Assam and foreigners

Immigration issues in Assam- the view from far.

On the question of being swamped by immigrants from Bangladesh, I have complete sympathy for the indigenous Assamese people. However this is not a unique situation. This piece draws on my experience of living in Assam rough the first anti-foreigner agitations in the late 1970s and early 1980s . 

Recent immigrants face indigenous fury in the UK( Brexit), US ( Election of Donald Trump) and many European countries like Italy and Germany have exhausted their good will with recent migrants.

Globally,immigration has been a reality since recorded history. It is well acknowledged that people will move places to improve their/ family’s lives. The white American of today who claims to be indigenous was an immigrant in the 16/17 th century when they displaced Native American Indians. The British of today can sometimes trace their bloodlines back to Romans/ Vikings/ European descent. 

Immigration has become easier in recent times due to improved communications ( internet / TV/ mobile phones) that highlight the strengths and advantages of migration to today’s successful countries. In the case of Assam, India with its dynamic growth surge must definitely be appealing to people in Bangladesh who wish to have a better life . This is something one can understand.

The core issues generically arising out of immigration anywhere are :

a) Threatened Assamese identity -the indigenous population’s cultural identity is threatened. For eg the far right in Britain is unhappy with the face veil ( naqab)Muslim women wear in public. Norway has banned the wearing of Naqab in public places. The same fear in part has fuelled the rise of Donald Trump in the United States. In Assam, a similar situation exists in areas that have seen recent migration where cultural shifts are takin place. 

b)Secular fabric and civic system pressures:  Immigrant arrival in large numbers can stress local civic systems ( Hospitals/ Schools/ Housing etc) as well as out pressure on jobs. In Assam/India ,this puts pressure as gains in national growth are clawed back by immigration pressures. 

In Assam, Bangladeshi immigrants also have skewed the political system as voters. This is threatening the secular fabric and foundations of India as never before. The Hindu majority party BJP has taken to milking the fear of the ‘Hindu’ population of being swamped by the Islamists. The Congress has over the years relied on Muslim voters in Assam to get elected to government. Both these approaches threaten the secular fabric of India. 

c] Fear- However the fear amongst the local Assamese about immigration from Bangladesh to Assam in India seems to have an added dimension. This is the fear of Muslim religious expansionism and the spectre of living in a state where Shariat law rules unofficially. This is a valid fear given the recent attempts by a sizeable Islamic minority across the planet to enforce their view of an Islamic world on the planet through violence/terrorism and other more nuanced approaches. 

In 1947, the people of the subcontinent had a choice. The choice was to move to Pakistan -a country for ‘pak ‘ or ‘pure’ Muslims or stay in the rest of India that decided to be secular country. 70 years later,secular India faces an immigration deluge from its neighbours founded on a religious identity. India now has to cater for the failure as a state of its neighbours. India and Assam have to find their unique solutions to this problem.

One has to accept that much like a chronic illness like diabetes, there is no getting away from the immigration problem.The condition has to be managed with minimal harm to the host body. Each nation needs to have a clear and enforceable immigration policy. The key word is enforceable as this is where it all falls apart. 

As a first step, a non partisan  expert ‘immigration task force’ needs to be formed at the policy level to study the best practices in managed immigration .This task force needs to come up with a tailored solution for Assam within a rapid time frame of months rather than years. This solution then needs to be debated in parliament and incorporated into law. This would highlight the will of the people of secular India. 

The enforcement should be a joint effort of the federal Indian and the local government with civic watchdogs from all concerned finding a place at the implementation task force level. 

Implementing the above will send out a strong signal to immigrants that the Indian nation state means business.

Finally, its fully justifiable to have an immigration policy/mechanism in place to suit a country’s need 

Dr Devjit Srivastava

11 Aug 2018 

     

The prefect system at ARPS Laitkor

The prefect system at ARPS Laitkor – as it was then….



