“Class, I hope you all remember that your final examinations are commencing from next week,” said the class teacher.

The students replied in the affirmative.

The words had nothing unusual in them but for Ali, these words were a revival of his dreams as he had taken ‘every measure’ to lead in the class as he couldn’t see someone getting more marks than him. Ali’s goal turned into obsession and he made it difficult for his classmates to do their exam preparations well.

For instance, Ali hid a couple of notebooks of his competitors and never explained any concept to those who wanted his help. The worst was when he accused his competitors of cheating so that teachers become suspicious about them. Thus, Ali made sure, by hook or by crook, that no one stood a chance to do better than him.

Ali had always been was competitive. When he was young, he wanted to win everything, be it a speech competition or a toy at a friend’s party. If he failed to get what he wanted, he would throw a tantrum in a way that the adults would be forced to oblige him. This had encouraged his bad behaviour and thirst for winning.

This year too, he wanted to bag the first position in the finals and since he could not throw a tantrum now like he used to do, he adopted other methods to ensure that he would come first in exams this time.

However, despite Ali’s ambition, he was not at all interested in studying hard like all the other position holders did, but this didn’t stop his craving for the first position. Ali did manage to be among the top five students, through a bit of studying and much more of misguiding other students and cheating. Soon he became overconfident of his shrewd abilities. He didn’t feel guilty about cheating, instead he felt joy over his achievements through unfair means.

What Ali never thought of was that every bad deed done in this world gets returned in some way. And so it happened with Ali. On the day of his final exams, he felt so sick that he couldn’t get up from his bed. He tried hard, but due to high fever and body ache, he couldn’t move and remained there while his mum took care of him. He cried as he wanted to go to school but it seemed impossible.

He cried every day of the exams, but he felt so weak that he couldn’t even move. The examination week passed. Unbelievably, the day after the exams ended, he felt so fresh that he jumped up from the bed and went to the dining room where his parents were having breakfast. They couldn’t believe their eyes as it seemed that nothing had happened to him.

As the finals were done, his father requested the school to take his exams but the management refused. And so Ali had to repeat the same class, unlike everyone else who were promoted to the next grade. Ali was shocked as his classmates were his seniors now. That day, he realised that this was the punishment for his bad deeds. And he cried in his heart, but there was no way to turn back the time.

So friends whatever your dream is, please work honestly and don’t be dishonest and mean to achieve it because you are paid back for your deeds in this world.

Published in Dawn, Young World, June 1st, 2019