Old memories were revived when AASCON Communique of Nagpur's College of Science came in the post. Ours was the first post-Independence batch to join in 1948. Gandhiji's grand-son Kanu was with us. Our class sent Arun Sen to become a bureaucrat and Inderjeet Singh Chadha a diplomat - Inder was a refugee from Pak and had topped the list in the matriculation from CP & Berar. Suryakant Puranik followed the footsteps of his father into a Judgeship while others joined the usual professions. Among them was H Padmanabhan who got his medical degree and promptly migrated to the UK to settle down with his English wife in Littlesborough, Lancashire. The College had only a sprinkling of girl students but we were lucky in Mary Tobin, a State level hockey star. She was in the biology stream wanting to graduate as a doctor.

Much later I ran into her in a Janpath shop in Delhi by which time she had opted to become a nun. Two years senior was Rajani Rai nee Patwardhan, later to become Lt Governor of Pondicherry. College memories somehow are still quite fresh. For example, of Prof Raghavachari taking his maths class with a 'dhoti and large turban' topped with a bhasma on the forehead - he played tennis also wearing his dhoti. Contrast that with the three-piece suit of AN Kapanna (Chemistry) and the bow-tie of KM Vaidya (English), not to forget the immaculate turn-out of Principal Dr K Krishnamurti (DSc), DN Chakravarti (Organic Chemistry) and many others in 'coat & tie'. And to cap it all, believe it or not, the nine-yard saree of mathematics Professor Ahilya Datey.

Quite an unbelievable ensemble compared to today! In the Communique, SM Singru's reference to poetry, Keats, Shakespeare reminded me of my English Professor, Kashinath Purohit and his quoting Ibsen that went well over my head. It was not surprising that he went on to become quite a celebrity figure in the sahitya field. And not from a privileged class was Dr ML Sakhare (Inorganic Chemistry). Nagpur belonged to all as you can see. Our khadi-clad, Chemistry Professor MS Gokhale, who also doubled as the Hostel Warden, was friendly with several 'socialists' including Jayprakash Narayan, Achutrao Patwardhan and others. One day he was called by the Home Minister Mr Dwarka Prasad Mishra (his son Brajesh, four years our senior, was Mr Vajpayee's Principal Secretary and also wore a second hat of National Security Adviser). 'Bal' Gokhale was questioned by the Minister whether he was meeting his socialist friends after joining govt service.

When the reply was in the affirmative he was told, "you have to choose between service and friends". Gokhale chose the latter and left the College. Subsequently, much later, he got an assignment as a Member of the Central Khadi & Village Industries Board. And finally, an affair to remember!! One day Tara Dandige, a national level badminton player, saw that the college gate was closed but, not one to be deterred, she thought nothing of climbing over it, and jumping to enter the premises! Post Script: I left college after three years of the BSc course to train with the Royal Navy in England. and thought I was getting far away from my bogeys viz integral and differential calculus. But an unpleasant surprise awaited me when the navy piled on us spherical trigonometry, astronomy and, in due course, nuclear fusion and fission!