Dear Friend, 

We hope you have received our latest issue of the newsletter e-Digest (datelined December 2009 emailed to you on Jan 3, 2010) & enjoyed it. We would love to hear from you - your comments, suggestions or any other contribution you would like to see in the newsletter.

We had carried a news item about the film " 3 Idiots" currently running to full house audiences all over & the controversy between the film production team & Chetan Bhagat, the author of the book "Five Point Someone" about credit given to him for the film story (3 Idiots is Five Point someone & "Upset Aamir Khan hits out at novelist Chetan Bhagat"). This seems to have subsided now but the issue remains unresolved. We had asked for your opinion & some of you have sent us your feedback. 

Chetan Bhagat, our Alumnus, seems to have become a youth icon in the short time since he started writing on serious subjects like Education Reforms in a fun way & has a very large following. All of his four books have become best-sellers while two have already been made into Bollywood films (the other film is "Hello"). He is now writing a weekly Sunday centerpage column in Times of India & has taken centerstage as a speaker in "India Today" national summit.

Some columnists have expressed concern about the Book/Film making society "shun higher education because there are flaws in the system" ( 'bloody mary - Idiot is as idiot does' by Sagarika Ghose in HT) & the kids would want to take advantage to avoid hard work by insisting on doing their own thing & "dont push the chldren over the edge" ( http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Archive/skins/pastissues2/navigator.asp?AW=1264850376531 ) but can you "achieve excellence" without hard work? 

We plan to carry a SPECIAL FEATURE ON CHETAN BHAGAT soon. Please sent us your comments on these issues & review of his books/films within a week & we would include them in the newsletter.

Pl write to eDigest@iitdalumni.com . 

Chandra K Jain, Editor

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