Guru is a Sanskrit word. Gu means darkness and ru means dispeller. Guru is the one who is enlightened and the one who brings enlightenment to his disciples. Our culture equates guru with god by saying “Acharya Devo bhava”. Most of us know the famous guru mantra, which again elevates guru to god status.
Guru Brahma Guru Vishnu Guru devo Maheshwaraharaha
Guru saakshath Para Brahma Tas mai sri Gurave namaha
Every year we celebrate Guru Purnima as a mark of respect to our teachers. Other than this we celebrate teacher’s day on Mr. S. Radhakrishnan’s birthday.
If I peek into my past, I see that I've learned under many teachers during my sixteen plus years of formal education. There have been some teachers who have made tremendous positive impact on me and are frequently remembered, there are some who have slipped down my memory lane and there are some whom I remember for not so good reasons.
Out of all my teachers I remember the teacher who thought me the music the most. She trained me and my brother in Carnatic classical music for many years without even charging a single pie. I have very fond memories of the time we spent learning music from her. When we started learning music, we were little kids full of play, laughter and mischief. She was kind and generous enough to ignore our lack of seriousness and silly pranks and teach music with dedication. Sometimes we used to get into one of our uncontrollable bouts of laughter, usually stemmed out of silliest of silly reasons. It must have been very though for her not to loose patience with us. She always managed to find some time for us despite of a tight schedule. The “Thyagaraja Aaradhane” days are still green in my mind. All her students used to assemble at her house, she used prepare big meal for all of us, everyone used to play and sing whatever they’ve learnt and used to take her blessings. Today if I can appreciate music, understand its beauty and allow it to enrich my life then, it’s all because of the foundation she laid.
One more person I often remember is my no-nonsense high school math teacher. I always used to score good marks in Geometry much because of his ability to put things in an idiot proof way. He was our school headmaster too and by default was very strict. My respect to him was always offered not because he is strict or headmaster, but for the strength of his character. He commanded respect from all quarters of student base. During my three-year stint in high school, He never left any part of syllabus incomplete, never took special classes and still ensured that everyone scores good marks in the subject he taught. I took math and science private tuitions from him during my 10th standard. Well thanks to him managed to score a good score.
How can I forget my Sanskrit teacher? Honestly he was no good at teaching, but I was one of his pet students probably because he knew my family well and was from the place from where my forefathers hailed. I’ve never been trashed, whipped and caned by any other teacher as much by this gentleman, but there was always concern and affection underneath. I used to be his favorite target whenever he felt like quizzing his pupils. I somehow used to answer few of his questions, but there were few topics that required us to learn by heart and I was too lazy to do that. Invariably I used to get caught regularly and used to provide him a reason to exercise his arms. I still remember the day when I got to see how much affection he had towards me. Once, a friend and I were caught red handed by our English teacher playing some prank inside the classroom. Much to my misfortune, that day our English language teacher was not in good humor. Who knows? He must’ve fought with his wife. Even after couple of rounds of caning, boss wasn’t satisfied. He ordered us to take our school bags and stand in front of Head master’s room so that everyone in the school know that we were being punished for some terrible crime. Many teachers passed by and asked why we are standing there. After hearing our dismal story, some preferred to scold us, some preferred to slap us, some preferred to whip us and some were extremely apathetic and they just ignored us, some looked at us with with victorious smile as if their stand was finally vindicated. After sometime I saw my Sanskrit teacher coming our way. First thing that I could think was a free lecture filled invectives followed by heavy duty slapping on head and generous doses of ear twisting. He saw us from distance and looked shell shocked. He pulled me aside and asked what I am doing in front of head master’s chamber hanging my school bag. Mentally preparing myself for the impending doom, I hesitantly blurted out the tragic turn of events that happened on that eventful day. He just looked at me once, said something that I couldn’t decipher and walked away to staff room. I was so relieved and started believing that luck too sometimes can be kind and generous. I was explaining what happened to my fellow convict, much to my shock I saw my Sanskrit teacher coming back to us again. He was still wearing the same grim look that he put on when I talked to him earlier. I thought I was little too early in drawing my conclusions about luck. He ordered us to get into classroom immediately with our bags. I don’t know what kind of truce he brokered on our behalf with our English language teacher. We were pardoned and set free from the exile right away. As we were leaving, he summoned me back and gave me a lecture on why my parents have sent me to the school and how I should behave etc. etc. Nothing went inside my head, as I was busy experiencing his love and concern for me. It seems he always told my father that I have great potential, but I was little lazy. Well… now that’s something debatable.