It has been twenty five years since we left school in the spring of 1986 as the first batch. At the time of leaving I had been fortunate enough to have held the post of ‘School Captain’- the highest post in Mr MN Tankha’s prefectorial body. This is perhaps why my good friend Dr Rangam Rajkhowa has asked me to do this write up.
Since then the prefect body (I hear) had been abolished and then reinstated recently at ARPS. This shows that the concept of a Prefect system is up for debate. In this article, I will endeavour to look at the history of the prefect system in general, how the set up was run at ARPS in the 1980s,the pros and cons of the prefect system and in what form do we need the system to meet today’s challenges.

Background:
The prefectorial system has its origin in the English public schools. The Victorian public schools prime purpose were seen to instil ‘character’ amongst its students, however there was another tacit and unofficial purpose- to provide capable public servants to serve the British Empire which was then at its zenith. It is widely held that the stability, order, and good administration which has obtained both at home and
throughout the British Empire has been due in no small part to the excellent training in leadership and responsibility which the upper-class youth receives as a prefect in a Public School.
And thus so even after independence in 1947, the prefect system continued in the Indian public schools long after the British left Indian shores. It continued perhaps because a majority of people saw merits inherent in this system of grooming future citizens. Mr Tankha came to ARPS from St Paul’s school in Darjeeling – a public school in the great Victorian tradition. The prefectorial body at ARPS Laitkor was constituted right at the outset in 1980.

The prefect system at Laitkor
As I can recall, the prefect system consisted of a House prefect for each house (Mizoram, Arunachal, Nagaland, Manipur and later Holding Houses) with an additional School vice Captain and School Captain. In addition, each class had its own Class prefect. Thus below the teachers body there was a parallel institution of administration. This was quite like what I saw later in the Armed Forces- an Officer cadre and then a JCO cadre overseeing soldiers’ affairs but reporting to the Officers.
This prefect system then was perfectly in sync with the schools stated objective of providing future leaders for the Armed Forces primarily.
The prefectorial body met once a month with the Principal and House masters. This was the forum at which any prefect irrespective of his age and class could speak up. I distinctly remember Moji Riba (then a class IV prefect) making his point with aplomb at a meeting held in that wonderful library. This was democracy at its best and allowed the person to develop communication skills and confidence in public speaking. The minutiae of day to day working would be discussed at these meetings and responsibilities distributed to the prefects. For me personally, this stood me in good stead while attending the Commanding Officer’s meeting as a medical HOD [head of department]. I am sure my friends in the Armed Forces would back me on this one.
The House prefects had a slightly more onerous responsibility. In conjunction with the Housemaster they formed a management team for managing the affairs of the House. The house had students ranging from 10 year old to eighteen year old. Time keeping for various events [Like morning PT!] was an important job. A quaint terminology in use here was ‘chota haziri’- the morning cuppa at 530 am before PT. I never did find out what was ‘Bada haziri’. In the Army, the system is on its way out I believe but the Officer’s batman subserves the chota haziri function, especially in the field.
Looking back I think the house system was designed to develop loyalty and team work as well as a hierarchy of rank and privilege. Thus a junior boy would obey a senior and learn to be a follower first. As he grew up, he would be given responsibilities and if he proved himself, then rank and privilege would follow. The follower would then become a leader. The present always had strands of yesterday’s thought processes embedded and one only has to look at David Cameron’s Conservative party in the UK to see a sanitised, contemporary version of this theory in practice.
Often the House prefect and House master combine would become and administrative, judicial and legislative body. This made the prefects quite powerful but Mr Tankha ensured that prefects acted with self restraint and as ‘role models’. There may have been a few overzealous actions by the prefects [including me] but overall the system worked with a high degree of self restraint.
As prefects we learnt very early on how to handle responsibility and privileges. Once there was a series of scout lectures in the Meghalaya Hall on a Sunday afternoon. The whole school had to attend as usual. I and my friends (one is now an eminent doctor) went in initially but after an hour left to go out for a hike on this lovely summer’s day. Things went very well with us having fun and frolic in the nearby waterfall and ‘lal chai’ at the kong’s stall. But we ran into what today would be called a ‘killer app’ on our return –Mrs Tankha herself. Thankfully she was angry but stable. She had noticed us slipping away and we the School Captain and Vice Captain had bunked a mandatory proceeding of the school. She said ‘When you hold a position of responsibility, you have to lead by example and in this case you needed to show more patience and stay through the entirely dull proceedings’. What she told me that day has served me well since especially when I have to sit through a boring accountancy survey of the departmental finances or an eminent Neurologist talking about one obscure gene for Huntington’s disease he has discovered and named it after himself!!
The School Captains job was much more of an overarching responsibility for the administration of the prefectorial body and by extension the school. The point to be highlighted here was that I got every support from Principal and teachers. The lesson learnt again was that if a deserving person is given responsibility and space to perform, it often brings out the best in a person. Sadly due to a multitude of events, society especially in the UK has become a nanny state with ‘Big brother’ watching over your shoulder at each step. While this fosters fear and uniformity in service output, I certainly do not think that this is necessary great for development of leaders and ‘outliers’.



