a visual video -( picture slide) My marriage on 13.December 1965

Principal B.C.Chakrabarty, the founder principal of A.P.C.college

Principal B.C.Chakraborty was appointed in the tear 1962, after two years of the foundation of our College and shifted in the new building. During this period Prof. Jogesh Chandra Chakrabarty of Sanskrit acted as Prof.-in-charge. The founder Secretary, Mr. Haripada Biswas had some fascination on him. But he did not fare well in the interview to become Principal of the colleges. Then Principal B.C.chakrabarty ( of English Dept.) was appointed from among the panel of Principals . But he was appointed at the fag end of his career and completed 60 years of service of his life and  as he could not satisfy the de mands of the then secretary Mr. Haripada Biswas, he could not get the re-employment that was in vogue at that time.
During his period I would   be lacking if I don't mention two incidents happened in his time. I  got married on 13 Dec. 1965 in which occasion he was present and gifted a nice sari to my wife. But was not kind enough to me because helped in taking the decision of the deduction of my salary for three days after summer vacation of 1966 when I was absent. I informed him earlier that it would not be possible for me to remain present in the college as I was out of station for my honeymoon. When I met him after three days of the summer vacation, he did not inform me anything and I found to my astonishment on receiving my salary for the next month that a deduction of three days salary had been  made. I met him and asked the reason of deduction since  I had sufficient earn leave in my account. He used some unpleasant words and we had some heated exchanges. Though the managing committee had repaid the amount on my application showing rigid reasons. On another he was present , i.e., in the inaugural ceremony of a Kinder Garten School, Happy Home in Madhyamgram, I started for employing my wife who got trained in Montessori training course after her marriage.

 

My colleagues in A P C College

 

Pic 1 Left; from left Prof. D.De, Prof. Minati Mitra, Prof Kayani Roy, Prof.Amalankur Sen, Prof Murari Sen and Son and daughter of Prof. Minati Mitra.

Pic 2 Right; ( 1st row , from left-Prof. Minati Mitra, Prof. Chandra Mukherjee (Sarkar), Prof. Bhabadev Banerjee, back row, from left- Prof. B.K.Roy, Prof. D.De, Prof. Arun Dasgupta, Prof. Mrinal sengupta, Prof. Amalankur Sen.  

My first friend was Prof. Bhabadeb Banerjee ( pic above at right - standing extreme right) and it was very close for the first few years. In a summer vacation i went to his native village at Dipadoli, Bankura. Stayed there for a week in a room ,known as guest house. The main building was two storied with mud walls on all the sides. But it was cool.. Electricity had not reached at that time in first half of 1960s. I got acquainted with his two elder brothers who were serving outside, the elder one was a doctor lived in Dhanbad, Bihar and the second one (elder to Bhabadeb) was an engineer residing in Durgapur ( known as Mejda) I was invited at his marriage ceremony , both as a bride-party and first eating rice of the groom in her father-in laws' house. I took many photos of his marriage and gifted that to him. But closeness did not last long. Even he did not invite mein his own marriage. He married one who took Mathematics in her P. U. course in our College. I do not know that there was any hidden reason behind this.   

The batch of Professors in the first two years. We had occasions to meet monthly in a house of some of us for get together. Arunendu Prasad Dasgupta ( pic. top  left - standing 3rd from left at the back row ) was very enthusiast  in this affair. We had three such get together.  But this type of get together did not last long.

I served under three principals  1. Principal B.C.Chakrabarty (pic-left), 2. Principal S.K.Banerjee, ( pic- Right)and  3.Principal Jyotirmoy Mukherjee. (pic center). Among the three Principals (centre, in a T.C.meeting)I had some friendly relation with the 3rd one.  .

