The Hindu Business Line : N for nosy, O for order and P for parivar

A RHYME for kids talks about an old woman in Surrey, who was morn, noon, and night in a hurry. "She called her husband a fool, and drove the children to school," continues the poem, but attention is suddenly on the good old Addy in hot curry, and in great worry too, at all hours. All because he called knickerbockers names, to cause much heat in the khaki world. It is rumoured that Sudji feels Addy has had too much play and no study. And that he must, therefore, be put up back in school, for a revision of values. Let's catch up with the rumpus in the campus.

"You will be schoolmaster and undertake the teaching of the maid," says Tranio in The Taming of the Shrew. Something similar was whispered to Sud by Vajju just before the class started, cutting out the `i' in the last word! "An understanding simple and unschool'd," began the teacher with a line from Hamlet, admonishing the errant ex-students who needed to be reformed, though there were a few exceptional ones who were so good that they had come back to the school to become better.

But no class is complete without a baddy that pays no attention to the teacher. Thus, there was this dreamy Addy, wondering, as Bianca did in the Shrew comedy, "The taming-school! What, is there such a place?" To complicate matters for himself, Addy was happily playing with Mulri, "I can find out no rhyme to `lady' but `baby,' an innocent rhyme; for `scorn,' `horn,' a hard rhyme; for, `school,' `fool,' a babbling rhyme; very ominous endings!" remembering Benedick's dialogue in Much Ado About Nothing.

"A for... " began the teacher, and Vajju blurted out, "Alliance... Atal", inviting a scorn from Addy, even as Mulri kept religiously striking out `Akbar' from his history book. Sud shouted, `Negligent student!' as Moth does in Love's Labour's Lost, and went to the board to write `Authority.' Everybody cowered obediently, though momentarily.

"B for... " said Sud, but Vajju was breaking off into a poem already, "Kabhi, kabhi, there's a stinging bee!" A rap of the cane on the table brought some order to the class, and the teacher wrote confidently `Bharat.' Addy heaved a sigh of relief that there was no dotting of `i' after the crossing of `t.'

"C for criticism," offered Addy, but was criticised for being too offensive. Mulri answered, `Culture,' and that made the teacher happy. Meanwhile, Jassie, in the rear row murmured `China'; somebody else asked for `coffee.' Then it was D that generated some debate whether it should be `dream' that never gets fulfilled, `demit' that Addy kept repeating, or `decline' that they all seemed to suffer from. However, Sud had the last word on that and wrote `Discipline,' and once again there was peace in the class.

The first sign of serious trouble came when G was on the board. Addy wanted `Government,' but was overruled with a unanimous and passionate chant, `Guruji.' By J, everybody knew Addy was going astray, suggesting `Janta,' while the appropriate word was the predictable `Janmabhoomi.'

So much so, there was no love left when the class was on L and continued to chug along to M and N. As for O, Sud didn't spend much time to write `Order,' though Mulri said something about Vedic mathematics and our contribution to `zero.' Somebody asked the ex-finance man Jassie, "How many zeroes are there in a billion?" and he replied, "Oh, only one!"

The dreadful letter P came, a few minutes before the recess that the boys were anxiously waiting for. As expected, there was a showdown, with Sud sticking to `Parivar,' and Addy warring with his adamant suggestion, `Party.' The bell rang and everybody rushed out for some welcome relief.

If you'd gone after the boys, you would have seen Vajju under a tree composing a verse on leadership; and heard Mulri asking Jassie, "Where's the Q?" only to elicit the reply, `Restroom.'

But, where's the baddy and naughty Addy? Oh, he's sitting outside the class, suffering the punishment that the nosy Sud has meted out to him: "Write all the `right' words a hundred times!"

SayCheek@TheHindu.co.in

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