IRENE SHILPA S.	The Cross and the Switchblade	David Wilkerson
15.	JAYASHREE RAJAN	Asura	Anand Neelakanthan
16.	JOANNA SHALOM JOHN	Bad Ground	Joanna Shalom John
17.	JOLENE CANDICE	Roadside Crosses	Jeffery Deaver
18.	JOSE MARY JENIFER A.	The Case for Christ	Lee Strobel
19.	MAANINIJAYAL V.	Midnight’s Children	Salman Rushdie
20.	MAGDELENE ANEETEE BROWN H.	The Last Wave	Pankaj Sekhsaria
21.	MERRIL MARY MATHEW	The Namesake	Jumpha Lahiri
22.	MOHANA PRIYA	The Rainbow	D. H. Lawrence
23.	NISSY SARA GEORGE	The Book Thief	Markus Zusak
24.	PHEBA K PAUL	Night	Elie Wiesel
25.	PRIYANKA TOMY	Mahashweta	Sudha Murty
26.	REBECCA JACOB	Animal Farm	George Orwell
27.	SADEPALLI JHANSI RANI	How to Win Friends and Influence People	Dale Carnegie
28.	SALEENA S.	En Kadha
29.	VIJAYALAKSHMI INDIRAN	Don’t Delay Enlightenment	Sri Bhagavath
30.	Abhishek I Singh	The Whale Rider	Witi Ihimaera
31.	Akash Saji Kumar	Such a Long Journey	Rohinton Mistry
32.	Akil Raj G.	The Dead Heart	Douglas Kennedy
33.	Andrew Titus Jasper	Three Men in a Boat	Jerome K Jerome
34.	Bhuvanesh Kumar	The White Tiger	Aravind Adiga
35.	Kumara Sethupathi R.	Evidence for Truth: Science	Viktor Pearce
36.	Manu Kuriakose Zachariah	?	?
37.	Oswin Barnabas	The Kite Runner	Khaled Hosseini
38.	Phinehash R.	The Sacred Wood	T S Eliot
39.	Ravi Shankar	Digital Fortress	Dan Brown
40.	Sampaul C.L.	The Home and the World	Rabindranath Tagore
41.	Sivakumar	Jane Eyre	Charlotte Bronte
42.	Veillakshmikanth	Karna’s Wife	Kavita Kane
43.	A. M. Arun Kumar	The Light of Asia	Sir Edwin Arnold

Literature and Human Rights - A One-Day ICSSR-Sponsored Seminar

Dreaming Big...! Inspirational for Young Minds

“Let me do my best for my society by educating at least ten people around me,!” was the motto of a young adult from a village in Andhra Pradesh, whose noble aim resulted in the starting of a tutorial or a coaching centre for job aspirants. Having seen first-hand many of his friends and relatives drop-out from school and college due to lack of right guidance and motivation, he then took it upon himself to start Vignan High School in 1983, and from then on, it was no turning back. Due to his Tagorian ‘tireless striving that stretches its arms towards perfection’, today, this humble man has been instrumental in setting up numerous degree colleges, Junior Colleges, Pharmacy Colleges, Engineering Colleges, and one can vouchsafe that Vignan is synonymous with quality higher education in Andhra Pradesh.

One of the numerous architectural beauties of Vignan

The benchmark for Vignan is only Vignan and there is no rival for them in many ways!

The man is Lavu Rathaiah Garu, and even today you can find him clad in his traditional white, and doing the rounds as a simple, down-to-earth-person in and around campus.

The first thing that strikes you as you enter this high-profile-techno-campus In Guntur, Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh, is the hundreds of students who literally fill up all the play fields in Vignan University. Almost every other student is seen playing either Volley ball or basket ball or football, and yes cricket too (at times)!

When I was there in Campus on an invite from the Training & Placement Division of the University for the past two days, I was witness to an ‘Indo-African football match’ in progress, and players from abroad busy doing their nets.

Unrivalled in infrastructure and unparalleled in commitment!

Yes, there’s no exaggeration when I say this!

