Abhinav Maurya

Graduate Student Address: Circular Hall, KReSIT Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering IIT Bombay, Mumbai - 400076 Email: reCAPTCHA (preferred) Contact: +91.9004610601 Research Groups: Machine Learning, Systems and Networks Research Advisors: Prof. Bhaskaran Raman, Prof. Saketha Nath

About Me Academics Projects Personal Quotes Vita Calendar

About Me

Welcome to this nook of the World Wide Web. You are visiting Abhinav Maurya's in silico existence @ IIT Bombay.

I have studied at Little Flower High School, K J Somaiya College of Science and Commerce, and VJTI. I have worked as a Lecturer at VJTI in Fall 2008, teaching undergraduate Computer Networks and Automata Theory. I have subsequently worked at Wipro Technologies as a Project Engineer (January 2009-March 2010) and then a Senior Engineer (March 2010-July 2010). I am currently pursuing graduate studies at Department of CSE, IIT Bombay. I have lived in Bombay, Delhi, and Chennai.

I occasionally dabble as a freelancer. My work has appeared in Urban Voices and Little India. I have reported for The Kala Ghoda Gazette which covers the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival held in Bombay. In 2008, I won the Book Pitch Contest, and was a runner-up in the Flash Essay Contest, both organized under the aegis of Kala Ghoda Arts Festival-2008. I am presently working on a novel which may or may not see the light of the day.

I believe in living life as if it were a book, the beautiful equanimity of its script unmarred by the event and incident embodied in the words. I believe that the pursuit of truth is more noble and precious than truth itself. I also believe that if one stands on his head long enough, he is bound to grow brainier than Chuck Norris. I love good books, gentle music, a good cup of tea, and all things in the same vein that do not require me to abandon my couch for all the worthier things in life. I do not mind being a human being, though it seems to me that being a lark or a goldfish would have been supremely better for my health and soul. I love having irrationally sensible conversations that may set forth something of precious value or confounding intrigue for me. I am intensely averse to small talk and flippancy.

I love all cities that I have lived in. Inspite of the disastrous administration and chronic violence, I love Bombay for the magnificent Gothic architecture at the heart of its urbanism. I love Delhi for its inspiring history of monuments and poetry and the chicanery it endows people with. Though I have spent only a few months in Chennai, I love that city for breathing in a language that I do not understand and for the gentle murmur of Elliots's Beach. I love being in the company of nature. I have had an idyllic childhood in a quiet suburb of Bombay, minutes from the Sanjay Gandhi National Park. I have grown up watching the monsoon mists rolling over the hills just before it begins to rain. And so on and so forth.

I suffer from bibliophily bordering on the pathological. I splurge on books till I am broke, and read them till I am blind with fatigue. I splurge on little else. One of the best ways to break the ice with me is to just whisper in my ears that you love books too. That should take care of my praetorian airs. I believe in the supremacy of the written word over the spoken one; and that the written word has much more pith, memorability and consequence than speech can ever command.

I love to travel without donning the guise of a tourist, and could easily have been a wandering minstrel or a hitch-hiking hippie in a previous life. I love music and cannot imagine life without it, though you can hardly call me a connoisseur. I especially love Indian and Western Classical and related forms such as the Ghazal and Jazz. I love arthouse cinema for harmonizing the sensibilities of literature, music, drama, and visual arts; and world cinema for acting as a proxy to the joys of actual travel. My personal favorites are Regen, 400 Blows, The Apu Trilogy, Black Cat White Cat, and The Hero. In popular culture, I love quite a few American SitComs. Favorites include Seinfeld, Friends, That '70s Show, and The Big Bang Theory.

The following thing just about sums up my entire outlook on life, except my views on delicious omlettes and intelligent fools:

If there's one thing I like, it's a quiet life. I'm not one of those fellows who get all restless and depressed if things aren't happening to them all the time. You can't make it too placid for me. Give me regular meals, a good show with decent music every now and then, and one or two pals to totter round with, and I ask no more.

--Bertie Wooster in Wodehouse's The Inimitable Jeeves

Updates

• Jan 2012: I am a TA for CS726 (Advanced Machine Learning) offered by Prof. Sunita this semester.
• Oct 2011: Presented the results of first stage of master's thesis; awarded the highest grade (AA).
• Aug 2011: I am a TA for CS419 (Introduction to Machine Learning) offered by Prof. Sunita this semester.
• May 2011: Began thesis project guided by Prof. Bhaskaran Raman and Prof. Saketha Nath.
• Apr 2011: Presented the graduate seminar and work done in the R&D project; awarded the highest grade (AA) in both.
• Jan 2011: Began graduate seminar and R&D project under the guidance of Prof. Bhaskaran Raman.
• Jul 2010: Joined the M.Tech. (Computer Science and Engineering) program at IIT Bombay.

