This is a preview of the Ask Me Anything session conducted by the Physics Department Academic Mentorship Program, IIT Bombay in October 2020. The final version will shortly be posted on their website to which the link will be provided here when available.

1. Tell us something about your time in IITB as an undergrad. Are there any fond memories you will never forget? How does it feel being a professor in the same college? Do you find any difference from your undergrad years?

Things have changed a lot from the time I was here as an undergrad. Let me first give you an idea of the physical changes. There was no LHC, and all our physics classes from second year onwards were held in the department itself. In fact, the third floor housed the first year UG lab as well as several classrooms at the location where there are labs now. Our first year tutorials were held in those little dilapidated rooms that you see on the first floor of the main building, right next to what is called “Materials Management Division” today. Our departmental computer room was quite small and only a few were ever working so there was some sort of a quarrel situation sometimes.

Coming to hostel life, I visited my old hostel on the very first day that I arrived at IITB as a faculty. Nothing much has changed in terms of the quality of the rooms. I visited my old room and the mess — some of the staff is the same. I visited the TV room, where the entire hostel had watched live the 26/11 coverage. The xerox shop, which was the lifeline of many students one day before midsems and endsems was shut down. Hostel Holi celebrations were scary in which our clothes would even be torn. There was no fitness center like the one you have now in front of hostel 11. There used to be one small room, labeled a ‘gym’, which I used to go to with friends. 

On exam days, with roommates and wingmates we used to go to hostel 13 around 3am in the morning to have dosas and parathas. We frequented the hostel 8 coffee place and the newly opened juice center near hostel 5. Gulmohar was the go to place on days when the hostel food was terrible. At that time, all this non-mess food tasted very good. I do not know if this is still the case. We used to visit the lake side during the forbidden hours (please don’t do this now, it’s dangerous). 

Apart from these physical changes, I think there is one big difference between now and then, a difference that took some effort on my part to come to terms with. As a student, I used to idolize the faculty, comparing them to self-less intellectuals sacrificing the joys of the world and living in the middle of this forest with the sole purpose of disseminating knowledge. When I was offered a faculty position, I was worried about not being able to match up to the lifestyle and worldview of my old teachers. Within the first few months of joining, I discovered that from the perspective of a colleague, the faculty here are more human-like, with worldly virtues and vices in various proportions. This realization helped me overcome a sort of an impostor syndrome as a faculty at my alma mater. As they say, knowledge comes from learning new things, but wisdom from letting go of what you know.

Lastly, the teaching was very different. With the new faculty that has joined, I think there are fresh perspectives and new styles of lecturing. The academic structure was far too rigid during our time. Even doing a project or seminar outside the department required jumping through multiple hoops. I think during my last two years as an undergrad here, I spent an extraordinary amount of time circling between the academic office and the department for various kinds of signatures. I think you guys are lucky that now these things are quite streamlined.

2. It is said that physicists are also philosophers. What is your philosophy on life?

Partially answered already. Don’t have much to say anyway, since I am still in the process of learning how to live.

3. It is said that post-graduate education can be very expensive, outside the country. For people with limited resources, it means a severe curtailing of options. What can one do in such a situation?

I am afraid I am not sufficiently informed on this topic. I had a fellowship for most part of grad school. If the program of your interest does not offer fellowships or assistantships, perhaps an education loan can be taken? I think our Engineering Physics DAMP can probably address this question in a more comprehensive manner. Good luck!

4. We always see you impeccably dressed in formal suits, whether it be class or office hours. You look handsome. How do you keep this up?

Thank you for the compliment! I don’t think I have an incredible taste in clothing, but for whatever little is there — I have to credit my better half. Regarding keep up, I think it has to do with fitness — something I always encourage the batch for whom I am the faculty advisor to pay attention to. Carefully choosing what you eat and working out not only help you stay in shape but also bring some clarity of thought, which is critical for research as well as other aspects of life.