Vignan is known for her palatial Library, which houses a phenomenal collection of Journals and Periodicals, and yes, it’s fully air-conditioned. Library apart, the three language labs (with one lab exclusively devoted to Soft skills – called the Soft Skills Lab) are a cynosure to the ardent and enthusiastic learner.

On Madurai and her falcons of yore...!

A pale haggard ol’ man in a worn-out lungi, with expectant eyes, was waiting ardently for some good customer, to take to his cycle rickshaw amidst the hoard of prying autodrivers vying with one another, and ploughing their way through the passenger-arrival terminus of the Madurai Railway Station.

It was 6 am by my watch!

A Symbiosis ‘Management’ degree should 'really' prove handy for any sane passenger to 'manage' the throng of auto-drivers who are there at every vantage point making sure you don’t escape their prying eyes and trying mannerisms in the melee!

15 March 2016 Arasarady

After judiciously and sagaciously circumventing and at last navigating with considerable knack and elan through the labyrinthine of the autowallahs’ fervent appeals  and cries for a ‘savari’, I managed to cross the road across the railway station, to go have a cuppa Coffee at the famed Coffee house adjacent to the Meenakshi Amman Temple Road, when…

A cycle-rickshaw-wallah walks up to me with wistful eyes, to accept his rickshaw ride!

For a moment I was in a double bind! Should I go for the coffee or take the cycle-rickshaw just to make happy the rickshaw wallah! This is the pale haggard ol’ man in a worn-out lungi, with expectant eyes!

'Arasaradi evlo anna? (how much for arasaradi, brother?)'

Fifty rupees anna.

'Okay.'

Auto-drivers were (probably) wonderstruck or thunderstruck, when they saw me taking to a cycle-rickshaw, after having eluded their convincing rhetorical tactics!

I climb into the cycle-rickshaw, and placed myself comfortably in the nicely made-up  coir-cushion, when i had one surreptitious glance at his legs as he was riding along – and I was shocked to find the varicose veins widened, bulging and twisted beyond measure in both his calf muscles!!!

Now, a flood or a barge of nostalgic memories of our childhood days, came crowding into my mind - when, once upon a lovely time, the cycle-rickshaw wallah was the ultimate, trustable and indispensable part of our school days, for parents to get their children in safety and in security to the school. The rickshaw-wallah not only gets you down his vehicle, but also makes sure he holds your slender hands with his rugged palms, and safely gets you walking down the aisle in the school premises – the promised Land!

Theme for this year's World Storytelling Day

The theme for this year’s World Storytelling Day (20 March) is

Strong Women

Chennai Storytellers are conducting three sessions in the city.

18 March 2016 – 6 pm: Russian Cultural Centre, Kasturi Ranga Road

20 March 2016 – 11 am to 1 pm: Anna Centenary Library, Kotturpuram

20 March 2016 – 5 pm: Odyssey Bookstore, Adyar.

The session is for children above ten years and adults.

To register, contact 9551762399 / 9940036390

Inter-Collegiate Quiz

Inter-Collegiate Quiz

Lions Club of Central Madras is organizing its 

45^th Inter-Collegiate Quiz Competition

 on Saturday, 26 March 2016, 

at V. D. Swami Auditorium, 

7^th Floor, KNBIRVO, Research Block, 

Sankara Nethralaya, College Road, 

Nungambakkam. 

Dr. Sumant C. Raman will be the quiz master.

Time: 2.30 pm

The contest winners will receive trophies and cash awards. 

Registration forms are available at 11/2, B.V. Street, Triplicane.

Last Date for Registration: Wednesday, 23 March 2016

For further details, contact V. Aravind Das at 9840146017

The Student Essay Contest is back...!

MANY LANGUAGES, ONE WORLD

2016 Student Essay Contest and Global Youth Forum

Share your ideas and be heard…

perhaps even in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations!

60 Students will be selected as delegates to the 2016 United Nations Academic Impact Global Youth Forum, 25-31 July, 2016, where they will create action plans related to the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The students will present these action plans at United Nations Headquarters in New York City.

