Summer Internship with Power Grid Corporation Of India Limited – Atul Sharma from NSIT, Delhi

Daily Winner for: –  13th August 2013

Name of the intern: – Atul Sharma

Institute: –  NSIT

Organization interned with: – Power Grid Corporation Of India Limited

Let me start with a confession. Being an engineering student in the field of Information Technology, who had recently finished his 2nd year and had no great technical skills to boast of, securing an internship by applying to various internship opportunities (online or otherwise) was not a Herculean task for me, it was simply impossible. So when my father asked me if I’d be interested in doing an internship in the software department at his workplace (he works in a Navratna PSU- Power Grid Corporation of India Limited) I thanked my stars (and of course my father) and jumped at the opportunity.

I accompanied him to his Gurgaon office on the 5th of June with some apprehension, some excitement and loads of questions floating around in my brain. What exactly will I be doing? Have I gotten in way over my head? What will my mentor be like? My office, as it turned out, was in the basement and my mentor was a deputy manager in the ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) department. All my earlier doubts seemed unfounded as he turned out to be a good-natured guy with crystal-clear concepts. He taught me the basics of Visual Basic and SQL with patience and I was often awe-struck with his knowledge as well as the widespread applications of these tools. He had a good sense of humour and was always cracking jokes and keeping the atmosphere light.

On the first day itself I came to know that the guy sitting next to me was my namesake and was a year old recruit in the company. This later led to a comedy of errors when both of us responded when our name was called. Although with time I realized that me being an intern and him being an employee, more often than not, he would be the one being called for. I asked him about his journey and his college life and was fascinated by his story (turns out he was from an engineering college too). Two other employees sat next to me and one of them was an expert software developer who I turned to for help if my mentor was unavailable. I tried to spend my time at the office constructively and used the office library to issue a brilliant ‘four part trilogy’- The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.

The fact that all social networking sites, media streaming sites, download sites and almost every other site which we visit daily (except Google) were banned came as a mild surprise to me. It was in the end that I realized that had this not been the case, I might not have learnt half as much as I ended up learning there. That my namesake, who used to bring a dongle to the office (clever guy!) was logged into Facebook whole day is a different matter altogether.

It was a hectic one and a half months for me. Gurgaon is a bit far from my place and as I used to travel with my father, I had to sit for the full 8 hour duration (sometimes more if he was busy) until he finished his work. This awakened in me a new sense of respect for my father as I realized that while it had been just over a month for me, my father has been doing this since a very long time. I just hadn’t ever thought about it before. Also, the fact that the people in the department thought of my father highly made me happy as well as proud.

Although saying that all I did there was work my ass off would be unfair. There were countless telephones in the office and opportunities to call up my friends existed aplenty. And trust me – I didn’t let them slip by.

For the duration of my internship I almost felt as if I was a part of the company and not just an intern. I was treated as an equal (which means that I wasn’t made to do any menial jobs, thank God) and given actual projects (the technical details of which would bore you) once I was finished with the basics.

Soon it was time for my college to reopen and with that came an end to my internship. I’d like to finish with a quote (clichéd it may be) which described my state of mind at the end of the internship perfectly:
“I’m not sad that its over; I’m glad that it happened”.

If Atul’s internship experience motivates you, you can view the latest internship in Delhi.

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