Wherever you go, our network pain follows...

"Mobile Phones are not allowed beyond the staircase of PGP Block during the examination period. If any Mobile Phone is found with student, the same will be confiscated and the same will be considered an attempt to use unfair means."

And thus I am gifted 2 hours of bliss on every day of mid term examination.

For those post exam hours I can unaudaciously walk in the campus. I am de-linked. I am free from the guilt of not having my cellphone with me. Believe me, it's a burden worth dumping. Your cellphone weighs more than the average 100gm that Nokia claims. It carries innumerable reins stuffed up your nose (sorry, couldn't find a softer analogy). Anytime anyone wants to contact you, they just yank it. And you have to oblige....

Society Norms:

1. You can not swtich off your cellphone.
2. You pick up calls if you are not on another call.
3. You (bloody well) call back if you don't take a call immediately.

If wish there were more states for a mobile than ON or OFF.

Sure, SMSes wait for you. But they carry along a glowering expiry date.
Calls of course are quite impatient. They sulk if neglected.
You can only ignore them for a while, before they began taking offense.
Break these rules, and soon you become the guy who doesn't answer calls. And you definitely don't want that.

Call rates have dropped to affordable levels. So have the sensibilities of all owners. Given a choice, we'll always call up somebody rather than dropping the idea.

"Abe Kahaan hai tu ?"
"You coming ?"
"When will you have dinner ?"
"Had dinner ?"
"Having dinner ?"
"What's for dinner ?"

Small talk becomes pain talk. Plain talk becomes cellphone talk. And soon social groups have all people consistently talking to people not physically present in the picture.
Everyone is paying half attention.

I really think we....Ooh...just a second....tik tik tik tik tikk....tik tik...
Sorry. Had to SMS this friend.

As I was saying, the Airtels of India should allow people more cellphone states. Because we obnoxious Indians are surely not going to respect time and space. Maybe instead of having loud caller-tunes, the phones can play a message of yours explaing your current cellphone status. Or the contact list for all users can be appended with status messages (like e-messengers).

Wow, that almost sounds like a BPlan....