Memories of one of the greatest teachers I have known

Great people always leave an everlasting impression on the minds of everyone they directly or indirectly interact with. Prof P.V. Sreehari was one such person. He left this world in 2014 but had left an indelible mark on the hearts of a lot of people especially those of whom he called his students. Today on his birthday, I felt a strong urge to recount a few memories of my interactions with him through the years that I have known him

 

We were all quite clueless on our first day at Fr. Conceiçao Rodrigues College of Engineering, at the start of a 4 year roller coaster ride called Engineering. We learnt from our time-table that our class teacher for the first semester was a person called P.V. Sreehari. Around the lunch break on a cloudy August afternoon, we met him for the first time in the drawing hall on the third floor. A tall, lean, dark skinned gentleman with a deep baritone, he introduced himself to us as our class teacher and told us that we were free for the day but that the semester would be challenging. The next working day, he addressed us in our class and was pretty meticulous with the attendance. He was to teach us mechanics, a subject which struck terror into the hearts of most FEs. From the first minute that he started teaching, the subject seemed to flow effortlessly through him. He seemed to enjoy the activity of teaching and that enjoyment rubbed off onto most of us. This was the shortest semester we had and we had a good amount of syllabus to complete in all subjects. That led to a lot of lecturer battles for extra lectures which used to be fun for us to witness, with the most memorable battles for CP and then CS in Semester 2

He had initially nominated me to be the first CR of FE Elex, but being a democracy, we put it to vote. Since our elected CR fell victim to a mosquito borne disease, I spent a lot of time as the “acting CR” through the first semester which led to a lot of regular interactions with him. He had the amazing ability to remember every student’s name. It served as an inspiration for people like me who have always struggled with names. His lectures almost always had 100% attendance. Not once did he belittle anyone even if they approached him with what many would call silly doubts. He would always be there for his students and would ensure that he gave them all, the best he could. I had once read outside a church, “Give your best to the world and the world will give back the best it can”. The results most of us got in Mechanics and ED seemed like a fitting tribute to his efforts to teach us

We witnessed his anger for the first time when we were pulled up for making too much noise holding a rugby match outside one of our many Semester 1 classes during the lunch break. Just a minute after the blasting, he was joking around with us. On a similar note, when we had our cricket tournament in January, I received a few bazooka blasts since I had called him once to update him about our match result but we ended up inadvertently mass bunking his lecture because of the next match. Sensing the fear in our behaviour, he told us, “Don’t worry. That is all in the past. It is not going to affect the rest of our interactions”. Such a sense of forgiveness though hard to cultivate, is something every single person needs to try and emulate as he showed that life is too short to hold grudges against anyone.

 

In Semester 2 he was still our class teacher, teaching us the subject Engineering Drawing. As always, it was both interesting and fun to learn. When our results for Semester 1 were declared, I was ill with chicken pox. He was one of the first persons to call me and convey my results to me and enquired about my health. He also told me about the surprises in the results and shared his reactions about the same. Such a tiny gesture, made me feel so much better. Later, during our cultural fest Euphoria, we got an idea that he was a singer and a violinist. We didn’t get to hear him sing that year though. Thus understanding his passion for music, we gifted him a flute that year for his birthday. I am not sure if he learnt how to play it though

 Since he was part of the Production Engineering department, he didn’t teach us in our future semesters. He still would drop into our class from time to time and have some small talk with us etc. All conversations with him would always be nice, warm and fun. Even folks from the diploma section who never attended his lectures found him really endearing and said that he was “awesome”. I heard him sing for the first time when we forced him to do so during our Formal day in Third Year. It was a beautiful ode to Goddess Saraswati and we could feel the years he had dedicated towards learning the intricacies of Carnatic Music. It was simply magical to hear him sing. How I wish we could hear him more often. Once he had made a surprise appearance during the orchestra night auditions but we failed to get him to sing that evening. He would say, “Mai aisa sab gaana nahi gaata hai..You people enjoy yourselves…”

He left CRCE to join DJ Sanghvi sometime during our final year. I still remember having visited him in DJ Sanghvi with a box full of Tirunelveli halwa, which I had got from my native place, just before I started working. That day’s conversation included a lot of points mentioned above like the extra lecture battle with Kalpana mam, Raina mam etc. He enquired about almost all my classmates, especially “Chottu” who was one of the most famous rebels in his lectures. I was fortunate to accidentally bump into him a few times when I visited some sites near DJ Sanghvi. He would always grace our alumni meetings and would always be one of the star persons everyone who learnt from, would want to meet. He was conspicuous in his absence in the 2014 meet after which we learnt that he was battling cancer. It was shocking to hear this news. Unfortunately our prayers couldn’t stop the inevitable and he lost his battle with the disease at a young age of 43. The world lost a gem of a person who moulded a lot of future diamonds from CRCE

Sreehari sir, thank you for being a part of our lives. Your memories shall live on forever…