Shala

by Milind Bokil

  We were free to roam around now. The atmosphere was really relaxed. We were not in our uniforms and, although teachers were around, there were no classes to attend. Adhav and Pethe ma’am sat there, sipping endless cups of tea since morning. Manjrekar sir was talking to the teachers from that school and Rajguru sir roamed around the camp. No one bothered us.

  The boys were cool as always, but the girls too had let their guard down. I could see the boys and girls of Nine-C talking to each other. The boys had helped them get a few buckets of water from the pond. There were more girls in nine-a as compared to the boys. Our class girls too were now interacting with the boys. I had seen that on the bus last evening. Teredesai and Shembekar had stood up and offered their seats to the birdies and they had given them some lemon flavoured hard-boiled toffees in return. They found some excuse or the other to chat with the boys since morning. One of the groups was short of dry wood and requested us to give them some for our cooking. Bibikar in the Tiger group was, as usual, trying to act smart. He borrowed some washing powder from the girls to clean the vessels.

  The girls from Nine-C had set the ball rolling by speaking to the boys. Each one in the school wanted to mingle with the other sex, but the question was who would take the first step. No one wanted to get teased to death. No one knows who created such stupid rules. Naru mama says, in countries like England and America, no one bothers. Girls and boys talk to each other without a care. They can even sit on the same bench if they like. Boys like Surya would love to do that. I am sure the girls too feel the same, but who would bell the cat?

  We sat down for lunch and the boys and girls exchanged their dishes, urging the other groups to taste. Our chutney was immensely popular and we had hardly any left for our own selves. Kamat’s group had made besan curry and all hell broke loose when the birdies announced that they had got some pickles from home. Dongre was on the verge of tears seeing her pickle disappear in minutes. Shirodkar stood up and handed over a plate to us without saying a word. It had some vegetable curry, similar to the one we had prepared. Sadu, Gaitonde, Memane and some boys were clueless, but Chitre gave me a knowing smile. The curry tasted divine. She had added some fresh coconut to it. Their group must have brought some freshly grated coconut from home.

  There was a decoration competition in the afternoon and Chitre came up with a bright idea to pluck small branches from trees and label them as per their botanical names. Bibikar tried copying the same but fell flat. We bagged the first prize. The girls roamed around in groups inspecting what the other groups had done. We had free time in the evening and there were some matches between the boys and girls. We played the langdi game, with one leg folded. I was hoping Shirodkar would play against me, but I was up against that long-legged Pandhre from Nine-C who pulled me down in a matter of seconds.

  That evening Manjrekar sir came up with the idea of preparing a common meal. We borrowed some huge vessels from the school and the chowkidar helped us light a big fire. The boys were given the task of making rice while the girls opted for dal. Chitre casually announced that we need not be a part of the process and could excuse ourselves. We asked Kamat to come along and enjoyed his songs sitting on the bank of the canal.

  In the evening, all the girls and boys sat around the campfire in a huge circle. Sir had noticed that we had managed to slip out of the meal duty and promptly ordered us to wash the vessels. We were a little late by the time we finished and joined the group around the bonfire. There was no place in the ring. Chitre and I were forced to sit next to Adhav ma’am. I was fuming but had no choice but to sit quietly. The bonfire was bright, but the circle around it was so big I could not see people’s faces clearly.

  The girls started some stupid ‘chain song’ game wherein you go on adding one line every time and repeating the whole song at the same time. The boys soon got bored of it and Sir asked us to stop. We then sang a few other songs. Sir sang one sung by the local fishermen. The tune was catchy and the chorus ‘jhim gale gale jhim…jhim gale gale….’ was soothing making one drowsy. I could imagine myself swaying gently as the fishermen rowed the boat back to the shore after a hard day’s work.

  Adhav ma’am got up and returned in a while with the teachers from the local school. We were asked to squeeze in closer to make space for them. The teachers sang a local song for us. The bonfire was burning, but the brightness had reduced considerably now. I looked up to see the sky. It was filled with stars. It was not cold, but a pleasant wind was blowing gently. I felt something fall near my thighs. It seemed to have been thrown from the side where the girls sat. I looked down to see a Ravalgaon toffee lying there. I glanced up and was shocked to death to see Shirodkar sitting next to me. When I looked, she continued to stare at the bonfire as if nothing had happened. But I could see her faint smile in the mild light of the fire.