Did the Prefect system serve its purpose?
This prefect system was set up in the 1980s India. Remember this was the time when we watched the 1983 Cricket World cup finals [kind courtesy of Mrs Sen] on a black and white TV set with grainy pictures being beamed by Bangladesh TV. There were no mobile phones or email. If you wanted to speak urgently to someone in another city, you booked a ‘lightning call’-which took a couple of hours to materialise! This was India on the tail end of the failed Nehruvian dream. The sought after careers were Armed Forces, Civil service, Engineering and Medicine. The economic reforms of 1992 were still far away and GDP growth had not entered the vox populi’s lexicon.
So the success of the prefect system of that time should be judged by the social expectations of that period. Add to that the fact that 90% of children at Laitkor came from Armed Forces background [primarily non officer rank].
Against this, I think the system outperformed itself. Never has a school given so much to so many. It was able to transform the life of hundreds of families whose children found access to not only quality education but also a laboratory to hone their future team-working and leadership skills. I think the school has produced an impressive array of students doing well in diverse walks of life.
To have so many of our students in leadership positions both in India and abroad is creditable considering that the 1980s Northeast India was a backwater when it came to educational opportunities for the middle class.
While I do not have access to data about how our ex students are performing, Face book [though not the best place to get data] offers a good peak into how they are doing. An interesting fact noted by my wife Rashmi is that there are quite a few Laitkorians in off beat and artistic professions. Though the prefect system is designed to breed conformity, group loyalty and obedience to a certain degree, it would appear that there was sufficient latitude in the prefectorial system to provide space for creativity to flourish.
Should we retain the prefectorial system?
To answer this question, we need to know what are the requirements and challenges of 21 Century India.
India, China and Brazil are fast challenging the might of 500 years of Western dominance. The future is a multipolar world with these three countries jockeying for placement amongst the world’s elite.
The challenges of twenty first century are complex. Most tasks would require people to work closely together in groups without losing their individuality. This means we need people capable of collaboration. One would need to break down artificial ‘turf’ boundaries which arise in any organisation to foster closer cooperation especially in mega corporations.
An important challenge for tomorrow’s leaders would be aligning a multicultural, multinational workforce towards organisational objectives. This would be true in research or in industry (eg Indra Nooyi CEO of Pepsico).
We are heading towards a leader who strives to provide individual empowerment. On a visit to a spinal cord implant manufacturer in Europe recently, the person in charge of quality control said that he personally feels responsible for each implant because if they work well then that is one person less in this world with debilitating pain. With people like this on your assembly line quality control only needs to be ‘light touch’
Apart from the above, a national requirement is to have a substantial body of people who can provide ‘clean governance’. Also we need our current national institutions to work towards eradicating social inequality. Remember we are only as strong as our weakest link.
For the Armed Forces, Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat had piloted the ‘techno warrior’ project. Though it has fallen into disfavour, I see future Officer cadre of the Armed Forces having much more specialist knowledge than at present. The world is becoming increasingly complex and a higher level of specialist knowledge is necessary.
The prefect system in the 21 century would need to be modified to incorporate these objectives of society. How this is to be done is best left to the education experts.
Conclusion
The prefectorial system at ARPS Laitkor was singularly successful in meeting the expectation of society at that time. However, the needs of society has changed quite a bit in the intervening years and the new system should be designed to meet the challenges of 21 century India.

