Kambargatta: Sherlock Holmes in School?

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 Probably the readers are wondering who is this Sherlock Holmes in school and where did he come  from . Is it some imaginary character or Holmes in real?.Well, nothing of that sort but I would like to share a small incident that happened when I was in school.

All this happened when I was in 7th grade and for our age doing all kinds of mischief in the school was part of life and was also our birth  right. (So proclaimed a staunch supporter of Bal Gangadhar Tilak). So there were various kinds of  mischief ('Dhangya' according to one of our Kannada teachers) we used to do and teachers really tolerated us as long as it didn't cross the limit and not offended either the teacher community or  the girls. Everything was very much in control when this mysterious thing happened during a lunch  break.

There was a paan shop ala 'chutta Angadi' (popularly known as Bhattana angadi) near our school in Malamaddi  and this bhatta catered to all the needs of the school kids ranging from chalk  piece ('Pene') to notebooks!.He also had varieties of sweet candies and all sorts of eatables (Home  made)  just for the school kids and not to mention his various inventions simply to attract the kids.Probably most of the eatables available in paan shops in Dharwad now are
invented by this  'Bhatta' but went un noticed.

One of his popular invention has been 'Kambargatta' a sweet eatable  more like an Ordinary chocolate made out of Gud ('Bella'), Tamarind,salt and what not. It was  really a tasty thing and it almost took the whole lunch hour to consume fully thus making it a  favourite of everybody in the school. (Next came Chikki and Khara in the popularity list).
However the problem with this eatable was, it was sticky and would have messed up your white  uniform if not handled properly.
The school was full of this Kambargatta wrappers and the sweepers probably had hell of a time  cleaning these sticky wrappers strewn all over the school.

The trouble started when one of this plastic wrappers perched upon the desk of a girl who was  fairly popular in the school and more so was the daughter of an influential person in the school.  Nobody knows how it reached that place but things started taking ugly turns when she went to the  Head master and filed an FIR that somebody had stuck the Kambargatta wrapper on her desk and  she can't sit on that.

Well the whole school was sounded alarm and all the teachers were summoned and some kind of  meeting was held and the decision was taken to find out the culprit who was responsible for this  mischief.
Two of the more intelligent teachers (Read it:who cared the girls most)were chosen to start the  investigation and thus entered our school Sherlock Holmes and Dr.Watson.(Well their physical  appearance also matched pretty well).

  First of all the surroundings of the wrapper was analyzed (I  don't know what chemicals were used from our dilapidated Chemistry lab) and some foot prints  were found around the wrapper and immediately came to a conclusion that this was the handiwork  (Or is it legwork?)of a boy wearing Judo shoes (these blue Judo shoes were very popular at that  time and almost 75% of the boys used to wear them),who stuck the wrapper below the sole and pasted them on the desk on the pretext of jumping over the desk. (But our
Holmes never thought  that it might have come there accidentally too!). So the dimensions of the shoe marks were taken  thru all angles and the right size of the shoe was determined. Now they had to find out who wore  that size. Though many would have worn that size it was just a matter of picking a mischievous kid  among those . So all the boys  who wore Judo shoes were made to stand outside on their knees and started measuring the shoe  size of each. I guess couple of boys were found to have worn the same size and they were promptly taken to the principal's chamber. Now since the boys did not have any attorney to defend  them they had to defend themselves with all their effort. So those who could speak up in front of  the principal came out unscathed and one poor guy who feared our deadly principal was unable to defend himself and was termed guilty by our Sherlock Holmes and the Principal. The whole school  came to know about  this incident and how one of our teachers (ala Holmes) found out the guilty. I don't remember what punishment he got for that but very soon the incident was hushed up as it  involved this popular and influential girl. I know this person who was punished and will ask him  about this sometime later.

- dharwadavan@email.com

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