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I was born in Pune, which is regarded as the cultural capital of Maharashtra. Since the age of three, however, I have lived outside Maharashtra, in several places. I studied in Kolkata, in a Bengali medium school upto standard IV, and did my standard V in Indore in a Hindi medium corporation school. Then, our family moved to Secunderabad, where I completed the rest of my schooling upto standard XI (higher secondary of yesteryears) in Kendriya Vidyalaya, Picket. I did my B.Tech at IIT Madras in the Electronics stream of the Electrical Engineering Department. My stay and education in different parts of India has broadened my outlook and enabled me to pick up several languages - I have learnt to read, write and speak Bengali, Hindi and my mother tongue, Marathi, and to speak Telugu and Tamil.

By the time I completed my B.Tech at IIT Madras, I realized that I was cut out for a career in research and teaching. I applied to reputed US universities for further studies and received lucrative offers. At the same time, as per a scheme of the then director of IIT Madras, my teachers offered me another option based on my academic performance in B.Tech - direct admission into the PhD program and appointment as a Senior Scientific Officer in the EE department of IIT Madras. A patriotic impulse (internal factor) and the promises of my teachers (external factor) motivated me to chose this option. Carrying through this decision has been a great learning experience in my life.

Apart from professional activities, I have deep interest in music (sing light and classical), philosophy, social service (participated in the relief operations of 1977 cyclone in Andhra Pradesh; have coordinated the activities of the Voluntary Blood Donor's club of IIT Madras since 2001), and sports (participated in football, kabaddi, cricket tournaments and in some boxing competitions too !).

© Karmalkar, 16 October 2017