"More Characters!"

As the bus entered the gates of the school, I heard the first bell of the day ringing, instructing the students to get back to their respective classes before assembly. Vyankatesh and I disembarked from the bus along with the other children and made our way to our class room. As we entered the main building, we passed a short, thin man in a green uniform with oiled hair,a thin moustache and a broad grin, carrying a load of heavy books. “Good morning Gopal Bhaiya!” I greeted him, “What work are you completing early in the morning today?”. In my opinion, Gopal bhaiya was the lucky mascot of our school . I had always believed that he was the busiest person in Pride! He had been there since the day it had been born and everyone, be it teachers, students or the headmistress herself, was hugely dependent on him! He was in charge of photocopying the worksheets for teachers, for giving medicine to the ill students, for arranging Mrs. Bhan’s office and bringing her tea, for ringing the bell after every class, for taking the memos from one class to another, for monitoring the other didis and bhaiyas and a million of such daily chores. He completed all of them to perfection  and always with a warm smile ! He was the most polite and soft-spoken person you could ever meet and was adored by everyone at Pride.

 “Good morning jee!” he replied, “I am on my way to library to put these new books on the shelf after which I shall go and ring the bell for the assembly. You all should go to your classes quickly or you will miss the attendance. Jaaiye, jaldi jaaiye( go quickly!)”

 As we turned towards the corridor, I heard my name being called from behind “Maaaaaaaaaaluuu!!!” I turned to see Sonal and Sakshi trotting towards me. Vyankatesh proceeded towards the classroom as I stopped walking and waited for my friends to join me. “Hii!” I said, “Where’s Pratishtha?”

 “She is just coming,”  Sakshi answered, looking over at her reflection on the glass door of one of the classes and fixing her hair, “She is getting her hair plaited by Sunita didi. She woke up late today as usual!” We reached the classroom and pushed the door, only to find it locked from inside. “ Oh  no!  Not that stupid password thing again! ” Sonal said, rolling her eyes. Inside, Aniket came rushing to the door and with a broad grin said “Password please!” He was a very tall, lanky boy with a deep voice and a very spontaneous sense of humour. He could mimic all the teachers, students and television personalities. He and a couple of other silly boys had invented this ritual of entering the class by saying a  password which, by the way was to be changed every week. Funny as it had seemed in the beginning, it was now getting on our nerves.

 “Raul Gonzalez  Blanko!” we said in unison, in most bored voices.

“Well done girls!” he said.

 “Yeah Yeah, we are absolutely proud of ourselves!” I muttered sarcastically. As we proceeded towards our desk,, we heard a commotion at the back of the class. Before even turning round, I knew it could be none other than Avtar and Amitayu.  Avtar was the boy who fitted the description of Harry Potter to the last hair, with his round spectacles and untidy mass of hair. He was a great football fan and talked only about the teams and jerseys and the star football players. His favourite pastime was teasing the girls and singing funny, outdated songs which made everyone laugh. Amitayu was a different matter altogether. When I had first arrived at the school, it had taken me at least six months to interact with him. He had been one of those kind of boys who do not make friends  with girls and are usually confined with the men-folk. But as time  passed, we had started talking to each other and I had found that despite his tough exterior, on the inside, he was an extremely sweet and caring person. The only scary thing about Amitayu was his temper! If ever he flared up,he was like an angry bull, with red eyes and uncontrollable behaviour. We constantly advised him about anger management but that was one thing which he thought was beyond him. At this particular moment, he was thrashing around the tables and chairs in mock violence and Avtar was covering him with an imaginary camera made up of his rolled up right-hand and  the circled palm of the left-hand being the lens!  “Yes, ladies and gentlemen, please pay attention. This species can be very very destructive and dangerous! It is seldom found in other parts of the world but we have managed to capture one just for you to seeeeeee!”

“Give me a break!” I said, turning back to my desk.

“Have a Kit-Kat!”,Pratishtha’s voice could be heard as she entered the class, her hair plastered in a tight plait.

“Hee Hee! Wow Pratishtha!” Sakshi  giggled, “Don’t you look smashing!”

“Arrey! Sunita didi plaited it too tightly, “she said, pulling at the end of her braid. Sunita didi was a shy, very dear maid who assisted Gopal Bhaiya in his chores. “What do you know, its hurting also! I say that’s one hell of a Discovery channel going on at the back of our class!”

We settled down at our desks and waited for Mrs Ghosh, our class teacher to arrive. “Hey fatso!” I  jumped and squealed at loud exclaimation near my ear. I picked up the class duster and threw it at Avtar.

“What??” I shouted at him.

“...Be good fatso! Otherwise you are not going to get this from me.” I looked at his hand to see what he was holding up. It was a cold-drink cap with the Indian cricketer- Rahul Dravid’s picture inside it. “Eeeeeeeeee!!” I jumped up and shouted “Gimme, gimme gimme gimmeeeeeeeeeee!” Laughing, he flung it at me and took his seat just as Mrs. Ghosh entered the class and closed the door. We had been assigned just one class teacher after the previous year when more than half of our class had moved to various other schools. When our senior batch had reached class tenth i.e the year of the board exams, there had been some delay in the allotment of affiliation to Pride. Some people were anxious by this happening, but Pride was soon granted ICSE Board and our board year went off very smoothly and well .

However, After the ICSE year, many students left for different schools, leaving a total of nine boys and girls in the class 11th. Even-though the strength of our class had diminished rather dramatically , we bonded well and had a lot of fun. The boys- Avtar, Amitayu, Vyankatesh and Aniket had chosen the science stream. Four of the five  girls, Sonal, Sakshi, Pratishtha and I , were in the commerce stream. Our ninth classmate, Khushboo,  was the sole taker of the Arts stream. English language  was compulsory for everyone and was taught by Mrs. Ghosh. At first it seemed weird when just nine of us were left in our class, but we slowly adjusted and then became very comfortable in our smaller  group! We were the only batch having such a low strength. Classes junior to us all had a good average strength of 25-30 students!