A day’s wait, a minute’s telecast

Earlier in the day, they had held their regular Teachers’ Day celebration, with music, short speeches and some stand-up comedy by students, followed by lunch. Later, Principal Pazawna announced, “From 3 pm to 4.30 pm, we will listen to the PM and watch the function on a projector. Mr Modi is an RSS man, and naturally he wants to promote Hindi and he may speak in Hindi. Even if he does, we all have to listen.” The students laughed.

“Anyway, he is a great PM and what he says may benefit us,” the Principal concluded. The teachers, forced to be in school all day, kept themselves going over cups of tea and the irony of watching a Hindi telecast.

When the electricity first went off just after the school authorities had finished putting up the screen and projector and were testing it, the option of radio was considered. But just as the hunt for the radio batteries again, someone reminded: “There’s no radio signal in the school compound.”

Power came back just then, and a teacher took to the microphone to say, “Our PM became CM the first time he stood for Assembly polls. He also became PM the first time he contested MP elections. He is undoubtedly a great man, and as we can all see today, he does things no one else seems to have thought of.”

Minutes later, the projector flickered to life and Doordarshan came on. In less than a minute though, even before the PM’s speech began, it was gone again. A teacher brought out the generator and got it going, but there was no cable signal. After half an hour of trying, the Principal announced that the students could go home.

By 4 pm, when the electricity returned, it was dark and the school ground was empty.