If I could pin point the happiest time of my life, there would definitely be this incident on top of the list. I was working as a drama and social science teacher in Hamsalekha Desi Vidya Samsthe. If you don’t know then Hamsalekha is a legendry music director in Kannada filmdom. He has opened a school for the children of down trodden communities. So I was teaching them in the school what I hardly learnt in my schooldays.
So it was an eve of mid term examination and the question papers were in office and in spite of being five minutes late, the question paper hadn’t been handed over to us. So to check what’s happening I went down to office. The school was in top floor and the office was in downstairs. As I went down a tall man, resembling some rowdy I had seen in those bad Kannada movies was standing on the door and blocked my way. “Who are you? Go back!” Now I was a guy who was underpaid then rest of the teachers, and they were underpaid then their counterparts in other schools. But I did twice the work. I almost resided in the office. So I had wanton liberty to walk in and walk out of the office and use any equipment to my own personal satisfaction. That was the only thing that kept us there. Now here was a man, whom I had not seen before, who was meddling with my rightful freedom. I looked at him and said, ‘Don’t do this again!’ My stern command made him understand that I had some special privileges in this office. So he stepped aside.
As I went inside the hall was filled with people. I thought that some producer has come to meet Hamsalekha to book him for his film. I went into the recording room to enquire about the question papers. As I entered I was awestruck! Hamsalekha was discussing something with the sound engineer. Some were standing near the wall. there was a stool on which there were lots of eatables. (Bringing eatables inside the console is strictly prohibited. But that day was an apparent excuse) And right 5-6 steps before me was Dr Rajkumar.
Now I am not a die hard fan of Rajkumar, but I was always amazed at his simplicity. He was something that the whole of Karnataka was proud about. A terrific singer. And abode of humility. I never dreamed of meeting him in my lifetime and I never even wished to. But here I was standing right in front of the legend and he looked at me a nd gave that paternal smile, my eyes became wet. Next few seconds is what I describe as the happiest moment of my life. I bent and without my knowledge touched his feet. So subconsciously, that if anyone else would have done it I would have questioned the logic of doing it. But love, respect, gratitude, affection cannot be divided and judged on the basis of logicality. I touched his feet, he lifted me, and I said. “I am your fan Anna!” I never knew till then that I really was one! He looked into my eyes with gratitude and said, “I too am your fan. What do you do here?”
“I teach”
“Oh! You are the ones who make this society a better place! God bless you”
I was blessed. I came out went to the office picked the question papers and went back to class. My soul was so exhilarated that day that I ignored all those who were coping, cheating and worrying. I was just happy to be bothering about frivolous matters.
That was great