It takes a teacher to save or scar a child

Dr Shashikant Patil, Reader at Mithibai College
Far from the city lights in a remote village in Raigad, a teacher named K R Patil encouraged a fisherman's son to study. The shy boy, Shashikant Patil, went on to do his Ph.D at Mumbai's Vaze College. A teacher for 22 years, he is now a reader in zoology at Mithibai College with two PhD students under him.
Patil, who did his BSc at Sathaye College and MSc at Mithibai, says that he may never have had the confidence to face the world had it not been for the zilla parishad school teacher who made him believe in himself. "I was low on confidence, so every time there was a function at school, K R Patil would make me give a speech in front of the entire school,'' says Patil, who topped Class VII, and was encouraged by the same teacher to continue his studies in a school in the neighbouring district since his village didn't have one beyond the seventh grade. "And when my older brother became an engineer, I, too, felt that I could make it I life.''
Dr Vivek Monteiro, Trade Unionist
Trade union leader and mathematician Dr Vivek Monteiro's relationship with his guru W W Sawyer is reminiscent of Eklavya's with Dronacharya, in the sense that Sawyer guided Monteiro in maths without ever actually meeting him.
Monteiro first learnt of Sawyer as a science student in Goa when he picked up a copy of Prelude To Mathematics, a book by Sawyer. "I went on to devour all the rest of his books, and ever since I've always considered him to be my guru,'' he says. Monteiro went on to set up Navnirmiti, an NGO that has devised innovative ways of teaching mathematics to underprivileged children. He says Sawyer has inspired the entire team at Navnirmiti.
Forty years after he first read Prelude, Monteiro traced Sawyer to his home in Canada, and wrote to him, telling him how much he owed him. "I was in touch with him for three years until his death earlier this year,'' he says. The other guru in his life was someone he knew intimately-his mother, a mathematics teacher who made sure that her five children excelled at the subject. "It's because of my mother that I understood several concepts in math at an early age.''
Dr Narendra Jadhav, Pune University Vice-Chancellor
Growing up in a slum in Wadala, Narendra Jadhav was painfully aware of his Dalit background and barely spoke a word in class. Until Madhav Sakhardande entered his life. Although he had perfectly good handwriting, young Jadhav held back from participating in the school's annual handwriting contest. So after one such contest, Sakhardande summoned Jadhav to the front of the classroom, asked him to pull out of his notebooks and compare his handwriting with that of the student who had won the contest. "Which looks better?'' he asked. Jadhav had to admit that his handwriting was better of the two.
Jadhav went on to write for and edit the school magazine. Many years later, he returned to his school with a copy of his college magazine, and Sakhardande quickly asked if he had written in it. Jadhav shook his head. "Oh, then I'm not interested in seeing it,'' replied his old master. A year later Jadhav was back to show him a long piece that he had contributed. Another teacher he remembers with regard was his science teacher named Bandekar. "He was a loner with a squint in one eye who never spoke to anybody. But it was he who taught me to develop a scientific mind and think logically,'' says Jadhav.
On the downside, there were also regressive teachers who never lost a chance to remind him of his caste. Like the one who read out the names of all the students who had paid the school fee. He never failed to call out Jadhav's name and follow it up with, "Oh, I forgot! You're the son-in-law of the government. You don't need to pay fees.'' "What he meant was that since I was a backward class student, I was entitled to government concessions and didn't need to pay any fee. It was humiliating then but today I only feel sorry for him,'' says the man who went on to become the chief economist at the Reserve Bank of India.