An Encounter with A Devil

“You don’t deserve to be passed!!!”, were the words ,the devil uttered, with his face covered with some preternatural vibrations all over. The guy standing in front of him was literally frightened for a moment with his immediate thought to slap him as hard as he could, for the devil had almost put his career at stake minutes ago. Despite all his anger, he couldn't commit any such blunder as it could potentially make him cry for even worse.

***

It all started the yester-night. Raghav started to study at 10 pm for the practical lab exam, scheduled at the next day at eleven in the morning. He started reading from his practical file in which he had copied the experiments all the semester from someone else’s file (someone, who in turn, had copied it from someone else’s as a convention followed for years). Consequently, he could only understand only the first two of the eight, that too after struggling for 3 hours with them. Now it was around one when he decided to take a break and plan a strategy for further studying as well, for he knew it wasn't going to be completed like this.

 “Bhai Sutta hai kya?(Bro, do you have smoke?)”, he asked Vipul ,his roommate, pleadingly.

Vipul refused plainly. Raghav went out and knocked at Archit's door, the very person from whom he was sure of getting an affirmative response to the same question.

Archit came out and tacitly said, “Just a minute. I light up one.”

He asked Archit, who had taken the very exam the same day, “ Bhai kya scene hai kal ki lab ka?(Brother, what’s the scenario of tomorrow’s lab exam.)”, blowing a dense smoke out.

“Light hai bey.”,Archit replied reassuringly.

“Would I be able to complete it till morning if I am studying it for the very first time, as usual?”, he asked anxiously.

“Do you think I have been studying it for the whole semester regularly? Come on!! I too had studied it for the first time yesterday itself. It is the only way we engineers study.”, Archit responded indifferently.

Raghav took it casually as they all have been doing the same every semester and were able to secure decent grades. The next day’s exam was of little concern to him. For him, the formidable was CAT 2014(Common Aptitude Test), something of arrant importance in his life which many might not even understand, to be held after two days,for which he had prepared religiously since last four months, skipping meals and spending sleepless chilling nights.

Ten minutes later, after a quick session of smoke and chit-chat, he returned back to study starting from the third experiment. After spending twenty minutes on it, he realized that it’s not working and he started studying from the lab manuals photographed by those geeks who save people like him during exam time. Despite studying from the manuals, he could complete only five experiments by five. Now, he waited for Osho, his only savior, who slept at night after studying everything, to wake up and teach him the remaining experiments. In the interim, he took a power nap setting FIVE alarms to wake up for he knew if he didn't wake up on time, he would be fucked up. Everything was going right, brewing up for an unimaginable wrong. He woke up at six. He went to see if Osho had woken up or not. To his fortune, Osho was awake. He taught him the remaining experiments within an hour. His happiness seemed no bounds. It was just minutes past seven, and he was done with all the experiments. He revised the syllabus twice leaving no scope of any mistake in the exam. He cleared all his petty (and some pitiful)doubts before the exam. By this time, as always used to happen, he was confident enough that he could setup and complete even the toughest of the experiments without ANY mistake. He had wished hard for this exam to end as soon as possible and had planned to rest for the whole next day, the day penultimate to CAT, to give his BEST.

***

It was eleven. He had reached the lab a few minutes beforehand.

“Choose one of the Question papers”, the devil exclaimed, pointing to the few question papers arranged in astack on the table, partially kept one over the other. Raghav picked up the fourth sheet from the above, almost knowing, empirically, that he would get the toughest of the experiments. On the contrary, history, this time, did not repeat itself. He got the easiest of the experiments which he had done in the lab on his own during the class. He was relieved and happy. He took it to be a child’s play and went back to his seat where he had to perform the experiment. Before the experiment started, he was shifted to the adjacent hall along with another guy to wait until the other persons, who had got the same experiments as both of them, finish the practical. He sat in the waiting hall. After going sleepless for almost twelve hours, even the worn out sofa of the waiting room comforted him so much that he fell asleep, gaping.

“He has had a glance of you from the glass door, sleeping, agape, and went away smiling slyly.”, informed to Raghav, the guy accompanying him in the room. He alluded to THE DEVIL.

Raghav was prodded by shock and jumped awoke. The devil was notorious for his sins that he had been committing for years and he, for no matter at all, wanted to take any damn chance. Finally, both of them were called to do the experiment as their respective predecessors had completed it by then. Raghav started his experiment and was done with the observations within just ten minutes. It went so smooth. In the meantime, the devil was taking viva of the students who were sitting idle after completing their experiments. The devil’s mood was in shambles that day. He tried to entertain his senses and alleviate his disrupted mood by committing some more sins. He distributed E-grades to the students who should have gotten A-grades, most deservedly. He was sitting near the door of the room and was inquiring every student going out about their grades. E was the reply by three consecutive guys. He was sure by that time that being an above average student, no matter what, the least, as well as the most, grade that he get would be E. Raghav was satiated with this thought, for the bigger issue at hand, then, was not that petty experiment or the grades associated or the going-to-happen-very-soon endsem exams after four days, but the CAT. While sitting idle after doing the experiment and waiting for his turn to take viva, he was strategising on taking CAT and resting for the next day, unlike others, who might be getting anxious about the ongoing viva.

