At the center of the matter is a professor in the finance department. A professor who has been been termed variously as boring, soporific and monotonous. I hope there are people who beg to differ - because I want some company here. While not everyone is as lively as SRK playing that remarkably shot "Raaskalaa" scene in OSO, here's a very knowledgeable person trying his best to inculcate some sense of a deeply theoretic discipline into a set of uninterested people - people who have been under the grind for 10 months and think they deserve a break.
I am sure I am not the only one who thinks so, but anyway - in no uncertain terms, I enjoyed his classes. Except the two in which I slept - but that was more because I had been watching a movie till 3 am the previous night. I didn't laugh at his jokes which frankly didn't seem funny to most of us. But when he delved into the more theoretic aspects, it became interesting. Applying one's mind made it a conversation full of insights rather than a monotonous monologue.
Anyway, the teaching abilities of that professor are not the central theme here. And things take a very sad turn now.
A very popular event in the campus, Chaos - the cultural festival, was scheduled to be held in second half of January. A few days before the date, Professor's son dies of some medical complications in the US. The professor's family is supposed to return on the day Chaos is scheduled to begin. The campus authorities see the glaring issue here - how ironic and perhaps insensitive it would be for the campus community as a whole to rejoice with such vigour while a family mourns right there inside the campus. The festival is called off but in the true authoritarian manner - the decision is announced as something being passed on from the authorities to the students. I think this was as much authoritarianism as HRD ministry's edicts which the campus authorities fight tooth and nail. Nevertheless, there is a brief discussion among the students with various opinions. My own opinion is that it was an excessively knee jerk response to entirely call off the festival - rescheduling would have been quite sufficient and absolutely necessary, but I am not much of a stakeholder in the festival now.
Even while this discussion is going on, the Professor sends across a message to the campus community - and that message is the most touching part of this incident. The Professor says that if his son was around, he would have liked the students to enjoy and rejoice in the spirit of Chaos. So, he says, the festival should not be called off.
Of course, the event was rescheduled but I was deeply moved by the manner in which Professor responded. While it is true anyone at that position is expected to show a level of grace and maturity, but in such trying times, this letter displays a gesture far more understanding and compassionate than anyone else's.
I might be, as I usually do, blowing things out of proportion. But fact remains fact. And there is a new name in the list of people I am a fan of.
I hope his family recovers from the shock soon and the situation comes back to normal. Amen.
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