This story was written by crypt221b
Ever since I can
remember, there weren’t many Indian things I thought highly of. ISRO was a rare
exception. Capable of developing and deploying geostationary satellites and
cryogenic rocket engines, launching lunar probes which would later go on to confirm
presence of water on the moon, and now recently, a spacecraft orbiting Mars. For
a country that has one of the biggest slum area, gaining a spot in the top 5
space agencies in the world is a pretty remarkable feat. ISRO made India proud
among the world’s intellectual circles.
I always wanted
to be a part of ISRO. These scientists and engineers had my utmost respect. You
can only imagine how religiously I look up to my Dad who actually worked there!
No, he wasn’t a scientist or an engineer. He was a Senior Networks and System
Admin, basically in charge of all the computers. But that didn’t alter my
regards for him in any way. He was loving, supportive, geeky, and the smartest
guy I knew. He was my hero.
Then I turned 18.
The charm wore off. I started noticing weird oddities about ISRO. You know how
you have these internal flags that can tell when something’s offbeat. You can’t
really explain why since these flags are built from your life experiences and
act on instinct. Some of these flags were waving bright red for ISRO. No matter
how cool my Dad was, you could ignore these oddities only so many times until you
realized that something was fishy about the organization. It was enough to make
me give up my seat at IIST and go to US for a computer science degree.