My Academic Details

(The first two paragraphs are particularly meant to meet any long-lost friends. Just check the bold lettering for any familiar names, and safely skip off if there are none)

My schooling was done in St. Joseph's English School, Kurnool during the period 1984-'92, after a short schooling at Sree Krishna English Medium School, Anantapur from 1981-'84. A part of the schooling (June - November 1990) was done at Panineeya Mahavidyala Public School, Hyderabad when my family moved to Hyderabad, but I returned to Kurnool and resumed my studies there in the aforementioned school. (Thanks to Balakiran Vadlani at PMV Public School who signed the guestbook on this website on March 22, 2004 to remind me that I did not list this school, which was entirely my oversight, or rather my "undersight". Well, I mean, I did not know how I could list this school and not confuse people!) I was a student of Nrupatunga Junior College, Hyderabad and SMS Study Circle, Hyderabad during 1992-'94, and a student of Special Coaching Center, Hyderabad for a short period in Summer 1995.

My undergraduate coursework was done at Bapatla Engineering College, Bapatla during 1995-'99, and I earned a Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) in Electronics and Instrumentation from the (Acharya) Nagarjuna University, India. Coming to the western hemisphere in Feb. 2000, I have earned a Master of Science Engineering (M.S.) (Biomedical Engineering) and a Master of Science (M.S.) in Microsystems Engineering, both at the Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, USA. After a brief stint with employment, I am back to Louisiana Tech University for my Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Engineering (Engineering Physics track). On the way there, I earned a third Master of Science (M.S.) in Applied Physics from Louisiana Tech University too.

Pastimes, Likes, and Dislikes

I love to be a Jack of All Trades, at the same time mastering at least one. I like literature, in any language I can read ;-), preferably Telugu, though. I am a budding writer - I generally prefer to write songs, traditional poetry (metrical), and free verse, though I also sometimes try my hand at prosaic forms of literature such as stories and essays, all in Telugu. Only sometimes, I try my hand in English! (TeluguCinema.Com has been one such forum, since 2000.) I like music, if it is melodious, especially instrumental, and preferably carnatic music (A form of music originating in South India – the word "carnatic" is an anglicized form of the Sanskrit composite word "karNa-aaTaka", meaning "sweet (resonance) in the ears"). I like Indian classical dance, and other fine arts such as painting and drawing too, but I am not INTO them, though I sometimes try to prove myself an artist through my pencil drawings. One of my drawings can be found here. (The drawing also tells why I don't draw frequently ;-)!)

My likes go on and on, unending, including astrology, numerology, and many other interesting subjects. And my dislikes are a bit limited – things like tobacco, alcohol, non-vegetarian food (I am a vegetarian in a stricter sense - not even an "eggitarian" - more like lacto-vegan!), and one more thing – recklessness and irresponsible attitude of common people. I am in fact irked by lack of respect to love, logic, or "misology" (hatred of reasoning), and individuality.

Literary Interests

I, with my pen-name NaChaKi, have been a contributor (though not a regular one really) to a few websites, TeluguCinema.Com being the main one that I associate myself with. My writings were published in a few websites/e-magazines such as eemaaTa, kaburlu, bhuvanavijayam (now defunct), Web prapancham, TeluguOne, SujanaRanjani, koumudi, etc.; I have only a few hard-copy publications to my credit, majority of them (just 4 or 5) published in souvenirs of Telugu organizations in the U.S.A. Through their Telugu Creative Writing Contest every year, Vanguri Foundation of America, Inc. had been thoroughly encouraging my budding talents in poetry, with their prizes (first prize in 2003, 2006, and 2008), second prize in 2007) and special appreciation (in 2004, 2005, and 2010).

An aspiring lyricist I am, I did make a sort of debut into the Telugu filmdom... though not quite Tollywood. The difference is that this is the first all-NRI song ever done for a Telugu film, titled marO sandhyaaraagam that'd be made as a sequel for the popular movie of 20 years, paDamaTi sandhyaaraagam. For Mrs. Padmaja Sonti's composition and her rendition along with Mervin Michael, the recording of my lyric was done with orchestra by NRI, and was supervised by NRIs too. (While NaChaKi happens to be my pen-name, I chose "Chakravarthula" as my screen-name, upon the suggestion of Mr. Meer Abdulla, the producer and scriptwriter of the flick.) In mainstream Telugu cinema, I had the opportunity of assisting the director Dasaradh for the movie swaagatam (starring Jagapathi Babu, Bhumika, Anushka, and Arjun) shot in NJ, USA for just over a week. My name was credited for lyrics on the screen for the first time in the one-hour film missamma NRI, watchable through YouTube Rentals (USA only, 99 cents) and the song itself is available in full here. Still yet, I am yet to officially set my foot into the Telugu Film Industry as lyricist, and that may not happen until 2011. Meanwhile, I am acquainted with short films made by friends such as this one (appeared as the "ghost") or this USA version of the film song from maryaada raamanna (penned subtitles in English).

On the WWW... 

Of late, the WWW grew more than e-mails and websites, with blogs and social networking in vogue. (I know, I know I cited the great might of WWW in merely four aspects!)

My Blogs:

Two in English and one in Telugu. While my first blog still continues to be my generic choice, I prefer the Telugu blog for more localized content that I can express better in my mother tongue and/or to other speakers/readers of the language. My another English blog is my First Step into the Society, so to say, and is relatively quite in its infancy. I have ideas for more blogs - one akin to a travelog, and another for my reviews of movies, books, songs, etc.The URLs of the same shall be updated whenever they're ready.

My Social Networks:

I am a member of Hi5, Ringo, WAYN, Bebo, LinkedIn, and at least a few others that I don't even remember. However, all said and done, due to its rising popularity and having all the right features at the right time, I have been only active on Orkut and also on Facebook.

Wanna E-mail me? Send it to....

kirandotc@hotmail.com