{ သားသားၾကီးလာရင္ဖတ္ရန္ သံမဏိလူသားဖိုးဖိုးၾကီး တစ္ေယာက္အေၾကာင္း} (၃)

{ တစ္သက္ တစ္ခါ နွစ္လႊာ တစ္ရြက္၊ } { ပြင့္လိုပဲ ေၾကြေၾကြ ေျမမွာပဲ ခခ၊ }
{ ပန္းေျခာက္ကေလးပဲ ျမတ္နိုးတယ္။ }
ဆရာၾကီး မိသားစု ပုံေလးပါ ၊ ဇနီးသည္ကေတာ့ လူ ့ဘ၀မွာ မရွိေတာ့ပါ ၊ တစ္ေန ့ မိုးေကာင္းကင္ေပၚမွာ
ျပန္လည္ဆုံေတြ ့နိင္ပါေစ ဆုေတာင္းေပးလိုက္ပါသည္။

              Maybe it was divine intention and intervention to change my fortune or would you label it as 'misfortune' ? A certain Regional Chairman of Mandalay (TaingKaunSiOkkaHta) appeared on the scene. At that time we had an educational system where a student needs to enter a 'Regional' college first, before he is allowed to register as a university student. Unfortunately, both the two daughters of this TaingKaunSiOkkaHta failed to qualify, even for the 'Regional' college. Meaning to say that the 'hope' of ever registering as a university student was already forfeited. Surprise, surprise, surprise, not only did they got admitted into Regional College, but later also into 'Medical' college. With this type of bare-faced and shameless corruption, we had sold the 'standard' and the honour of our Higher Education down the 'sewage' drain.

 

   Collaboration in Corruption -

                 

               A Rector, by nature of his rank, responsibility and integrity is expected and required to uphold the rules & regulations of the Institute of Higher Education. But if such a person of responsibility starts to manipulate with the results of examinations, especially a Medical one, which is connected with the health, welfare and lives of people, it is regarded as an extreme tragedy and gross and wanton corruption. Those 'doctors'  or lecturers and professors who pretended  'not to know' (U Pyit Khar) of such irregularities for fear of losing their ranks and jobs, are guilty of collusion in this despicable collaboration and high treason . Thus during the meeting of the members of the Board of Examiners, the Rector / Chairman of the Board, started to suggest about conferring 'Distinction' in Anatomy to elder of TaingKaunSiOkkaHta’s two daughters who did not deserve it. For such brazen misuse of power and authority unbecoming of his status, not only should this person's rank and responsibility be revoked but his license and registration with the Burma Medical Council should also be cancelled immediately. It was under such scenario that i put in a contention to the Rector's suggestion and after some heated arguments with him walked out of the Board Meeting in utter amazement and total disbelief and refused to sign the Results of the Second MB Final Examination Results for that year and session. With me protesting to their conspiracy to give distinction, I was informed later that the Rector demanded that each member of the Examiner’s Board who were left behind give a letter of agreement to give Distinction in Anatomy to the Mandalay Division Chief’s daughter.

             When the results were later put up on the notice board of the Rector’s Office the students vented their disagreement and disgust by spitting and hurling their phlegm and nasal discharge onto the pasted results. I did not mind at all. As everyone could see, the students have explicitly demonstrated their resentment and hostility towards that incident. After that I refused to take on the duty as an Internal Examiner despite frequent reminder by the DGME (Director General Medical Education) to do so. So I did my work and the wayward Rector did his work. It was a sort of each party being aware of the faux pas of the other – Bo Ney Myere Kyar Ney Myere – until one day months afterwards I received a letter from the Rector’s office instructing me to vacate the room he had given to me in the hostels as an Assistant Warden. The letter was delivered by hand at exactly 12 noon on a Saturday so that I had no recourse to   repeal the order. That was the most ‘ungentlemanly’ act that he had done and I highly resented it. Had it not been for my former Head of the Department of Anatomy, Prof. Dr U Myint Thein, my bedroll and my things would have been thrown out of the window onto the road. That was how vindictive and ‘small-minded’ the Rector was. U Myint Thein on being informed of the situation came in his Land Rover and helped to load my things onto his car. He went straight to a house just beside the Yey Nyi Myaung across which was the PanTra School of Music and Fine Arts. From that day onwards the Rector had released the ‘Beastly’ side of my Zodiac (Gemini – Twins – One face is extremely Good and the other face, Ferocious, Merciless & Wild). Thus each time I saw him walking in the corridor of the Institute, I would walk straight at him and bang his shoulder very rudely with mine. He was ‘stunned’ the first time it happened as he never expected someone of my education and rank to show such animosity and the height of rudeness and brazen disrespect to the highest authority in the Institute.  The second time I saw him walking in the corridor was when he was going to the Physiology Department from his office. I walked and half-ran to catch up with him and banged his shoulder from behind and continued to walk past him briskly. I did turn around to smirk at him adding to his anger and shame. The third time we met in the corridor, he was walking in the centre of it as if to assert his rightful turf and territory. Again I went straight at him and much to his disbelief, banged his shoulder with such malice that it made him swivel and fall on his bum. One morning, days later, as I was going up or actually, I was running up the stairs to meet with the Registrar U Than Tun Aung Hlaing, I saw him coming down with the high ranking Party Member from the Mandalay Division. Instead of slowing down and giving way to the ‘LuGyis’ that were coming down, I continued to run up and again banged his shoulder. He fell heavily on his bum in front of the Party Member. Instead of stopping to lift him up and apologising profusely, I just stood there with my fist on my hip with one foot on the next rung of the stairs and just stared at him with an amused smile. This time he reported the matter to DGME, surgeon U Kyaw Maung.  When I went down to Rangoon as an examiner, U Kyaw Maung sent a note saying that he wanted to see me. So on the last day of the exam I went to his office.

