Priyadarsan: the victim of the wrong Vission & Mission ... The life-train derails.

The life-train derails.

As mentioned earlier, the Plus2 year was a year of dreams and prayers. The dreams were about becoming a medical doctor and the prayer was to get sufficient marks to get qualified for admission.

It was not actually Plus2 but Pre-University. During those days, the school education had 3 phases. Lower Primary,Upper-Primary and Secondary. Lower Primary (LP) was of 5 years’ duration, Upper Primary (UP) was of 3 years’ duration and Secondary of 3 years’ duration. Thus the total number of schooling years was 11.

As per international standards, the minimum eligibility for university education 12 years’ schooling; and we had to undergo one more year’s study. It was really pre-university and post-secondary. The Pre-University class was conducted in Colleges.

I had the privilege of studying in one of the oldest Christian colleges of Kerala; and it is the Union Christian College, Alwaye. It is 10 miles away from my home. It was then a college with some special features.

The Union Christian College is an institution jointly owned by the Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church and the Church of South India which is the South Indian branch of the Anglican Church.

Almost all the Professors and Lecturers of the U.C.College were with the highest academic-records and all of them were extremely dedicated to their profession.

Majority of the faculty were from highly affluent families in or around the South Travancore area and they treated their profession as a charitable mission. Most of them used to donate major portion of their salaries to the college-fund.

During the early 1960s, college education was a luxury and only around 5 percent of those leaving the secondary schools did get the opportunity to go for university education. The main reason for this factor was that we had to pay monthly fee of Rs.20. Even though Rs.20 is a small amount today, then it was a big amount. It was a period when the salary of a non-gusseted-government-servant was only Rs.90.

Most of my classmates in the pre-university batch were from out of Cochin area. A majority of them were from South Travancore (South Kerala) area and all of them were staying in the college-hostels. They were very serious in their studies, and this factor made me also to put seriousness into my studies.

Though I was forced to take my studies seriously, I had a draw-back. I had to travel 10 miles which, during those days took one and a half hours. By this time I used to get tired and by the time I reach the college I would be in a fatigued mood. Still I managed to attend the classes very actively.

Active attention in the class was one of my characteristic features which was automatically developed since my early years in the schools. I used to make comical comments during the lecture, which were enjoyed not only by my classmates, but by my teachers also.. This habit made me popular among the students and the teachers. And as a result I became the natural choice to become the class-monitor. I was the class-monitor from class 1 to class-11.

Even though I was a smart boy in the class, I was a little bit lazy at home. I hated doing home-works in time. During the LP and UP school days I spent my home-time by going for fishing with the fish-hook-rode in the rivulet close to my home.

During those days there were two sessions in the LP schools. Class1&2 were conducted in the morning session (10AM-12 AM) and classes 3&4 were conducted during after-noon session (2PM-4PM). During my class 1&2 period, I used to spend the noon to evening time by fishing by using a fish-hook tied at the end of a bamboo-stick . But don’t think that I caught too much fishes during those days. The maximum rate of the catch was one or two prawns per hour.

The prawns have very clever habit. Once they approach the bait, they scare other varieties if fishes by using their scissors like limbs. After chasing all other fishes from near the bait, the prawns would draw the bait with their limbs. It was only during rare occasions they bring the bait into their mouth.

For most of the time, the float would be underneath leaving the fisherman to guess what is really happening. He cannot just understand whether the bait is in the prawn’s mouth or limbs. We called it as fake-bite (kallakkothu). Sometimes, I mean once in an hour or so, I might be lucky to catch one prawn.

As I was only a boy, I had no wrist-watch. Nonetheless, wrist-watch was a real luxury during those days. Still we had a way know the time. Then, there was a Bombay-Bangalore-Cochin daily flight which was scheduled to land in Cochin Harbor air-port at 12.AM. Just five minutes earlier to 12.00, the Indian Airlines Dakota plane would appear in the sky, and that would make an end to the fishing. After a soap-less bath in the rivulet, we (myself and my friends) would run for home, because we had to eat our lunch and go to the school to attend the afternoon session.

Though I was lazy at home I cared to attend the class every day without fail. As I was of a little above-average brilliance, I fared well in the examinations, and I was the student of the year from class 1 to class 11. But I had to face a tryst with my destiny. In the final examination for the Secondary School Leaving Certificate, I couldn’t score a first-class. I could score only 418 instead of 420 out of 700. But still I managed to get admission in the U.C.College. It was really a privilege to have got admission into that college.

The days at the college was funny. Eventhogh I had taken my studies seriously, I continued my laziness at home. This bad habit caused serious set-backs to my educational future. I could score only a high second-class in my Pre-University examination.

Then there were only three medical colleges in Kerala: at Trivandrum, Alleppy and Calicut, Those days parents used to send their wards to the medical-colleges at Madras and Bangalore. We had to pay a capitation fee ranging from 3000 to 5000 rupees to get admission to the MBBS course. My dad was prepared to raise that amount by selling a part of his land-property.

At last the unlucky day arrived. I was shocked to learn that my marks for Biology was only 48 percent, whereas the minimum eligibility for MBBS admission was 50 percent. I was expecting at least 60 percent marks for biology, because, for me, Biology was the easiest subject, and I had done well in the examination also. Still I am sure that my Biology paper was examined by an insane individual.

But the real casualty was due to the ignorance of my parents. They have completed only the LP level school education. So they were ignorant of the prospects of re-valuation process. In fact, to my extreme bad luck, there was nobody to guide me or my parents. Still I believe that if my paper was revaluated, I would have scored more than 60 percent.

Later I came to understand that the teacher who had valued my paper might have a son or daughter whom he wished to send for the MBBS course. He might have purposefully cut down my marks to avoid competition for his son or daughter. One would understand the logic behind my this assumption when comes to know that the total number of students appearing for Pre-University examination was only in between 5000 and 10000.

Whatever it may be, I realized the harsh reality that my life-train had in fact derailed.