***

The much un-awaited encounter with The Devil took place, finally, diminishing Raghav's pleasure. He started the viva.

“Which diode is used in photo-detector?” , the devil started with an intention to make time tough for him.

“Pin-diode”, he replied thoughtlessly.

“Explain the working of Pin diode”, he demanded.

Raghav explained the working of pin diode, thoroughly, for five minutes.

The devil was irritated of his every right answer and, due to his inherent knack for humiliating the students, the devil revealed out his sinister weapons. He rolled through his answer book and asked something really illogical, which I don’t even remember by now, in order to entrap him. Raghav was no less than a deadpan while looking at him vacant. He still tried to answer even the sheer non-sense put-up job.

“Stop this crap.”, the devil said, annoyed.

“That’s exactly what I wanted to say to you since last 10 minutes, bloody hell.”, Raghav thought, with the dejection clearly visible on his face. Despondently, he had to remain silent.

The devil asphyxiated his mind by throwing up another question that appeared unearthly to him, partly because of his not-so-thorough knowledge of the subject (still at par with most of the others) and partly because of the devil’s hard put efforts to make it sure that it appeared so, for him, in particular. While he tried to answer him, the devil started discussing fucking trivial politics to a subordinate, ignoring Raghav at his best, knowing vividly that he knew that he was ignoring him, knowingly. He looked at him incisively as if his sight would pierce his face and bifurcate it into two parts.The devil ignored the very look equally well. It continued for two or three minutes and finally the devil acknowledged his helpless presence just to make it more pitiful. Before he could answer his question, the devil folded off his answer sheet and said,

“saal bhar padhte likhte ho ni aur exams me bhi bina padhe aa jate ho.(You people don’t study the whole semester and come to exams too the same way)”, marking an F(meaning FAIL) on his answer book.

He could not believe his eyes. He had been a bright student all his life and had never ever failed. He started swooning.As soon as he came back to his consciousness,his very first thought was, “You have ruined my CAT, you son of a bitch.” CAT is more about one’s state of mind and he had, in a way, assailed hard the confidence and his state of mind like never before. His eyes pleaded for mercy but the callous devil shoveled him out of the room.

***

Raghav stood up and came out of the room, waiting for the devil to come out. By the time the devil came out, his mind had been bombarded with the thoughts of all possible extremities, ranging from appearing for the summer term after the college ends to suicide attempt, that could have, eventually, happened but, fatefully, didn't. After half an hour, the devil came out and he followed him to his office, his mind shattered and eyes almost at the verge of brimming out.

"Sir, I have done the whole experiment correctly. You can check my answer sheet again. I answered three out of five questions in the viva a midst an average answering rate of one and a half to two. So, why did you fail me?" , Raghav importuned the devil and broke down.

"Mujhe in sab cheezon se koi matlab nahi hai.( All this doesn't matter to me at all.)", replied the stolid devil.

"Sir, you can check my academic background. I have never ever failed a single exam. I have a CGPA of 7.94. How could you fail me?" , implored Raghav desperately.

The devil was not affected by any of these arguments and bellowed, "You don't deserve to be passed!!!"

Raghav was desperate to show the devil what he indeed deserved. He wanted to make the devil realize, then and there, that he had a despicable sense of judging a person but, to his utter dismay, couldn't. Raghav went back to hostel, very disappointed.

***

Hunger and thirst could approach him only after all his senses and consciousness were released from the preoccupation of the sensations of the dramatic tragedy that had taken place that day. He was lost. He was sad, not because he had failed in an exam for the very first time in his life but because a sort of premonition he had got for the CAT, going to held just a day after. He couldn't cope up with the fact that his life was going to be affected for worse because of some asshole's frivolous act.

The only mistake that Raghav committed in this whole episode was going to a senior professor for help, the same evening. Although the professor helped him unconditionally but it infuriated the egoistic devil so much. The devil had to concur to the demand of the senior professor to pass Raghav and others, unwillingly. He agreed not to fail any student in the lab on an unfair basis but his ego was hurt. He hinted to make time really tough for the students, and especially Raghav, in the theory exam, to be held after four days, of the subject, he used to undertake that semester. He was going to set the question paper by himself with an intention to fill up his pot of sins a bit more.

Raghav studied nothing but the devil's subject for four days( nights as well) neglecting CAT with a heavy heart. On the exam day, he was so sure that he would pass the exam no matter how unearthly the examiner had set the paper. He attempted the whole paper. Incidentally, in this very episode, many things had happened, unexpectedly, for the first time in his life and this was one of those many. After the exam, he was confident enough that he would, definitely pass the exam. Finally, Raghav passed the exam securing 32 marks out of 50, well above the required marks to pass the exam.

***

This whole incident has made Raghav stronger in ways nothing else could have. Now, he is determined twice as much as he was a day before. Now, he is inspired twice as much as he was a day before. He, now, understands life exceptionally better than he did a day before. This episode has, latently, transformed him for so better that no one but himself can understand. Still, he wants to slap the devil, not literally, but by showing him that he had a despicable sense of judging a person, by showing that Raghav indeed deserved to be passed. Hopefully, he will slap him soon.

 This episode was a blessing in disguise that could literally make Raghav believe that "Everything Happens for a Reason." After this episode, Raghav humbly thanks the devil from the bottom of his heart.