Ripples on the brain

Kendriya Vidyalaya IITM’s alumni meet happened today. I look forward to this event every year since I get to meet a lot of very eminent and interesting people - the old students, and obviously my teachers. My mom is still a teacher there, so I get to visit the school frequently anyway. None of my batch mates in school ever turn up for this event every year, so it has never been a “reunion” for me with my friends during such meets.

KV IITM is a school that had such a glorious past with so many students excelling in academics, sports and culturals. The school has definitely lost its sheen over the last many years due to several reasons, but the good thing is that I think everybody realizes that and each one of us is trying to bring the school back on track. Personally, I feel, the kind of student intake in the school has changed over the years and hence based on the nature of students that are there in the school currently, the metrics used to track the school should also change. For example, instead of tracking how many students make the broad jump into IIT, the school should now be tracked on its pass percentage and so on.

To me the greatest part of this year’s event was when we paid rich tributes to one of our own, Lt. N. Parthiban, who laid his life while serving the country. The announcer, who himself had been in the army, mentioned how Parthiban bravely chose the infantry (that is directly involved in the ground battles) division over the other divisions when he passed out of the Officers Training Academy. Explaining the events on his final day, the announcer mentioned how Lt. Parthiban was responsible for preventing infiltration in the Dras sector, how infiltrators are tracked using the special night vision devices, how Lt.Parthiban identified a gang of millitants and moved along with 4 of his colleagues to create an ambush, how these ambushes are dangerous where you expose yourself to the gang of millitants after which it becomes a free-for-all with automated rifles firing in all directions, how Lt. Parthiban, who had himself killed 3 millitants only days ago, killed 2 more that night, before exposing himself to a wounded terrorist, whom he thought was dead. Little did I realize then that I was sitting next to Lt.Parthiban’s family, his father, mother, sisters and other relatives. As the announcer was giving the details, the family was totally in tears, each one of them crying as if they were hearing it for the first time. The father wiped his tears before presenting a framed photo of his son to the school. For the mother, the flow of tears simply refused to stop. I was moved on watching this from close quarters. “We are proud of Lt. Parthiban, for he has achieved what every soldier yearns for: laying one’s life in service of the nation”, the announcer said. It made me think for a moment, “This boy, 4 years younger to me, has laid his life to protect people like me. Do we deserve it?”