Never copy, rather make your life worth copying
The intricate subtleties involved in copying during exams were one of the rare domains in which academically weaker dimwits exercised a coveted edge over their egghead peers. To sneak peek into the student’s paper sitting ahead of you with squinted eyes needed adept mastering of oscillating your whole body left to right and vice-versa or craning your neck at a tilt over their shoulders right on time when the examiner’s focus lapsed a little in dealing with other miscreants.
The absence of unity, loyalty, mutual synchronisation, and teamwork made one-sided cheating even tougher. After catching the offenders unaware, the examiner, if genial, would let them off the hook with a plain warning, otherwise, they would straightway snatch their sheets before escorting them out of the hall on a quiet.
Hard-core cheaters were diligent in laying a strong groundwork well before the announcement of the datesheet as they shelled out a considerable time befriending luminaries whom they expected as neighbours in exams. The subdued cries of a failing candidate falling upon deaf ears would eventually galvanize them into pleadingly tapping their saviour’s back, though, those soft and gentle futile taps would transform into uncouth tugs of the shirts and blazers to draw special attention at the earliest.
Feeling helpless over the ineffectiveness of their moderate endeavours, stooping to the most daring act to score passing marks as saving grace turned out to be their last resort. They would silently fish out all those abridged rolls of chits tucked deep into the remote confines of their shoes, socks, and even thief pockets for utmost urgency. No surprises for a correct guess about the final fate of all those offenders if heaven forbid their little clumsiness in the execution requiring nippy manoeuvres or an element of complacency put them in the examiner’s crosshairs.
A stroke of luck besides the seating arrangement played a decisive role in clearing the hurdles for the harried students heading for writing an exam of an underprepared subject. However, my best friend and I were fortunate to have had roll numbers in sequence and working in tandem, we both cooed answers ear to ear, save our bad luck when I would get the last bench with her seat at the front of the next row. Separated by distance yet close by stratagems, our flair for tracking the movement of the eyeballs besides our lip-reading skills significantly helped us build an invisible bridge of communication that never caved in.
Our foolproof record goaded us into swapping each other’s sheet for the first and last time before the prying eyes of the examiner once caught both of us by sheer surprise. We were summoned to the then principal of our school, and our good academic record was factored in to commute our punishment from getting rusticated to only a dressing down.
Now, as an examiner, spotting the vulnerable tricks of the students soaked in innocence and immaturity would often take me back in time when we harboured a similar misconception that hoodwinking the examiner was child’s play by just fidgeting, wincing our foreheads, twiddling our thumbs or by pretending to tie the laces of our shoes. My childhood slip-up indeed helped me realise that copying had zero scope in both exams and life. Better for the kids to score less or even flunk the subject with honour in lieu of cheating on their own values. My principal’s remarks uttered that day still reverberate loud and clear: Never copy, rather make your life worth copying.
THE ABSENCE OF UNITY, LOYALTY, MUTUAL SYNCHRONISATION, AND TEAMWORK MADE ONE-SIDED CHEATING EVEN TOUGHER