LTA Part V - Proxies

Well.. it is difficult to stop me when you start talking of college.
So after getting ‘hints’ of turning this LTA thing into a series and getting positive feedback from everyone.. I can’t help myself from writing more.
The fifth in the series concentrates on the Proxies.

A proxy-friendly class, many students missing and Mr Atul Singal in his true elements. I guess he said yes sir, present sir to roll no. 00601 , 00610 (his own), then 2-3 more roll numbers in 30’s and then Chawla’s(00641) which was just before me. Some were bold and loud..some with covered mouth.. some bending down from almost under the table… and I guess only 1 (his own) with raised hand..(The teacher was not seeing above so it didn’t matter much).
And yes, he was sitting besides me. So when he said “Yes Sir” 4th or 5th time that day.. I couldn’t control it… I laughed out – quite loudly.. the prof called out my roll number.. looked up.. I was still laughing (by now under the table).. and then the prof carried on. Not much of a problem though. At the end I went to him, told him that by mistake I had missed my attendance. Some normal words – “Sote rehte ho kya class mein” etc etc.. and end of a successful class.

Def: Successful Class – The one for which you get attendance.

A new teacher - M.E student who had committed the grave sin of coming to teach 1st Year Mechanical. No white hair/ bald head meant that the Prof was in for a hard time.
So it was Triple E class (Elements of Electrical Engineering). Somehow the prof was able to pass half an hour with everyone on seat. Then started the shouts of “Bas Sir”.. “Sir.. next time”.. “Attendance Sir” ..
Gradually some people got up and started roaming around… the prof was helpless.. he came forward near the benches, kept giving a strange smile and continued teaching to a few who were sitting. Some of us (not me though ;)) went behind to the teachers table, opened the attendance register, picked the pen, marked their attendance and got out of the class. After one did it, many followed. I don’t know how, the prof didn’t come to know that people were marking attendance. He later found out when more than half of the class had marked ‘P’. The rest forced him to fill P for the few blank boxes that remained. The poor prof, never ever came back to teach any class!!

Then there was one Prof. His unmatchable husky voice was legendary.. In the class he was full of energy. With his real life examples he tried hard to teach the finer things of Chemistry. He used to come up to the last bench, sit besides students, telling them how to solve the numericals… That is why whenever you attended his class – there was a rush to sit on the 1st bench – the safest place. But such fights for 1st seat were far and few. Reason – his distinct style of taking attendance. He used to pass on a sheet and tell everyone to write his name and roll no. on it. Once it was tried to write a few absent friends roll no.s also. The ploy succeeded. Slowly it became the norm that 10 – 15 people used to attend the class and there were 60 names on the list.

All said and done, the Professors who had style of taking attendance where proxy was possible must be aware that they are ‘allowing’ it. Doing it they, in a way helped us – not only in completing our attendances but also letting us have so much thrill and fun.. It was thrill – wasn’t it..
Thank you Profs…