5. What’s the secret to your fitness?

Most important is to pay attention to what you eat. There are many online resources which you can consult and I think there is also a nutritionist at IITB. Don’t succumb to social pressure — for instance, in faculty meetings, I always say no to unhealthy food and drinks. Secondly, you must do some form of physical activity. As for me, before the lockdown, some of you may have seen me running inside the campus. I do participate in various running activities such as the Tata Mumbai Marathon.

6. When teaching a large class, there is often a bias between the needs of the many (everyone understanding a particular topics) and the few (teaching advanced topics). What’s your formula to deal with this?

This is a tough one. I have been teaching two core courses both of which have a large undergraduate strength. In such cases you always have to deal with a situation like this. Since these are core courses, I cannot do much modification to the course content itself. So I stick to the stated ASC course content during the lectures. For students interested in advanced topics, I give them the option of course projects on these advanced topics. I also supply reading materials from contemporary research literature on advanced topics which the students can read and ask questions from.

7. You’ve gotten a lot of papers published during Undergrad. What was your strategy back then?

Overall I had some very good research experience during the later years of my undergrad time here, where I did a joint project between Physics and EE departments. I spent a lot of time at the CEN cleanroom and characterization labs. It was quite exciting to participate in these experiments since these were different from the traditional view of lab work that I had. It was more of curiosity that made me spend several hours and persevere in the project.

I don’t think there is a one size fits all strategy that I can recommend and honestly, I am not very happy with some of the choices I made during undergrad. At certain stages, I ran after hype when I should have chosen an intellectually stimulating research topic and persevered despite barriers. I see a lot of undergrads, some of whom have worked with me and some from my courses — repeating the same mistakes. One needs to take up a challenging research problem and give your 100% to take it to a conclusion instead of trying to go back and forth and trying to juggle multiple projects in the hope that one would click. A research problem is not like a course assignment — one needs days if not weeks of deep contemplation and struggle and there will be long periods of low productivity.  

8. A lot of the times our childhood dream isn’t the profession we finally choose. If you hadn’t chosen physics as a profession, what would you have done?

I am afraid I do not have an interesting answer to this question. As far as I can remember, being an educator and a scientist was always on the top of my list. There were of course moments where I contemplated other career options — but these were mostly based on herd mentality and I am glad I didn’t go further in those directions. I am quite happy with where I am right now. The academic freedom and most importantly, the brilliant students at IIT Bombay who I teach and with whom I work make every day here worth it.

9. We always see you wearing gloves whenever writing on a chalkboard. Where did you get the idea?

Chalk dust makes my hands dry. Also I get an uncomfortable feeling when my fingers get covered with chalk and eventually it gets to my notebook and the laptop which I use during the lectures. 

10. Why didn’t you apply for professorship at a university in the USA? What hurdles does one typically face if one wishes to be a professor abroad?

Honestly, it’s not any harder to get a faculty position abroad than it is to get one in India. If you have good publications and wish to stay abroad, then absolutely do apply! The process is more or less the same as here. As for me, the decision to move back to India had to do with personal rather than professional  choices, but several of my friends do have a successful career as a faculty in US universities as well.

11. What’s your take on relationships, and were you in any during your undergrad days, or during your grad school?

I would not like to comment on the personal aspect of this question on a public forum. Hope you can empathize with this decision. But I can certainly make a general comment about relationships during undergrad or grad school. I think it’s absolutely healthy to be in a relationship as a student. In fact, if you have a supporting partner especially at the same institute it does help a lot in your emotional well being during this period of intense competition and stress. Having said that, every relationship is different — you all are here to build your careers and if your relationship is hurting your professional goals, it might be a good idea to slow down.

12. What’s your view on managing personal life with profession? Or for that matter, even the balance between being a teacher and a researcher?

This is a good question. Having lived in an IITB hostel as an undergrad, some of that conditioning resulted in me mixing the two for quite some time. But now in order for me to stay sane, it is very important to keep the personal out of the professional. It is incredibly hard to do this in a sort of a closed community like IIT Bombay, especially for me since some of my colleagues now are my teachers from yesteryears. . I am still working on it.

