Veeran: the perseverant student and an inspirational educator
A journey through the life of an educator and his grandchild
A child was born eight decades ago in a backward society in the Mappila caste of the erstwhile Malabar region of Kerala, India. His mother died when he was a child, and his father remarried. After his primary education, he traveled 15 miles on land and water to reach his high school. Most of this journey was on foot, and the rest was on a canoe. Many of his friends dropped out, but the boy continued his tiresome journey to school and back home without a second thought.
Decades down the line, his grandchild asked how he — the retired professor of a reputed government engineering college Dr. Veeran, motivated himself to undertake that journey every day, and the septuagenarian smiled. He said:
‘Destiny, I guess….’
High school and wisdom
After high school, Veeran got admitted to the prestigious Farook College in Malabar. His teachers did not doubt that he was destined for greatness because of his exemplary grades. He was a model student who excelled in his studies. His favorite subject was Mathematics because he likes to play with numbers and almost always scored the maximum 100/100. His weakness was Hindi, which he did not know of until high school. After he realized that he would fail in Hindi, he decided to see his Hindi teacher about it.
‘Sir, may I come in?’
The Hindi teacher in his 40s looked up to the door through his spectacle. He saw a lean, short, barefooted boy standing at the door. The boy was so skinny that the teacher thought he was malnourished.
‘Come in’
The boy came in and stood beside the teacher.
‘Yes, Veeran’
The boy hesitated.
‘Veeran…’
‘Sir, I don’t know Hindi….’
‘Okay…’
‘I am afraid I will fail the exams’
‘Mmm…’
‘Sir, I was not taught Hindi in my primary school. I am new to Hindi, and I am struggling.’
The teacher smiled.
‘Veeran, don’t worry. Hindi is not a big thing. I have heard that you were the first rank holder in your previous school.’
The boy looked at the master without confidence.
‘Don’t worry, Veeran. Study as much as you can, and I will help you. I am sure that you will excel’, said the teacher patting Veeran’s shoulder.
After the exam results came, Veeran, as usual, was the class topper except in Hindi, which he managed to pass. Hindi master was impressed.
‘Veeran, even without any previous education in Hindi, you managed to pass in Hindi. You are destined for greatness, Veeran.’
Veeran managed to get 70% in Hindi for the final exams of high school, but he still managed to become the topper with his high percentile scores in other subjects.
My grandfather’s entire school education was on scholarships due to his exceptional exam scores, but I have never seen him forcing anyone to score high. When I scored 70% in my higher secondary examination, many in my family and society looked at me as unworthy. While many wrote me off as a below-average teenager, others scolded me for my grades. But, my grandfather, Dr. Veeran, was calm.
‘You have passed, which gives me hope for your future education. Nothing else matters,’ said the yesteryear higher secondary gold medallist of Farook College with a smile. That smile was a relief when I was going through a downward spiral of depression, and the support that came from him kept me standing.
Value of education
After my grandfather’s higher secondary education, his teachers advised him against engineering and persuaded him to take Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics. But, contrary to their better judgment, Veeran opted for engineering and went to Coimbatore, Tamilnadu, India.
At Coimbatore, Veeran remembers wearing leather shoes for the first time, and it was unpleasant. He narrated that his legs went sore and were filled with sputum due to the leather shoes.
‘Somehow I managed, and luckily after a couple of months, my legs adapted to the leather shoes,’ said my grandpa.
After excellent scoring innings at Coimbatore, he got selected for a Master’s degree in engineering. He sailed his way to the permanent post as a lecturer at a prestigious government engineering college. However, he was not done. After some years as a lecturer, his college selected him to take a Ph.D. at IIT Madras and Veeran; the evergreen, studious student was happy to continue his education.
After two years at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, India, Mr. Veeran became Dr. Veeran. His research career boasts of a scientific paper in civil engineering that deals with water flow in aquifers. After taking a Ph.D. and returning to Kerala, the local newspapers applauded the first person in Malabar to get a Ph.D. His paper was titled, ‘Transient well-flow in an unconfined-confined aquifer system.’ It was published in the Journal of Hydrology in 1975 with an impact factor of 5.7.
