Thiruvananthapuram: Piers Pendred had taught at the Sainik School Kazhakootam (SSK) 48 years ago.
On Tuesday, he returned to visit the school from his home in England and waiting to welcome him were a whole lot of his old pupils.
Among them was Dr. Philip Puthumana, a well known surgeon from New York, who was moved to tears as he shook hands with his former teacher.
A student of the 1965 batch, Dr. Puthumana told Pendred that though he had not taught him, he had always been in awe of the Britisher and remembered his coaching the students for the Shakespearean play Comedy of Errors performed in SSK’s dining hall in 1966.
Pendred, now 77, had come to SSK in 1966 when he was just 21. He taught English, some mathematics and drama to the school’s 25 pupils.
He was with the Graduate Volunteer Service Organisation (GVSO) and had just graduated from Cambridge University and signed on for a one-and-a-half year stint in India.
“When I reached here, independent India was only 18 years old, Kerala was nine and SSK was just three years old. The boys I taught then were the children of independent India with whom the future of the country rested. I am extremely lucky to be here now,” Pendred said amid applause from the old boys and current students of SSK.
Retired Canara Bank employee Ullattil Chandran and planter K. C. Dominic said Pendred was “just simply superb.” The boys just used to just dribble a football then, but he taught them what real soccer was all about, even if they played with just seven players to a side.
Pendred was accompanied by his wife, Carol Haslam, a television personality in the UK. Former union minister and Kerala Congress (Anti-merger group) leader, P. C. Thomas, and OBA founder president T. K. Chandramohan, both alumni of the school were also present.
SSK’s current principal, Group Captain B. Janardhanan, the headmaster, Lt. Commander Girish Gopidas and the school’s registrar, Lt. Col. P. G. Suresh Kumar also addressed the gathering.