  I grabbed the toffee and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. The boys were busy listening to the teachers singing, but Chitre had noticed. He said, ‘What is it, buddy? What’s going on?’

  I was forced to show him the toffee. He exclaimed, ‘Good progress!’

  I was terribly embarrassed. But I was feeling good too. I did not know what to do. On one hand I was keen to preserve the toffee and keep it in my pocket, but on the other there was a danger of being caught by the others.

  ‘Do you want to share it?’ I asked Chitre.

  ‘No. You eat it,’ he said, smiling.

  The next day we were to depart after lunch, but no one felt like leaving. Sir had called for a feedback session an hour before departure. Teredesai was the first to speak up.

  ‘Sir, what if we have our school permanently based here? It would be so much fun,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, Sir,’ the birdies chirped in. ‘We don’t want to go back. Teach us here.’

  Everyone felt the same. No one was teasing anyone else. We were happily chatting with everyone. Even when Deosthale threw up in the morning, no one sniggered and, in fact, when Phatak from Nine-C got some cloves for her to chew on, no one teased him. The distance between the boys and girls had disappeared, and we felt as if we all knew each other for ages.

  ‘Sir, why can’t we have a school without walls?’ Kamat asked. ‘We don’t mind cooking.’

  ‘It is so nice and open here,’ Gaitonde commented.

  ‘Yes Sir,’ the birdies chirped. ‘We should have a school like this one. We will never trouble you.’

  Manjrekar sir smiled.

  ‘I agree with you, but my hands are tied,’ he said. ‘When you grow up, you should build a school like this one.’

  The next day I was in a dual mood wanting to go and yet felt like staying back alone. It was a Monday and we had decided to meet at our adda. Surya and others would have returned from their NCC camp, and we were waiting to hear their exploits.

  I left a little before eleven. I was planning to take the route through the paddy fields but changed my mind and went by the main road. Walking past Shriram Flour Mill I noticed some posters stuck high up on the wall above it. The message was loud and clear—‘Emergency Murdabad! Down With Dictatorship!’ The black and red letters on the white paper were clearly visible from a distance. The bhaiya managing the flour mill was oblivious to the posters and was busy grinding wheat in the mill. I then understood the meaning of Ambabai’s whisperings this morning. She had spotted the posters while returning from a friend’s place. ‘They are everywhere,’ she was telling Aaisaheb in a low voice. When I asked her what she meant, she snubbed me saying, ‘Why are you so curious? It’s none of your business.’

  The posters were in many prominent places—on the dustcart, on the electric transformer, on the wall near the shops, on some fences, and one on the wall of Chowdhary bungalow. Someone had tried tearing it off. There was one on Surya’s building too.

  When I reached our adda, I saw Chitre and Surya looking at the poster. Surya said, ‘Just see these posters—Emergency Murdabad! Down With Dictatorship! It is fun, bhenchod!’

  ‘They are
up all over town—even near the station,’ Chitre said. ‘The police are removing them.’

  ‘But who put them up?’ asked Surya.

  ‘‘Who knows?’ Chitre said. ‘Someone has dared to.’

  ‘There are a few on the wall of Mokshadham too,’ I added.

  ‘What does it say?’

  ‘The same message—Emergency Murdabad!’

  ‘They should stick them everywhere, bhenchod,’ Surya said. ‘I would have put them up if I had them.’

  ‘The police will put you in jail, understand?’ Chitre explained. ‘Take these out before your dad thinks you put them up.’

  Phawdya came in and told us that the posters were all over the marketplace and that the police were removing them.

  ‘How do we remove them?’ Surya asked, looking around. ‘They are so high up. How did they put them up in the first place?’

  ‘They must have used your ladder,’ Chitre said. ‘Look, I can see the ladder there.’

