26. Gita-Running Competition -By K.S. Ramachandran

Some of you, my fellow octogenarians of India, might recall how our country celebrated the Silver Jubilee of King George V’s reign in the year 1935. The metropolitan cities were all lit up and thousands of people went round the cities enjoying the festive celebrations. In fact, during those days, I remember our Young India Boy Scouts sang “God Save the King” in the evening every day when the Union Jack Flag was lowered for the night.

Yet barely four years later, in 1939, the same Scout group put away the Union Jack forever and replaced it by the Congress National Flag, and sang “Jana Gana Mana” instead. The mood of the country was changing and the anticipation of Independence began to dawn with increasing brightness.

It was in this background that in 1941, an ICS officer named Sri Ramachandran (a namesake of mine) reckoned that the country would gain its freedom in the year 1957. It was daring of him to openly speculate on the withdrawal of British imperialism, even while he was serving it.

He said that he would give a prize to the boy who would be very good in his studies as well as in sports. To pick out the best boy under these criteria, he wanted to hold a competition in reciting the Bhagavad Gita. The three best candidates would be asked to run a 1957-yard race. The length of the race track was to signify the year of India’s liberation. The ultimate winner in that race would get the “Gita-Running prize,” which he was instituting.

It was an eccentric idea. All the boys of our school declared it a crazy and impossible combination.

I was the favorite of my Sanskrit teacher. He ordered me to participate. While I figured I could manage the recitation part of the competition, I was under no illusion of making a mark in running races. I was quite roly-poly, nicknamed “Glaxo Baby” by my classmates and must have looked like a young elephant. I thought I would be quite ridiculous in any running event. But the teacher brushed aside all my pleadings and forced me to join.

True to everyone’s expectations, I did well in the recitation event and qualified for the race. The other two successful boys were Ramaswamy and Subramanian. They were regular sportsmen, whose specialty was long jump and high jump respectively. The fact that they were not winners of running races was no consolation for me, as they were lean and lanky.

“More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of,” I told myself. I prayed that I might put up some semblance of competition to those two guys.

The date for the race was fixed about four weeks after the recitation competition and it was to be on a Sunday. My two classmates used to go to the school playground every morning and practice running, trying to keep trim and fit. They consulted the School Physical Director (PD) about the right pace, the right breathing technique and the right strategy and so forth.

I did no such thing, as I knew that all this was futile in my case. I never believed I stood a ghost of a chance of winning.

Come the fateful D-Day, I noted with satisfaction that there were no spectators except the PD and a friend of his. The PD was tickled pink to see me bravely showing up for the running race. He grinned widely and said a few pseudo-Sanskrit words, invented by him, pretending he was wishing me all the good luck in the world in that classical language. I let it pass.

Soon the whistle was blown and the Great Race started. A very bizarre idea suddenly took possession of my mind. “Anyway I am going to lose, why not lead for a few laps by a good margin?” So I broke into a gallop, of which a thoroughbred Derby horse would have been proud.

Startled by the wide gulf developing between them and me, Ramaswamy and Subramanian came charging up behind me. The PD had said that there should be only a yard or two between the competitors and that the final burst of energy should be reserved for the last 400 yards. They caught up with me at the first hundred-yard line and fell in step with me, keeping the gap exactly one yard and two yards respectively, as prescribed.

I was delighted to continue as the lead runner even after the first hundred yards, even if the pace of our running was rather pedestrian. This was more than what I had expected. Every now and then, when I had regained my breath, I made a sudden and uncalled for sprint for 20 or 30 yards, faithfully mirrored behind me by my two friends. 

In this manner the uneven, jerky race was run for three rounds.

The last four hundred yards were to be the most sensational. Who would overtake whom? Who would cross the winning line first? This eventful stretch would decide.

I was still in the lead and wanted to speed up to maintain it. But my legs had got accustomed to my lumbering jog of the first three rounds and would not change their pace. I got resigned to the idea of losing in the final stretch.

But, lo and behold, how amazing! My contestants discovered that all their measured steps and their four weeks of training had gone haywire by my unorthodox fits of trot, canter and gallop. Their legs also refused to obey their fervent wish to accelerate. No speeding up, no overtaking! We finally crossed the winning post in the same order in which we began the race, with me in the lead!

The PD declared that he had never seen a running race finish in such slow motion as he had witnessed that day. In his opinion, any tortoise or snail could have easily overtaken us. A most unkind cut, don’t you agree?

Some days later, at a ceremonial function, I was awarded the “Gita-Running Prize” costing Rs. 10. Two books of that value were given to me. To me they were priceless. They were Gandhi Ji’s “My experiments with truth” and Swami Vivekananda’s speeches. They still adorn my library in Gurgaon.

This was surely one of my least anticipated victories.  I recall this episode often, relating as it does to one of the most enjoyable periods of my life, namely my school days. And when I do, I cannot help seeing an underlying parallel between my willingness to attempt the seemingly impossible – and the growing momentum in those times to secure our country’s liberation.