Current Research Interests

• Machine Learning, Data Mining, Intelligent Systems, Information Retrieval, Algorithms and Theory, Systems and Networks

Education

• IIT Bombay, Mumbai-400076
  MTech (Computer Science & Engineering)
  Indian Institute of Technology Bombay
  July 2010 - July 2012 (expected)
  
• VJTI, Mumbai-400019
  BTech (Computer Engineering)
  University of Mumbai
  July 2004 - May 2008
  
• K J Somaiya College, Mumbai-400077
  Higher Secondary Certificate (Science)
  Maharashtra State Board
  July 2002 - May 2004
  
• Little Flower High School, Thane-400601
  Secondary School Certificate
  Maharashtra State Board
  July 1992 - May 2002
  

Graduate Coursework

• Artificial Intelligence (Logic, Planning, Probabilistic Reasoning)
• Foundations of Machine Learning (Regression, Classification, Clustering, Bagging, Boosting)
• Advanced Machine Learning** (Probabilistic Graphical Models, Structured Learning)
• Statistical Relational Learning (Decision Trees, Rule Sets, Decision Lists, Rule Ensembles, Paper Readings)
• Web Search and Mining (Information Retrieval)
• Organization of Web Information (Information Extraction)
• Fundamental Algorithms in Computational Biology
• Introduction to Probability and Linear Algebra
• Embedded Systems
• Advanced Computer Networks (Paper Readings)
• Mobile Computing (Wireless Networks)
• Graduate Seminar on Data Center Systems (Paper Readings)
• R&D Project (BriMon)
• Topics in Machine Learning* (Kernel Machines, Semi-supervised Learning, Structured Learning)
• Design and Analysis of Algorithms*
• Applied Economics*

Projects

Interests

• Literature, Cinema, Music, Mathematics, Statistics, Dialectics, Blogging, Travel.

Concerns

• Plagiarism: Prof. Bhaskar's opinion. A daredevil essay I wrote for a class.
• Climate Change: See this.

Web Trail

• Blog
• Facebook
• Google+
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• LibraryThing
• Delicious

Online Introductions without Agonizing Pain

• Probability and Random Processes
• Numerical Linear Algebra
• Applied Mathematics
• Algorithm Design
• Machine Learning
• Convex Optimization
• Computational Finance

More Links

• Quotes: 1, 2, 3
• Douglas Comer's Essays
• Soumen Chakrabarti's Blog
• Communati Indianae Scientificum
• PhD Comics
• XKCD
• Lee Kozar's Humor Page
• Dilbert and IITs
• Cheng Zhai's Research Resources
• OpenSource Scientific Plotting Packages

Quotes

Abhinav Maurya (:Notes to Myself:)

There is no such thing as a right decision with a wrong motive.

Decisions based solely on fear, righteousness, vengeance, or convenience are always wrong.

The greatness of literature is to be measured not by its complication but by its ambition.

A good writer seeks to be understood, but a great writer seeks to understand.

I can deal with a closed door, but not with a closed mind.

Abraham Lincoln

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any one thing.

Albert Einstein

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction.

If at first an idea does not sound absurd, then there is no hope for it.

I have never belonged wholeheartedly to country or state, to my circle of friends or even to my own family. Such isolation is sometimes bitter, but I do not regret being cut off from the understanding and sympathy of other men. I lose something by it,to be sure, but I am compensated for it in being rendered independent of the customs, opinions and prejudices of others, and am not tempted to rest my peace of mind upon such shifting foundations.

Alfred North Whitehead

We think in generalities, but we live in details.

Amelia Earhart Putnam

Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things, knows not the livid loneliness of fear nor the mountain heights where bitter joy can hear the sound of wings.

Anonymous

It's impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.

Anthony Robbins

I've come to believe that all my past failures and frustrations were actually laying the foundation for the understandings that have created the new level of living I now enjoy.

Bade Ghulam Ali Khan

If, in every home, one child was taught Hindustani classical music, this country would never have been partitioned.

Benjamin Franklin

Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.

Blaise Pascal

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.

Brian Tracy

Do one small thing immediately - often this is all you need to do to get started.

Buddha

The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, not to worry about the future, but to live the present moment wisely and earnestly.

Charles Dubois

The important thing is to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.

Douglas Pagels

Sometimes it's important to work for that pot of gold. But other times it's essential to take time off and to make sure that your most important decision in the day simply consists of choosing which color to slide down on the rainbow.

Dudley Field Malone

I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me.

Dylan Thomas

I fell in love - that is the only expression I can think of - at once, and am still at the mercy of words, though sometimes now, knowing a little of their behavior very well, I think I can influence them slightly and have even learned to beat them now and then, which they appear to enjoy.

e e cummings

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best night and day to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight and never stop fighting.

Earl Nightingale

A good attitude does much more than turn on the lights in our worlds; it seems to magically connect us to all sorts of serendipitous opportunities that were somehow absent before the change.

Earnest Shackleton

Men wanted for hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant dangers, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success. (An advertisement in 1914 that received 5000 replies)

Eddie Cantor

It takes twenty years to become an overnight success.

