IDHAR UDHAR KI BAAT 108 - KV SPIRIT Brig P S Gothra (Retd)

“Which school?”
My college roommate, a proud alumnus of an elite Delhi school with marble floors and imported chairs, had asked me with an air of haughtiness.

“Kendriya Vidyalaya,” I said.

 “Which one? You are everywhere!”

“Yes,” I smiled. “Exactly.”

That’s the thing about us KVites — we aren’t from one school. We’re from all of them. We’re a tribe stitched together by transfers, trunks, and the smell of chalk dust that lingers the same from Leh to Kanyakumari.

My father worked for the Army which, meant pack your bags every two years. My schooling began in KV Jalandhar, where the morning assembly in the big ground felt like a national event. The air rang with prayers, pledge and patriotic songs.

My mother’s said on day one, “See, beta, real playgrounds, real labs, real learning — and all this without paying a fortune.”

She was right. KV gave us affordable quality education with the discipline of a fauj and the heart of India. The teachers weren’t just educators — they were torchbearers of values and uniformity.

By the time I reached KV Panagarh, I’d already mastered the art of goodbyes — that bittersweet ritual of exchanging slam books, marbles, and promises to write letters that never came. But the move was like changing the channel of the same beloved show.

The diversity in each campus was dazzling. My classmates came from every corner of India — the son of a sailor from Kochi, the daughter of an Air Force officer from Assam, a friend whose father worked in DRDO and another one from the Railways Asansol. We didn’t just learn lessons from books; we learned languages, cultures, and empathy. Our festivals were shared, our jokes multilingual, and our accents beautifully confused.

Of course, KV wasn’t paradise. Our classrooms were overcrowded, our infrastructure often tired. But those limitations taught us resilience. Our teachers, selected through national exams, carried a quiet dignity. Whether it was Mrs. Sapna, who taught us chemistry as if it were poetry, or Mr. Shah, who made History feel like cinema — they worked with whatever they had, and still built achievers.

When board exams arrived, the entire school transformed into a war room of discipline and collective willpower. Excellence wasn’t optional; it was habit. KV students didn’t chase glory; we earned it, quietly, one late-night revision and early-morning prayer at a time.

Somewhere between, tours for representing in KV Regional meets or National meets or  the NCC camps and the annual day dramas, we discovered the real KV spirit — adaptability.

You could drop a KV student into any new city, any classroom, and they’d blend in before lunch break. We didn’t fear change — we wore it like a badge of honor.

Every transfer taught us humility, courage, and quick bonding — life skills no classroom could teach. Our roots weren’t in soil; they were in movement.

Years later, in college, I witnessed the power of that invisible bond. My roommate was struggling to  assemble his batchmates. I, out of boredom, posted: “Any KVites here? Let’s meet near the canteen.”

Within four hours later, 25 people turned up — from KV Jaipur, KV Coimbatore, KV Shillong, KV Noida. None of us had met before, yet we spoke like family. We laughed about the itchy uniforms, the endless assemblies, the legendary samosas, and those teachers who could silence a class with a single glare.

When my roommate asked, “How do you all know each other?” Priya from KV Jaipur smiled, “We don’t. But we all know the same prayer, the same discipline, the same spirit.

The KV Spirit is quiet but fierce: it’s the belief that no matter where you’re posted, you’ll rise, adjust, and excel. It’s the pride of being part of a living network of millions who learned that discipline, diversity, and determination can move mountains.

Yes, we lacked the gloss of private schools, but we had grit, gratitude, and a stubborn will to prove ourselves.

Our spirit burns silently, in classrooms, in board results, in defence academies, in startups, in every KV alum who still stands straight when they hear “Bharat Ka Swarnim Gaurav Kendriya Vidyalaya Layega……….”

So no, we don’t lack school spirit. We redefine it.
We don’t belong to one KV — we belong to all of them.

Because a KVite doesn’t just study — a KVite builds India, one transfer at a time.

Note:- You are requested to share your school experiences and anecdotes in the comments.