"Here are your answer scripts,” said Mr Desai, handing them out. “Get them signed by your parents and bring them back tomorrow.”
Rahul’s heart sank as he heard the teacher’s instructions. If there was one thing he did not want to do, it was show his history paper to his parents. They knew that he rarely did well in history, but this was no ordinary test that they might overlook; it was the first-term exam.
Rahul was a good student who fared reasonably well in other subjects. History, however, held none of the fascination for him that it did for his classmates, who enjoyed Mr Desai’s informative and interesting classes.
Rahul liked and admired Mr Desai, but felt there was nothing much to be gained by knowing who succeeded whom to which throne; what reforms had been introduced centuries ago; why and how battles were fought, and when and where monuments were constructed.
It seemed to Rahul that most rulers did the same things. They invaded someone else’s territory or defended their own. In times of peace, they built schools and resthouses, forts and palaces or thought of new schemes to fill their treasuries.
What Rahul could not understand was why these distant happenings were considered important. How could they possibly affect life in the present day, and why did one have to know about them?
Faced with his latest history challenge, Rahul had dramatically described Hyder Ali valiantly fighting the British, during the Third Anglo-Mysore War. The problem was (as Rahul only realised later), that by the start of that conflict, the Sultan had been dead for eight long years.
What worried Rahul greatly was that the night before the history exam, his mother had told him that she was fed up with his poor grades. “You had better do well, young man,” she had said sternly, “or no meeting your friends for a month.”
Despite this warning, Rahul had hastily glanced through the chapters assigned. The matter he thus carelessly read had completely eluded him when he was faced with the question paper.
Rahul looked at his history marks in dismay: 34/100. He admitted to himself that he deserved no more, but that awareness would not help him when his parents saw his poor performance.
As Rahul gazed forlornly at the offending figures, Rahul thought of a way to deal with the problem. It should be fairly easy to change the 3 in 34 to 8. That would give him 84 on 100; a little unrealistic perhaps, but it would be difficult to alter that digit to anything else.
Rahul was desperate, and acted swiftly. Using a red pen, he quickly did the deed and took the paper to his parents. He felt terribly guilty when they praised him and said they were very proud of him. So delighted, in fact, were Rahul’s parents that they did not notice that Mr Desai had surprisingly omitted to write an appreciative comment on their son’s unusually excellent performance.
Soon after Rahul had secured the mandatory signature, he retired to his room with the history paper and began the delicate task of changing 84 back to 34. His eraser was not very effective, and as he rubbed harder and harder, the paper wore out. Rahul stared in horror at the little hole that appeared. Not only had the marks vanished completely but also part of his father’s signature.
There was nothing he could do but confess his crime to Mr Desai.
The latter was shocked, but dealt kindly with the tearful boy. “I have to tell your parents, Rahul,” he said, “but I shall urge them not to be too hard on you. “Will you, on your part, promise never to repeat this again?”
“I promise,” said Rahul sincerely. “I have really learnt a lesson from what I did, and I shall never be dishonest again.”
“Good!” said Mr Desai. “You know, Rahul,” he added gently, “that is what history is all about. We study the mistakes of the past, and try not to repeat them in the future.”
Rahul was struck by his teacher’s words. All at once, he grasped the relevance of the subject he had scorned so long. In years to come, he would often recall his teacher’s words of wisdom.
Rahul never forgot that memorable occasion at school, which for him was a historic moment.