Some things the students do not know...

It was in 1985. I was a fresh lecturer in Assam Engineering College, Guwahati. My HOD, Prof (Dr) A C Sharma was the examination-in-charge and I was his assistant. It was mathematics exam. Huge number of students used to fail in that subject. In addition to about 250 regular students, there were nearly 250 students appearing for their back paper in Maths. that day.

After the exam was over and the invigilators had left submitting the answer scripts, we started sorting out the scripts for packing. Suddenly I came across one loose sheet , one or two answers were written on that, but the sheet did not have any roll number written on it and it was not attached to any answer script either.. My initial thought was to neglect that sheet. “No roll number is written, how do we know whose sheet is this? After all it is the responsibility of the student to write his/her roll number and attach the additional sheet to the main answer script properly”, I was telling myself. And there were about 500 answer scripts to be sorted.

I showed that sheet to A C Sharma sir and he said, “Let us check the hand writings in the answer scripts one by one; we shall attach this sheet to the script that matches the hand writings. This student might pass the exam because of the answers he has written on this additional sheet.”

Checking hand writing one by one of 500 scripts? It would be two to three hours extra job. I was hesitating, but Sharma sir was adamant and we started checking the scripts. After half an hour or so, we could locate the script, attached the additional sheet properly to that and completed our job by around 3.00 pm.

I do not know who that student was and whether he passed the exam on that occasion or not. That student never knew what Sharma sir had done for him. After few months, as a reaction to some incident, the students attacked and ransacked Sharma sir’s house. That particular student may have been a party to that. No one knows. But Sharma sir never complained and continued to be the same sincere and hardworking teacher he used to be.

God bless such teachers.