Friday, March 2, 2012

The Solace of a Teacher


Suddenly, a young man came to me and touched my feet. This surprised me and I tried to recognize the young man. I recollected that the fellow was my old student while I was serving somewhere in Shimla. His name now rang in my mind. I was surprised not by the fact that he had suddenly came to my feet nor by the fact that I could not initially recognize him. My being surprised was due to some other reason. In fact, I was surprised because I had thought otherwise regarding the boy. I had thought that the guy in his life will never like to recognize me and will never try to show any reverence to me, And the idea of his touching my feet was a a distant dream - a dream which I had never thought of having.
The boy gave me enough stimulus to be thrown back to the days while he was my student. It had so happened that this guy was to take 10+1 exams and wanted some kind of help from us- the people on duty. I as I am could not do that at any cost. He just connived with the local goons and instigated them to browbeat us and thus teach us some lesson. These hooligans did their best to scare us physically and mentally. We had to inform the police and this guy was handed over by us to the police the next day for some better treatment. The examinations went on and came to an end without any hassles and the matter was forgotten as being a little frivolous incident.
Now after six years, this man had come down to me to seek my blessings. What I could make from this incident was that perhaps this is the only solace a good teacher can have even today.