Summary

In a 1980s tale set in the small railway town of Maligaon, a young boy named Gattu seeks revenge on a strict teacher, O.P. Sir, who had punished him harshly for an accidental window breakage during a game, by ingeniously sabotaging a classroom ceiling fan.

Abstract

The story "Gattu and the Ceiling Fan" recounts the events following O.P. Sir's disciplinary action against Gattu for breaking a school window. Gattu, seeking retribution for the harsh punishment and lack of sympathy at home, cleverly manipulates the teacher's personal ceiling fan, leading to a series of humorous and revealing interactions among the school staff and students. The narrative highlights the solidarity of the community, particularly the railway workers and teachers, as they handle the situation without involving the authorities or replacing government property with non-regulation items. Despite the resolution, Gattu's desire for vengeance remains, as he ultimately wishes to target the specific teacher who punished him.

Opinions

The author suggests that the disciplinary methods of O.P. Sir are overly harsh and impersonal, as he wishes for an automated system to discipline children.
There is an underlying critique of the strict and sometimes unjust disciplinary practices in schools of that era.
The community's response to Gattu's act of vengeance is seen as protective and understanding of the child's need for retribution, despite the wrongfulness of his actions.
The story implies that the Railways and the school are closely intertwined, with the employees' lives and work deeply connected.
The author seems to appreciate the ingenuity and resourcefulness of the characters, especially Gattu, in dealing with the constraints of government property regulations.
There is a sense of nostalgia and camaraderie in the way the story is told, with Gattu's prank becoming a legendary tale among his peers, even into their adult lives.

EDUCATION/FICTION

Gattu and the Ceiling Fan

How does the mind of a child work after he’s been burned? A 1980s tale

Representative image of Gattu. Photo and artwork by author.

Gattu is disciplined

O.P. Sir had beaten Gattu for breaking a school window. Gattu had been bowling. The batsman had hit the unfortunate six and had run away and out of the school before he was caught.

Gattu had rushed to retrieve the ball, and ran smack into Manjula madam, who had been correcting papers in the room with the broken window. Manjula madam was an old softie, but O.P. Sir had just arrived to collect her papers and seal the envelopes.

O.P’s only thought was that the process of disciplining children should be automated so that one could fit the child to a whacker and not have to administer the whacks personally. He had envelopes to seal.

Seal he did. Wax is hot.

Gattu plots revenge

Gattu fingered his bruised skin, and knew he would get neither sympathy not medic at home. His father would beat him for playing, and his mother would cry. O.P. Sir should have to pay.

Maligaon was a hot and humid town. Each classroom had two fans, one for the teacher, right above the teacher’s desk, and one for the students.

The teacher was lucky, though. Teachers had a fan all to themselves.

Early breakfast for Gattu

Gattu left home early the next day. O.P. Sir was to take the first class. He used to wear a tie. That tie was coming off today.

Gattu placed the teacher’s chair on top of the teacher’s desk. He reached for the fan and twisted down the blades of the fan till they were vertical instead of horizontal.

Artists’ impression of the fan Gattu twisted out of shape

When we entered the classroom after assembly, we didn’t notice the teacher’s fan. Gattu held his tongue. He didn’t giggle or sneer, or drop any kind of hint by word or deed.

The first class was O.P. Sir’s. He had gone to Gauhati for the day. The teacher substituting for him was D. Pandey sir.

The teachers’ expressions when they saw the twisted fan

As soon as D. Pandey sir came in, he reached for the fan switch and heard a whirring instead of the regular breezy whirling.

He looked up, and then he looked at us. Oh God, what a look.

He continued the class, sitting sideways on one of the desks in the back of the class where we had a working fan.

We were silent. We were all guessing inside, which one of our scalawag classmates had done the dastardly deed.

D. Pandey sir left without providing anything other than English instruction.

Next came Manjula ma’am. She walked in and shrieked.

She screamed at Gattu. What is this? Are you mad? Don’t you know this is Railways property, your father will be in deep trouble at work because of you! Couldn’t you have dug a hole or something in your anger?

Gattu didn’t say anything at all, but held out a bruised arm with a wax heat imprint on it. Manjula ma’am flinched.

Manjula ma’am ropes in her husband to save the day

She abandoned the class lecture for the day. She told us to be quiet as mice, and left us to call her husband from the school phone, and explained the situation.

Prasad sir, Manjula ma’am’s husband, called Mr. Syed Rehman in Stores. Mr. Rehman was the father of one of our classmates, Obaidur.

Obaidur’s dad in Stores finds a replacement

Obaidur’s dad managed to find a storeroom with an unused fan. He ordered the interchange of the fans.

Somebody came to our classroom and changed out the fan. The old one which Gattu had twisted out of shape was taken to the tool-shed in the Diesel Loco shop. It was beaten into shape, but was made flatter than it needed to be. This didn’t happen accidentally. The fan blades were flattened, on purpose.

Gattu was wrong, but he’d been scarred, burnt. The Railways and the schoolteachers worked as a unit to protect him (and his authoritarian parent!) from harm.

Problem was, Gattu still wanted revenge, but O.P. Sir hadn’t taken off the tie.

The flattened blades find a home

Well, maybe he did. Syed uncle and Prasad sir contrived to get the fan blades flattened in the Diesel Loco shop fitted to the fan in his bedroom when O.P. Sir was in Gauhati that day.

Note:

In small railway towns like Maligaon, everyone knows everyone else, and their designations. Everyone either works for the Railways or the school.
Each piece of Railways property has a painted tag on it. Fans are labelled on their necks, not on their blades and that is why the switcheroos were even possible.
In case of government property, it isn’t even possible to buy a new product with pooled money, for example. This is against the law and can get you arrested. Else corruption would be possible, for example someone could buy a cheap plastic replacement for a steel chair, and pocket the difference. So government property is always replaced by government property. Gattu would have done much better if he had got some wax on the offending tie, and lit it.
Maligaon was so hot, one would sometimes get stuck in a seat with no airflow at all, and spend the class looking at a lucky classmates’ hair waving in the breeze from the fan. Fanning oneself manually wasn’t allowed, besides the exercise usually served to make you hotter.

Even today, at reunions, Gattu is greeted with a hand motion to indicate what be did to the fan.

Hand gesture with which we still greet Gattu.

He’s legend. If you must know, he works for a bank now. An air-conditioned one.