Felicitation of Prof. Anil Bhattacharya (centre) for being General Secretary of WBCUTA

Our sweet home at Madhyamgram, 24-Parganas (N)

My father, after losing all his property due to partition of Bengal, purchased a land at Bosenagar, Madhyamgram, 24-Parganas (N) of about 7 Cottas , some 10 miles off from Sealdah station in Bongaon line. The plot was a nice one  at the corner of three roads in East, West and North. He constructed a one storied building with three rooms,one kitchen and one toilet covered by wide veranda on three sides south, ,east and west.He completed the construction after his retirement with the money he received after retirement.The building was situated at the corner of east and north side road leaving space at the back ( wet side) for Kitchen garden. He planted 4 coconut trees, one Kanthal tree and one guava tree etc. We shifted from Calcutta to Madhyamgram at the end of 1958 for celebrating "first eating rice" of Apurba (Babu), the elder son of my elder brother.
My elder brother has two sons, Apurba and Ajoy. Our house was first tartitioned in two parts, 1. for myself and the other for my elder brother, Kumud Ranjan retired from Post and Telegraph as a 2nd Class Gazetted officer the written consent of my mother and three sisters on the condition that an amount of Rs. 6,000/- would be deposited in the name of my mother in her account shared equally by me and my elder brother to meet  her medical expenses. But no decisions were taken  regarding her, day to day, food and lodging   It was supposed that since she preferred to stay always with me, It would be borne my me. As ill luck would have it, I was attacked with a dangerous disease in 1978 when she required a separate dwellings than myself. My elder brother, and two sisters, to some extent economically steady, were asked to give shelter to our mother but , any way, they were reluctant to do so. The problem was solved my elder sister, Sachi, with difficulty. i am grateful to the family of my elder sister, specially, to my brother in law who took lots of trouble of my morher in her death bed. She died in the house of my elder sister though she had two sons who could do it.
My portion was sold to some person for some construction of my recent house and paying the amount as decided during deed of conveyance of partition. At present the portion in which Kumud Ranjan stayed was again partioned into two among his two sons. The youner one Ajoy renovated the house.

   My college was situated on Sodepur Road, 4 km off from Madhyamgram. When I used to go to my college by my bi-cycle when I put on pant and shirt otherwise I put on Dhoti and Panjabi while going by Rickshaw.  Apurba on my lap (pic right), pic (bottom) after coming from my college.

At that time the pay scale of the College teachers were very poor and divided in two categories; 200 - 500 and  300 - 600. the college teachers under an umbrella WBCUTA ( West Bengal College and University Teachers Association) launched movemnt in three stages. 1. squatting in Esplanade East through out night, 2. Indefinite class boycott, 3. Boycott of examining scripts of examination papers. The movement lasted for 1960s with the two demands;
1. Revision of Pay scale, 2. Introduction of uniform pay scale.actually the demand was fulfilled in 1969 and was implemented in the early part of seventy's.



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Acharya Prafulla Chandra College, New Barrackpore (contd-1)

Gradually, the 2nd post of each Department was filled up with the following persons, English -Damodar De, History-Chandra Mukherjee, Bengali-Amiya Krishna RoyChoudhury, Economics- Mrinal Chandra Sengupta, Political Science-Nakshatra Bhushan Dutta, Mathematics-Chitta Ranjan Sengupta
Philosophy-Jagadish Goswami and Science stream was also started with the following persons; Physics-B.N.Paria, Chemistry- Murari Mohan Sen (Prof. P.K.Banerjee joined later and became senior most in Chem dept. as Pro. Murari Sen discontinued), Zoology-Dhilan Ray, Botany-Pratima Nag, Electronics- Syed Rafi Ahmed etc.
Principal - Bhupendra Chandra Chakrabarty 
( English) was also appointed.
The new building was opened for regular functioning by Prof. Humayun Kabir, Minister in Charge of the Dept. of Education.
At the beginning of my career I used to put on pure Bengalee dress, Dhuti and Panjabi. I had a by-cycle and I used to attain the College with this by-cycle.One day it so happened that my dhuti was stuck in the spokes of the cycle and I had to come home immediately with the help of a Rickshaw. From that day I began putting on Pant and shirt when I wanted to ride on the bicycle.
One day I met Amiya Kumar Rao, my classmate in post graduate classes. He was serving at that time in Gobardanga Hindu College at Gobardanga. He asked me to come to coffee house on Wednesday, Usually, some of the professors of different colleges and Universities met in the coffee house on every Wednesday . Henceforth, I too, began going to Coffee house on every Wednesday. There, we  used to occupy a round table and we would take our seats round the table. The system of taking coffee and fish fry was in the system of "his his whose whose".
One day we decided to go to Darjeeling in summer vacation.