Mera desh mahaan??

Every age has its Bhisma pitamah. For our age its possibly Narayana Murthy,the founder of Infosys. He recently spoke to our would be Babus at Mussorie. I found lots of resonance with his views when I compared my Indian experience. I have attached a text of his speech.

Learning from the West: Narayana Murthy
Ladies and gentlemen:

It is a pleasure to be here at the Lal Bahadur Shastri Institute of Management. Lal Bahadur Shastri was a man of strong values and he epitomized simple living. He was a freedom fighter and innovative administrator who contributed to nation building in full measure. It is indeed a matter of pride for me to be chosen for the Lal Bahadur Shastri Award for Public Administration and Management Sciences. I thank the jury for this honor.


When I got the invitation to speak here, I decided to speak on an important topic on which I have pondered for years - the role of Western values in contemporary Indian society. Coming from a company that is built on strong values, the topic is close to my heart. Moreover, an organization is representative of society, and some of the lessons that I have learnt are applicable in the national context. In fact, values drive progress and define quality of life in society.



The word community joins two Latin words com ("together" or "with") and unus ("one"). A community, then, is both one and many. It is a unified multitude and not a mere group of people. As it is said in the Vedas: Man can live individually, but can survive only collectively. Hence, the challenge is to form a progressive community by balancing the interests of the individual and that of the society. To meet this, we need to develop a value system where people accept modest sacrifices for the common good.



What is a value system? It is the protocol for behavior that enhances the trust, confidence and commitment of members of the community. It goes beyond the domain of legality - it is about decent and desirable behavior. Further, it includes putting the community interests ahead of your own. Thus, our collective survival and progress is predicated on sound values.



There are two pillars of the cultural value system - loyalty to family and loyalty to community. One should not be in isolation to the other, because, successful societies are those which combine both harmoniously. It is in this context that I will discuss the role of Western values in contemporary Indian society.



Some of you here might say that most of what I am going to discuss are actually Indian values in old ages, and not Western values. I live in the present, not in the bygone era. Therefore, I have seen these values practiced primarily in the West and not in India. Hence, the title of the topic.



I am happy as long as we practice these values - whether we call it Western or old Indian values. As an Indian, I am proud to be part of a culture, which has deep-rooted family values. We have tremendous loyalty to the family. For instance, parents make enormous sacrifices for their children. They support them until they can stand on their own feet. On the other side, children consider it their duty to take care of aged parents.



We believe: Mathru devo bhava - mother is God, and pithru devo bhava - father is God. Further, brothers and sisters sacrifice for each other. In fact, the eldest brother or sister is respected by all the other siblings. As for marriage, it is held to be a sacred union - husband and wife are bonded, most often, for life. In joint families, the entire family works towards the welfare of the family. There is so much love and affection in our family life.



This is the essence of Indian values and one of our key strengths. Our families act as a critical support mechanism for us. In fact, the credit to the success of Infosys goes, as much to the founders as to their families, for supporting them through the tough times. Unfortunately, our attitude towards family life is not reflected in our attitude towards community behavior. From littering the streets to corruption to breaking of contractual obligations, we are apathetic to the common good. In the West - the US, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand - individuals understand that they have to be responsible towards their community.



The primary difference between the West and us is that, there, people have a much better societal orientation. They care more for the society than we do. Further, they generally sacrifice more for the society than us. Quality of life is enhanced because of this. This is where we need to learn from the West.
I will talk about some of the lessons that we, Indians, can learn from the West.


In the West, there is respect for the public good. For instance, parks free of litter, clean streets, public toilets free of graffiti - all these are instances of care for the public good. On the contrary, in India, we keep our houses clean and water our gardens everyday - but, when we go to a park, we do not think twice before littering the place.



Corruption, as we see in India, is another example of putting the interest of oneself, and at best that of one's family, above that of the society. Society is relatively corruption free in the West. For instance, it is very difficult to bribe a police officer into avoiding a speeding ticket.



