Bombay – the city of dreams

 

Bombay – the city of dreams

I was a rustic village boy from a small non-descript village Sunkanpally, District Nalgonda of the erstwhile Nizam State of Hyderabad (now Telangana), came to Bombay in June 1965, after passing the HSC examination from a Zilla Parishad High School. I was 16 years old. It is 60 years since then, a remarkable journey of turbulence that left a deep imprint.  

 

After learning and acquiring some proficiency in typing and shorthand, I secured a job in the Office of the Regional Labour Commissioner, Bombay. under the Union Ministry of Labour.  I had a dream of studying in a regular college in the city to obtain a degree from the University of Bombay. The dream was shattered. Because I studied in Telugu Medium and didn’t have good marks in English at the HSC examination, the University refused to give me the eligibility certificate required for admission in its affiliated colleges.

 

Those days the colleges conducted degrees classes in the morning and evening for the benefit of working people. I commuted some 60 km in a local train to attend BA degree classes at Ulhasnagar, Thane District, that time affiliated to Poona University, beginning at 7.00 AM, then reach my office at Ballard Pier, in the heart of the city, around 11.15 AM. Being the peak time for office goers, I had to stand during the entire journey in the packed crowded train that took more than an  hour-and-half to reach the office, tiered and exhausted.  I was traveling 120 km to-and-fro every day for two years 1970-72; catching the local train 5.30 A.M at Parel. Owing to this ‘Earning and Learning’ facility that was unique to Bombay, it was possible to realise the dream.  Moreover, the fees charged was subsided and affordable.

 

The best of my academic pursuit was when I was doing the master’s in political science from the University of Bombay from the evening batch at its Fort Campus during the years 1975-77. The classrooms atmosphere was very conducive for learning and serious reading and research. It was during those two years that I had developed a scholarly bent of mind and started reading extensively and making exhaustive notes from every book and periodical recommended by the teachers. There was a healthy competitive spirit due to the internal-cum-external scheme of examination that kept us occupied throughout the year.  The teachers who taught us were intellectual giants, that included Dr. Aloo Dastur, Dr. Usha Mehta and Dr. Y.D. Phadke.

 

I was so particular about getting a first class in the master’s degree that I resigned from the permanent government job to concentrate on the studies. About the Rajabai Clock Tower in the Fort Bombay, that houses the University’s Library, Bernard Shaw said that “its height was only matched by the depth of Bombay University’s ignorance.” However, to me, it was a beacon of hope. Those days the library was opened from 8.00 AM to 10 PM, including Sundays. I used to walk to the library from the university’s PG Hostel, opposite Sydenham College, Churchgate, across the Owal Maidan, and spend practically the whole day in the library reading and making notes.

 

During the course of my academic pursuit, I was fortunate to have come under the spell of the writings of Jawaharlal Nehru and Bertrand Russell. From them, I learnt the value of being indifferent to personal misfortunes. It was the impact of Nehru’s and Russell’s writings that liberated me from the prejudices of caste, religion, language and province. Intellectually, I became a secular and liberal democrat.  To me, discriminating people on the basis of birth and religion is a sign of mental backwardness – absence of enlightened education. When the birth is accidental, why look down on fellow human beings?

 

The University of Bombay that denied me the admission to its colleges twice had conferred me a first-class master’s degree in 1977.  I secured the post of a junior lecturer in one of the most prestigious colleges Ramnarain Ruia College, located in Central Bombay. The five and half years that I taught at this College were the most satisfying and rewarding. I was so popular that the students from other divisions would prefer to attend my lectures. The teaching is the only profession that gives instant reward. While teaching at Ruia, I was also a vising faculty member at the All-India Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG), Bombay, where I delivered lectures on Public Administration to the trainee officers from the Municipal Bodies across the country. My lectures were specially arranged to suit me in the afternoons on Saturdays, when the officers from Bombay Municipal Corporation were given half-day off to enable them to attend my lectures. 

 

I joined Somaiya College as a senior Lecturer in Political Science in December 1982, founded the Department of Political Science and became its Head.  I was appointed in June 1991 as the first Principal of the Kandivali Education Society’s College Bombay – a state aided linguistic minority institution of Gujaratis - where I spent next 18 years of my creative life, putting all my learning and knowledge into practice, built the institution and laid its ethical foundation, nurtured and guided the college with far-sighted vision, exceptional courage and turned it into a model first-rate institution in the city. My teaching experience of about 15 years at the AIILSG came handy, and I applied the principles of delegation, coordination, unity of command and integrity effectively with remarkable success, while administering the college. My academic background was best suited for my role as the academic and administrative head of the College.

 

My autobiography - magnum opus - The Trial by Fire: Memoirs of a College Principal gives a gripping account of my relentless fight against the corrupt system, taking on the high and the mighty to protect the integrity of the institution of Principal, risking the career time and again in the process.  The autobiography that makes an interesting and inspiration read, has received rave reviews. It is called a ‘Lifeblood of a noble soul, saga of virtuous struggle versus evil”; and “a Bible for the young teachers to mould their academic careers, retaining all the noble values humans are inherently imbued with.”

 

All this was possible because of open merit system that characterised Bombay- the city of dreams. One could get jobs on merit without anybody’s recommendation or bribing anybody, which we don’t find in any other part of India. Bombay was the most cosmopolitan city in India, where the parochial caste, religious and provincial identities merged into a larger human identity.  I would not have achieved this feat in any other place in India. It was Bombay that made it possible to realise my dreams - pursuing higher education, getting a promising and rewarding teaching career, marrying a sophisticated woman with modern bend of mind, a doctoral degree on the stalwart of the freedom struggle and the first Prime Minister of independent India Pandit Nehru, and publishing a research work on him that has historical bearing.  I would not have asked for anything better and more. Incidentally, I became a teacher by accident.

 

I am not sure whether the dream city remains the same today. The name of the city of Bombay is changed to Mumbai. And even the name of the University of Bombay is changed to University of Mumbai. The name the University of Mumbai is written in bold letters only in one language, that is Marathi and displayed at the main entrance gates of the University, both at its Fort and Kalina Campuses. It shows how linguistic jingoism has percolated into what once known as a premier national university. Added to this, the regional, the linguistic and the political ideological considerations have taken the sheen off the University.  And I do not think a rustic village boy, like me, could now dream of coming to Mumbai and achieve what I did, with increasing commercialisation and privatisation of higher education, making quality higher education inaccessible and simply unaffordable to a vast majority of people. The dream has gone sour.