BY P. K DHAR and RAVINDER KOUR
“Lives of Great man all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time”
Longfellow
Born on 13th May, 1911 in a reputed Khatri family (Mengi’s ) at Mastgarh, Jammu, Dev Dutt Mengi, the youngest son in the family became a legend in his lifetime by dint of his hard work ,magnanimity and intelligence. The strength of philanthropist was his pious and noble parents and pliable and very meek personality Pusha Mengi (wife).
Late Dev Dutt Mengi did his graduation from Prince Wales College Jammu and completed his B.T. from Punjab University, Lahore. He was a teacher by choice. He joined a teaching profession in the year 1933 and served the School Education Department in J and K State in various capacities. He was a real and ideal teacher in his lifetime and generally used to understand the minds of pupil by coming down to their level and transferring his soul to their soul. In mid 19th century, the great educationists of the State were Ishwar Das Mengi, Master Ram Lal, Tej Ram Khajuria, N. D Suri, Ghulam Rasool Azad and many more. Dev Dutt Mengi was one of them. Their humility, compassion, clarity of mind and dedication to work had great influence on the life of the community in general and students in particular. He belonged to the rare breed of teachers whose behavior matched with their ideals. Mengi was an attractive and pleasing personality, soft spoken and unpretentious .His simplicity and sobriety always impressed one and all. He was highly disciplined and expected others to manifest the same quality. He was never vindictive in approach and his ideals were highly constructive and positive which benefitted the institutions, teaching learning process and student’s community. He took keen interest in social activities and worked for the betterment and upliftment of the economically weaker student’s belonging to the deprived sections of the society.
He was a founder force and source of inspiration behind the development of educational institutions in Jammu. He devoted his whole life for the improvement and imparting quality education based on values and ethics. He had vision to rebuild the man and always considered it scared task to build the life of student who came to him. Dev Raj Goswami (retired Principal) a great educationist of Jammu recognised Dev Dutt Mengi as an epitome of all the sterling qualities required by a good educationist. He preached what he practiced. In the words of Ved Chauhan(Principal Oriental Academy,Jammu) “Venerable Dev Dutt Mengi was endowed with simplicity, novelty integrity, grace and above all education sight.”
His committed attitude, ardent measure and sincerity made him great celebrity. Mengi was an educational administrator of par excellence who used to listen to everyone sympathetically, established fair and constructive policies, created an atmosphere of mutual understanding and good will and recognised moral implications in all administrative affairs.
In 1967,he retired from School Education Department of J and K State and served for about 35 years .Immediately after retirement great personality got an opportunity to be the first Principal of KV NO 1 Gandhi Nagar and served their for the period of two years. He transformed his ideals into reality. He established a high school in Gandhi Nagar area in 1969 with meager role of 210 students. His dedication and his team of true scholars made all efforts to develop the institution as a model one in the State. He gave his far and soul to the institution up to 1983. 14th May 1983, was a shocking and sad day, when the great soul left for heavenly abode. A small and beautiful plant (Shiksha Niketan ) planted by visionary and philanthropist has now grown to a huge tree with its branches as Shiksha Niketan Higher Secondary School, Jeevan Nagar, R M College of Education and R M Public School with total roll of above 6,000 students. All these full-grown institutions are now being taken care of by true son of great educationist, Rameshwar Mengi.
In a most genuine and true estimation Dev Dut Mengi was great scholar, teacher, guide, philosopher, saint and magnanimous. A true son of soil was a great inspiration for all including students, friend, family and society etc.
“Dedication and sincerity never die but remain there for centuries together”.