Actor Krishnudu of ‘Vinayakudu’ fame recalls his student days

Our sir used to make us write “I am a donkey” on our answer sheets

I belong to Razole in East Godavari District. My early education was in Razole. From Class I to Class IV, I studied there. Those were great days with so many friends and I have many fond memories of the times. Just like any village lad I played cricket, marbles and hide-and-seek with my friends. Those were the happiest moments of my life.

But after that I left to Vijnana Vihar Residential School in Gudilova, Vishakapatnam. I had my upper primary education from Class V to Class X there. It was here that I had some teachers who made a huge impact in my life. The first one is my mathematics teacher Harishchandra who was very strict. His strictness was such that I lost interest in the subject. I am sure his intention wasn’t that… In fact if we scored less in the subject he would make us write “I am a donkey” behind our papers. He probably hoped that I would improve but it all went reverse! I would get good marks in all other subjects except his. The other teacher was my English teacher Varma sir who made the subject among my favourites. My school principal Vasapathy Raju who still remembers me for my first ever acting role taken up on stage – that of Ram. I went to meet him recently and he still has that childhood picture of mine with him! It’s a great feeling.

And after school I didn’t go for Intermediate but chose to pursue Polytechnic in Bangalore and those days in college were a party in the true sense. I bunked colleges regularly, and it was easier considering I got a really generous allowance from home too. I used to watch a lot of movies because that was the only thing I loved most.

I think my interest in movies and acting began during my childhood because there used to be many shootings at my house. I really enjoyed watching them and it was great feeling to be a part of all that.

But other than all that, if I had to think about some memorable moments in my childhood, it would surely be the times I drove nearly 12-13 km from my village to watch movies in the nearest theatre. I vividly remember I once took my grandfather’s Luna to a second show film and on my way back, it broke down. So I had to walk back to my home. My grandfather was very strict and I was very scared of him. So the next day when everybody was wondering what happened to the Luna, I didn’t utter a word! In fact they lodged a police complaint thinking that a thief must have taken it. The bike was later found and returned back home. But till today I never mentioned it to anyone.