It was settled that during this summer vacation (1961) we would go to Darjeeling. Actually , we went to Darjeeling for an excursion. This was my second excursion in my life and the first excursion in my career. My  first excursion, in my life, I had in Digha after my Matriculation examination in 1951 with some of my local friends of Shankaritola Street, Cal-14.. It was too much amazing not only because  that was my first excursion but also this was the first time I saw a sea, a vast range of water  which  I still remember and just before reaching the sea beach we heard a tremendous sound of the breaks of the waves of the sea.    

Acharya Prafulla Chandra College - My whole career.( Aug 1960 - Dec 1994)

(Welcome to Acharya Prafulla Chandra College

Acharya Prafulla Chandra College was founded on 16 August, 1960 under the Dispersal Scheme–with the joint participation of the State and Central Governments. Late Haripada Biswas was the founder secretary of this college. Initially it was named ‘New Barrackpore College’.)

I came home from Bajali College, pathsala, Assam, in the 1st week of May, after summer vacation and heard that a College , from RR Dept of Govt.of India was going to be opened in New Barrackpore, at a distance of 1 KM from our residence, Madhyamgram, at the initiative of the founder of the New Barrackpore Colony, Mr. Haripada Biswas, a  famous personality.  I made him pleased at my first interview. Actually, myself , Mrs Nilima Das of Madhyamgram ( stayed just in front of our house) and Dr.Manati Mitra of New Barrackpore got the first appointment in this college and joined on 4th August 1960 for enrollment of students. The foundation stone of the College building on Sodepur Road was laid down by Mehr Chand Khanna , Minister in charge of R.R Dept.of Govt. of India. on 16th Aug  1960.Actually the College began functioning  in the morning in the premises of New Barrackpopre Boys' Colony High School on 4th August 1960 ( this can be verified from the old records of admission register . I used to write the admission, Prof. Minati Mitra used to write the bills and keep the cash in a wooden box) . The name of the College was New Brrackpore College. Later it was renamed as Acharya Prafulla Chandra College, New Barrackpore (north 24-Parganas) 

Only 9 (nine)Professors were appointed in the first year of the College. 1. Prof. R. Samadder (Mathematics), 2. Prof. (Dr.) Minati Mitra ( Bengali), 3. Prof. Nilima Das (Philosophy), 4. Prof. Bhabadeb Banerjee (English), 5. Prof. Jogesh Chandra Chakraborty (Sanskrit), 6. Prof. Binoy Roy (History), 7. Prof. Amalankur Sen (Economics), 8. Prof. Arunendu Dasgupta,( Political science) 9. Prof. Kalyani Roy (Sanskrit). At first it was started as a Degree College only in Arts with Mathematics as combination Subjects. Prof Jogesh Chandra Chakraborty acted as Professor -in-Charge of the College. Prof. B.C.Chakrabarty was  appointed as a First Principal of the College in 1962 (probably). in the new College building. The Functioning in the new building was opened by Prof. Humayun Kakir, Minister in the Dept. of Education of Govt. of India.    

Librarian - Asit Brahma, Office Assistants - Sukumar Ghosh, and 4 Class four staff were also appointed.

Bajali College , Assam - My first appointment

My first appointment was in Assam, Bajali College in August 1959 and served upto ( April 1960). In  summer vacation I came home and did not join again for anti- Bengali movement gripped the whole of Assam.

During this period I got an appointment from Acharya Prafulla Chandra College, NewBarrackpore (formerly Nrew Barrackpore College).