The secretive teacher

Synopsis: Mrs. Deshpande, a teacher by profession, is deeply concerned about her son's performance in the upcoming state-level board examinations, and more particularly, in the discipline she teaches at the college. Even though the situation appears to have gone beyond her control, it seems that the world is conspiring to make her wishes come true.



When Parikshit walked into the room, he heard his father and mother conversing.



"... You know what the newspaper's 'Your Day Today' predicted for today? ... A surprise is in store for you... I don't know what made me think that it would be a pleasant one... Gosh! I had no clue that it would be a horrendous one! "



Parikshit stood near the dining table. His father gave him a derogatory look and continued, "Check out what he is up to; else even you may end up in the same situation as Mrs. Saxena."



It looked like a mystery was unfolding for Parikshit, who always enjoyed following the interaction between his parents.

He asked his father, "What had happened with Mrs. Saxena?"



The father scornfully replied, "Her son flunked in the very subject she teaches at school!"



Parikshit was overjoyed and he wanted this conversation to go on. It looked like a pleasant extension of the gossip session, he had with his friends a while earlier. Little did he know that the guns were soon going to turn on him.



"And which subject was that?" he couldn't control his excitement.



"History!" the father reacted with the same degree of scorn, and went on, "And someone is on the same path in Chemistry."

It was more than a few times Parikshit had heard this story, first with his sister as the subject, and later on, his brother. Each time it was an enjoyable narration, but this time around, for the first time, he realized that he had made it into the story.



His mother felt scared. At this juncture, there were three things that had potential to go wrong. One, the hardship Parikshit would face if he flunks. Second, the wrath of her husband that would follow, and third, how she would save herself from the stares and nagging questions in her peer circle.



However, she felt countering her husband would be the most appropriate thing to do. She replied coolly, "You will never come up with some good inspirational examples!"



She turned around and left the scene.



Parikshit had scored a measly 44 out of 100 in Chemistry in the preliminary exams, of his college. The situation was alarming because the State-level Board examinations were just a few months away and his father's intuition told him a disaster was in offing.



His mother, Mrs. Shikha Deshpande, or simply Mrs. Deshpande as they mentioned her in college, taught Chemistry in an all-girls school. They said, she was an unpredictable lady. If you see her at different times of the day, she would turn out to be completely different.



When in a class, she was firm and high on authority, a silent terror for the children.



At first, she would defer all questions to the end of a class, and then towards the end of the period, when presented with a question, she would say, "OK, so let me see now...Who amongst you all is the smartest to answer this question?", most often to conceal her ignorance on the topic.



The deliberation between the students would go on until the bell rung and she would conclude, "The answer to this question lies in this very chapter out here," pointing to the book,  and would conclude, "I would want all of you to search for the answer to this question. Have I made myself clear..?"



But then, one of those perseverant students would bring up the question in the subsequent class. She would out rightly appreciate them for their efforts, but wouldn't budge from her strategy and say, "So, did anyone bother to find out the answer to the question?" And thus, the loop continued.



She would never bother to find out the answer to the question herself and would hardly give a straight reply to a question.



The other teachers said that if a student goes through the internal examination papers she had set in the yesteryears, it would suffice for them to score big in her subject. They claimed that her knowledge was constant, and was largely covered in the examination papers of the previous five odd years.



When amongst her superiors she had the knack of observing what they desire. Her response would be a short one, "Yes, that's possible and will be accomplished. It may only need a few more days, that's all."



At home, she thought of her hubby as an impediment, uniformly and equally in all fields.



If a television had to be purchased, she would pitch-in at the last moment saying, "But Mrs. Damle is considerably unhappy with this brand..."



Mr. Deshpande would feel unsettled.



"You never listen to me. Such an obnoxious decision can't be implemented," would be the typical, or as Mr. Deshpande would say, 'derailing-the-deal' response.



It was a different matter that she just watched TV for around five minutes in a day.



A strange habit made her unique. In most of the questions posed to her or any narrations she would be an audience to, her standard response would be to look elsewhere -- no nod, no shrug, no regret, no reaction, just dump the question or the situation.



When at college in the staff room, Mrs. Damle would ask her, "Ma'am, how did your son fare in his preliminary exams?"



Mrs. Deshpande chose to continue eating her food as if she never heard the question. Still, that provocation had her worried.



