[Techie Tuesdays] Roundup - the 11 techies who made our Tuesdays

In the past two months, we've covered some amazing technologists. Apart from one student whizkid and one tribute to a veteran (posthumous), the Techie Tuesdays for the past two months have mainly been experienced professionals. Some of them are in the startup space and some of them are high ranking professionals in large corporate conglomerates. But here are a few common threads that connect all of them -

1) Almost all of them come from a background traditional programming. They also urge students to not worry about languages and concentrate more on algorithms and the fundamentals.

2) Most of them were first exposed to a computer late in their school life and had limited access to it. At college is when they made the most of the time that they had with the machine.

3) Most senior level techies have had experience in large IT conglomerates. Some of them have even had experiences in the Valley. But they all have left it at some point of time so as to be able to work on technology for longer or to pursue an opportunity that they saw in the space.

4) At startups where they work, they're mainly take care of the technology as CTOs of the company. They usually shy away from limelight.

5) Most of them are painfully humble.

6) Not all problems that they solve have business consequences. A lot of what they do is for plain fun.

7) All of them are remarkable people; a trait which vastly overpowers their technical prowess.

Here are the Techie Tuesdays from the past two months. Do go through these stories; these are possibly some of the best technology talents in India and most of all, great people stories -

Saurav Modak - West Bengal was always known for poetry. This kid writes poetry in code. A BSc grad who has an interesting reason as to why he's not an engineer, builds applications for fun and is recognized by renowned hackers like RMS.

Bashkar Sharma - Not many people are inspired to take up coding because of Harry Potter and of those who do, not many get as good as this guy. One of MobStac's first engineers who loves working for startups. An interesting insight into the mind of your typical startup genius.

Kingsley Joseph - A designer by trade who's worked with giants like Salesforce and Digital Chocolate. Currently a co-founder at travel startup TripThirsty, he has great insights on design and user experience and also helps run his wife's cupcake business.

Pavan Kumar - This polyglot programmer is currently the CTO of ecommerce user engagement tool, MineWhat, love coding on Python. Your regular "talk is cheap, show me the code" guy.

Rinish KN - The quintessential Indian programmer. Quite, understated and yet, enthusiastic. He's worked on the early days of programming, but still was one of the first people to adopt mobility in India. Also a great believer in the power of youth.

Kumar Bibek - One of India's first Android developers, Kumar Bibek has worked with a string on interesting companies. Currently an Android developer at FICO, his story of having gone through health problems because of excessive work and the typical techie lifestyle is a gruesome reminder that we shouldn't take our health lightly. A must read for today's techies.

Atul Chitnis - The frontrunner for FOSS in India, the Indian technology space lost a leader last month. This is his story in the words of those closest to him and also ones who were deeply impacted by him and his work. You are deeply missed, Atul.

Balaji Lakshmanan - RoboBalaji makes robots for a living. 'Nuff said. From building humanoids for movies to building robotic replacements for amputees, this is a story of how a CS grad took to robotics against all odds to become one of the most recognized names in the field in India.

Sriram V Iyer - Founder of Umobile, Sriram was a part of the team that installed the first WiFi chipset in a laptop. He was also one of the first people to implement the world's first WiMax network. And he hasn't leant communications formally. This is a story of computer scientists who goes toe to toe with the communication experts of the world. Beware, he's also a martial artist.

Arindam Mani Das - He builds finance management software for the government of Assam, builds kernels from scratch on Android devices and does an MCA course to buy time as he figures out what he wants to do with life. Anridam's story is that of a computer genius from Assam who doesn't know his own worth.

Yousuf Fauzan - Shaadi.com engineer who hacks for the sheer fun of it. And some his hacks are what many companies do for a living. This is an interesting story of an An Ocean Engineering and Naval Architecture grad who codes and codes really well.

Techie Tuesdays will resume from next week onwards