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| The College |
After scraping
through the matriculation examination it was time to seek admission in the only
college we had. My mother was keen that I took Science with Biology for
preparation to ger into a medical college. She thought, and she was probably
right that a science graduate or an engineer or a doctor had greater chances of
landing a job or earning good money for a decent living. She obviously had a
better appreciation of the then job market. For an ordinary Arts graduate or a
post graduate, there was nothing other than try and get a clerical job unless
one qualified in a competitive examination. She had no confidence in my
capabilities and the results that I brought in would in no way have changed her
assessment about me.
Despite my
protestations I was forced to take admission in Science Biology stream. I knew
it was going to end up in failure. I had realized that I had no brain or
aptitude for Science and Mathematics and wherever there were formulae and
equations I was all at sea. Physics was particularly difficult and howsoever I
tried I couldn’t get the hang of things. I inevitably flunked to the great
disappointment of mother.
When the time for admissions came I quietly
filled a form for admission in Arts. Ma blew her top; she wanted me to try
again the Science and Biology stream so that I could become a doctor. That was
then not possible as the die had been cast – by none other than me. I was sad
to have flunked in the first year of my college career and didn’t want to face
that ignominy again.
Besides, there
was uncertainty ahead, too, as father was retiring later in the session. In
those days the retirement age used to be 55. Fortunately for him and for us he
was asked by the Minister of Education of the newly formed state of Madhya
Bharat to take up the assignment of heading a new private college that was
being opened in the badlands of Morena. His salary was greater than what he
retired at and he was assured of a place to stay on the premises. The Minister
was somehow very impressed by father as the latter had helped him in resolving
the students’ agitation. Father spent 10 years in Morena before he retired at
the age of 65.
Things progressively eased a little for us. In
the following year the eldest brother qualified for the IAS and the second
brother went away on a scholarship to Frankfurt in West Germany which was still
under (post War) US occupation. The parents were a little relaxed now as the
financial pressure on them had eased up a bit. But, as I look back and think I
find it amazing that there were no savings and yet they did not seem to have
any worry.
True, the
landlord, a very decent trader, had told him that we could stay in the house
for as long as we wanted. It was due to sheer respect for father. Those days
were different as there was tremendous respect for an educated man even if he
had no money; and a teacher living on rent in one’s house was a matter of
honour. Such men and their elevated standards of thinking are all dead and
gone, and what we are left with is crass materialism. Respect and honour for people
of learning and character have largely become things of the past. Even then
father never seemed to have thought of a roof over the head of his family
although there was no paternal property to fall back on. My grandfathers’ properties
from both sides were unavailable, the one from father’s side being lost to
Pakistan with the partition of the country. Probably, there was no craze fifty
years ago of building or acquiring a house like we have these days. Perhaps,
one thought one could get by by spending one’s life in a rented accommodation.
As I changed
over and joined the new stream I lost some of the friends who were very dear to
me. One of them was Pramod Jhawar who went on to become a reputed general surgeon
at the Bombay Hospital in Mumbai. He, unfortunately, became a victim of cancer
and died prematurely; it was an unlikely end of a bright mind. In the new class
I met some old school friends and acquired some new ones. Among them were Chandrakant Bhonsle, Sharad
Paranjpe and Anand Bamroo. Hari Nandan Sahai was also there, a friend from the
DAV School. Four of us would stick together inside or outside the class rooms.
In those days
the system of terminal (half yearly) examinations in the month of December was
still in existence. I realized that these were taken very seriously by the
faculty only when one day the head of the department of Economics came to take
the class. He had a bundle of answer scripts with him. As he sat down he called
my name. I squirmed in my seat and I did not know where to hide. The Professor
was a friend of my father and he knew me from childhood. Shaking on my legs I stood
up. That is when he told the class I was the topper with as many as 62 marks.
Later in the Civics class the Professor was effusive in praising the language
in which I had written my answers. These two incidents were kind of a watershed
and the feeling that I was good-for-nothing slowly started dissipating.
It was Anand
Bamroo who was instrumental in giving Hari and I a flight for free. Some outfit
had hired a single=engine plane, probably a Piper Cub, and was offering joy
rides at Rs.5/- for a 10-minute flight. The pilot was none other than Anand’s
cousin who was staying with the Bamroo family. On Anand’s suggestion we bunked
classes and went to that great open ground in Gwalior known as the Nau Lakha
Parade. It is no longer there, it has since come under the sweep of urbanization
and has been built over and a new township has been erected on it. It used to
be a huge ground with hardly any tree; perhaps all the trees were felled.. Anand’s
cousin came to the ground in a jeep after lunch for the afternoon flights. Anand
introduced us to him whose name, perhaps, was Kichlew. He offered us a free
flight saying we could accompany him on a test flight for which nothing needed
to be paid.
Apart from the
pilot’s seat the plane had two other seats behind the pilot’s. With what
appeared to be makeshift doors it was cramped inside. As Kichlew worked the
throttle it started taxiing and I felt as if we were in a jallopy; it rattled
so much with its wheels running on rough ground. It took off and we realized it
only when we saw its shadow progressively getting smaller. It soon gathered
height and was flying over the Fort, then on and over the town, close to the
College and then made the landing run. We were in the air for 10 minutes or so
but were very excited, I was though a little sad that I couldn’t locate my
house in that jungle of houses. I thought looking like ants from up above people
were really so small and insignificant.
I cleared the
first year pretty comfortably topping the class even in the final examinations.
The next year was the Intermediate Examinations of the Board of secondary
education. I, unfortunately, went down with typhoid just before the
examinations. As a special case I was allowed to write the examinations laid up
on a bed in a room while my father sat outside the holding a flask of fruit
juice. This happened on two successive days for first two papers that were of
English. I did very well in all the other papers and would have qualified for I
Class but for those two English papers. Later I came to know that those very
papers had been set by my father for the Board but he never gave any inkling of that to me.
Such were the men of those days or rather that era – so different from ours.
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