Fall from grace

The recent episode of Hardik Pandya and KL Rahul refuses to die down. Every day in the newspapers there is extensive coverage with the most recent one in the Indian Express analysing every word spoken by the duo and the in-depth analysis of what the players behaved like when the controversy broke out. Views of ex-cricketers were also given. Some outright hostile while others more cautious in their words. For both cricketers, the timing could not have been worse. Just a few months before the World Cup during an Australian tour which will be remembered in history as the most successful ever.  As some sniggered, Rahul’s bad timing spilling over from the pitch to life off it!

Notwithstanding, his poor form in the test series KL Rahul is a man who holds immense potential for the India’s cricketing future. The same goes for Pandya. This fall from grace for the star cricketers has been triggered by their own acts. In such situations, one does not expect support from the outside world. You know you have let down family and friends but somewhere deep down, you know you that as long as they are in your corner you can expect things to turn around.

I write this piece because this incident takes me back to my days at boarding school in Dehradun in the mid-90s. I was in Class 8. I was a good student. I did the regular sport and kept myself busy. The previous term, a new Head Master had joined and had a highly favourable opinion of me. At least that is what his end of term report indicated. He had written that he had a high opinion of my potential and I was one of the ‘high performers’ he had identified for the coming years! My elder brother, a couple of years ahead, was an established all round student by then. My parents were thrilled that they were getting maximum bang for the buck for their investment in our public school education!  

It was Diwali. I told my parents not to come since the winter holidays would begin in another 20 days. Seerat, Nishant, Das, Shivaji and I were together when the evening started. We started lighting small crackers near our hostel. After some time, we felt the monotony and decided to take a round of the school to meet our friends in other hostels. On the way there were houses of ‘Masters’ – our teaching staff. It all started near the house of Gursharan Singh, the Music Master. His son, Deep, was a class mate – a day scholar – who went home every evening. His house had a small garden, surrounded by a hedge. As we walked on the pebble stone path outside hedge, a crazy idea took seed.

“Challenge anybody to throw a ladi into Deep Singh’s house,” I said.  A Ladi is a cracker which has series of interconnected small crackers. They go off one after the other as in a chain reaction.

Something had gotten into me at that moment. Before anybody could take me up on the challenge I lit the ladi and hurled it into his garden. The house was quiet and dark. The garden was empty. No damage was done.

Emboldened, we moved on. The next target was Mr Walia, the mess contractor. I don’t remember who did the act but I remember a Ladi being lit on his door step and us scattering away in all directions, hooting and laughing.

We descended into the main field where Pratyush Vaishnava joined us. He was the son of Mr Bhuvan Vaishnava, the senior most master of school.  Pratyush was a year senior to us. He was a cheeky kid with a naughty mischievous smile permanently etched on his face. I had seen him get roughed up by seniors and still be smiling. On hearing what we had done, he laughed out aloud and said he would love to join us. He suggested we cross the Main field since many masters lived there. So off we went ably led by Pratyush.

In the bachelor’s accommodation there lived the EVS teacher, APP. Short for Anand Pendharkar. Pendharkar was a young man in his late 20s. He was extremely passionate about what he taught but not everybody was equally enthusiastic about Environment Sciences back then. It was an add on subject which we were all dying to drop as soon as we reached Class 9. With our confidence sky high post two ‘successful’ strikes we climbed onto the first floor of the building and inserted one ladi under the thick plywood door. There was a gap of at least an inch or two between the door and the floor. The ladi would not damage such a thick door.  We had often slid our assignments and report cards under this gap. There was huge lock on the door. This was a piece of cake, we thought. I don’t remember which brave soul lit the cracker t but I remember rushing down the corridor – three of us almost falling over each other. The Other three stood outside to guard.

From here, we parted ways and went back to our hostel. Pratyush said he would join his own class mates. There were no more strikes. We went to sleep after the most ‘fun’ Diwali we had had in years! Some of our friends who had gone out with their parents went green with jealousy as we told them about our conquests! They had no idea how much to thank their stars in the days to come!

