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"...Every night we wore academic gowns for dinner. The first night it scared the life out of me, because I didn't like the formality. But I soon realized that the gowns were a great advantage. Guys who were out playing tennis could rush into their room, grab their academic gown, and put it on. They didn't have to take time off to change their clothes or take a shower. So underneath the gowns there were bare arms, T-shirts, everything. Furthermore there was a rule that you never cleaned the gown, so you could tell a first-year man from a second-year man, from a third-year man, from a pig! You never cleaned the gown and you never repaired it, so the first-year men had very nice, relatively clean gowns, but by the time you got to the third year or so, it was nothing but some kind of cardboard thing on your shoulders with tatters hanging down from it...."
..........Feynman "Joking"
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The first academic gown I saw was in the studio-photograph of my Father wearing black robes as if for a funeral, with a hood that looked very like an inverted tub, also black, with his right arm resting casually on a pedestal and his left carrying a folded parchment paper, which he said proudly was his B A Degree from Christian College, Madras. There was also a gilt-edged Holy Bible (for keeps) that I loved for its getup and its beautifully printed butter paper. I used to browse it for the sheer pleasure of handling it and flipping its pages...I was too young to follow the King James Version. My Father was a bachelor then and very handsome (he kept his lean and mean figure till his death at 80). So, it was he that added color to the black witch-robe:
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By the time my turn came, I discovered I had to rent the gown for a hefty Rs 10 for an evening, which was too much for me (@ 5 full meals at the upbeat Santi Niwas Hotel...when I first went there with two rupees in my pocket and asked at the counter, "Can I have curds too please!" the man behind the desk looked severely at me and growled: "No system here without curds").
I had half a mind to skip the Convocation and take my Degree Certificate later in absentia to avoid all the hassle, but I was told I had to pay Rs 20 as fine for super-added clerical work and postage. Also, curiosity to have a peek at the jamboree won. It was a heck of a punishment. The crowd was too big, the function was in the open-air, it threatened to drizzle, the mikes hooted and tooted and whistled and howled, and the gown stank to heavens. And that night I skipped the default studio-photo session since there was a snaky waiting line and when I looked at my gowned self in the mirror, the sight didn't seem worth preserving for a doubtful posterity.
And then I traveled to IIT KGP and there was this Convocation there within a few months of my joining. I thought Bengal was forward-looking and dumped all the clownish symbols of slavery in the dustbin. But no! The evening before, men arrived in the Exhibition Hall carrying trunks of costumes in various colors, black in two trunks, red in one, blue in a bag and so on. I watched the first Convocation there which was held in a huge pandal by the side of the Netajee. Each and every student went up the dais and took their Degrees (after muttering a fulsome oath under their breath); and there were claps, fulsome and desultory depending on the popularity of the recipient. But there was a thunderous applause for the PGM...a sight to watch.
As years went by year after empty year and my heart pined in vain for taking my Ph D Degree wearing red robes and going up the dais...I stopped watching the agonizing annual event. It took me 12 good years to get my Ph D after my M Sc. And one day a telegram came from my Father summoning me to Madras to assist and attend to him in his ankle surgery. I thought it would be a week's leave, but it stretched to six weeks.
And one morning when I walked up to Parry's to buy my copy of The Hindu after doing my father's bedside ablutions, there was this huge front-page photo of Indira Gandhi doling out Degrees at IIT KGP. The write-up said that since it was Emergency time, she didn't say, 'Yes' or 'No' to the Silver Jubilee Convocation Invite till the last minute...her Father doled them out in the First Convocation.
And so it was held in a hurry and I missed my final boat...saving Rs 100 rent for the red gown...IIT KGP didn't charge any fine for latecomers.
Anyway, I always had a deep aversion to black clothes and hoods:
And wished IIT KGP would abolish this mourning attire on the happiest day of its students. It took thirty years or so for IIT KGP to realize it and hold a contest for a new and simple design...just a scarf maybe.
It just happens that my son too missed his only Convocation. First, the Chemistry Department was unsure of the loyalty of their JEE entrants to their 5-year program and so withheld their B Sc (Hons) Degrees for two full years to be doled out along with their M Sc Degrees (Phy Dept then was more liberal and didn't want unwilling folks in their Dept to stay back and cause nuisance). So, he missed his B Sc (Hons) Degree.
Next, for a long while the Convocation used to be held in December so that the pass-outs who joined their jobs could accumulate some leave and take their Degrees in person. But they found that the PGMs invariably traveled to the US for higher studies in September and so missed the Do. But it never mattered...they got their standing ovation in absentia from their batchmates present. But IIT KGP wanted them to watch and revel it in person, maybe. So, the Convo was preponed to August on the Foundation Day, if possible. So, the ones that got away to the US got their Degrees in person...but the leftovers in India didn't get leave so soon after joining their jobs to clap clap clap...
So, my son was in Hyderbad trying hard to master Java when his turn to climb the stairs of the Holy Dais came and went...
I walked to the Exam Section and collected his two Degrees from the ever-efficient and ever-courteous Tapan-babu...may his tribe increase!
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