The Great Indian School Hunt

The Great Indian School Hunt: A Father, a Son and Eight Schools

There is a great deal of discussion these days about the condition of government schools in India. Before I join the chorus, let me make one thing clear: I myself am a product of a government-aided school in Delhi.

It was certainly not a modern school by today's standards. No smart classrooms, no air-conditioned laboratories, no fancy gadgets—probably not even a smartboard in anyone's wildest imagination! But the teachers were sincere. They came to school, taught their subjects and, most importantly, did their job faithfully.

And somehow, I survived the system and eventually passed out of IIT Kharagpur!

My son Anish had a rather more adventurous education. Because of my transferable job in BHEL and my involvement in power-station project execution, he changed schools eight times!

You could say he had a pan-India education without ever applying for admission to a pan-India school.

The first stop — Singrauli

After completing Kindergarten at St. Cathedral in Delhi, I was transferred to Singrauli Super Thermal Power Station. I put Anish in St. Joseph's School in the township.

During admission, the principal, a padre, interviewed Anish in English. Fortunately, the boy could answer him reasonably well.

Then came another father with his son. The principal asked him what he did.

The man proudly replied that he was a shovel operator in the coal mines adjoining the power plant.

The principal then asked, "Do you speak English at home?"

The gentleman replied, rather proudly, "Na ji, na."

I liked that school immediately. Here was a school where the son of a shovel operator could aspire to study alongside the children of engineers and officers. The father could afford the fees and, more importantly, he wanted his son to get a good education.

Anish studied there till Class II.

Back to Delhi — and the Bengali problem

Then came another transfer to Delhi.

My first choice was Kendriya Vidyalaya. No admission.

I tried another English-medium school near the Western Extension Area. Again, no admission.

By then I had taken a small flat in West Patel Nagar, close to my parents, who were living in WEA after my father had retired and had to vacate the government accommodation at Wilson Square, Gole Market.

I had run out of options.

So I did something that every Indian father understands perfectly well.

I used my influence!

I approached my old school, Raisina Bengali Higher Secondary School at Gole Market. The principal, a former Army man, kindly agreed to admit Anish.

There was, however, one small problem.

Anish didn't know Bengali.

The principal looked at me and said, "He will have to learn Bengali during the summer vacation because he will be entering Class IV."

Luckily, Mrs Gupta, who had taught me years earlier, was still living near our house. I approached her.

"Madam, I have a small problem."

She probably knew what was coming.

She agreed to teach Anish Bengali.

And somehow Anish sailed from Class III into Class IV and even managed to pass Bengali!

My son was now becoming a linguist by force rather than by choice.

Wanakbori — the English-medium school

I stayed in Delhi for about a year and was then transferred to Wanakbori in Gujarat in 1985.

There was an English-medium school at Shivalia where most of the children of my BHEL colleagues studied. I took Anish there.

The infrastructure looked good. But I had one doubt.

I discovered that many of the teachers were wives of my BHEL colleagues.

The principal sensed my hesitation.

He called a boy.

"This is Indranil. You can speak to him in English."

Indranil spoke excellent English. Smart boy, confident, fluent.

I was impressed.

Admission done!

Later I discovered that there were about twenty students in the class, but only five had literate parents. The rest were children of labourers.

Then I became friendly with Mr Purkayastha, the project manager of the coal-handling plant supplied by MAMC. One day we visited his quarter.

And there was Indranil!

I told his wife about my impressive encounter with Indranil during admission.

She burst out laughing.

"The principal does that with every new parent!"

It turned out that Indranil had arrived in Wanakbori only a year earlier and had learnt English in his previous school.

So much for my scientific assessment of the school's English standard!

I also became uncomfortable because most of the teachers were wives of my junior colleagues. I felt they might be giving Anish marks with a little extra generosity.

A father's suspicion is sometimes more powerful than an examination result.

Baroda — boarding school at last

I decided to look for a better school in Baroda.

I visited Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. They had a hostel, and the principal understood my predicament. He admitted Anish directly to the next class.

For the next two years, Anish stayed in the hostel.

It was a massive school and, in my opinion, one of the best in Baroda at that time. There were four football fields, and playing after lunch was compulsory.

Now that was education!

Anish made friends with children of well-known artists and businessmen. Life in the hostel gave him a completely different exposure.

But something else happened there which, at the time, seemed like a minor matter.

The computer arrives quietly

In 1986, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan started an additional computer class for students who were interested. It was not part of the regular curriculum and required an extra fee.

I paid the fee and put Anish into the class.

That was the beginning of his tryst with computers.

During our Vizag days, I continued this by making him attend the summer computer classes conducted by APTECH.

