And sometimes, right before the last bell, a whispered murmur of "Fight!" would pass Chinese-whisper style through the classes and practically the entire student body would pour out en masse and form a little circle around the fighters. The challengers would swagger in, the challenged would look a little scared or defiant. Mostly, the fightswouldn't be planned and you'd be lucky if you were hanging out there and you saw the fight burst into progress in front of you, like ancient Romans with theirgladiators. We watched, our mouths open, as noses were bloodied and lips cut.
The "serious" fighters--the kids you didn't want to mess with--had weapons, of course. Not all had guns, not that the guns wereuncommon knowledge, but these were children, you mustn't forget, and the glory of having a new toy was too much for them not to show it off. The guns belonged to their parents, but theyweren't locked away, or when they were, since their parents spoke of their weapons around the dining tables, the sons knew how to access them. What you could buy without a license was a knuckle-duster, a lethal looking piece of iron, moulded in the shape of your knuckles that you slipped over your hand to add a little extra to your punches. I remember boys showing off to each other about theirknuckle-dusters; everyone wanted one.
It's hard to work off aggression when you're a teenager. Most people turn to sports, but when fighting was"cool" and beating someone else up a way to assert yourself, it's not surprising that so many people chose to do it. The Gurgaon school has admitted to having defunct CCTVs, the owner of the gun, the father of one of the boys was arrested and it is as if the entire country has just about woken up to violence in schools in India.