BANGALORE: Seventy-eight hours with hardly an hour or two of sleep, little food, constant alertness, and no, it wasn’t an army camp. The clock was ticking as Kathiravan M Pethi (Kadri) and his team of 37 students attempted a tough task they had set themselves. They were making an attempt at the Guinness World Record’s ‘Longest Lesson Learned’. They had begun at 9 a.m. on October 31. Kadri’s theme was ‘Gandhi’s Vision and Mission in Life’, and he was conducting an interactive session on Gandhi and the relevance of his philosophy in today’s world.
On the morning of November 3, at 10.38, Kadri broke the previous record of 73 hours and 37 minutes that had been established during October 20-23, 2005. Kadri and gang then went on to about 3 p.m.
So, what exactly was happening inside the API Bhavan auditorium? There were the Invincibles, Evangelists, Gladiators, Orions, Legend Killers and Ambition —- six teams of students with a group leader each and Kadri leading them on. The teams participated in discussions, debates, with Kadri throwing questions at them.
They even made models and charts and had slide shows. All this through day and night, with only five minutes break every hour, which they could accumulate (by not taking breaks every hour) and use the minutes at the end of the day to eat, sleep, stretch. Also, they weren’t allowed a gap of more than 30 seconds between each speaker or activity.
It was a rigorous and strenuous process for which the students trained in yoga for the last two months, ate light food and gave up smoking or drinking.
They even had a mock session of over 50 hours at Kadri’s house.
Kadri said, “I have been influenced by Gandhiji’s life and I think things like his conflict management, stress management, social inequality issues, and how he, a scared speaker, overcame the fears are very relevant for us today.” And so, inspired by the Mahatma and also his friend Squadron Leader Jayasimha who holds three Guinness World Records, he thought of attempting the task.
And all this for a good cause. “There was an MBA student who was barred from appearing in exams as he did not have money for fees. So I thought I should raise money for such people. I started Feel Foundation and the money from this will go into the NGO funds,” said Kadri.
shatarupa@epmltd.com