So, while I was busy running around looking for schools, admission, languages and suitable teachers, his computer skills were quietly being sharpened in the background.

The irony is that I had absolutely no idea what was coming!

This was the mid-1980s. The IT revolution was still largely invisible to people like me. Computers were simply something interesting and useful for a child to learn.

I certainly did not imagine that computers would transform the world by the late 1990s and beyond.

So, quite unknowingly, I had put Anish on a road that would eventually become his career.

Vizag — three languages strike again!

In 1988, I was transferred from BHEL to Vizag Steel Plant.

Naturally, the school hunt started all over again.

I first took Anish to DAV School at Ukkunagaram, the township of Vizag Steel Plant.

At the same time, I was trying to get him into Kendriya Vidyalaya.

After some effort—and, I confess, with the help of the CMD of the Steel Plant—I managed to get him admitted to KV.

But the famous three-language formula now entered our lives.

Anish was comfortable with English and Hindi. The third language had to be either Telugu or Sanskrit.

I decided that Sanskrit was the lesser of the two evils.

Then came the next question:

Who would teach him Sanskrit?

I could teach him most subjects, but the Sanskrit I had studied at school was hardly enough to prepare him for his class.

Fortunately, my neighbour Mr Bandopadhyay came to the rescue. His father had been a Sanskrit pandit.

And so Anish's education continued—with a rotating cast of English teachers, Bengali teachers, Sanskrit teachers, hostel wardens and, of course, his permanently available father-tutor!

Farakka — finally, some stability

In December 1991, I was transferred to Farakka, just when Anish was preparing for his Class X Board examination.

Luckily, Farakka had a Kendriya Vidyalaya.

He joined there, completed his schooling and finally passed both his Class X Board examination and Higher Secondary.

At last! No more school hunting.

I think I was more relieved than he was.

And the computer class turned out to matter

Looking back now, the most interesting part of this whole story is perhaps the little computer class I put him into in Baroda.

At the time, I was simply trying to expose him to something new. Then came the APTECH summer classes in Vizag.

I had no grand plan.

I had no crystal ball.

I had no idea that the IT industry was going to explode.

But the foundation was being laid quietly.

Today, that little boy who went through eight schools, several cities, different curricula and multiple languages is a successful IT engineer in Australia. He went on to complete his Master's degree in Information Technology from Griffith University and built his career in the IT field.

Looking back, I sometimes feel that while I was busy changing his schools, the computer was quietly changing his future!

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So where is the real problem?

That is why the current debate about government schools interests me.

The problem is not simply government school versus private school.

A good school ultimately depends on good teachers, committed management and an environment where children are encouraged to learn.

My own government-aided school in Delhi did not have fancy infrastructure, but we had teachers who took their responsibility seriously.

And my experience with Anish taught me another lesson.

Education is not merely a building, an English-medium label, smart classrooms or high marks.

It is about giving a child a strong foundation and the confidence to face the next environment.

Anish had to adjust every time we moved.

Just when he made friends, another transfer came. Just when he became comfortable with a teacher, we moved. One school taught Bengali, another expected Telugu or Sanskrit. One school had a hostel, another was in a power-station township. One curriculum differed from another.

Yet children are remarkably adaptable. Perhaps much more adaptable than their parents.

I had the advantage of being an engineer, having a transferable job and knowing people in different places. I could run from pillar to post, persuade principals, find tutors and occasionally even use a little "influence."

But what about an ordinary parent who has none of these?

That is where our education system needs to think harder.

Because if a reasonably educated father like me had to struggle so much to provide continuity of basic education to his son, imagine the struggle of a parent who has neither the information nor the connections nor the money to manoeuvre through the system.

And perhaps this is the part of the government-school debate we sometimes miss.

We should not judge education only by buildings and facilities. We should ask whether the teacher is sincere, whether the child is learning, whether he is being encouraged to think—and whether the system gives every child a fair chance.

My own journey from a government-aided school to IIT taught me that.

Anish's journey through eight schools taught me something else: a child's education is sometimes less about the school he attends and more about the opportunities he encounters along the way.

And finally, there is one more lesson.

Sometimes parents think they are carefully designing their children's future.

In reality, we often just open a few doors and hope they walk through the right one.

In 1986, I paid an extra fee for a computer class without having the faintest idea where computers would take us.

Life, as usual, knew better than I did. 😄

And perhaps Anish deserves a special certificate:

"Successfully completed schooling after surviving eight schools, several cities, multiple curricula, three languages, one overenthusiastic engineer-father—and one accidental introduction to the IT revolution."

I wonder whether any university offers a degree for that! 😄