These are the stories of my father's life as written by him when he was alive. He left behind a rich trove of stories and I wanted to share a few of them with you.
- Francisco D'SouzaThe Years in College
Placido D'Souza
I was very excited about going to college. Above all, it meant freedom – freedom from the discipline of regular attendance of classes as at school, and more excitingly, social freedom to mix with the opposite sex who had been so far a closed book to me.
My first problem was to choose what I was to do with my life. I was ill-prepared to make this decision. At school, one went from class to class routinely, and the question of taking such important decisions hardly ever arose. In those days, the first step was to decide whether to join the Arts or Science streams. The latter meant one intended to take up either medicine or engineering. Most boys from my class opted for Science as the alternative provided for a vague future as a lecturer or lawyer or clerk.
I did not fancy becoming either a doctor or engineer. I had some vague inclination to join the priesthood, but was not sure of my vocation. Every year, a few Redemptorist priests came to Pune from Bangalore and preached a series of sermons for a week or so. They made a great hit as their sermons were meaningful and laced with unusual humour. They were greatly admired and perhaps that attracted me to them.
Without telling my parents, I began a correspondence with one of them, telling him of my interest in their Order. He understood my hesitation and advised me to take my time to decide. I thought it would be best for my career as a priest if I joined the Arts stream, where I found myself one of the few boys, surrounded by a majority of girls.
My father consulted our landlord Mr. Oliver who studied my marks sheet and advised me that medicine would suit me best. But on my own, I went and enrolled in the First Year Arts class. My parents did not object. Nor did they ask the reason for my decision. I did blurt out my interest in the priesthood in answer to a question, and my mother showed some disappointment. I assured her that I had yet to decide. Her concern was that priests led a life of privation and knowing me as someone who was quite spoilt, she felt this would not suit me.
Anyhow, the die was cast, but as a way of keeping my options open I elected to take mathematics as one of my subjects. This I continued in the second year of college, partly in the hope of scoring well in the exams, which would not have been possible with other subjects like logic, economics etc.
I did very well in the exams in the first year of college, obtaining scholarships that virtually paid for my tuition. But in the second year, it gradually began to dawn on me that I had elected to go along a road that led to nowhere. I was thoroughly confused about my future. I fared poorly in mathematics in my second year and obtained a second class which was not going to be of much help in my career.
I then had to decide what subjects to take for the B.A. for the third and fourth years. I really had no idea. I had no special preferences. Nor had I any particular career goal in mind. The idea to become a priest had fallen by the wayside as I realized the discipline of that calling would be too much for me.
I toyed with the idea of becoming a journalist for two reasons. Frank Moraes had just become the first Indian editor of the
Times of India, then the premier paper in our part of the country. He was greatly admired and lionized, and I looked on him as a role model, reading his editorials and columns with care and trying to imitate his style of writing.
At that time, too, we had in our class a student from Harvard, one, Premkumar Sadanand, son of the legendary freedom fighter and editor of the
Free Press Journal. Prem and I were quite good friends and even though journalists were paid a pittance in those days, I thought I was cut out to be a journalist. (He once asked me to interview some American students who were visiting the University and write a short piece about it. It was published as a middle by his paper and I received the princely remuneration of Rs. 5!)
At that time, something else happened that was to change the course of my life. A fellow student, Jagdish Hiremath, who was two years ahead of me, got into the Indian diplomatic service. It was quite a sensation in Pune, when he emerged successful in the Union Public Service Commission examinations and entered the Indian Foreign Service – a profession about which little was known in the backwaters of Pune.
I was already beginning to wonder what I would do with my Arts degree which seemed inevitable after I had gradually decided that I was not going to join the priesthood. My father consulted Mr. Oliver again, who said we should talk to one of the college professors. We invited my French Professor, Prof. Chaubal, for a drink one morning, and I still remember the “elaborate” preparations we made for this unique occasion. Papa bought a bottle of beer and prepared salami sandwiches – neither of which I had seen before.
The professor was unable to give me any advice, and suggested I meet Prof. Choksi, the History Professor in our college. This may seem routine nowadays, but at that time, it was with some trepidation that I knocked on his door and spoke to him. He too could not help but suggested I meet Jagdish, which I did.
It was my intention to follow in his footsteps – get a 1st class in my B.A., go on scholarship to the USA, finish my M.A, as he had done in a year, appear for the competitive examination and enter the Foreign Service. I consulted him, and he advised me on the subjects I should take for the B.A. (General) course which would also cover subjects that I could take for the competitive examination for the Foreign Service.
I did work hard towards this goal, but sadly missed my 1st class by a couple of percentage points. That put paid to my dreams of going abroad for my second degree on scholarship, as I could not afford to go on my own.
I was a year too young at that stage to appear for the IFS exam, and so went on to do my Master’s with more or less the same subjects – history and political science. Here too, I once again did not make it to a 1st Class by a couple of percentage points, the added difficulty being that Pune University had fixed 65%, and not the usual 60%, as qualifying marks for a 1st class.
I finally appeared for the exam in 1956 and got through at the first attempt, much to the surprise of my friends and colleagues, and above all, myself!