  Surya put the ladder against the wall and we stood looking at the posters when I said, leave it. People may think you are putting up the posters. Why bother?’

  Surya agreed and got down the ladder keeping it on one side.

  ‘Leave it, bhenchod,’ he said. ‘My dad will take care of it. Come, let us go and sit upstairs. How was your camp? Our camp, Ichibhana, was fabulous!’

  We bounded up the stairs. The work was almost complete and the floor tiles had been set. The bamboo poles had been removed and now one could not hide behind them. The dampness of the walls was gone and the room was not as cool as before. But there was a lot of space for us to move around.

  ‘We had such fun, you know,’ Surya said.

  ‘We teased the eighth standard boys a lot,’ Phawdya said. ‘That stupid Vichare had got some laddoos in a dabba. We found that out, ate the laddoos, and replaced them with small stones.’

  ‘I tell you, bhenchod,’ Surya said. ‘And tell them what we did to that Pendse.’

  ‘Chaila! Unfortunately for him, he was in our barrack. That night, Surya took his toothpaste and emptied the entire tube into his trousers after unzipping them.’

  ‘Oh boy!’

  ‘You bet! He started crying and was quite sure Surya must have played that prank. But we kept our mouths shut. He could not prove it.’

  ‘Wasn’t your sergeant present?’ I asked.

  ‘He was. Pendse went crying to him, but he shooed him away saying, “tum kuch bhi karo, bhosadike.”

  ‘And those guys from Shivaji High School? They had got a bottle of brandy, you know?’ Surya said. ‘They offered us some too.’

  ‘Were there students from other schools too?’

  ‘What do you mean other schools? There were three thousand students!’ Phawdya said.

  ‘You have no idea! We could do whatever we felt like. It was total ruckus.’

  ‘But was there no one supervising you guys?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes. There were supervisors. But they were bothered about discipline on the ground. In the tents, no one bothered. That havaldar would kick us if we tried some prank on the ground. There we would behave well. And we had mutton four times. It was total dhamaal!’

  ‘Anyway! Forget our tales. Tell us, how was your camp?’ Surya asked.

  Chitre and I looked at each other. We did not know what to say. We had not had their kind of fun. We were with our own schoolmates and teachers. We had made khichdi and onion-potato curry.

  ‘Tell them,’ Chitre nudged me.

  ‘No. Why don’t you tell,’ I said.

  Chitre thought for a while. He had to make our camp experience feel better than the NCC one.

  ‘The boys and girls stayed together in our camp,’ he said.

  ‘What!’ Surya and Phawdya exclaimed at the same time.

  ‘Together, meaning next to each other. Not exactly staying in the same room,’ Chitre explained ‘It was like being at home. We were all bindaas—all the girls and boys.’

  Phawdya and Surya were all ears now.

  ‘What are you saying?’ Surya asked, not believing what he heard.

  ‘You bet! We went for walks together. We cooked together; someone would make chutney; the other person would make subji. The girls were really free and chatting with everyone. We all sat close together on the bus.’

  ‘Ichibhana, it must have been fun, isn’t it?’ Surya exclaimed.

  ‘Of course! Joshi was in his true spirits. He was busy chopping vegetables, running errands for them. He even got a toffee in return for his efforts.’

  ‘Hey, shut up!’ I said.

  ‘Why are you asking me to shut up? Didn’t that Shirodkar give you a toffee? That too, at the camp fire, when no one was looking, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s nothing special. The girls were giving many people such toffees.’

  ‘Chaila! You guys had all the fun,’ Surya said. ‘Phawdya, we too should join the Scouts now.’

  ‘What is so exciting about this?’ Phawdya asked. ‘All girlish activities!’

  ‘Wasn’t Kevda there?’ Surya asked.

  ‘No. The girls from eighth standard were not there.’

  ‘Then it is fine. But tell me, were the girls really interacting with you guys? You should have taken one of them into the woods in the dark of the night.’

  ‘Don’t talk crap!’

  ‘What do you mean crap? Were there no woods around? If I was there, I would have taken one of them out. But I am sure you sissies must have sat and just talked the whole night.’