Airfare, Room and Meals will be provided by ELS Educational Services, Inc.

To Participate:

Write an original essay (2,000 words or less) discussing global citizenship and cultural understanding and the role that multilingual ability can play in fostering these. The essay should reflect your personal, academic, cultural and national context. Essays must be written in an

Random Reflections on 'R. K. Narayan's Rasipuram' - II

An arts & science college in a nondescript town that has THREE huge ‘sections’ for BA English Literature, with 70 students each - numbering a strong 630 students - for the BA English Literature course alone! that's MCAS for you! And it doesn’t stop there! This College - with some of the best infrastructural facilities - is located in an enviable ambience with little pollution, far far away from the maddening n’ sickening crowds! 

the main entrance at twilight [11 March 2016]

Interestingly, the traditional courses like Maths, Physics and Chemistry have a huge three sections each, and I was told by Prof. Mohd Iqbal - a wonderful Professor who’s been with the College for quite a long time - that in fact the traditional courses are in great demand here, with good placements! Parents are convinced that their wards get a rewarding experience in this wonderful ambience, and so the seats get filled up at the quickest possible time, he added! 

It is indeed amazing that the demand for Sciences far outnumbers the demand for Commerce, (which has a modest two sections!). Yet another interesting feature here is that, although a co-ed college, the girls outnumber the boys by an overwhelming majority, and interestingly, most of the students are from in and around the region.

The English Language Lab(s) in the huge Language block is a treat for any learner! (many colleges should pay a visit to MCAS).

The Students of the Department of Catering made sure our lunch today (11 March) was a delight to the taste buds! Indeed our taste buds started working ‘overtime’ on sensing the delicious menu that was placed before us. I asked some of the Second year students who served us, on how the course is, and if they really enjoy the course! They were all happiness, and said, this is one College that makes sure that you are placed with reputed names in the hospitality industry, and right from day one, we have it like 50 % theory and 50 % practicals, and so we balance it well over here, they added.

State-Level Workshop @ MTN College, Madurai

Calling all my friends, staff members, students - past and present - in and around Madurai, to be a part of a State-Level Workshop on Postcolonial Aura and the Celebration of the ‘Other’. Well, yes! this blogger will be doing the Workshop ;-)

There is no registration fee, and Certificates are given to all participants.

This invite is on behalf of Dr. A. Rama Subbiah, Organising Secretary of the Workshop, and Dr. Arjunan, Dean (Arts) & Head, Dept of English, MTN College, Madurai.

Be there! 

A Snippet of Inspiration for Learners

Had the wonderful opportunity of being a part of a famed-Corporate-sponsored programme for students at Velammal Engineering College, Surapet, Chennai. I had Ms. Lauren (an alumna of Stella Maris), joining me in a day of wonderful interactions with the Engineering students from Civil, Automobile and CSE Streams of the College.

About the College: Surapet is all Velammal. Yes, the place has been literally under the spell of the Velammal charm. Be it the security personnel, who resemble the cops in uniforms and mannerisms, or be it the ambience of the campus - we both were simply astounded at the meticulous attention given to even the finest detail when it comes to logistic details and administration. Right from the line marking for car parks, to the highline paint marks with cateyes for the two-wheelers, any new comer heaves a sigh of great relief when they have a palpable assurance that their cars or two-wheelers are in safe h(l)ands. The whole place is CCTV monitored, and that adds to the assurance. Although the security staff are there in full throttle all through, they do not interfere with your parking or pester you with their goading and chidings! They just step in when you violate protocol.

The College boasts of rich and enviable Language Labs and students get the best of both worlds. All boys and girls were spick and span in blue coats, and it was a delight to interact with many bright faces through the day in the Training and Placement Building of the College.

One girl was the cynosure of our eyes, and she merited or attracted our attention with her graceful mannerisms and wonderful way with words. After her wonderful presentation, we both were so curious, that Lauren was prompted to asked her,

‘Dear girl, did you by any chance study or reside abroad?’

No ma’m.

‘I was curious since, you have a wonderful accent!’

Oh thank you ma’m.

‘How did you get this accent?’