Ravi Speaks:
Updated this article date 12.07.2022.
“My Crucial Year-1979 At GGM Science College-Jammu.”
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| Aspirational College students |
Today I shall discuss a topic other than Sales and that is regarding the time when I was a student of 12th Standard in GGM Science College Jammu. This was a crucial year, especially for me, as far as admission to MBBS was concerned. They used to call it Ist year TDC as well. I had the medical subjects and based on my performance this year, entrance to the Jammu Medical College was possible. I was otherwise a fairly talented student and had the distinction in my board exams and also in my PUC had secured a very good percentage.
For the first time, I had gone to group tuition for physics and chemistry separately. Those days, the popular professors used to give tuition in groups of four on an hourly basis at their respective residences in the afternoon after they came from their colleges. I remember going to the “Phattu-Choukan” area in Jammu where my Physics professor was living in the evening for an hour and immediately after that to the Chemistry professor who was near the Residency Road. So daily I used to get free in the late evening and that way tried to put in good labor for the preparations.
I was going on normally to my satisfaction till the middle of the year up to September 1979, but as the luck would have it, there was a sudden stoppage of my college classes/lectures. Although I used to go to college almost every day, there was a strike and agitation by the college students and it continued for almost two and a half months until the end of November. This agitation was because of the demand put by all the educational institutes and even the university students for the reopening of the Ayurvedic Medical College in Jammu.
Especially in our College which was attached those days with the Jammu University-Departments of Chemistry from one side and the Administrative Department of University too was hardly any distance from the college-any call for the agitation would immediately see the assembling of a very good number of students from all the corners there.
It used to be a daily practice that by around 10.00 AM once the students called for the boycott of classes-all the students used to go to the main gate of the college which was opening towards Canal Road and there they used to throw stones and try to attack the police and para forces which used to be standing in good number outside the college gate. Thus, the fight between the students from the college premises and the police from the roadside used to last for a couple of hours almost daily. Even from the playground side, the boys used to throw stones which were being supplied by the other students after collecting a good number of stones from the backyards of the college, which was simply the “Tawi-river” falling on that side.
In this confrontation, the boys were assured of one fact that the police would not be entering the college premises-come what may and police too restrained for quite a few days of the initial agitation but in hurling the stones from the students’ side and the tear gas being hurled by the police from outside, many students were injured badly and were being taken into the inside of the college small dispensary and given the first aid by their fellow students.
This way, the agitation lasted for months together, and even for some time, the colleges were closed down by the state government as well. Thinking that after the closure, the colleges would function calmly, they opened again after a fortnight.
But immediately after these colleges were reopened there was a bigger call for agitation and this time the students seemed to be even more dangerous in their role of attacking the police towards the canal roadside where a lot of battalions were standing throughout the route and the whole traffic used to be choked because of this agitation. Finally, one day in October somewhere in the usual fight happening between the students and the police-the students having this feeling that the police would not be entering any circumstances into the college premises-intensified their attack of hurling stones collected from the “Tawi” banks on the police. Suddenly the police entered the college campus, and they started beating those who were at the front attacking them. I remember we were at the back somewhere near the boy’s hostel of the college and the moment we saw the police charging and chasing the students badly also, beating them with their sticks-we started running at the top gear towards the “Tawi” river from the back. I saw even the police officer still chasing us and we entered the “Tawi”-river with our shoes in our hands and crossed the river, reaching the “Satwari” side. That day I reached my home very late in the evening and took another road linking the residency road and the back of the city.
In the evening at around 6.15 in the local Dogri-news, the news of the police attack on the students was also there and, subsequently, the colleges were again shut down indefinitely. I came to know that there were quite a few students who were badly injured and taken to SMGS Hospital as well. That included two junior professors as well. Although these professors were not involved in the agitation since police entered the campus-who so ever came in front of them -he got the real good drubbing.
Thus, the classes were shut down for almost two and a half months in total and we could not even complete our courses during the entire year through class attendance. Most of us completed the syllabus through our private tuition and prepare for the final exams accordingly.
The exams were held as per the schedule and there was no special concession given to that year’s students. The results were such that the number of students who were expecting a very good distinction could manage fairly good numbers and the people who had a terrible score.
Therefore, the crucial year-1979-which was the deciding year for us to get admission to Medical colleges was wasted, and during the Interviews for the Medical College -low percentages could not make it into the merit list. We, being the Kashmiri pandits, were otherwise also taken only if we did feature somewhere on the top in merit. Though significant discretions were featured in the selected lists taken out by the Selection-committee also and later some of us had filed the writ as well in the Apex court for not considering our merit even. (Regarding that I have already published a blog which I shall circulate again) Thus, this crucial year would always be remembered by me throughout how both the controllable and non-controllable factors influence one’s career so drastically.
Finally, which of the following quotes to believe out of the three keeping in view the earlier related true happenings?
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