“Oh, so you are Dr Hla Khine, I’ve been hearing a lot about you and this is the first time I’ve met you. Please sit down’.

“Your Rector from Mandalay Institute of Medicine came to complain to me that you caused intentional injury and harm to him and also caused him to lose face in front of important people’

‘It’s true, Sayagyi, what do you want to do?’

“I’m just asking you this because he came here to complain to me’

“I said, it’s true, what do you want to do? Do you want to sack me?’

 “Goodness, it’s difficult to talk to you. What can I do to you? You’re a Selection Grade Lecturer (Gazetted Officer)’

‘Anyway, it’s up to you. Do what you like. I’m not bothered’ Loke Ye Yin Hkan Ye Ya Mere’/

Departmental & Personal Investigation

SeyYoneOke from  the General Hospital in Mandalay came to investigate and I gave the incidences that happened in writing. I also admitted that I ‘on purpose’ caused him body injury. Some of the staff who were questioned and whom I regarded as my personal friends testified against me and supported the Rector. People like BalaDewa Singh Ko Lay, that half Punjabi Kabya (father was Kashmir Singh, picture frame seller in Zegyo, Mandalay), B.S.Ko Lay, my class mate was ‘amply’ rewarded for testifying against me during the investigation. He was promoted to DGME himself by his patron and boss the Rector. He must have basked in the limelight and ’transitional’ honour, for a time. I could have easily got a job for him like I did for the MC2 Head of Department of Anatomy in East Malaysia had he showed some genuine friendship to me and like the MC2 Head of Anatomy, he would still be earning a salary in Malaysian Dollars. Unfortunately, now he’s back in a one-room PyiDawThar Quarters and his career as an Anatomist has gone from fading twilight to total darkness. LuPaungHmarPyi AkoYey. Soon after I walked out from the Examiner’s Board Meeting I came to realize that ‘not one’ staff forming the Members of the Examiners Board stood up to support me. Not one of them looked at me even to show a spiritual support. Everyone kept his eyes down. The External Examiner from MC 2, sensing that a storm was brewing with regards to the ‘Distinction’ matter made a quick gateway back to Rangoon without being present in the Examiner’s Board Meeting to deal with some such matters. That was definitely cowardly, because he could have put in a word or two of impropriety of over-riding the result and opinion of the examiners. I felt as if I was a ‘condemned’ criminal. From then on I realized that I’m on my own – Live or Die, and that I have no ‘real’ friend. Thus the contents of the poem my dear father gave me became the guiding principle from then on. I began to ‘stand’. on my own two legs, ‘depend’ on my two hands and ‘breathe’ with my own nose. Colleagues whom I regarded as my bosom friends before I fell out with the Rector started to shun me. Smiles disappeared from their faces. Stony expressions on their faces as they pass me by told me – ‘Hla Khine, you’re an outcast’. 

           Christine (KhinLAyMyint) used to come to my office now and then to verify some points from the Embryology or Histology or NeuroAnatomy lectures. Poor girl, even at that tender age in 2^nd MB, she was inundated with all my complaints and venting of anger and matters of frustration.

Her intention of coming to me was to ask questions, but seeing my dark cloudy expression and mood, she would ask, ‘What’s wrong?’

And all the pent up feelings, anger, frustrations and dissatisfaction now found patient and  ‘empathetic’ ears in her. She would listen patiently, with full understanding and empathy until the intensity of my anger abated somewhat with the ‘cool water’ of understanding that she poured on my troubled mind ; a virtual daughter which every father would have liked to possess. I realized in retrospect, much later, that she was not only a confidante but also a reliable one in that she never leaked out whatever was confided in her. She was endowed with that admirable and good virtue that I was informed, she was a trusted confidante to many of her friends even a few children of country’s leaders.

             The investigation committee must have found out by now what shameful and unethical mistake the Rector had done which was unbecoming of a person of his rank and the trust the government had placed in him. But ‘no’ action was taken for whatever gross impropriety he had committed. The investigation resulted in just separating the ‘warring tribes’. They sent me to where my class-mate and colleague was: to MC2, Mingaladon. This was just a ‘stop-gap’ solution they have taken to diffuse the tense and hostile atmosphere that existed between the two of us. I did go there and contributed my share of the lectures assigned to me and also helped the students by giving ‘free’ extra classes. But instead of coming in one single group, they clung to their own region. I had one group from Prome, one from Rangoon, one from Moulmein, one from the Tenessarim, etc. but I served them faithfully, At the first Examiner’s Board meeting chaired by U Tin Aung Swe the Rector, in MC 2, he commented that the performance of the students have come up in Anatomy as there were 6 students who got Distinction in this subject. There was no word of thank from my erstwhile ‘friend’ the Head of the Department of Anatomy for this faithful service. But then I had helped them only for 6 months. The following year when the students enjoyed one whole year of my service, there were 8 students who harvested Distinctions. Still no word or a nod of appreciation from the Head of the Department. Did he regarded this as a threat to his effectiveness as the Anatomy lecturer??? Perhaps having come from the district (MonYwa) and being educated in a state High School, he lacked mental maturity and social magnanimity to show appreciation where it was due.