This is because of the individual's responsible behavior towards the community as a whole On the contrary, in India, corruption, tax evasion, cheating and bribery have eaten into our vitals. For instance, contractors bribe officials, and construct low-quality roads and bridges. The result is that society loses in the form of substandard defence equipment and infrastructure, and low-quality recruitment, just to name a few impediments. Unfortunately, this behavior is condoned by almost everyone.



Apathy in solving community matters has held us back from making progress, which is otherwise within our reach. We see serious problems around us but do not try to solve them. We behave as if the problems do not exist or is somebody else's. On the other hand, in the West, people solve societal problems proactively. There are several examples of our apathetic attitude. For instance, all of us are aware of the problem of drought in India.



More than 40 years ago, Dr. K. L. Rao - an irrigation expert, suggested creation of a water grid connecting all the rivers in North and South India, to solve this problem. Unfortunately, nothing has been done about this. The story of power shortage in Bangalore is another instance. In 1983, it was decided to build a thermal power plant to meet Bangalore's power requirements. Unfortunately, we have still not started it. Further, the Milan subway in Bombay is in a deplorable state for the last 40 years, and no action has been taken.



To quote another example, considering the constant travel required in the software industry; five years ago, I had suggested a 240-page passport. This would eliminate frequent visits to the passport office. In fact, we are ready to pay for it. However, I am yet to hear from the Ministry of External Affairs on this.



We, Indians, would do well to remember Thomas Hunter's words: Idleness travels very slowly, and poverty soon overtakes it. What could be the reason for all this? We were ruled by foreigners for over thousand years. Thus, we have always believed that public issues belonged to some foreign ruler and that we have no role in solving them.



Moreover, we have lost the will to proactively solve our own problems. Thus, we have got used to just executing someone else's orders. Borrowing Aristotle's words: We are what we repeatedly do. Thus, having done this over the years, the decision-makers in our society are not trained for solving problems. Our decision-makers look to somebody else to take decisions. Unfortunately, there is nobody to look up to, and this is the tragedy.



Our intellectual arrogance has also not helped our society. I have traveled extensively, and in my experience, have not come across another society where people are as contemptuous of better societies as we are, with as little progress as we have achieved. Remember that arrogance breeds hypocrisy. No other society gloats so much about the past as we do, with as little current accomplishment.



Friends, this is not a new phenomenon, but at least a thousand years old. For instance, Al Barouni, the famous Arabic logician and traveler of the 10th century, who spent about 30 years in India from 997 AD to around 1027 AD, referred to this trait of Indians. According to him, during his visit, most Indian pundits considered it below their dignity even to hold arguments with him. In fact, on a few occasions when a pundit was willing to listen to hm, and found his arguments to be very sound, he invariably asked Barouni: which Indian pundit taught these smart things!



The most important attribute of a progressive society is respect for others who have accomplished more than they themselves have, and learn from them. Contrary to this, our leaders make us believe that other societies do not know anything! At the same time, everyday, in the newspapers, you will find numerous claims from our leaders that ours is the greatest nation. These people would do well to remember Thomas Carlyle's words: The greatest of faults is to be conscious of none.



If we have to progress, we have to change this attitude, listen to people who have performed better than us, learn from them and perform better than them. Infosys is a good example of such an attitude. We continue to rationalize our failures. No other society has mastered this part as well as we have. Obviously, this is an excuse to justify our incompetence, corruption, and apathy. This attitude has to change. As Sir Josiah Stamp has said: It is easy to dodge our responsibilities, but we cannot dodge the consequences of dodging our responsibilities.



Another interesting attribute, which we Indians can learn from the West, is their accountability. Irrespective of your position, in the West, you are held accountable for what you do. However, in India, the more 'important' you are, the less answerable you are. For instance, a senior politician once declared that he 'forgot' to file his tax returns for 10 consecutive years - and he got away with it. To quote another instance, there are over 100 loss making public sector units (central) in India. Nevertheless, I have not seen action taken for bad performance against top managers in these organizations.



Dignity of labor is an integral part of the Western value system. In the West, each person is proud about his or her labor that raises honest sweat. On the other hand, in India, we tend to overlook the significance of those who are not in professional jobs. We have a mind set that reveres only supposedly intellectual work.



