Delhi: At the Imperial Hotel in Delhi, Junaid Atlaf Bukhari, president of the Doon School Old Boys’ Society, spoke about how the elite institution is “steeped in egalitarianism”.
“When we walk into the gates of Doon we are all equal,” he told ThePrint. “That is how we approach each other. It’s not just about education, but the values of education.”
But it’s no ordinary school. The first-ever Doon School Summit was a testament to the vitality of its alumni network — the Indian equivalent of Ivy League levels of access. A coveted, upwardly mobile group, its riches were on full display at the summit. Raghav Maliah, chairman of global banking at Goldman Sachs; Ashvin Dayal, senior vice president of the Rockefeller Foundation; Rajit Punhani, FSSAI CEO; and Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia belong to different realms, but share power, privilege, and are bound by an invisible, impenetrable thread: the Doon School.
The summit, held on 14 October, was conceived as a platform to discuss the 90-year-old school’s wider influence on society.
The panel discussions were diverse — one on multi-generational leadership, another titled ‘Beyond Academics: Values at the Heart of Learning’, and a third on ‘The DOSCO Impact on Society and Aristocracy of Service’. Yet they seemed to circle back to the same ties, the links that supposedly cannot be severed. Audience members, also part of the school fraternity, cheered for their houses of yore. They broke into applause at the mention of a beloved teacher. An air of solemnity filled the Imperial’s ballroom when panellists spoke about how the school had shaped the contours of their lives.
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‘Aristocrats’ in service
The conversation on Doon’s societal impact and the “aristocracy of service” took on the weight of legacy.
Lt General Vipul Singhal, Rajit Punhani, Ashvin Dayal, and Amitav Virani, founder of the Education Alliance, an NGO working to improve government school infrastructure, discussed how the school was founded on the lofty premise of nation-building. And built on values meant to instil a commitment to service.
“Despite the impossibility of this ideal, we’ve tried to do a pretty good job over generations,” said Abhinav Kumar, who was moderating the panel.
Dayal, who joined virtually from New York, referred to the institution as a “leveller”, recalling that students were encouraged to go beyond the classroom.
“We had incredible teachers who used the landscape,” he said, speaking about lessons learned while trekking through the Doon Valley or discussing the dangers of deforestation.
In what was a reunion of sorts, the conversation might have stayed within the comforts of nostalgia and memories of an idyllic campus. But the panellists spoke of shifting ambitions, artificial intelligence, and a changing world.
Punhani, an IAS officer, noted that in his batch, ten students had gone to St Stephen’s. Now, most go abroad and have different ambitions.
Virani, who has spent 17 years in the unglamorous world of public education, a far cry from the halls of Chandbagh, recalled being told by a sitting Chief Minister, also a Doon School alum, that he was unlike other DOSCOs. This was because, as recounted by Virani, “not enough of us are in social service.”
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‘Island of excellence in a sea of muck’
As the evening tapered to an end, Jyotiraditya Scindia — a classmate of Rahul Gandhi at Doon — reflected on the structure and discipline the school instilled. He recalled waking up on chilly mornings to serve his peers at the dining table.
“It’s the simple concept of dignity of labour that arises from repetitive action,” he said. “It was a pain in the neck — waking up before your peers and walking to pick up the kettle. But it was to feed your family.”
He went on to imitate a sports teacher, who instructed pupils to smell the ball before they began playing.
“They were not teachers, they were institutions,” declared Scindia.
As for consensus on the evening, moderator Kumar summed it up: “Doon School is an island of excellence floating in a sea of muck.”
(Edited by Asavari Singh)