THE LOOK BEYOND

Mrs. Manjul singh had been a teacher in the postgraduate college now for last 2 years. A young articulate and perceptive lady she was the lecturer of philosophy, having done her doctorate on the subject Mrs. Manjul singh had felt complacent that she knows all that has to be known about various philosophies in life.

However the arrival of the new lecturer Dr. Kamalnath and his behavior did shake her apple cart of complacency and the feeling of knowing all.

It was only two months since Dr. Kamalnath joined the college in her very own faculty of philosophy. The post had been vacant for more than a Year. But what with the juggling higher up, the push and the pull needed to occupy the post that in spite of many a competent candidate hovering around it took one full yr to fill it up.

As soon as Dr. Kamalnath joined Manju tried to warm up to him. After all having occupied one of the three permanent posts he is going to be her colleague for ‘N’ number of yrs to come. But Dr. Kamalnath was not the one to reciprocate to any warm maneuvers. He fitted to ‘T’ the bill of a proper philosopher. The far away vacant look she always in search meaning beyond and in no mood to comprehend the immediate. Impeccable in manners Dr. Kamalnath made all the right noises a proper etiquette. Called for, but Manju could proceed in their relationship no further than just a Hello, and no, and exchange of civil Good-Morning in spite of two months.

But the astonishing thing was Dr. Kamalnath was an immediate hit among students. She noticed the half vacant classrooms were getting filled to brim with every passing day, in Dr. Kamalnath classes. The students seemed to literally lap up every word of their now favorite lecturer whom they were found to call with deference Dr. Kamal Sir. They seemed to have suddenly a volley of doubts. She noticed students coming in to their spacious staff rooms and discussing matters in hush voice with their lecturer. They almost to be mesmerized by every word uttered by their adored lecturer. Not that she could hear what was being discussed. It was generally the hush voices of students fielding a query or two and a monotonous drone of Dr.Kamalnath explaining away perhaps weighty theories, for the look of the student used to be the one being enthralled. The same look which she had confronted the first day in Dr.Kamalnath, the search for meanings beyond.

In particular of late she noticed the 3 lanky youths, fair and with regular features but looking rather anemic as though drained of all the blood. They were so markedly different from the bouncing youth of the rest of the college. Well she has seen the kind of look somewhere; the hippies in the compartment on her way back from Varanasi to Lucknow. It was a stoned vacant look, which she had dismissed due to excess drugs. But looking at the three young lads who had now become a regular feature in the staff room, she wondered how they were getting the kind of loony and stoned look. By now she had resigned to the peculiar nature of Dr.Kamalnath and the going on. In fact she was getting besieged with self-doubts at her own competency as a lecturer seeing the popularity of the new lecturer.

Any way soon the college will be closed for a month end she will have respite from routine for some time at least.

It was Monday after the two-day weekend the college had opened up. As she entered the premise in a hurry since it was getting time for the first bell, she found an unusual atmosphere in college. It was as though the whole college had assembled near the office room. All of them talking in one breath. Some excited, some bewildered, some simply stunned. She could immediately feel something was amiss. Well she didn’t have to guess for long. Spotting her one of the student came running and almost breathlessly blurted out “I am Navin, Satish and Romesh are dead. They are student of philosophy from section “B”. She just could not comprehend what was being told. “How on earth did it happen” How it was for the next student to butt “Mam they committed suicide.” They had come half an hr early to college soon locked themselves in the classroom. They had taken a lethal poison. When the rest of the students arrived, they could see the sight from the glass windows. Soon they had broken open only to be confronted by lithe dead bodies with the vials clutched in their hands giving out the mode of grotesque death.

That was it. They have taken the route of irreversible end. She entered the classroom. She could see the same students who are to frequent Dr. Kamanath. The bodies were still warm. She could immediately sense Dr. Kamalnath’s hand behind this. It was so easy to twist the impressionable minds with profound theories. She enquired as to where is Dr. Kamanath He had not come so far neither did he ever come, proving with out doubt his guilt in the scheme of things.

Later as investigations wont on for many months, they unearthed bit by bit the details how Dr. Kamalnath is to drill in the theory the world was on the verge of collapse. It is for the prudent to embrace death early and save themselves from the wicked end in store for the rest of the world. No doubt the young minds have literally got hypnotized on the mad theory and had taken their precious lives. Dr. Kamalnath whose credentials turned to be doubtful having spent tow complete yrs in the lunation asylum was still absconding six months after the incident.