For instance, I have seen many engineers, fresh from college, who only want to do cutting-edge work and not work that is of relevance to business and the country. However, be it an organization or society, there are different people performing different roles. For success, all these people are required to discharge their duties. This includes everyone from the CEO to the person who serves tea - every role is important. Hence, we need a mind set that reveres everyone who puts in honest work.



Indians become intimate even without being friendly. They ask favors of strangers without any hesitation. For instance, the other day, while I was traveling from Bangalore to Mantralaya, I met a fellow traveler on the train. Hardly 5 minutes into the conversation, he requested me to speak to his MD about removing him from the bottom 10% list in his company, earmarked for disciplinary action. I was reminded of what Rudyard Kipling once said: A westerner can be friendly without being intimate while an easterner tends to be intimate without being friendly.



Yet another lesson to be learnt from the West, is about their professionalism in dealings. The common good being more important than personal equations, people do not let personal relations interfere with their professional dealings. For instance, they don't hesitate to chastise a colleague, even if he is a personal friend, for incompetent work.



In India, I have seen that we tend to view even work interactions from a personal perspective. Further, we are the most 'thin-skinned' society in the world - we see insults where none is meant. This may be because we were not free for most of the last thousand years. Further, we seem to extend this lack of professionalism to our sense of punctuality. We do not seem to respect the other person's time.



The Indian Standard Time somehow seems to be always running late. Moreover, deadlines are typically not met. How many public projects are completed on time? The disheartening aspect is that we have accepted this as the norm rather than the exception. In the West, they show professionalism by embracing meritocracy. Meritocracy by definition means that we cannot let personal prejudices affect our evaluation of an individual's performance. As we increasingly start to benchmark ourselves with global standards, we have to embrace meritocracy.



In the West, right from a very young age, parents teach their children to be independent in thinking. Thus, they grow up to be strong, confident individuals. In India, we still suffer from feudal thinking. I have seen people, who are otherwise bright, refusing to show independence and preferring to be told what to do by their boss. We need to overcome this attitude if we have to succeed globally.



The Western value system teaches respect to contractual obligation. In the West, contractual obligations are seldom dishonored. This is important - enforceability of legal rights and contracts is the most important factor in the enhancement of credibility of our people and nation.
In India, we consider our marriage vows as sacred. We are willing to sacrifice in order to respect our marriage vows. However, we do not extend this to the public domain. For instance, India had an unfavorable contract with Enron. Instead of punishing the people responsible for negotiating this, we reneged on the contract - this was much before we came to know about the illegal activities at Enron.



To quote another instance, I had given recommendations to several students for the national scholarship for higher studies in US universities. Most of them did not return to India even though contractually they were obliged to spend five years after their degree in India.



In fact, according to a professor at a reputed US university, the maximum default rate for student loans is among Indians - all of these students pass out in flying colors and land lucrative jobs, yet they refuse to pay back their loans. Thus, their action has made it difficult for the students after them, from India, to obtain loans. We have to change this attitude.



Further, we Indians do not display intellectual honesty. For example, our political leaders use mobile phones to tell journalists on the other side that they do not believe in technology! If we want our youngsters to progress, such hypocrisy must be stopped. We are all aware of our rights as citizens. Nevertheless, we often fail to acknowledge the duty that accompanies every right. To borrow Dwight Eisenhower's words: People that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both. Our duty is towards the community as a whole, as much as it is towards our families.



We have to remember that fundamental social problems grow out of a lack of commitment to the common good. To quote Henry Beecher: Culture is that which helps us to work for the betterment of all. Hence, friends, I do believe that we can make our society even better by assimilating these Western values into our own culture - we will be stronger for it.



Most of our behavior comes from greed, lack of self-confidence, lack of confidence in the nation, and lack of respect for the society. To borrow Gandhi's words: There is enough in this world for everyone's need, but not enough for everyone's greed. Let us work towards a society where we would do unto others what we would have others do unto us. Let us all be responsible citizens who make our country a great place to live. In the words of Churchill: Responsibility is the price of greatness. We have to extend our family values beyond the boundaries of our home.



