Mess at IIT Delhi - A complete mess!!!!

IITs are considered our nation's pride in terms of imparting quality technical education (Whether it is true is itself a big debate which I am not doing now). I consider myself 'partly' lucky and 'seriously' unlucky in being part of the IITD life. This is nothing to undermine the amount of knowledge gained at IIT which is at par to the best. But more than that, the very IIT system and the general campus life for students was below par (I am generous in saying that) as compared to other IITs. The most funniest part of every student's every day life at IITD is at the mess in hostels. The very fact that one pays around 20-22K every year for the sort of food that he gets at the mess itself sums up the tragedy.

There are lot of loopholes in the mess functioning which makes the entire mess system very sloppy. A bird's eyeview at every mess shows that they are clean, neatly arranged and they remain so. Coming to the set of loopholes that one can see here (as compared to other mess at colleges of decent standards). The mess timings have been the most inexplicable thing to me. Its fixed from 8 A.M. to 9 A.M.,12 PM to 1:30 PM and 7 to 8:30 PM. What happens after this is that the remains are thrown out. A simple solution would be to keep them separate so that any late comer can take them in a plate and have them. Another worst part is the extra menu that is pretty common in most of the mess at hostels in other colleges. There was as such nothing as extra menu (One has to be content with eating the hardest tandoori roti with aloo's which approximately costs Rs.25!!!) initially which later was implemented for two days/week. And guess what was there on extra menu - So called fried rice, and anda bhurji.

IIT have always been patenting their new ideas and discoveries. And it can be no surprise if they patent the following menu items - Fried rice on the extra menu (Heaps of oil + rice), The machine rotis (The most artificial rotis one can think of), The continental menu on fateful thursdays (A complete pack of useless snacks packed with the worst possible quality noodles or Macroni's makes one feel what fate has done to him), The ill advised Kichchdi (Normally given to ill people but served with great pleasure to everyone on Saturday afternoon), etc., The list can go on.

What an IITDian finds hard to digest (Besides the food of course!!!) is why is per-day meal of such standards is costing him Rs.60 around. But still IITDians who question a lot in class rooms always surprise me at their inactivity in the hostel mess. They do not question the double pricing of items on the extra menu (Ex: Egg which is purchased out of common bill has to be again purchased with a coupon), the quantity or quality of items procured (Ex: Most students do not check the weight of items purchased and sign the bill, Some days rice is of such bad quality that it looks like a Rs.2/Kg rice), the efficacy of the Mess-Secretary or the Mess-Committee (The Mess-Secy begs for votes during elections and in response makes everyone beg for food henceforth, The Mess-Committee members are seldom known to anyone in the hostel), the closing of mess timings before schedule on days on food shortage (Then the mess workers and other dignified persons like our STD booth owners take all the items and the poor IITian has nothing but Chaval and Dal), the actions of the mess-workers (Some serve in the most rudest manner, many a times there all mess-workers are inside so that a student gets fed up and goes), shortage of utensils (Spoons, glasses are always given on first come - first serve basis) and lastly the great mess supervisors.

However most active minds which finds no liveliness in the food served, tend to balance it out by either eating outside in hotels, or canteens or ordering Pizzas. Some poor fools like me do skip food. There are also some happy days for the IITDian like the Freshers day, STIC dinner, Hostel day when there are special dishes made (So called). Most of the days its the dish names which sound good than the dish itself. And besides these come at unknown costs (Meaning no one knows how much it costs but every student's account is debited a bulk amount for 5 dinners/year). Typically 3-4 meals out of 14 meals in a week (excluding breakfast) has 80% of students having food and on remaining occasions the nos hover around 40-60% (even lesser have been reported).

There was one thing in every meal that satisfies every IITDian. Atleast water coolers are cleaned regularly as are the glasses and many days four to five glasses of water fills up the stomach. Wait!!! They cooled the water-coolers but what about water itself. There were a couple of occasions when 'most clean' sewage water mixed with drinking water and IITDians were lucky enough to get this "Theerth" for 3 full days. Though sequence of health tragedies made the mess authorities realize that there is something wrong about that. To top all of this in IITD there was no night canteen in the hostel area which means from night 8 PM till 8 AM one has no other choice than Nescafe Coffee.

More than the sem to sem struggle with papers and projects what every IITDian faces is the bigger threat from the day-to-day struggle in the mess. I struggled for two years (Accomplishments : Jaundice, Malaria, Dysentry and visting most top hospitals at Delhi). Every IITD Alumnus can be proud that he has succeded in facing one of the biggest threats that he faced in day-day life. All survivors be proud to be an IITD Mess Alumnus!!!!