Regarding teaching versus research, honestly I do not have to choose one over the other. While preparing for my lectures, many a time I am able to explore the deeper aspects of some of the topics in my own research as well. I try to learn from the interesting questions that students raise during my courses. At the end of the day, it is all about time management and consciously avoiding non-productive discussions and activities. I am not perfect at it yet, but certainly better than where I was yesterday.

13. In class you often make references to philosophy or fiction. How do you find the time to delve into fields outside your profession?

Well first of all, thanks for being observant in class. Indeed, it’s hard to cope with life without the companionship of a Josef K, a Randle McMurphy, a Victor Frankenstein, a Giovanni Drogo, a Bernard Marx or a Winston Smith. In a selfish sense, it’s empowering to see these distant and possibly imaginary friends go through similar ordeals in their professional and personal lives as you. My “out of syllabus” reading has reduced a lot compared to my grad school time, but I am catching up now. In the pre-COVID era, I used to steal some time during the commute from my home to IITB campus. Nowadays working from home, much like you guys, my workload has increased. I am working on a research problem currently and sitting at home, never get the feeling of having done “enough” each day. So somewhat surprisingly, my leisure time has decreased during the lockdown. I do try to set aside some time in the evening before going to bed.

14. Give us an insight into what different people from your class ended up doing. How many of these got PhDs (maybe mention any if they got into notable universities), took up non-core fields, or ended up doing something radically different? Are you still in touch with any of them?

Most of them went for PhDs mostly in the US and some in Europe. As far as I remember only three or four people in our batch went for a non-physics route after bachelors. These career choices included consulting, entrepreneurship and journalism. Yes, I am in touch with them via social media!

15. How do so many undergrads working with you publish first author papers? What’s the secret ingredient?

First of all, I have had the opportunity to work with some very smart and hardworking undergraduate and masters students here from whom I have learnt a lot as well. It is true that most serious people who have stuck with me for about a year or so have gotten first author publications. If there is any secret, I think you should ask these students. At my end, my role as an educator and a scientist requires me to select interesting and relevant research problems for my students. Most of the time, the calculations or the experiments are not very hard, but I think the biggest factor which prevents UG students from doing good research is some sort of aversion to creativity and perseverance. For all UG students who have published in my group, I consistently see them improve on these two fronts — which I believe is the secret.

16. What’s your favourite genre of music? Any reason you like this particular genre?

Again sorry I don’t have an interesting answer to this question. No favorites now. But during UG days and grad school, I went through various phases of musical interest from Mozart to Rammstein to classical Indian to local folk songs from my birthplace. Nowadays I just go with how I am feeling on a particular moment and play the music that comes to mind.

17. Briefly lead us through the kind of courses you took during your stay at MIT. What led you to Photonics?

I mostly took courses on condensed matter. Photonics is honestly something I have taught myself for the most part, learnt the finer details while doing research and through interactions with fellow grad students and postdocs. The motivation was somewhat subjective to be honest — I just seemed to enjoy the theory and playing around with lasers! I can of course construct a story but that wouldn’t be honest.

18. You’ve achieved a lot in life, and like all human beings, (we assume!) would have had your share of ups and downs. What keeps you motivated through all this?

I have had a lot of ups and downs, yes. My motivation is to be a better scientist and an educator compared to what I was yesterday. I still have a lot of things to learn from pioneers in the field as well as from a UG student who solves a mid sem exam problem in a way I had not imagined. I do have a support system at home — my spouse with whom I have long discussions on all kinds of complex moral questions that I grapple with in my day to day professional and personal life. Another important influence has been Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning”, without which I would probably not be here. 

Even in my current role as a faculty, while IIT Bombay is academic heaven as far as India is concerned, there are occasional moments of pessimism about bureaucracy, hierarchy and politics — but despite all this, what keeps me going is you, the students! Your life as a student is somewhat like our IITB campus — in a perpetual state of construction and destruction, but always moving forward. The intellectual curiosity, the innocence and grit of the IITB student community are some things I cherish and they inspire me everyday. Although I am on the other side now, I still hope that I can continue to be like such a student in my research efforts now.