Parikshit was a smart, intelligent, fun-oriented boy who was outstanding with numbers. So, Math, Physics and certain portions of Chemistry came to him naturally. Rest all were in direct proportion to his perspiration. Each year, at least one of the subjects would go beyond his control, and as usual, on each occasion, it would be too late by the time he realized which subject had gone beyond his reach. This time it was Chemistry.



The worrisome factor for Mrs. Deshpande was that she couldn't have pushed him further. In the build-up to the competitive examinations for entering a professional course, Parikshit hardly had time. He would attend coaching for three hours a day apart from the seven hours at school.



Complicating the issue was the fact that the standard of Chemistry for the competitive examinations was considerably higher than that of the upcoming standard-12 Board Examinations. And to a large extent, they were unrelated too.



Mrs. Deshpande feared for Parikshit, mostly helplessly. And somewhere deep in the heart, lied the dream of seeing Parikshit bettering the scores of his siblings in Chemistry.



--



It was a hot, humid, sunny morning, on the day Parikshit was to write his Chemistry Board examination for Standard 12th. The exam was scheduled at two o'clock in the afternoon.



At about 11am in the morning, Parikshit's childhood friend and classmate, Devarat called him up.



"Do one thing... just write what I say!" commanded Devarat in a crisp tone.



'... comment on the ring structure of Benzene... What happens when Formaldehyde reacts with Potassium Permanganate?... Ammonia with Chloromethane...?..."



Parikshit kept writing.



Before Devarat hung-up, apart from all the Chemistry talk, he said only one line, "It is likely that these questions are coming in the examination today."



Parikshit couldn't contain his excitement. His mother came into the room and gauged the situation straight away. She asked him, "Do you know the answers to these questions?"



"Yes, of course!"



"OK, let me see how much time we have?" she checked the watch and looked at Parikshit, "Go and get a pen and a notebook."



"For what?" questioned Parikshit.



"Just do what I say. We don't have much time!"



On the paper, Mrs. Deshpande made Parikshit write each and every answer. Each time Parikshit faltered with a wrong answer, she made him re-write it until he wrote it without assistance.



Little time was left after this strenuous activity.



She hurried him up, "Get up quickly now, have a bath and make a move...And remember, don't talk to anyone today. Just go and write your exam. My sweet boy, may God be with you!"



Within no time, both headed out of the house, in their respective directions.



--



A few months ago, at the beginning of the academic year, Mrs. Deshpande had taken charge as the principal of the institution where she taught Chemistry, a reputed college that boasted of more than a couple of thousand students, from standard 6th to 12th.



During the Board examination, as the principal, she had to reach the center an hour before each scheduled exam, prepare the college staff and see through their activities during the entire duration.



On this day, she reached the center with renewed vigor. Apart from her usual work, that had become largely mundane, she had something to look forward to.



She did her work meticulously, gave out instructions to all the teachers at the college, tore-open the seal of the big bundle of the examination question papers, got them counted under her nose, got them distributed amongst all the staff members and gave them the necessary stationary and usual instructions.



Slowly, each one left Mrs. Deshpande's office and headed out to their respective classrooms.



Five minutes before two o'clock, Mrs. Deshpande sat alone in her office. She had been desperately waiting for this time. She closed her eyes for a moment and prayed to God and picked up one question paper booklet from the pile. As her heart pounded vigorously, she flipped the question paper to check its contents.



"...Benzene ring...Formaldehyde...Potassium Permanganate..." she read out to herself. She turned over the paper. "Ammonia..Chloromethane.. Cannizaro reaction..." she kept reading to herself.



Mrs. Deshpande thanked God once again, and then suddenly felt thirsty.



She picked up the cold water and then suddenly sprang forward, and turned the air-swing of the desert-cooler towards her. "These people na.... (the staff members) never let even a gush of cool air reach me," she mumbled in happiness.



The paper had all questions which Devarat had told Parikshit.



--



It was a first time experience for Parikshit. Never had it happened that he got to know beforehand, even a single question that would eventually feature in the question paper of the examination. He was ecstatic. He was done with his answers in two hours; the scheduled duration was three hours.



After getting out of the center he hunted for Devarat.



When they met, both friends hugged each other fondly; it was a 'partners in crime' kind of squeeze. After all, both of their 'efforts' culminated into an 'accomplishment'.



