Alumni receive caning from their beloved teacher on Teachers' Day

A group of alumni who met their teacher on Teacher's Day in Madurai sought blessings from him and requested him to beat them with a cane. They carried a cane to the school and recalled that such strict way of handling them during school days shaped their future.

Madurai (Tamil Nadu): As the country celebrated Teachers' Day on Sunday, some of the alumni of a Madurai school returned and received caning from their beloved teacher, a mark of their bond in those days. It was fun and frolic as the old students met their teacher at Manohara Middle School in Sellur.

Paul Jayakumar has been serving in the school for last four decades and he is presently a head master. In appreciation of 40-years-service, the old students felicitated their teacher with a shawl. They insisted that their teacher cane them, something that shaped their future during the school days.

One of the alumni, Sankara Pandian said that it was common for teachers to punish students with a cane whenever they made some mischief. Though painful in those days, teachers were strict so that the students would study and excel. Those days of teachers taking personal care and correcting students are gone, he recalled.

"When we met our teacher today, we were delighted to carry a cane with us and requested him to beat us. It was a symbolic way to recall how their strict attitude shaped us all and made someone in the society today", Pandian said. Abubakar, Siddique, Alex, Saravanan, Anand, Karthik and Dinesh were the other alumni who met Paul Jayakumar and sought his cane blessings on Sunday.

Once upon a time in Madurai, the canes used in the schools were sold as 'Vathiyar Pirambu' (Teachers' Cane) in Madurai's Goripalayam. Bamboo shopkeepers in this place now recall that there is hardly any sale of it at present.

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