Death of a Teacher

News of the death of my old school teacher Hoshang Kapadia who taught me English through classes XI-XII, has come as a shock. Hoshi or Kapadia as he was called was a gentle, genial soul with a peculiar sense of humour which I found quite mystifying then, but seems so civilized and urbane now.

As is our wont when an old companion passes away, I remember him through the fragments of memory that have survived the decades gone by. We were 17, I think, when he got us to debate on the travails of teenagers. In a classful of angst-ridden boys that was a recipe for disaster but he managed to get us to do reasonable soul-searching with his patience and tact.

In between classes on Coleridge and Shakespeare, his great passion was to turn some of us into good public speakers. To that end he would devote enormous time and energy working with us to fine tune our diction, style, delivery and the nous needed for debating. And it worked alright. The A-team of my good friend Sandip Ghose and AP Singh, was considered the crack debating outfit in Calcutta debating circles of the mid 80s. Subroto Talukdar and I were the reservists, a fact which to my great shame I held against our mentor at that point.

In truth he was much too generous and kind a soul to ever have anything but the best interests of his students at heart. I had the great fortune of continuing my English Literature studies in college under his brother Rohinton, a massive influence on a whole generation of students at Xaviers in Calcutta. Both brothers had the unique ability to turn their students into close friends.

In losing Hoshang Kapadia, I feel a sense of great personal loss, like a childhood friend passing away. Ironically I read about his death the same day that my 13-year old daughter went for her first inter-school public speaking competition. In the end she won only an honourable mention. But I know Hoshi Kapadia, teacher of English and mentor of boys at Don Bosco School, Calcutta would have been happy.

Thank you sir.