Edward Abbey

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.

Eric Olson

Music is what life sounds like.

Eyler Coates

We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually produce a masterpiece. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Without music, life would be a mistake.

Fritjof Capra

During periods of relaxation after concentrated intellectual activity, the intuitive mind seems to take over and can produce the sudden clarifying insights which give us so much joy and delight.

Gerard Bricogne

Mankind is a catalyzing enzyme for the transition from a carbon-based to a silicon-based intelligence.

Goethe

Incidentally, I despise everything which merely instructs me without increasing or immediately enlivening my activity.

Gustave Flaubert

The one way of tolerating existence is to lose oneself in literature as in a perpetual orgy.

Going to the Opera is like making love; we get bored but we come back.

Hermann Weyl

In these days, the angel of topology and the devil of abstract algebra fight for the soul of each individual mathematical domain.

J. Robert Oppenheimer

No man should escape our universities without knowing how little he knows.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

If I love you, what business is it of yours?

John Keats

I would sooner fail than not be among the greatest.

John Steinbeck

Only through imitation do we develop toward originality.

John von Neumann

In mathematics, you don't understand things; you just get used to them.

Joyce Grenfell

There is no such thing as pursuit of happiness; there is only the discovery of joy.

Kahlil Gibran

Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself. Love possesses not nor would it be possessed, for love is sufficient unto love.

Killa Petehog

It's better to go for it and get rejected than to never know at all. Wishing, wondering and guessing hurts more.

The best learning doesn't necessarily come from books. If you wish to learn quickly, watch those who excel in the game. Books are maps. They lead you in the right direction, but they can never replace exploration. When you were in school, you didn't just read a book. You did other things to learn that skill. Think of how that relates to all facets in life.

Be the man with scars. Learn from your mistakes and become stronger. Don't be so afraid of failure that you forget to live your life.

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

There is no remedy so easy as books, which if they do not give cheerfulness, at least restore quiet to the most troubled mind.

Lao Tzu

He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still.

All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.

Lee Jampolsky

At least three times every day, take a moment and ask yourself what is really important. Have the wisdom and the courage to build your life around your answer.

Leonard Cohen

Ring the bells that still can ring;
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything;
That's how the light gets in.

Marcus Aurelius

Our life is what our thoughts make it.

Maya Angelou

Courage is the most important of all virtues, because without courage you can't practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.

Michaelangelo

Lord, grant that I may always desire more than I can accomplish.

Mohandas Gandhi

Freedom is not worth having if it doesn't include the freedom to make mistakes.

You must be the change you wish to see in the world.

All through history, the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall.

Montaigne

The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.

Mother Teresa

I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much.

Neil Gaiman

I've been making a list of the things they don't teach you at school. They don't teach you how to love somebody. They don't teach you how to be rich or how to be poor. They don't teach you how to walk away from someone you don't love any longer. They don't teach you how to move on when the one you love walks away from you. They don't teach you how to know what's going on in someone else's mind. They don't teach you what to say to someone who's dying. They don't teach you anything truly worth knowing.

Paul Sweeney

You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend.

Peter Altenberg

I never dreamed of being Shakespeare or Goethe, and I never expected to hold the great mirror of truth up before the world; I dreamed only of being a little pocket mirror, the sort that a woman can carry in her purse; one that reflects small blemishes, and some great beauties, when held close enough to the heart.

Rabindranath Tagore

The insult and infamy that was my lot to suffer at the hands of my country were not inconsiderable in quantity and so long I had borne them with patience. In this context, I have not been able to understand clearly why I received honor from outside. I did not know that God, whom I had offered homage sitting on the Eastern shore, would extend his right arm in the western shore to accept the same... Europe has given me the garland of honor. If it carries any value, it lies in the aesthetic sense of the men of culture of that country. That has no connection with our country.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

A man is what he thinks about all day long.

Our greatest glory is not in never failing but in rising up every time we fail.

Life is short, but there is always time enough for courtesy.

Hitch your wagon to a star!

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.

Richard Bach

In order to live freely and happily you must sacrifice boredom. It is not always an easy sacrifice.

Robert Browning

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?

Robert Frost

In three words, I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.

There's no money in poetry, but then there's no poetry in money.

Satchel Paige

Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching.

Solomon Lefschetz

It was my lot to plant the harpoon of algebraic topology into the body of the whale of algebraic geometry.

Sun Tzu

All warfare is based on deception.

It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of carrying it on.

He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.

To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

Thomas Mann

A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.

Tom Peters

Unless you walk out into the unknown, the odds of making a profound difference in your life are pretty low.

V S Naipaul

The writer has only to listen very carefully and with a clear heart to what people say to him, and ask the next question, and the next.

Will Durant

Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance.

William Blake

Use what talents you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.

William Hutchinson Murray

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, the providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way.

Winston Churchill

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.

Zeno

The goal of life is living in agreement with nature.