I first got to know Nawang during his final year in
school. Until then, I only knew him as a senior from the Nehru house. It was a
distant acquaintance. He wasn't unapproachable, but I never had any reason to
approach him.
That
changed with Mrs. Saldanha, our school principal’s announcement during assembly
one morning.
“...
and finally, I am happy to announce that this year, our school’s annual play
will be performed in new format. Instead of multiple plays in Hindi and English
like in previous years, we will present a single play. This year, the students
of the St. Xavier’s Boys’ Academy will perform a play based on the book
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens.”
The
announcement was a disappointment to most students. By eliminating the
competition round, the rivalry to score points between our four great houses of
Tagore, Tilak, Nehru and Kabir had been taken away. Conspiracy theories swirled
almost immediately.
“She hates Mr. Singh / Mrs. Srivastava / Mr. Rai (our Hindi teachers) and doesn’t
want them to win the award for the best play!”
“Saldi
(the principal’s nickname) doesn’t want Kabir / Tagore / Nehru / Tilak house to win the
championship.”
In
hindsight, my guess is the real reason may simply have been that the teachers
were struggling with the effort needed to present three different plays while
simultaneously managing their classes and the curriculum.
Savio,
a talented, hardworking and patient Director was hired to prepare the students
for the grand event.
While
many of us hadn’t read Oliver Twist, it was easy enough
to see that the key parts were Oliver, Fagin, Nancy and Bill Sikes.
Oliver,
was to be played by a talented junior, whom we’ll call Zubin (for the life
of me, I can’t remember his name! Sorry Oliver). Nawang,
Hrishikesh (Hrishi) and I were selected as the main supporting
acts.
I
was to play the villain Fagin, Nawang played Bill the thuggish bully and Hrishi
drew the short straw (in our opinion) by being cast as Nancy. Naturally, he was
ragged by most of us. Did I mention this was an all boys’ school?
Hrishi,
though, was a good sport about it all and I don’t remember him ever losing his
cool. Underneath however, I’m sure he was seething with the double frustration
of being made fun of all the time and also for being selected to play the
female lead!
The initial weeks of rehearsals were not promising. Lines and cues were
constantly being missed or misspoken. Our singing was terribly off-key – especially
by Oliver and me. There was no tone or tempo to any of the acts and scenes.
Most importantly, there was zero chemistry among the main characters.
Much
to the frustration of our director, Nawang and I acted like we were playing
Bollywod villains from the 70s. Hrishi, meanwhile, was doing his best
to prove that Nancy didn’t have a single feminine trait in her personality.
It
was promising to be an absolute shambles. Secretly, I hoped that the teachers
would recognize the disaster and go back to the original format. It was not to
be. After the rocky start, things slowly started getting better.
It
started with Nawang.
He
took the lead by not teasing Hrishi anymore. I don’t know why he stopped – he
certainly seemed to enjoy it as much as everyone else. Maybe one of the
teachers had a word with him or maybe he himself thought that the joke wasn’t
funny anymore. Whatever his reasons, being the most senior student in the play,
his gesture didn’t go unnoticed by the rest of us and we fell in line quickly.
No one teased Hrishi about playing a girl after that.
At
another time, I was clowning around by singing Fagin’s lines to the tune of our
Marathi morning prayer. Something really seemed to tick Nawang off as he
berated me in front of everyone. While I can’t recall everything he said to me,
the message was pretty clear, “If you aren’t serious, get out of here because
you are ruining this for the rest of us who are trying!”
I
don’t think I cried but I must have pretty close to it. It was the first time
ever during my entire school life, that a student had scolded me! It was unlike
anything I had experienced.
Having
a senior student buying into the play had given a large fillip to the entire
crew. Hrishi and Nawang got on well from then onwards and prepared earnestly
for their roles. Nancy actually started displaying feminine traits!
Savio
(the Director), who until then, seemed to have lost the will to live, sensed the change in
mood and suddenly sprang to life. Forgotten lines and missed notes were no
longer tolerated. We practiced harder than ever on getting it right.
As
the play’s villainous trio, Hrishi, Nawang and I used to hang out together
during rehearsal and after the initial awkwardness, the three of us got along
well.
During
one of the breaks in practice, he shared why he had gotten so agitated at me.
“I’m sorry I shouted at you that day. But this is my final year in school. I don’t
want my memories to be spoilt because of one lousy play. Even if this won’t be
the best play in the school’s history, I absolutely don’t want it to be the
worst. We’ll be mocked forever and never hear the end of it from everyone we
know about how rotten we were!”
For the first time I imagined a disgruntled audience walking out
midway through our performance. It wasn’t a happy feeling. Since I didn’t have
a choice of backing out of the play, I decided to get serious and give it
my best shot.
The
regular practice sessions started to bear some results. So did the equal parts
of encouragement and ear lashings, by Ms. Frank and Ms. Monteiro our resident
music directors!
As things began to turnaround, Nawang’s potentially life-long embarrassment was
turning into something good and noteworthy.
Towards
the end of particularly good rehearsal, the three of us turned to each other
and almost simultaneously said “Guys, that was pretty good!”
The
day of the grand show arrived. While I was excited about performing before the
entire school in a grand auditorium, I was also very nervous about flopping in
my role as the lead villain.
I
sheepishly confessed to Nawang and Savio that try as I might, I couldn’t
remember the opening words to any of my dialogues. Nawang just laughed and said
something along the lines of “Don’t worry. Say whatever you
can remember. We’ve rehearsed so many times that we all remember each other’s
lines. You won’t forget anything. Once it begins, you’ll be fine. Tension mat
le!”
He
was right. We
received standing ovations for our performances.
They loved us. We loved us!
Zubin
(Tilak house), Hrishikesh (Tagore house), Nawang (Nehru house) and I (Kabir
house) had excelled at our roles and forged a life-long friendship.
Or
so we thought...
Almost
twenty-five years since we performed Oliver Twist, we couldn’t be more distant
from each other.
I
can barely remember Zubin (if that was his name!). Hrishi and I drifted
into different circles and careers. We didn’t keep in touch and haven’t met or
spoken for over twenty years.
Then
there’s Nawang.
We
kept in touch briefly during college and even went hiking once with a few
friends and his dad. Only then did I find out that his dad is a super cool dude
and (along with his mom) is a famous mountaineer!
Unfortunately,
our paths didn’t cross again.
The
next time I heard about him was six years later. Nawang's elder brother, Sonam,
taught a course in Bond Financing at my business school. It was through him that I found out, that Nawang was training to join the Indian Army.
Nawang
soon became Lieutenant Nawang Harish Kapadia.
On
September 2 2000, he was commissioned in the Fourth Battalion the Third Gorkha
Rifles.
On
November 11 2000, less than 3 months later, Nawang died while gallantly
fighting Pakistan based terrorists in the jungles of Rajwar in Kupwara district
of Srinagar.
Just
like that, he was gone.
--------------------------------------- *** ----------------------------------------
I
did not get to know him as well as I could, but I am thankful that I got to
know Nawang at all.
During
our 8-week stint as co-villians in Oliver Twist, he had been my friend
and guide.
When
I found out that he had followed his dreams and taken the less beaten path of
joining the army, he was my inspiration.
For living life
on his terms, for showing true courage and bravery as he made the ultimate
sacrifice for his battalion and country, Lieutenant Nawang Harish Kapadia will always be my hero.
