Surabhi Graduates from Ashoka University

On 31st May, at 01:36 AM, Surabhi received an email from Ashoka University. In the attachment was her degree proclaiming her completion of Bachelors of Arts (Honors) in History, signed by the Chancellor Rudrangshu Mukherjee and Vice Chancellor, Malabika Sarkar.

She woke me up and I was lost down the memory lane.

Long time ago, when she was in primary school, I had made a deal with Surabhi. Whenever we will visit Delhi together, I will take her to one of the historical monuments for a visit. That was her condition to visit her grand-parents, and I had gladly accepted it. While at home, she would barely go out to play or do any physical activity, but I remember the day she went to Red Fort for the first time. She walked for hours, wanted to see every little stuff, asking many questions. No complaints about tiring, not even worrying about food.

When she came to class 6th, I thought I will introduce her to online learning, to encourage her to learn new things on her own. Initially, I would sit with her to watch the videos on Khan Academy. What she enjoyed the most were videos on French Revolution.

She must have been in the 8th class when one day I received a phone call from my friend, Sudhir Jain, Director of IIT Gandhinagar that the next day a team from the IIT was going to visit Dholavira, one of the largest Harappan site. What was interesting was that the team included Dr. R S Bisht, the famous archaeologist, and the Director of excavations at Dholavira starting 1989. He himself would be explaining the site to the people. The team also included Prof. Michel Danino, the famous indologist, whom we had heard about a lot. It was certainly exciting for even someone like me, with no formal training in history or archaeology. But we only had a few hours to reach Gandhinagar from Kanpur. So, I declined to join citing the impracticality of this. When Surabhi returned from school, I casually told her about the trip, and she was like, we just need to go at any cost. Within half an hour, she had changed, had food, and packed for a 3-day trip, and I had booked a taxi to Lucknow Airport, some very expensive last minute tickets from Lucknow to Delhi and Delhi to Ahemdabad. We managed to reach there late night, and left for Dholavira in the early morning. We had a great time listening to Dr. Bisht and Prof. Danino about Harappan civilization, and importance of Dholavira and so on.

Next year, Prof. Michel was visiting IIT Kanpur for a semester, and he was giving a series of lectures on the history and heritage of India. The only person who attended each and every lecture was this little school going girl, and she would always sit in the front row and sometimes even ask questions.

It was no surprise then that in 10th class, she told us that she will be studying history and other social science subjects in 11th and 12th classes. The problem was to find good schools where she could follow her passion. We went to a few schools in Kanpur exploring options. Everywhere, the first question would be whether she is an academically poor child and expecting very poor marks in 10th class. That usually would be the last question, since we weren't interested in her studying in a school where those studying social science subjects were assumed to be academically deficient students. So, we moved to Delhi.

As soon as we settled in Delhi, we had to go for certain pilgrimages - National Museum, Old Fort and Red Fort, Qutab Minar, and some lesser known places. Her 12th class history project was about Harappa Civilization. She made us take her to Lothal in Gujarat during that time. And her school project was no less than a thesis.

In between, when she had completed 11th class, Ashoka University had a one week Young Scholar Program for school students, and we sent Surabhi for that. After that program, she was completely convinced that this is where she wanted to study. She had a brochure of Ashoka with her, and throughout 12th class, whenever she will lack motivation to study, she will take out that brochure and tell herself that she needed to study harder because she wanted to be in Ashoka.

She did unexpectedly well in 12th class, including getting a perfect 100 marks out of 100 in history. She applied for admission to all the top liberal arts programs of the country, and thankfully, received admission offers from all of them, except Ashoka, because we had applied there very late. Her marks would have enabled her to get admission in any Delhi University college she wanted. We went on a national tour visiting these institutions, and were very impressed with most of them. We were totally confused, but on 2nd June, 2017, she received an email from Ashoka University, offering her admission. That settled the issue. We had already heard from a few history experts that Ashoka had the best history department in the country, at least among the institutions offering under-graduate program.

I thought she was now on her own and I didn't have to take her to historical places any more. How wrong I was. Her canvas had just become larger. Now, she would no longer demand that I show her places in Delhi. It had to be a different city whenever there were vacations in Ashoka. Not only did I see historical places in Kanpur which I hadn't seen in my decades of staying there, but I had accompanied her to Lucknow, Jhansi, Gwalior, Agra, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, and a few more.

The Ashoka years have been great. I have not heard many college students saying that they enjoy academics in their college. But Ashoka was different. Besides academics, the number of clubs and other extra-curricular activities were amazing. She herself organized a couple of history trips and university organized a few more. The quality of teaching and learning was such that at the beginning of every semester, she would be crying about having to forego so many good courses. She could only do 4-5 courses in a semester while she wanted to be doing 10 or even more courses. I am not sure such enthusiasm for learning is there in many institutions.

As a parent, I thank all the faculty members of Ashoka University. Also, I thank all the founders of Ashoka who had the vision of creating such a fine liberal arts university in India. Because of Ashoka, she has grown into a sensitive and confident young lady who has a keen understanding and appreciation for our history and heritage. And blessed is she for she could study what she was passionate about and not having to follow the herd, and Ashoka was an enabler for that.

Coming back to June, 2020, she was sad about one thing. Her convocation had been postponed indefinitely. She didn't know if it would ever happen. So we decided to create a little convocation experience at home. Got a convocation gown for her and for myself, printed the Ashoka degree, had a backdrop printed which is similar to what they would have in the real convocation at Ashoka. I even gave a small speech to her. We even had a Chief Guest for this "convocation." Prof. Sudhir Jain, Director, IIT Gandhinagar, agreed to give a speech on video conferencing. We had lots of pictures in all parts of the house, and thankfully, the food delivery has been allowed. So we could order a few things to eat and enjoy. Of course, we are still hoping that there will be a real convocation some time in the future.

Handing over the degree to Surabhi

With the family

With parents

With Dad

With Dadi

With Nani

Prof. Sudhir Jain, Chief Guest, on Video Conferencing

In the lawns