Her performance in the first semester had been great and she had been very active in extra-curricular activities as well. So, all the faculty members knew Rupali when the second semester started. The response she got from Dr. Paritosh Khanna was, therefore, a rude shock, when she came to the class five minutes late.

“May I come in, Sir?”

“No. The class has already started and you may not disturb the rest of the class.”

Rupali was so taken aback that she hadn’t known what to say for a few seconds. But she had found her voice, “I am sorry, Sir. But I was held up with preparations for the cultural festival. It was just a couple of minutes.”

“Leave now, Ms. Rupali Banerjee,” he had thundered. Rupali’s face had turned red at the humiliation. She had no option but to leave.

And it had continued, until it had become the established wisdom that it was fine to be late in Dr. Khanna’s class so long as you reached before Rupali. It was fine to get distracted and play games sitting on the last bench in his class if Rupali was not in the group. It was fine to be late in submitting the assignments so long as Rupali was not the one also late for that assignment.

She had to be thankful that his bias against her did not reflect in his grading. He was never unfair while grading her examination papers or assignments. But his dislike and grudge continued to annoy her; and she continued to try to overcome it by the only means she knew of impressing the teachers. Doing better in their subjects. She worked harder.

“Ah! So much hard work being put into the Medieval History project. You have a crush on Dr. Khanna, don’t you?” her best friend in the college, Sunidhi, had remarked.

“Crush? Have you gone mad? Why would I have a crush on someone who is so rude to me?”

“Precisely because of that. He is, like, out of bounds for you. The enigma. All other teachers and students  – you have them eating out of your hands, Ms. Rupali Banerjee.”

“Shut up, Ms. Sunidhi Mishra. Don’t you try your psychology major on me!”

In response Sunidhi had winked at her and had run away.

“Crush indeed! I would crush him, if I could,” Rupali had thought as she had returned to her project.

She came out of her thoughts as the clock struck two. Damn! She had a class at two. She rushed out picking up her notes.

—

“Sorry? No, Dr. Banerjee. It doesn’t work like this. Sorry can’t undo any damage,” Paritosh shouted at her after he woke her up from her afternoon slumber at her home.

“I… I…” Rupali couldn’t think of anything in her defense. It was indeed a grave mistake. She had forgotten that she had to give an exam. Students kept waiting and she did not reach the examination hall. She was highly embarrassed. But what was she to do now? It had already happened. Paritosh was not doing anything to make it easier for her.

“Dr. Banerjee. We are an autonomous institute. We have a lot of academic freedom and we pass that on to the faculty members. You are free not to give the exams and assess the students in other ways. But when you do schedule an exam, you can’t just vanish leaving the students waiting. This unprofessionalism is not acceptable.”

“I don’t have any explanations, Sir,” she spoke in a defeated voice, “A mistake is made. I cannot undo it. But I’m ready to take any punishment for it that you deem fit.”

“Punishment!” Paritosh snorted, “What harm is a punishment going to undo? Anyway. Apologize to the students and work with the admin to reschedule the examination. Make sure that the students are not inconvenienced. As far as possible. Check the schedule of exams for other courses. We will discuss anything else later.”

“Yes Sir.”

—

“You need an outing, Dr. Banerjee,” Sunidhi suggested when Rupali called her and told her about horrible day.

“I’m in no position to plan anything.”

“Don’t worry about that. I am relatively free today. I will come to your home by six in the evening and pick you up. We will go to a disco or something and have some fun. Auntie is not there at home, right?”

“Yeah. Mom has gone to Kolkata.”

“Done then. A night out, like in college days.”

After roaming around in various cities since her graduation, Sunidhi had done her MBA and settled down with a well-paying job in Mumbai. Rupali was glad to have her best friend in the same city after she came back to India. It was definitely a huge support in times like these.

“You know what, Sunidhi, the students will be more than happy that I didn’t turn up for the exam. But Dr. Khanna! He has to make me feel bad. I mean – yes. It was a stupid thing to do. But he was acting as if I have caused so much trouble to those students. I can bet we will spot many of them in the same disco tonight – celebrating not having to take an exam.”

“I agree! But it’s okay, Rupali. Let bygones be bygones. And he is the head of the department. In his position, what do you expect him to do? He can’t laugh it off, can he?”

“May be. But just as I had started to believe that his grudges were a thing of past, this had to happen.”

When Rupali entered the disco with Sunidhi, she forgot all about her work-related worries and didn’t pay attention to her constantly ringing mobile.

—

They came out at half past three in the morning after partying and dancing. That’s when Rupali noticed several missed calls on her mobile. At around ten in the night, there were five calls from a student. This was followed by calls from couple of different phone numbers at the college. And finally there were more than ten calls from Paritosh, the last one at a quarter to three.

Rupali panicked. She called Paritosh back. He spoke calmly, but she could guess that something had gone wrong when he gave her the address of a hospital and asked her to come there.

The student, Rakesh Sharma, who had called her, had tried to commit suicide by slitting his wrists.

“He had tried calling you, Rupali. You hold the pager for counseling forum for this week, right?”

Rupali could not meet his eyes as she nodded, “Yes Sir.” She, then, asked hesitatingly, “Is he… in danger?”

“No. He is out of danger.”

“But… it will… become a police case or…”

“The director has taken care of that. The news won’t go outside. We have informed the parents also. They will be here tomorrow to take him with them until he recovers.”

Rupali didn’t have the guts to say sorry, “Sir. You can go home and take rest. I will stay here.”

“It’s okay. There isn’t much time left to sleep anyway. I will stay over as well.”

Rupali was heartily thankful that he didn’t scold her just then.  Her guilt was already too much to bear. If he had hurled any stinging words at her, she’d have broken down.

—

To be continued