Finally, let us work towards maximum welfare of the maximum people - Samasta janaanaam sukhino bhavantu. Thus, let us - people of this generation, conduct ourselves as great citizens rather than just good people so that we can serve as good examples for our younger generation.

MR MN TANKHA, ARPS LAITKOR

Mr MN Tankha
Visionary, inspirational Headmaster who empowered a generation and proved that good people can be empowered anywhere.



As I sit in the lobby of Buxton Palace Hotel in the sublime surroundings of the peak district in the UK, my thoughts go back twenty five years back and I think about Shillong and particularly about one person who made such a huge difference to the life of a whole generation. We were lucky to train under Mr MN Tankha. He was the first Principal of the Assam Rifles Public School.
The immediate provocation of thinking about Mr Tankha has been the penetration of facebook into our lives and old school mates linking up after nearly twenty five years. What I have noticed on the discussion boards has been that the one factor which links together the Laitkorian family is the abiding love and respect they have for Mr Tankha.
So what was so striking about him? The first thing which would have struck anyone was his height[quite a few inches over six feet].My abiding memory of him remains the sight of him coming down the hill from his office for assembly dressed in a suit and wearing the black master’s robe flying behind him in the wind. Here comes’Budo’ [ Old man] the whispers would fly. He of course knew his nick name and often joked about it.
To understand Mr Mukut Narain Tankha’s work, one has to understand the socio-political milieu of the Northeast in the late seventies. The Northeast at that time was a far off corner of the Union of India with a million mutinies brewing within the seven sister states. Amongst all this unrest, the most powerful confrontation between the citizens and the Indian Union had been started in Assam. The Assam agitation was initially powered by the students and soon acquired substantial public support. The basic issue was the state of Assam in particular was being overrun by ‘foreigners’ from Bangladesh. As part of their strategy, the agitationist resorted to blocking oil refineries from sending oil to the Indian mainland; blocking government functioning and closing down schools.
My father worked as a banker and in 1979 he was posted at Gauhati [now Guwahati]. I was studying at the Don Bosco school. By March 1981,the agitation had intensified and I had not been to school for a full year! I was promoted to the next class without ever having set foot inside the class. A most unsatisfactory state of affairs and that was when my father who had heard of a promising boarding school in Shillong, decided to send me there. There were plenty of parents thinking the same and as a result there was a substantial number of students who turned up at the Assam Rifles Public School at Laitkor, Shillong [ARPS].
ARPS had been conceptualised by Gen Sushil Kumar whom we often met in our first few years in the school. Gen Kumar was the Director General of Assam Rifles.

The Assam Rifles are one of the Paramilitary forces of India. Originally called Cachar Levy,this force has a proud 175 year history. The 46 battalions perform many roles including conduct of counter insurgency and border security operations. The soldiers and Officers of Assam Rifles had to be on the move due to the nature of their jobs and Gen Kumar observed that their children did not have access to quality education and he founded the school at Laitkor, Shillong. Situated about 6000feet above sea level on Assam Rifles land, he wanted deserving children of Assam Rifles personnel to have access to education.
It is alright to have grandiose ideas but it is another thing to be able to successfully implement those ideas. In order to have a School at par with public schools in India, Gen Kumar needed a visionary as the head of his school and selecting Mr Tankha was a master stroke. Once Mr Tankha came on board, the school took wings. Mr Tankha arrived from St Pauls Darjeeling with a formidable reputation and experience.
The next requirement for success is to have a successful team around you. A good Chief Executive gives shape to a project by his hiring and firing decisions. Mr Tankha succeeded in attracting top teaching talent from St Paul’s initially. Mr SK Bannerjee [ Maths,later Principal],Mr Julian Egbert[Physics],Mrs Sharmistha Sen and Mr T Dasgupta [Biology],Miss Indie Sondhi [English],Mr Mazumdar[Music],Mr Gogoi[Arts], Mr Pramod Kumar[Chemistry]and Mrs Tankha [Hindi] came from pedigreed backgrounds .What was truly more amazing was that as students we saw great teamwork amongst the staff as they truly worked hard to get our first few batches up and going and competing against the best in the region. We students felt part of a family. For example, I can remember us doing English homework sitting in Miss Sondhie’s kitchen or Mr Thomas’s living room. We could knock on most teacher’s rooms for help even out of hours. The housemasters were very supportive and once I even had to do baby sitting duties at one of our teachers!!The teachers, we students believed had a great social life I believe due to primarily Mr and Mrs Tankha’s belief in playing hard and partying hard. The staff party news was often leaked to us the senior students by a certain gentleman who was nicknamed after an Italian poet. Many of you would have guessed by now. There were lots of picnics, movies and plenty of fun to be had.
The most important role of a Headmaster has been said to be that of a head master. He should be a master teacher. Mr Tankha’s classes in Geography were master-classes in succinctness, brevity and clarity in style. An important aspect of his class was his emphasis what we call in Medicine as outcome measures. It was not enough for him teach. He wanted to know whether we had understand the principles and the home work he asked us to do was quite similar to the problem based learning model we use for medical students today.
He also served as model for integrity and fostered empowerment. Mr Tankha had a great ability to instill self esteem which is an essential prerequisite for success. This he did in many ways but the most innovative one was the meeting of class prefects with the faculty and Head master present. A class 4 prefect’s statement was taken as seriously as a class 12 or School Captain’s presentation. This was democracy and consensus building at its best.