The first signs that all was not good surfaced the following morning during the assembly. The Head Master was extremely angry and perturbed about the acts of ‘vandalism’ that had gone on the previous night. On enquiring it came to light that apart from Pendharkar’s main door being blasted open, many concrete dustbins had been blown to shreds by the use of giant aloo bombs. However, things did not end here. Another incredulous story doing the rounds was of Mr Ganguly, a veteran Master having discovered human faeces scattered over his front door. The hypothesis being that boys had emptied their waste into a polythene bag, and lit a cracker underneath it thereby splattering everything onto front door of Mr Ganguly’s house.

It was rumoured that some Class 12 boys had done the hit job on Mr Ganguly’s house. Also, it seems after us leaving Mr Pendharkar’s house a group of more senior boys had gone and blasted open Mr Pendharkar’s front door. I found it difficult to believe that such serious damage could have actually happened. Surely Sivakasi crackers could not have had RDX in them!  

A couple of days later a message was delivered to us at 10 pm from Mr Vaishnava. He wanted to see a couple of us. As soon as Shivaji and I entered his drawing room, the interrogation about the Diwali night began. What had we done? Who all had been there? Where all had we gone? We tried to resist. But what match could two 13 year olds be for him? He got the confession from us. Pratyush had told his father everything and bit more.

The next day our numbers were announced at the assembly and we were summoned by the headmaster. When we met him, he kept saying that as much as we had not confessed, there was every reason to believe that we had done the job on the dust bins as well. Little mercy, he spared us the honour of decorating Mr Ganguly’s door. We denied the bins bit, of course. However, we were told that since exams were to begin in a couple of days, the decision would happen later.  What would happen to us? The thought hung like a Damocles sword over our heads throughout the exams. They were the worst exams I ever wrote in my school life.

The day the exams got over, the head master told us that he had seriously contemplated suspending us for a term but had now decided to hand us a yellow card each. I was shattered. Good students were not supposed to get yellow cards. The first card was handed over to the great Seerat Singh. On receiving the card, I think Seerat said “Thank you”. The Headmaster snapped back. “It is not an award, Mr Singh”. Nishant Anand, when asked his role made the cardinal error of saying “ Me and Shivaji….” To which Mr Mason disgustedly quipped, “Is that grammatically correct, Mr Anand”? When it came to me, I could sense the disappointment in his eyes. I sensed the fall from grace had been the steepest for me.  He did not say this. Instead he said something to the effect that a person of my intelligence could surely have figured out what was right and wrong. I agreed with him but only partially. Yes, we had lit crackers outside Mr Pendharkar’s door but the damage which he was so perturbed about had not been caused by us.  We were the smallest fish in the game and had confessed to our actions.  The real big guns had come, blown open the bins, doors and bags of shit and gotten away. Scot free.  The remaining five days in school were a torture. I did not feel like eating or leaving the hostel. I felt low on self-esteem and literally waited for the moment when I could go home. My grades, in the background, of all this were not great by my standards either.

A day before leaving – a senior in class 12 asked me why I was so low. I told him that I had been given a yellow card and did not know how I would explain this to my parents.  He told me what had happened could not be changed but what had I learnt from all this. I said, “Never to do such a thing again.” “If you did not cause the damage then why be so repentant about it?” I said I had paid more than the price for my mistake. Then a smile of extreme contentment came over his face and he asked, “What do you make of Mr Ganguly’s door. Isn’t that a job well done?” I told him that was more of a rumour. Of course it was true, he said. And then he said that his ‘gang’ was the one that had ‘beautified’ Mr Ganguly’s house. Do these things but don’t get caught and if you get caught don’t confess that easily. He winked and whistled off into his room. It was a lesson for life. Big fish rarely get caught, even if the whole world knows about them. When small fish get caught, they pay the price of what the big fish have done.

