As soon as I
entered the room, a handsome face looked up from the table. It was
automatically presumable that he was the teacher. But, he motioned
towards another figure. This person sat with his cell radio on. An aged
man with a white beard, spectacles set neatly on nose and lips
tightened. His expression wasn’t a welcoming one. The batch of ten boys
looked excited upon seeing an outsider (me). I am talking about the
vocational wing of GIMRC (Government Institution for Mentally Retarded
Children). I had gone to the book binding room, just to gain insights
into the proceedings therein.
Having taken my introduction, he seemed to have let gone of me as we
throw the wrapper of a sweet. I sat there for sometime, looking around.
There were old machines, thick books, a lot of paper cuttings and, more
thick books. Plus, some posters pasted on wall. By now, some of the boys
were smiling at me shyly, while other seemed oblivious to my presence.
Realizing the futility of sitting there, I asked leave from the teacher.
He nodded. However, as I got up to go, he started talking about himself.
I listened, standing. Coming from an army background, he was educated in
the field of astrology and numerology. “I want to proceed on to a PhD in
astrology, but, for the financial constraints.” He shared.
He had been teaching in GIMRC for past ten years, and felt proud of his
boys. I noticed a stick hidden below the table. “It’s only for scaring
the boys, I never use it. Mine is the most disciplined class in the
vocational wing.” I smiled a bit nervously… the stick had had some
impact on me, too.
A hefty boy suddenly got up and brought a glass of water for the
teacher. He had been trained to offer it every three hours, the same boy
had previously been the noisiest one in the class; I was told. He
offered water to me as well.
We sat quietly for sometime. FM played DDLJ songs. “Shahrukh Khan is my
favorite”, the teacher moved his head passionately. I smiled. And, felt
encouraged in pursuing a conversation with him…
“How does the binding proceed?”
“We get books and journals from all educational institutions in
Chandigarh. The first step is to remove the advertisements.” He
answered.
”What’s next?”
”I align all of them.” He demonstrated. The task takes time and
concentration. All the pages, however thick the book/journal might be,
have to be aligned.
“Hmm…”
“Then we paste a longitudinal peace of cloth along the to-be-bound side.
This is to keep the aligned pages aligned.”
“Interesting”
“Next, we paste the cardboard on both sides and fix it with the
machines. The machines are also used to print ‘GIMRC’ on the side.”
“That must be the last step?”
“No. At this stage the book/journal is bound, but, not presentable.
There is a gap of level at the place where the cloth is pasted.”
“So…?”
“We paste another piece of cloth there.”
“Wow”
I was truly amazed at the entire procedure. Sitting comfortably in
libraries, we never wonder where the neatly bound books come from. There
is a whole story behind them…
Now, I look up to the boys… the band of boys… the so-called mentally
handicapped boys… they are all working silently… tearing advertisements…
cutting cloth pieces… while the radio goes on… And the teacher; he is a
strict disciplinarian.
As I stood up to take leave after thanking the teacher, my eyes drifted
towards the handsome face. He was busy. All of them were busy… the
teacher encouraged me to go on more of such info-seeking sprees. He told
me he looked up to such people. I didn’t know what to say, hence, with a
smile, I walked out.
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