In an exciting development, a group of IIT Madras PhD students have been given permission to study the possibility of a revolutionary fuel. The fuel being talked about here is a mixture of tobacco and tea, which has helped hundreds of engineering students survive on the campus without any apparent intake of regular meals. The fuel, if successfully developed, will solve India’s energy problems by the year 2020.
The head of the group that will be leading this path-breaking research, Mr. Aurobitto Randomchatterjee recollects from his memory, “I remember two of us were sitting outside the Gopal tea stall near the Krishna Gate at 4 in the morning, when the idea was born. We realized that many students in the campus have been functioning very well living on tea and suttas (sic). We wondered if that was the secret of their energy.”
The evergreen fuel on engineering campuses
His companion, Sathieeshh Sutputanathan continues, “Especially, after the introduction of A-Diet Express as the lone caterer in the mess, most people have spent days solely on tea and suttas, and have still been doing very well in their academics and research. In fact, most of the surveyed students have mentioned an increased performance. So, we decided to propose this research topic and the IC&SR (Insti Chai & Sutta Ration) replied to us within a week saying they had even found a sponsor!”
The research group revealed that ITC (Indian Tobacco Company) has already pledged a million dollars to IIT Madras for this research. While it may appear as corporate support to academic research, sources confirm that ITC is looking to boost up their profits through this mean.
“If the proposed fuel gets commercialized, ITC can additionally charge every student walking on the road for being a fuel-powered vehicle apart from tobacco-smoking mortal; the money thus collected is expected to break their current record for cigarette sales,” a member of the research group revealed, “In fact, ITC even considering opening ‘fuel pumps’ like the current petrol pumps to sell the fuel powered by tobacco and tea.”
One of the prominent procurers of cigarettes for the group says that going was not so easy, “It was very difficult convincing the committee on our proposal. But we had done our homework this time. We showed them how the trends of the price hikes of common fuels such as Petrol, Diesel and LPG matched with those of popular cigarette brands. We also showed them data on the efficiency of tea and sutta consumers over time compared to the data from when they ate mess food.”
The news of the proposed research has taken the at IIT Madras campus by storm. Students from the departments of Civil Engineering, Naval Architecture, and Engineering Design have applied to join the researching group. When asked what their motivation behind joining such an ambitious project was, over 99.99% responded saying they had nothing better to do.
The research work will officially begin from next Monday and if the fuel is successfully developed, India could become the leading energy exporter by 2020. This has given rise to fears that the government could soon take over the research project from ITC and nationalize the chai-suttafuel, licenses for which could be auctioned later like the 2G spectrum.
Ashutosh 