I reached home and within a couple of hours told my mother and father about the whole incident and the yellow card. They were supportive and I felt that the situation was under control. The next week went smoothly. Then one evening when my parents came home, my father was looking very upset. He was not talking much. When I tried engaging with him, he did not respond in his normal affectionate way. So I went to my mom to ask her what the matter was. She hesitantly said that a letter had arrived from school. I could feel my heart racing and the knots in my body tightening. Mr Mason had written to our families about the incident. He had used certain words that had really disturbed my father. The only phrase my mother shared with me was “sly act of misbehaviour”. I was extremely disturbed. Firstly, why had he written home when he had dealt with us at school. Second, why did have to use such harsh and extreme words? I will never forget my mother telling me, “Papa and I don’t want anybody calling our son sly. How can papa be happy about it.” I knew at some level I had let my father down. He had not said it but the letter had hit him like a bolt from the blue. It had disturbed the equilibrium of our family. I had let the family down as well. My parents never shared the contents of the letter but they must have been something to ruffle a cool person like my father. It was one of the quietest dinners we ever had.  However, things were back to normal within a couple of days. The fact that I had realised my mistake was enough for my parents. I decided I could never come near to such embarrassment ever again.

It did not end here though. A couple of months later when I re-joined school – the headmaster told us that he would making us to community service. This entailed gardening and upkeep of the hostel garden. So we started tilling the flower beds every day after lunch. Some boys passed snide remarks when they saw us hunched over digging the flower beds or watering the plants. After ten days, I walked up to the headmaster to ask him how long we were to do this. In his signature style he remarked, “till something comes out of the soil, Mr Thakur. You have to pay back to society.” Off we went to the school nursery and got new rose saplings. We dug the pits, planted the saplings, and watered them till the flowers bloomed. A month later when I was batting in the cricket nets I saw the Head Master walking along the hedge which separated the cricket field from our garden. I rushed to take my pads off and went darting in his direction. I told him to have look at our ‘work’ in the field. He saw our work and seemed rather happy at our effort. He asked me whether I had learnt anything. I nodded my head. I hoped now that he put this incident behind us.

I stayed in school for another two years. My academic performance was back on track within a term. I was never very athletic or supremely gifted in any sphere but I was honest and sincere in my efforts. However, I don’t think the head master ever allowed himself to forget this incident totally or forgive us for it.  Every now and then his reactions gave him away. He was sarcastic and snappy and would say things, taking us back to this incident. That one incident had clouded his opinion about all of us. Forever.  Looking back, as 13 year olds, we deserved a second chance. We had made a mistake and paid the price. He had neither forgiven us nor chosen to forget the incident. Interestingly, Mr Pendharkar was very sweet to me for the remainder of his tenure in school. He left a year later. Many years later we connected on social media and are ‘friends’ of this virtual world.

A good six years later when Pratyush ‘smiley’ Vaishnava and I met in our college at St Stephens’. His father has passed away a couple of years after our Diwali fiasco. He and I hit it off almost at once. In one of those conversations, the Diwali episode came up. I told him that I felt the Head master had not let go of the incident. He said he agreed totally and then went on to recount a tale. He told me that when he finished school – a good four and half years after this episode – on their farewell dinner the Head Master had again brought up the Diwali episode. Pratyush said he was so disturbed that he had to really work very hard to hold back his tears. Maybe the headmaster being in his first assignment of a residential school was more scarred or shocked by the incident than any of us.

Looking back at the incident, I feel it could have been handled differently. We had been mischievous no doubt. Nobody spoke to us or tried to understand why we had done it. My parents had asked me these questions and having been convinced with my answers left it at that. We had done it for sheer fun. Instead, it was made to be some 9/11 type conspiracy. In hindsight I feel, everybody including the Headmaster knew that we could not have done all that had gone wrong. However, not taking action against whoever they had ‘caught’ would not have sent the right message as well. Overdoing it is where headmaster got it wrong. Occupying positions of public office where I have often been in similar positions as a disciplinary authority the principle of proportionality needs to be kept in mind. The impact of these actions was not the same on all of us. I did only one act of mischief in the next two years but that’s not on the table for discussion. The thought of doing anything of the sort took me back to that cold evening in Mussoorie when my father had come home with the head master’s letter. However, some of the others became repeat offenders often caught jumping the school wall or calling masters’ names and getting into trouble for the same.

So, where do I stand on the issue of KL Rahul and Pandya. I think they have been shamed– to win back their place in the team is one thing but to win back the trust and respect of their mates is quite another. They have paid the price. People make mistakes. The incident will never be forgotten and it’s important for us to allow these players to move on. 

That is only possible when we choose to move on ourselves.