After my higher secondary education, I struggled to keep myself afloat in a competitive world, and the attitude met out to me by society was not helping. I had no idea what to do. The only options given to me were to become either an engineer or a doctor. As my grades were average, the general attitude was that I was not capable of both, and the public perception was that there was no third option. However, my grandfather thought otherwise. He asked me what I wanted to study, and out of interest in biology, I said Zoology. So he asked me to search in Farook College and the nearby institutions for admission. After two weeks of traveling and exploring, my grandfather told me to come to Thrissur before going to Farook College, only this time, he accompanied me to the institution.
At Farook College, we went straight to the Principal’s cabin, but we were made to wait outside by the Principal’s secretary.
‘Just tell him that Dr. Veeran, the previous director of Farook College, is here,’ my grandfather said to the secretary. The secretary went inside and told the Principal. Within minutes, we were ushered into the cabin, and the Principal stood up to greet my grandfather. He shook his hands, and we sat beside him.
‘This is my grandson. He needs a seat in the college,’ my grandfather said to the Principal.
‘Of course, sir, please tell me the course, and I will personally call the respective department.’
‘He is interested in studying Zoology.’
‘Sure, sir…’
The Principal made a phone call and asked one of his peons to accompany us to the department. We were given a warm welcome at the Zoology department, and the seat for my Bachelor’s degree was ready. I visited Farook college twice before with my mother’s brother, and we were nobody there. Seats for Bachelor’s degree in Farook college are still hard to get today; even with grades as high as 95% and nearly 4000 USD, students struggle to get into the institution.
The pain and legacy
My grandfather’s involvement helped me capture a seat in a prestigious institution, which changed my education course. Today when I write this short biographical account between the time I get from my research work, I am grieved at his loss, not of his demise but of what happened four and half years back when he became paralyzed and lost his spirit to learn and teach. Every time I visited him after his bypass surgery, I tried to brighten his spirits, but as days went by, the chances of his recovery became dimmer and dimmer. His condition deteriorated after he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, and I couldn’t visit him frequently due to a tight schedule and my health problems.
When I visited him three months back, he smiled the instant he saw me. He gave me some money out of his habit, as he used to provide me with when he was healthy and I was in boarding school. I gave it back and said that I earn now.
‘I should give back for what you have done for me all these years…’, I said.
He smiled. His head with white hair and his face with white beard somehow brightened his eyes which gave his face an angelic appearance when he smiled.
When it was time for me to return, I told him not to worry and that I would return after some days as the COVID-induced restrictions were relaxed. He was crying. I was in pain inside for the last four and a half years when he became bedridden but seeing him getting emotional made me reach the verge of tears. I fought back my tears and repeated,
‘Don’t worry, grandpa… I will be back; Everything will be fine….’
Between his tears, he said,
‘Travel safely, take care of your health….’
He had never forced me to study, even when I failed physics in my higher secondary model exams scoring below 10 out of 100. But, I feel in his silence; he was making sure that I got the message to carry on his legacy, the legacy of the skeletal, lower caste, poor boy who became an influential professor and scientist in North Kerala.
Conclusion
My grandfather is not an ideal person. He had his flaws, and in many things, he was biased. He was patriarchal and religiously conservative. But, he was a human being who knew the value of education and used its power to change his family’s social status, which was once ignorant, poor, and underprivileged, to the one that it is today- educated, civilized, and economically sound. He was a great teacher and mentor to his family and at least three generations of students, including my maternal grandfather, father, and me.
Dr. B. R. Ambedkar — the father of the Indian Constitution, once said,
‘It is education which will enlighten the downtrodden masses to come up and gain social status, economic betterment, and political freedom.’
My grandfather was an example of how powerful a weapon education can be if wielded by the right person. My grandpa, if not anything, was a perseverant student, a loving grandfather, and an inspirational educator.
Au revoir grand pere…
Au revoir…
