SMV School searches for Iyengar

 THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The SMV Model Higher Secondary School in the city embarked upon a strange adventure on Thursday - to find out when a boy named P K Iyengar attended the school.School authorities were stunned on Thursday morning reading the obituaries of eminent nuclear scientist Dr P K Iyengar who died on Wednesday in Mumbai. It was only then that they came to know that the former Atomic Energy Commission chief was an alumnus.The school even hastily arranged a condolence meeting. ‘’We got to know that SMV was one of two schools Dr Iyengar attended from the day’s papers. But we didn’t know when he studied here,’’ headmaster A K Sadanandan Chettiyar said. Thus began the search.It ended around 6 pm, when a souvenir prepared by poet M P Appan, a former headmaster, was dusted up. ‘’One of the masters determined from the souvenir that Dr Iyengar was a tenth standard student here in 1945. From that, we can assume that he studied here from 1942 to 1945,’’ said Sadanandan Chettiyar.In those days, the school had classes from five to ten. A Padma Bhushan winner, Iyengar hailed from Valiyasala in the city. He had his schooling at the Attakulangara school and SMV. He did his PG in Physics at the Kerala University.