The Namesake

On a chilly autumn night a cute, sweet child is born. It's not that important news for millions of people or even billions of people but for a few people this was a very memorable day as they would be addressed by a new word. Grandpa, Grandma, uncle, aunt. The triviality of these words might bore you, but for them it was a very emotional feeling and lucidity of this could only be understood by persons who have experienced this. He (newly born) is the first child in the family of 9 brothers and sisters (maternal').
He is also the first successor of his paternal family. Now it could be a little more clear what am I trying to express. He was the talk of every mouth in the family. As everything, good or bad, unimportant or important, needs a name so that cute fellow was asking to be named. In India, name of a child is a very important thing. Suggesting a name is easy but naming is very disputable when you have 4 grandparents (maternal and paternal), 9+4 uncle and aunties (again maternal and paternal). After all the discussions and meetings two names were shortlisted. One each from two most influential ladies in the family. Two names 1 child, dadimaa (paternal grandma) was adamant over Ashish (divine blessing) and one of his mausies (maternal aunt) wanted him to be named as Gourav (the pride). So this dispute had only one solution to snatch away his surname and name him "Ashish Gourav”. This name is really a distinguishing feature for him as this name is quite uncommon. When he went to school he always had a problem, everybody teased him about this strange thing. Nowadays it is quite common in cities to replace your surname with a name but in that small town he was described as 2 names 1 person. He grew with this name disregard less of two names he liked it because of its rarity.
He went to college. IIT Kharagpur is the college he was selected for. A long first lecture was over and time came for roll-calls (attendance), 1 strange thing happened which startled me. Yeah me I'm Ashish Gourav. I heard my name called by the professor in spectacles twice I had no other option but to respond twice. This happened for two consecutive days( I couldn't understand that why my name was sounded so offensive that prof. has to check for my presence twice) but the third day I heard an echo the second time the prof. said Ashish Gourav, I reckoned this was not an echo but a real human voice. Voice which made me feel that the only thing which made me unique is no longer with me. A new Aashish gaurav (1 thing at least the spelling is not same) was in front of my eyes. I asked about him to further test if we have something more in common. As for now things which are common............


1. IIT (college)
2. Hostel (M.S. hall of residence)
3. Our ancestral house
4. The story behind this unusual name

These things weren't enough he was quite different from me which always put me in a lot more trouble than I anticipated.
To name a few..........


1. A girl rejected my friendship request on orkut as she thought I'm Aashish gaurav and not Ashish gourav.
2. During elections I was thought as Aashish Gaurav and as he was contesting for Hall president (happa-iit lingo) I had to face some serious consequences.
3. One of my interviews was messed up by this namesake.

1.Happy belated Dussehra and ID

2.Sorry for delay in this post.

2.I enjoyed my holidays @ home

2.Just reached hostel 2 hours back.