A parade of memories - Yaadon ki Baaraat redux

'Yaadon ki Baaraat' or loosely translated, 'A Parade of Memories', was a Hindi super hit film of the seventies. I must have seen the film at least five times since and hummed or whistled every song hundreds of times.

The last time I saw it was earlier this week with my wife, catching it on YouTube. Both of us had seen this when we were in our early twenties and both were seeing it after quite a long time.We found that our reactions to this viewing were very similar.

We both liked the music, we were quite alright with the action, we were not moved much by the attempted pathos, we actually laughed at the way the only love story in the film progressed, the so-called comedy sequences were terrible and we were quite appalled at the manner the story dragged in the first half. It was something like being in awe of a boyhood hero and wondering why you had respected him earlier when you grew up and met him again.

This movie incidentally has almost all of the tropes associated with Hindi films of that era and had even popularised some. To quickly state a few:
a) brothers being separated after their parents are killed by the baddies - nicely sets the stage for revenge and action in the latter part;
b) the chief baddie disguising his appearance over time by wearing glasses and growing a full beard
c) sliding doors, hidden switches and uniformed sidekicks in the villain's den
d) the villain owning a hotel - sets the scene for at least one song!
e) the villain(s) drinking, smoking and womanising
f) a  villain's 'good' sidekick helping the hero
g) the villain trying to escape in an aeroplane while smuggling artifacts
and
h) brothers uniting because of an old song - this was YkB's main contribution to Hindi films and became a trope in itself!

How did such a cliched masala film become a super hit forty years ago? Anybody who had seen even a handful of Hindi films could have predicted the next scene - it was so stereotyped ! The movie really didn't do much for the career of most of its stars either - one hardly heard of Vijay Arora, Anamika and Tariq later. At this later viewing, the only point of interest was identifying a young Neetu Singh and an even younger Aamir Khan.

Was it just the music or the feel-goodness of this film which made it popular? I really don't know. All said and done, despite all these holes we picked now, we did enjoy the movie - probably that was the reason it did well!

****

The three loves of a teacher

Today, the 5th day of September is celebrated as Teacher's Day in India - to commemorate the birth anniversary of Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a great teacher and India's second President after Independence. While his teaching career was a bit before my time, my late father had attended a series of Dr Radhakrishnan's lectures on the Bhagavat Gita maybe eighty years ago. My father, not normally a demonstrative person, went gaga when describing these lectures to me maybe fifty years after he had heard them. That is enough for me! As a teacher, I was happy if at the end of my session, students seemed to remember what I had told them in the beginning.

I became a teacher almost by accident after a fairly successful two decade long corporate career. Especially just after my foray into the new occupation, I was curious to find out the attributes needed to be a good teacher and tried my best to imbibe these as well as I could. Quite early after I had got into full-time teaching, we had an opportunity to interact with a seasoned teacher and he distilled the traits of a good teacher into three loves
1) love for teaching itself
2) love for the subject being taught
3) love for the student

At first glance, this might sound a trifle trite, but it actually makes good sense. If you don't love your job, you don't perform it well. Period. Unfortunately, many people come into this profession as a last resort - they are not able to get into a profession of their choice and then take teaching up either as a stop-gap or out of compulsion. Their heart is not in the profession and it shows within a few minutes of conversation. They go through the motions - that is it and students suss them out almost immediately.

The love for the subject being taught also makes eminent sense to me. From personal experience, I can vouch for this. At least three times in my career, due to the organisation's administrative exigencies, I have handled subjects with which I was not very familiar or did not particularly like. I did make a proper fist of it, but my heart was not in it. My conscience knew that I had handled other classes better.

The third love is a bit dicey because teaching often is a case of an irresistible force meeting immovable objects! A fine line between maintaining discipline and respecting the sensitivities of young adults has to be tread. Experience, however does teach you how to get your objective without stamping on too many toes. A sense of humour is a terrific ally here, especially if one stays clear of sensitive areas. Here again, it is easy to spot a reluctant teacher. If the teacher goes to class, thinking of the students as adversaries, a fight is what she will get. Show me a teacher and within a couple of minutes of talking to her, I will tell you whether she loves her students or not.

Especially while handling professional courses, it goes without saying that a teacher has to be au courant. This is also where a dilemma facing administrative administrators in professional education comes to light. Do you plump for academic qualifications like a Doctorate or do you recruit people with corporate exposure or do you go for a blend? I would say especially in management education, the jury is still out though regulations talk about the necessity of doctoral qualifications.

Like any other profession then, teaching requires passion, constant updating of knowledge and great communication skills to deliver this, empathy and real hard work behind the scenes. A rule of thumb is that an hour's lecture requires at least three hours of preparation. I would say at least this much effort needs to be put, if the classroom experience has to be worthwhile for all the stakeholders involved - the teachers themselves, students and the institution.

At least, as an exercise in self-analysis, I did and do wonder sometimes whether I was a good teacher. Good sense tells me that is something which I should not bother about - only the victims of my education can have an opinion on this The very fact that a large number of them are still connected to me on social media and otherwise even after I have retired, many do drop in or call me when they come to my city on work and yet many others message me or call me occasionally leads me to feel like the Sound of Music song 'somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good'!

*****