Manipal Time-Lag – Pages from my diary

Running-against-time
Time Is always flying. Flying and defying. - W.E. Henly

Time at Manipal is unlike time in any other part of the world. As students first come to tho college they find no bells to remind them of the time for classes but only clocks set throughout the campus buildings. There are about 87 classrooms in use at Manipal University, along with many other offices and buildings, all of which have clocks. Unfortunately, it seems that each clock on the campus maintains its own time.

W. E. Henley wrote, “Time Is always flying. Flying and defying.” This illustrates very well the way the time element works on the Manipal buildings. It is always “Defying.”

Running against time
Time Is always flying. Flying and defying. – W.E. Henly

There is always a few minutes time difference between most of the buildings. Perhaps a one or two-minute variation is of no consequence but when one set of clocks has a four or five-minute time lag it is the students who suffer with a tardy mark often charged against them. In walking across the campus from the newer classrooms (Academic or Business buildings) to the older blocks, a four-minute time difference can be very taxing to the students. This is so, of course, if the time is running against the student, which is more often the case than the time being on his side.

This problem may not be of great importance to some people but instructors and students find it very bothersome in the conducting of normal classroom procedure. Some way of synchronizing the clocks must be found. If it can not be done through mechanical means perhaps it can be done manually. It seems that some service club might be willing to check the campus clocks once a week. A standard time might be arranged so that one or two clocks in various sections of the campus could be trusted to be correct.

As the time situation is now, a student just has to take his chances when he walks from one class to another, especially when they are not in the same building.

I completed my Masters degree in Pharmacology (MD Pharm.)  in the year 2010. During the period, I used to regularly maintain a daily diary, the contents of which I cherish to this day. This is an excerpt from my diary, somewhere during my 2nd year at Kasturba Medical College (KMC), Manipal. Now as a teacher at KMC Mangalore, the problem still persists and no solution to this time-lag is in sight, and this is the reason, I decided to publish this excerpt online.

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