Teachers’ Day 2014

Srichand Arora is felicitated on Teachers' Day for never failing us 

The Club collectively paid obeisance to its favorite ‘teacher’ on the occasion of Teachers’ Day today. Led by senior ‘students’ Santosh Tyagi, Monthi Serrao and Geeta Sardana, a rose was presented to Srichand Arora as a token of appreciation and gratitude for never failing us on conducting the morning exercises – even in extreme situations.
Last year Nahid Khan earned this distinction on Teachers’ Day.
To Arora’s credit lies the fact that he is the only man among us to be consistently holding fort through thick and thin.

Arun Patil arrives in the Garden

All the others 'teachers', including Sitaram Hivarkar and Yusuf Rassiwala (who used to conduct our free-hand exercises regularly) have not been as regular for one reason or the other. Arora has not been in the best of health either. For instance, he suffered a terrible knock on his shoulder after an autorickshaw accident some time back. Even in that agonizing state – when he was unable to lift an arm without inviting a jab of pain shooting up his shoulder – he had conducted the exercises.
The ladies of course, tried to humour him, even teasing him for being a hard taskmaster and scolding them for no reason. True to style, Arora broke the lower half of the thorny rose stem and gesticulated at them as a schoolmaster would with a foot ruler. However, it must be said that it is this fire-‘n’-ice temperament, frequent mood swings, ready wit, being a stickler for discipline and above all, his caring and affectionate nature that has endeared him to us. No wonder he had to be our Teacher of the Year for 2014.
Amid all this bonhomie, Arun Patil walked in. It is almost a week since he was discharged from hospital (ref post of August 21) and happily, he looked to be out of pain – though he has developed a slight limp. He said the skin around the little toe (which was surgically treated for gangrene) is still tender and would take some more time to heal. Otherwise he is fine. We look forward to his rejoining us for the exercises every morning.
Harish Wadhwa:
Teachers' Day is not for one only and is not an yearly one-person event either. One can have many teachers simultaneously who need to be acknowledged and respected on this day. Therefore ALL the teachers which include Nahid-bhai, Arora-ji, Bose-Babu, Yusuf bhai and Razia-ji deserve the acknowledgment and felicitation for taking pains to conduct the exercises.