One more teacher from my high school days whom I fondly remember is my History Teacher. He was a hefty bald headed man who had lots of stories and interesting facts to tell. He was my favorite teacher then and I used to eagerly wait for his classes. If I can still recollect some of the historical facts, it’s because of him. His sessions on Harappan civilization, Egyptian civilization, Greek and Roman empires, Vijayanagr Empire, The world wars, Indian freedom struggle etc. are still etched in my mind. During later part of 9th standard, I started moving around with a gang of blokes who were addicted to smoking, movies and bunking classes. My History teacher knew my father quite well and wasted no time to complain to my father about the company I was entertaining. Hell hath no fury like a young man deceived. I immediately plotted his downfall and deposed him from the favorite teacher throne and started taking less interest in classes. But it did not take much time for good sense to prevail thanks to approaching exams. He was resurrected and given attention from then on. But his treacherous act was not forgiven and forgotten for long time.
I was adolescent, volatile and extremely reserved during my pre-university days. I never liked to be noticed and recognized by my teachers. I usually hanged around with the so-called “bad boys”. We were notorious for answering attendance call for an absent friend.
We were an adventurous band that took pride in getting duplicate report cards printed, mailing it home after generously giving ourselves good grades without forgetting to forge Principal’s signature. Some other adventures included trying to leak examination question papers, bunking classes in front of a lecturer, setting up cracker-time bombs etc. Initially I disliked almost all lecturers of that time but after my bad boy hangover receded a bit, I realized there is one wonderful physics lecturer who is unconventional and cool. Boss never gave lectures from examination point of view and always stressed on students understanding the subject. Thanks to his principle, he invariably used to fall behind the schedule and used to conduct special classes on Sundays. He should be proud of the fact that he was the only privileged person in this whole damn world, who could make my ass move to attend a special class, that too on a Sunday. His approach was unique and full of sense. His commitment to elevate his students to higher levels of consciousness was unquestionable. Those were great qualities to imbibe for impressionable minds like mine.
During my pre-university days, I attended private tuitions conducted by a chemistry lecturer. He was in great demand those days and people used flock around his house during the time of admission. He was extremely good at his work and probably had ability to teach chemistry to a dead log of wood. Armed with interesting set of analogies, he used to make toughest of tough concepts appear simple for us. One hour of his lecture used to pass like few minutes and used to leave us longing for more. I scored around 80% percent in II year pre- university exam chemistry paper. No prizes for guessing the man behind my success.
My engineering days were great fun but I didn’t get to meet a lecturer/professor who could impact me positively. In my humble opinion, they were far too mediocre and did their jobs mechanically with out bothering much about students. I too had become quite independent then and many times preferred the combination of self-study and bird watching to be more viable than a boring and lifeless lecture.
The most brilliant teacher ever to make a profound impact on me was the one with whom I interacted least. I joined a course on Unix internals and C in a very reputed and highly rated institute. It was an audio-based training. Our teacher had recorded his lecture sessions on an audiotape. We used to get course materials and audiotape to listen and learn the subject. Initially I was very skeptical about the whole set up, but later found my doubts were unfounded. He was a teacher who had tremendous industry experience and a great love for teaching. He was a great source of inspiration for many and had a huge fan following. He had developed an amazing technique filled with humor, stories, analogies and anecdotes that made us crack hardest nuts of Unix and C programming with tremendous ease. Many of his students used to get placed in most reputed IT firms of that day and usually used to leave their interviewers insecure with their amazing grip over the subject. I haven’t seen a teacher like him in my life.
After I got employment in the field of my interest, I have attended several trainings and lectures. The trainers were always too hard pressed for time to make any kind of strong impact on me.
Many times I feel we don’t give teachers the respect they deserve. They were the rays of light that showed us the path to success. To what extent we succeed is entirely in our hands but the road to success undoubtedly was shown to us by our gurus. It makes me sad when I hear the ladder, which I used to toil up, is no more. This article is a tribute to one of my teachers who recently passed away. He taught me mathematics during my pre-university days. He was a good teacher and a highly respected man in my town. It seems there was huge crowd of his ex-students and friends during his funeral. He also was my Father’s contemporary and a friend, which leaves me more nervous and shocked.
