Bhubaneswar: The much-awaited Teacher’s Day is here and the students in the city are all enthused to express their love and gratitude that they feel towards those who have taught them in life, from school teachers to college professors to tutors or trainers in fields other than academics.
Learning is a never-ending process, more of a Sisyphean task, you can continue learning in perpetuity, said Dinesh Mohanty, an IT professional in the city. “During my student days, we used to have a cake cutting ceremony. Students used to perform on songs and gifts were given to the teachers,” he added. Mohanty, who has a son at a private school in the city, exclaimed with joy that “the celebration” has changed “since then”. “My son and his friends are planning to surprise their teachers with a gala dinner at a restaurant,” he added.
For Amartya Bhattacharya, an Odia movie director, the day is not a mere holiday rather it’s a day to express our gratitude and thus worth celebrating. “The celebration is not just for the teachers, but for ourselves too because it makes us feel responsible of being a student,” Bhattacharya added.
Pointing out that when he said “teachers”, he was not restricting the meaning only to the teachers imparting formal education but the word is more of an umbrella term, he added that anyone who has taught us even an iota of anything is a teacher.
“While they are (teachers in formal education) indubitably important in shaping our lives, there are others as well whom we fail to acknowledge. To me, anyone whom I’ve ever met or thought of is a teacher,” he underlined. Any saint or a pick-pocket, any film star or a pornstar, any artist or a terrorist, is a teacher. From each one of them, I have learnt something or the other. The ones who supported me are my teachers, the one who stabbed me in my back are also my teachers. With so many teachers around, there’s so much to learn, he highlighted.
Above all, nature is there, the most influential teacher that I have met. There is no material gift that a teacher deserves, all that he/she/it deserves is an attentive student in you, he concluded.
Apporva Das, a Class X student in Buxi Jagabandhu English Medium (BJEM) School, said, “We are preparing a collage for our favourite teachers.” She said that she is planning to a gift a saree to her class teacher who is also her “favourite teacher.”
Roshni Naik, a student of KIIT University, said that her teacher especially her Odia teacher has immensely contributed towards her academic growth and she will always be thankful to her.
Chetaline Mohanty, another student of BJEM School, said that she along with her classmates and their seniors have planned a “cute skit for their teachers.” We will dress up as our teachers, each one of us will be essaying the character of one of our teachers and take classes of our juniors with our teachers as the audience, she added. “We will reach the school early and complete the decoration work by the afternoon, organise competitions such as musical chair, singing competition, quiz and other entertaining activities for them,” she said.
Pratishta Patnaik, a student of DAV Public School Unit VIII, said that they are planning to celebrate the day by gifting special mugs with their teachers’ faces printed on them. “We will also bring school their (her school teachers’) favourite dishes from our homes,” she added.
While in almost every city school, the students are planning surprises for their teachers, at SAI International School, the teachers have planned a surprise event for their students. The teachers said that they have been preparing dance and song performances. However, the students also have quite a few plans up their sleeves. “We would gift our respective class teachers with cakes and flowers and have also planned some fun contests,” said Lalit Kumar, a Class X student.
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In India, on September 5 every year Teacher’s Day is celebrated to pay obeisance to the first Vice President and second President of independent India Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan who was born September 5, 1888. A great scholar, philosopher, Radhakrishnan was a Bharat Ratna recipient. As the story goes, he had said that it would be his proud privilege if his birthday is celebrated as Teacher’s Day and thus since, September 5, 1967, the day is being celebrated as Teacher’s Day.
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Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
File photo
Teacher’s Day celebration at BJEM School, Bhubaneswar
SAI International School, Bhubaneswar
Bachpan playschool, Bhubaneswar
DAV Public School, Pokhariput, Bhubaneswar