IDUKKI: Every year on Children’s Day, the residents of Bison Valley remember the seven students of Government UP School who kept the hill town on the toes for a night and two days. The story, which was passed down from generation to generation in the village, prompted Adimaly resident and minor irrigation department official Subhash Chandran to pen a Facebook post about them, which has already won the hearts of the netizens.
During the 1970s, when Bison Valley was a settler village where road and transportation facilities, as well as phone connectivity, were scarce, the seven students went to the Udumbanchola police station, located 25km away by foot covering forest and cardamom plantation to save their teachers from residents’ moral policing. Their only aim was to clear the misapprehensions of residents created by a local publication alleging illicit affairs between female and male teachers of the school and protect them from miscreants who picketed the school.
“We were seven students then, and the main purpose of the two-day journey was to seek the assistance of the police to ensure the protection of our teacher,” Raju Krishnan, who is now a retired animal husbandry official, told TNIE. He said Bison Valley being a settler village where modernisation was yet to hold its grip, teachers from various districts posted at the school used to stay in makeshift rooms built adjacent to the houses of local people. “However, female and male teachers mingling with each other prompted miscreants to spread rumours about them. A local publication carried a report alleging illicit affairs between the teachers, which resulted in some residents picketing the school,” he said.
Fearing they would manhandle the teachers, the students aged 11, 12 and 13 years, all studying in class 7, set out to the police station. “We had nothing in hand and had only one aim to save our teachers. “We reached our team member Raman Kutty’s sister’s house in Chemmannar, 18km away from Bison Valley, that night,” he said.
The students took shelter in the single-room hut and set out for the police station the next morning. “We were fortunate to meet an officer at the station. However, he demanded a written complaint and asked us to bring a teacher from the school,” he said.
By the time the team reached Bison Valley, it was almost evening and the residents were in a frantic search for the students who had gone missing from the school. “A teacher saw me while returning and took me to my home. Although we got enough scolding from our families, our missing news doused out the issue at school, which also helped to put an end to the misunderstandings,” he said.
Raju and his family stayed in Bison Valley until 1990, before they left for Kottayam. Apart from Raju and Raman Kutty, Sasidharan Pillai, Vijayan Pillai, Rajappan and Antony comprised the team.