I am suspended from classes for a week. The reason: my English essay on my school.

Patnaik sir, our English teacher, is not responsible for my suspension though.  He has a sense of humour.  After reading my essay he laughed and said, "Saurav, I'm happy that at least your perversion has not made ostentatious appearances in this essay.  However, I feel that you should have an eye for the brighter half of reality too.  Anyway, I can let it go this time taking this as a satire."

How did the essay reach the hands of the principal?  I don't know. Someone must have stolen it from my desk.  There are far too many thieves in New India Public School.  

New India Public School is run by some bloody organisation called Nav Bharat Sanskar Kendra.  Nav Bharat is in Mumbai and New India is in Delhi, if you don't know.  Nav Bharat believes in Indian culture but will adapt the best in Western culture, that's what the prospectus says.  A harmonious blend of Indian culture with the Western culture.  So we get McDonald's burgers and Coke in the school canteen, along with Kurkure and Tiger Biscuits.  New India is a pure vegetarian exclusively residential school for boys. 

But I'm digressing.  This is my problem.  Patnaik sir tells me that.  Teachers want us to stick to one thing at a time.  Why can't my mind go bloody anywhere it likes I don't know.  Patnaik sir says it's a question of marks.  "If you want to score marks in CBSE exams," he says with his bloody practical sense, "you have to stick to the point, young men.  Value points, that's what CBSE calls them.  Half mark for each value point.  Two marks, four value points."

Why did Gandhi involve women in the freedom struggle?  That was a question in the exam.  I wrote, "Gandhi had a weakness for women.  In his old days he had two pretty young girls on whose boobs he had his palms all the time."  Patnaik sir was very angry but he pretended not to be.  That's Mr Patnaik.  When he's angry he'll bite his lower lip and stare at you.  Or he will make a cynical comment.  But he will not display his anger like the others.  The others have their own kind of phoniness.  Every one of them teachers in New India is a phoney.

Patnaik sir referred to my answer about Gandhi without reading it out in the class as he usually did .  Then he said, "We all tend to make the same mistake: ascribe our motives to others."   Then he said that I had not stuck to the value points.  "Read the text, young man," he shouted at me.  "Read the text at least once before you go for the exam.  The city editions of your newspapers won't give you more knowledge than this," he said holding up my essay in the air as if it were a copy of Delhi Times.

But Patnaik sir is a nice man.  He has a reason for everything.  He always sticks to the point.  And he never calls us "children" as the other teachers do.  He calls us "young men".  The other teachers will call us "children" and they will screw us from the backside.   

Backsides play a very important role in New India.  That was the theme of my essay, in fact. I had said in that essay that the principal will pat the vice-principal's backside and the vice-principal will pat the principal's backside; the PTI (physical training instructor, that is, if you don't know) will pat the principal's and vice-principal's backsides and the two of them will pat the PTI's backside; and this backside patting goes on ad infinitum, ad nauseam.  Any time you see them teachers in New India you will find them patting somebody's backside. 

My essay had ended with a cartoon.  The principal and the vice-principal together were pinning an award on the backside of the PTI.  That was the cartoon.  That was not part of the essay strictly speaking.  "You have been extra-creative," said Patnaik sir after looking at the cartoon with his cynical smile.  "I'm letting that pass since creativity is running the risk of vanishing altogether from the campus."  At least he understands something's vanishing from the campus. I know what's vanishing.  But I won't tell you now.  Otherwise I may get a dismissal. 

The PTI was being conferred with the Best Teacher Award by Nav Bharat Sanskar Kendra, Mumbai.  That's why I had drawn the cartoon.  Last month the PTI had conferred an award each on the principal and the vice-principal.  Not the PTI, in fact.  The PTI runs many enterprises.  One of them is a society called Bharat Sree.  Bharat Sree had conferred the award on the principal and the vice-principal for their exemplary contribution to the cause of education. 

"My backside has started itching badly.  I will soon be a good New Indian."  Those were the concluding sentences of my essay. 

In spite of that ending on a positive note, they have suspended me. 

I'm now consoling myself patting my own backside and trying to find out its brighter half.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and all the characters in it are imaginary.  Any resemblance to real characters is mere coincidence.

For a related story: http://matheikal.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/10/twinkle-twinkle-little-star.htm