BENGALURU: It was in the 1950s that J. Jayalalithaa studied in Bishop Cotton Girls School in Bengaluru. Classmates remember her as ‘the girl with a sparkle in her eyes’.
Long after she left school and made a name, first as a top film star and then a politician, Jayalalithaa continued to stay in touch with her alma mater. Fatima Jaffer, a teacher in Bishop Cotton School who was also Jayalalithaa’s classmate, was responsible for distributing the sweets every year on her birthday until she retired in 2007.
Ms. Jaffer cherishes a class photograph with Jayalalithaa, which was later reproduced in a book published by the school.
Lavanya Mitran, principal of the school, had attended the last two ceremonies where Jayalalithaa took oath as chief minister.
Shantha Asok Kumar of Bannerghatta Road, a retired teacher who was her classmate in Bishop Cotton School in class three and four, said that she learnt that her ‘classmate Jaya’ was Jayalalithaa only last year. “Even at a young age, she was a determined girl. She was quiet and sweet but never timid,” she said.