Parikshit asked his close pal, who appeared to him even more closer now, as to how he found the question papers?



"Oh, don't ask...! There is this bunch of duds. They got hold of the question papers through some connection. And guess what?... They don't even know the answer to a single question. Such duffers, I tell you....Without the answers, they could have only tallied whether the paper had the questions they knew beforehand...I solved it for them, this morning!"



"But how do you know these ruffians?"



"Ahh! Just some city-bus companions, a few hi,bye exchanges. They live on the other side of the park near my house, it seems. That's all."



Just then, a bunch of guys passed Devarat. "The same ruffians..." Devarat whispered to Parikshit.



They yelled jubilantly, "Guru!...The answer to that numerical question is 3.7, right?"



"Yes, yes, absolutely!" he responded to them.



Parikshit was perturbed now. As they moved on, he retorted immediately, "Wasn't the answer to that, 2.5?"



"Yes, my dearest friend, it is indeed 2.5. With the numbers these people got from their sources, the answer is 3.7, with the figures that featured in the question paper, the answer is 2.5. They don't have the head to figure out that something changed in the final cut!"



Parikshit sighed.



--



Parikshit's father maintained a stoic silence all through the evening. The next day morning, he waited for the local daily to reach his hands. The moment he got it, he looked for any news related to previous day's exam paper leaking out, but there wasn't any reference of such an event.



Another three days the same pattern repeated. Those days included, one exam each of Chemistry, Math and Physics -- of all the exams, the most difficult ones for Parikshit.



It was only after this, the menace was arrested and the city administration nabbed a few people. Still, no news came out for any action being taken for what had already taken place.



Much later in the month, the English exam was cancelled because the authorities claimed that the paper had leaked and that a re-exam would be conducted.



--



The period of lull had already started. Parikshit had secured noteworthy ranks in the competitive exams, he had been preparing for the past two years. It was only a matter of a few weeks that he would head out in pursuit of a professional career in medical sciences in a metropolitan city in the country, very much like his siblings. Rest all was immaterial to him now.



He loved spending long hours in front of the television, outings with friends and playing games on the computer.



The results would come out soon. At the college front, for Mrs. Deshpande, the Board examination result was the litmus-test for her role as a principal. She had inherited a tough legacy of 100% students passing the Board exams from the former headmistress.



Upholding the already set-out benchmark in Board exams was the 'face-saver' for Mrs. Deshpande.



On the evening, a day before the results were to be announced in the afternoon version of a local daily, Mrs. Deshpande was answering a phone call for a long time. As she murmured, "hmm.." repeatedly, she was scribbling on a piece of paper as well.



No one paid attention to this until she came out of the room and announced in an elated fashion, "My son has held my head high. He has scored 97 in Chemistry, 96 in Math, 98 in....the overall score is 429/500, i.e. 85.8%"



She reached out to Parikshit with stretched hands and embraced him. Parikshit was more amused than being happy.



His father asked her mother, "Was it Mr. Srivastava's call from Nagpur?"



Mrs. Deshpande nodded and went on to call up Parikshit's siblings. The 'history-creating' news was relayed to them about his results.



--



The following day, in the morning, Mrs. Deshpande walked up to her husband who was reading the newspaper, and asked him, for the first time in their life, "What does your 'Your Day Today' say today?"



"Oh-ho!" remarked Mr. Deshpande with astonishment as she smiled. He flipped the pages and said, "It says, be prepared for a surprise later in the day."



Mrs. Deshpande remained mum. Mr. Deshpande felt sympathetic towards her, "Yeah, I know! Tough day for you. I wish your college result comes out to be a hard slap on their (the critics) faces."



She walked off without furnishing a response.



At about 4pm, the result came out promptly in the newspaper. Mr. Srivastava's data turned out to be precise.



Mrs. Deshpande studied the newspaper for a while, and eventually, in a somber mood blurted out, "The State-level merit-list lists down top-21 students. The student, at the 21st rank has obtained 431 marks out of 500..."



Parikshit heard it carefully, so did his father. It appeared to them that there was more to come.



With a regretful sigh on her face, she said, "Had you just got 2 more marks, your name would have made it to the state-merit list! ...There would have been a picture of you in the newspaper."



Mr. Deshpande started searching for the performance of the students at his wife's college. Parikshit looked at his mother dumbfounded.