  We did not comment. Surya would not appreciate the kind of fun we had there and it was useless trying to make him understand.

  There was not much discussion on the posters in school as most of the idiots would not have understood or even seen them. But during our mid-break, when we were standing near the water taps, we heard Redkar sir saying, ‘This is going to increase now!’ Prem Chopra commented, ‘These people are not going to keep quiet.’ Unfortunately Manjrekar sir did not have a class else we would have encouraged Bibikar to ask him some questions in this regards.

  But Appa gave a lecture during the last period when the entire school had gathered in the ground for PT. We were made to sing the song, ‘Anushasan parva shuru aaj se’. Someone got the harmonium down from the office. Sontakke from class ten is always ready to play it and she sang, ‘Ma tere beeson sapne pure karenge hum’. Appa’s lecture, as always, lamented on the lack of discipline, how indiscipline was rampant and why people do not like discipline, how the country moves ahead only when there is discipline, and then he gave examples of Japan and Germany and their discipline! He espoused discipline all over, be it in school, at home, on the roads, in railway stations and in queues. The students had no choice but to endure the lecture.

  We were hoping Appa would stop after five minutes. We would gladly do ten hours of PT in lieu of listening to him for ten minutes. But Appa was relentless. He went on and on and on. The teachers, zealously patrolling the crowd, too got bored. The boys were restless and a mild murmur started in the crowd. Someone commented, ‘Please note; it is PT period.’ Whoever said it had said so in a low but deliberate voice, clear enough to be heard by everyone. It must have been someone from the tenth standard. But Appa did not hear it. We tried to stifle our laughter. The same voice said, ‘Children need exercise.’ The teachers were now alert and looked around trying to spot the culprit. Appa’s lecture finally got over. He was in consultation with the teachers over the next steps, with his back towards us, when someone from the crowd shouted, ‘Emergency Murdabad!’

  Appa turned around sharply. The teachers were taken by surprise. We too were surprised but we continued to stare ahead. The rule was to either look straight ahead or look down. One should never turn back or look around. There was a chance someone may bash you up later if you were found doing so.

  ‘Who is it? Who is it?’ Appa shouted angrily. Sycophants like Prem Chopra immediately came down to investigate. Bendre ma’am, standing near the girls, came towards the
boys’ side. But there was nothing to be gained. And frankly speaking, there was nothing to get angry about. But Appa was angry at the indiscipline of the students.

  ‘These fellows will not listen! Let them run around the ground. Right now!’

  The whole school was then made to go round the ground in a line. It looked like a long train. The girls too were asked to run. It was good that boys like Surya were not leading the train, else they would have deliberately taken a zigzag route. But the boys from tenth standard managed to break the line and then within moments, there were a few trains running around the ground. The boys were having fun. Prem Chopra tried running along with us for a while but gave up soon. Someone shouted, ‘Emergency Zindabad!’ The whole crowd started shouting, ‘Emergency Zindabad, Emergency Zindabad!’ Appa had no choice but to ask Ganoba to ring the bell, thus ending the day.

  The classes began in earnest after the school gathering. The fun was over. All that remained were the months leading to the final examinations. The road ahead was stark. It grew hot in the afternoons. The grass in the playground had dried up long back and it was dry and dusty.

  The atmosphere in the classroom was back to normal; boys and girls kept to themselves. We exchanged a few words during the gathering, but in the classroom we did not talk to each other. It was as if the intermittent period when we spoke did not exist. Bendre ma’am continued her torture as before and so did Redkar sir. He had become even more boring than before. The Maths classes were getting tougher. Luckily, Zende sir’s and Manjrekar sir’s classes were fun, as usual.

  But that day in the fifth period, when Manjrekar sir came into the class, Ambekar stood up and said rightaway in English, in a clear, loud voice, ‘Sir, these girls are talking about you and me.’

  Most of the class did not get the drift of it. They were yet to settle down after the break, and many had just managed to enter the class after a last minute dash to drink water and were wiping their mouths with the back of their hands. I had managed to steal a glance at Shirodkar while looking around. But I had noticed Ambekar getting up and had heard her clearly.