The students felt part of the management team and had ownership of the organisation. Today when in the NHS in the UK there is plenty of bemoaning of the fact that management don’t work in sync with Clinicians, there is a lesson to be learnt from Mr Tankha’s inclusive team meetings[Its rare to find a clinician who knows how the Chief Executive of the trust looks like!!].
Mr Tankha was a great communicator and all parents of that era would vouch for it. He had a great feel for the moment. Laitkor is located close to the wettest place on Earth,Cherrapunjee. So after weeks of rain, the mood turned gloomy and sullen all round. When the sun opened up and Mr Tankha announced that the choir would be singing ‘All things bright and beautiful….’,we knew a ‘Sunshine holiday’ was on the cards.
Everyone knows the importance of marketing today. When you have started a school and wish that it’s success breeds more success, its probably important to spread the word. We were lucky that Mr Tankha could attract top talent from across societal spectrum to visit the school. Whether it was Brigadier Gyan Singh telling us about his role in the first Indian expedition to Everest or General Vaidya the C in C of the Army or a United Nation representative, a North east Council member or a sportsman/ politician, this gave the students a chance to meet top performers from diverse fields during their formative years.
When Gen Sushil Kumar retired, there was a real danger of losing support of the next Assam Rifles DG. To Mr Tankha’s credit, his messiahnic zeal and belief in the project saw to it that the transitions in the power structure did not affect the school and in a few years he succeeded in institutionalising the administrative structure of the school.
The ICSE examinations of the first batch would decide the school’s reputation and there was quite a bit of pressure on the teachers.I remember Mr Egbert asking me after the exams whether I would be able to get 70% at least. The first batch surpassed those expectations. Going back to the beginning of the ICSE examinations, I remember Mrs Tankha coming into what was our dugout in those days[Holding House] and stuffing rasgullas into our mouths and blessing each one of us individually. Where else would you feel like family except at Laitkor?Behind every successful man is a woman. In this case it was the graceful Mrs Asha Tankha. She kept the wheels moving especially on the social side of things apart from being a teacher. I can still hear her laughter in the staff room. She lives currently in Canada and the US with her sons Timmy and Monty.
Long before ‘Environment’ had become a buzz word, Mr Tankha had involved the students in ‘Shram daan’ and we planted all those thousands of trees which sway in the wind today. He was truly way ahead of his time.
I did not get to meet him after 1986 and he died a few years back. I have always missed his presence long after leaving school and I am sure there are many of us who feel the same. Some people are born to be greater than life and Mr Tankha was one of them. Men like him come along once in a few generation.
Like I said at the beginning, facebook has linked us together after a long hiatus and I can still sometimes hear some where in the background the strains of the choir singing..
‘When the old school cry resounds
We come running to the mound
Joyous and we celebrate
…………