A TOAST FOR THE CHIEF

Kunjpura was one of the first Sainik schools to be commissioned in the spring of 1961. Sainik schools were the brainchild of then Defence Minister V.K. Krishna Menon who saw these schools as centres of excellence where rural students could be trained for the armed forces.

Kapoor8217;s elevation comes at a time when the school is toiling to regain its past glory. Reputed for its high standards during its infant years under Lt Col E.J. Simeon, the school had of late begun to show signs of ageing.

Principal Kumar still remembers the shock he got when a day after he joined in March 2005, a group of parents said they wanted to take their children away. 8220;They said their village schools had better classrooms,8221; recalled Kumar.

One round of the school and he could see the rot. The walls had cracks, the ceilings threatened to cave in, the beams were bare and the musty smell was enough to drive away the devil. As if this wasn8217;t enough, the electricity played truant.

But the school8217;s powerful past rose to its defence when one of its alumnus, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, took over as state chief minister in 2005. Today a picture of 8216;Cadet Hooda8217; beams down at the boys in the main dining hall.

Hooda has fond memories of Gen Deepak Kapoor. 8220;We used to share a bench,8221; he said. They also shared a passion for sports 8212; the school has 48 playgrounds, one swimming pool and a firing range on the campus.

The main building, an architectural marvel with 365 windows and doors besides four corridors representing the four seasons, was built by Kunjpura Nawab Ibrahim Ali Khan for his daughter8217;s marriage party in 1900. A century later, the building stands strong.

But it8217;s the school8217;s recent academic success that everyone8217;s talking about. Last year, the school sent a record 16 cadets to the National Defence Academy NDA. That8217;s a far cry from 2003 when it could not send a singe cadet to the NDA.

The students, in dashing crew cuts, speak clipped English. Cadet Jitender Sharma, a Class X student from Barta village, says he is 8220;the only one in this school8221; from his village. 8220;I want to be an army officer,8221; he declared.

Last summer, the school team scaled two virgin peaks at 6250 m and 6640 m in the Rupshu Valley of Leh, and christened them Kunjean-1 and Kunjean-II. As ad man Prahlad Kakkar, also an alumnus, would tell you, Kunjeans have a penchant for scaling new heights. Gen Deepak Kapoor would agree.