BITTER LESSONS

It’s not as if the college is caught in a time warp though most of its distinguished alumni are decidedly grey — supercop K P S Gill, N N Vohra, director David Dhawan, former CEC M S Gill — and there seems less and less to boast of with every passing decade. Vice-principal Dr R R Paul blames the intellectual drought on the general decline, the falling share of Punjab in the all-India services, and the gnawing funds crunch.

In 1920 the college was set up on a sprawling campus of 90 acres.Today it’s shrunk to 60. Gaur is not sure what happened to the rest. The British, who built it as a gift to Punjab for its contribution to the armed forces during the World War-II, made sure it had one of India’s most-admired academic in Principal A C C Hervey. He churned out an army of civil servants, police officers, scientists and soldiers — one of his students Satish Chander Dhawan was the brains behind the first Indian satellite of Aryabhatt. Another called Sahir Ludhianvi became a famous poet after he was politely told to leave following a messy love triangle.

Prof M C Sharma, who had a long inning in the college from ’48 to ’73 recalls how Hervery continued to take interest in his baby even after leaving for England. He made sure he was succeeded by U Karamat and then Dr Jahangir Khan, a Cambridge blue who went on to become the education minister of Pakistan.

This tradition of outstanding principals continued with the likes of Dr Tarlochan Singh, a PhD from London, Dr K N Dutt, a Cambridge graduate, and Dr H C Kathpalia, who held the first pre-Asian Games selection camp at the college in ’51. ’’But now transfers and promotions have become politicised,’’ rues Prof M S Cheema, a former teacher in the college, and president of the Retired Principals’ Association of Punjab.

It’s a fact reflected in the board behind the principal. From ’99 to date, the college has seen six principals. The teachers’ strength is also becoming feeble even though the number of students hovers around 3,800. ’’Thirty-eight of the 131 sanctioned posts of teachers are either vacant or occupied by part-timers,’’ says Jaipal Singh, Physics lecturer and general secretary of the Punjab Government College Teachers’ Association.

Even though at least 20-25 Plus Two students of the college clear the Common Entrance Test (CET) every year, old-timers say the results need shoring up. Prof M C Sharma faults the quality of students joining the college. The students are quite prosaic about their aspirations. No glowing dreams for them. Teaching seems to be the Ambition No. 1. You are taken aback when you hear this from the mathematician trio of Kanwar Rajinder Singh, Manvir Bhullar and Gurmeet Singh. “Do you think we can get any other job without paying for it,’’ they shrug off your amazement. Besides burning ambition, the college discipline has dimmed a little even though teachers insist it’s still shining bright. A few months ago, a young ad hoc English lecturer quit after alleged harassment by students. She says what hurt her the most was the unsympathetic attitude of the powers-that-be.

While the issue of discipline may be debatable, what is not is the shoddy state of basic amenities. At the staff room of the Physics Department, the teachers lug in a bucket of water for their use. Sorry, tap water is in short supply. Students complain of faulty fans, dark rooms, and broken window panes. ‘‘What can the college do when it gets only Rs 34,500 a year for maintenance and other overheads,’’ gripes Jaipal, before getting up to rinse his cup of tea. It’s then, sitting in the high-ceilinged room in the midst of this earnest group, that the tragedy of it all sinks in. The woes of this grand old college are just a symptom. The malaise lies elsewhere. ‘‘It’s in the system,’’ the teachers sigh. ‘‘Education is not a commodity to be sold and bought; it’s an investment in the future, to be given and acquired,’’ Jaipal sums it up.