Once again upon Devu’s request, I am telling you about the scout group that we started in Tambaram called Vijay Scout Group. First, why the name Vijay? I wanted to pick a simple name, but not a common one in Madras at that time. I did not want the appearance of any political or religious affiliation. Vijay was a safe and neutral North Indian name, and so that was picked as the name for the group. At that time, it was also difficult to find boys who were serious about scouts – even then not many wanted to work hard and learn to be a good scout, most just wanted to be Prince Charles, not a lowly scout. In any case, we found some boys and formed the group. There was an Indian Airforce Ground Training School (GTS #2) in Madras at that time which was very prestigious place for IAF cadets to train on aircraft maintenance. More recently, the Officer Training School has taken prominence in Pallavaram, but those days it was only GTS. Affiliated with GTS was a scouting establishment called Mazumdar Air Rover Group. This was the scouting arm of GTS, and it used to hold many events, including campfires. I had made a good friend, one M.S. Rajagopalan, who was a leader at this Pallavaram scout group, and he would invite our group to also participate in their events. The campfire was a large wood-fueled fire around which all the boys would gather for several hours, sing songs, discuss their lives, and have fun. We also organized some camping and excursions. Ultimately, I would not say that the Vijay Scout Group was a grand success or anything, but it was just our way to pass some time as youngsters.
In Memory of Ambu 