“Welcome to the flogging jamboree!”
Atatam, the physics teacher’s voice boomed to welcome us to the day’s class. And true to his welcome remark, it was a flogging jamboree. We were lined up according to our heights and then separated into groups, with a leader appointed for each group. And then the session started. We were just some young boys in Senior Secondary class 2 (SS2) and we had hopes of being the greatest scientists. All of us wanted to be better than Albert Einstein.
Well, today’s session was no different from yesterday’s or the day before, or even last term’s.
There was no special reason for these unending floggings. Any reason, regardless of how flimsy would suffice. “You all failed to enter my class at the same time, therefore you shall be punished accordingly.” “Most of you tended towards the lower limit of zero in your assignment. Punishment is the only way to bring you back to the path of sanity and sensibility.” “Your practical dues are long expired. You either pay now, or the whole class will be punished.” And so, the reasons piled up.
I dreaded entering physics classes. Mathematics classes were also not left out, as the teacher seemed to be in classes just to vent her anger and frustration (or so I thought with my tender brain) on the young students in the class.
Well, back to Atatam. And to the day’s jamboree…
He started with the first group and lined the group members up according to their heights. The smallest received the cane first. It was like a hot water on his skin. The cane landed on his soft left palm and the impact tore the palm, showing some whitish skin underneath.
And our teacher grinned in a maniacal way and inquired,
“You see why we don’t allow babies in our class?”
No one responded. Of course, we were all panicky. We wondered what would befall us. The boy with the torn palm raised his face already drenched in tears and cast some hot imploring gaze on our Master (and host of the flogging jamboree). For some pity, the Master grinned and asked for the boy’s right hand. The party must continue.
The pain couldn’t allow the boy to give the other hand.
And the Master continued on the soft body of the crying boy. He landed three deadly strokes on his back which did well to create three lines of blood soaking the school uniform. The class and the group members shrieked and drew back. Even the brave ones that were stretching out their palms to collect their strokes and get over with the pain withdrew their hands in shock and disbelief at what they were seeing.
The jamboree ended with the Master dropping his cane and asking us to take the bleeding boy out of his class to the Guidance and Counselling office where the First Aid Box was located. The Counsellor patched up the boy and sent him home. The parents came the next day and met with the Principal and Atatam.
But as you would expect in a government school, nothing meaningful came out of the visit.
The boy returned to school after about one week and things went on as if nothing happened.
Our physics class started feeling the toll of the uneasy silence following the incidence of the torn skin.
The population fell by more than half, and the few that remained started living in fear. Nobody could ask questions. Nobody was willing to go extra lengths to learn and be better. Majority of the people in the class lived to please the Master and be free from any future jamboree.
Fearfully we went for our classes, and like stooges, we sat. Exams came and woefully we failed. And then the jamboree started again. Why should we fail?
And we were blamed for being dullards. Of course, only smart students pass exams. The dull ones fail.
But has anyone gone to find out if we would have been better students had Atatam changed his teaching pattern and not hosting us each day to a flogging jamboree? Or, has anyone asked those physically abusive teachers why they did all they did?