Some teachers teach subjects. A few teach discipline. Very rarely, a teacher teaches you how to be human. Mohd Maqbool Koot, lovingly called Mug Sb, belonged to that rarest category. I first saw him sometime around March, when I was in Class 1 at Mehboob-ul-Aalam Memorial Public School, in my native village Gundpora. He walked into the classroom with a white beard, a quiet presence, and a simplicity that, to a child’s mind, did not look extraordinary. I remember thinking innocently, even foolishly what could a teacher like him really teach us? I did not know then that the most enduring lessons of my life would come from this very man. Mug Sb taught us Islamiyat and Kashmiri. But he never confined himself to textbooks. Alongside lessons, he gave us tasks, reciting verses of the Quran, memorising duas we still recite after namaz today. His Kashmiri was so refined, so rich, that even as a child I sometimes doubted whether it was Kashmiri at all. It carried depth, discipline and beauty, shaped by years of learning and reflection. Like many teachers of his time, Mug Sb carried a stick carefully shaped, its branches trimmed, its tip crafted neatly. He always had a small knife in his pocket, and even the stick bore the marks of his meticulous nature. Corporal punishment existed then, but what stayed with us more was something else: reward. For a correct answer, for effort beyond expectation, Mug Sb would reach into his pocket and pull out sugar cubes. Those sugar cubes, small as they were, taught us something powerful that learning deserved sweetness, not fear. After school hours, when most of us went home to play, Mug Sb’s day was far from over. After 4 pm, he would walk from house to house, teaching children the Quran. Many evenings, I saw him returning on foot, quietly making his way back home. No announcement, no applause, no expectation of recognition, just service, repeated every day. Mug Sb’s contribution cannot be measured in years of service or number of students taught. It lies in what he gave us beyond academics. He taught us values, honesty, humility, restraint, responsibility. He taught us that life is not about living for oneself alone, that real life begins when you live for others. These were not lessons delivered as sermons. They were lessons lived, day after day, in the way he spoke, walked, taught, and served. His simplicity was unmatched. In a world that increasingly measures worth by display, Mug Sb remained content with very little. I do not even know how many sons or daughters he had of his own. What I do know is that he treated his students as his children. He called all male students by one name, his son’s name and all female students by one name, his daughter’s. In his eyes, we were not separate from his family. We were part of it. Such teachers shape villages quietly. Their influence spreads silently, passing from one generation to the next. Gundpora, like many villages, may never fully realise what it owes to Mug Sb. Neither can I. No words, no tribute, no remembrance can repay even a fraction of what he gave. But perhaps remembrance itself is a duty to say that he lived, that he mattered, and that his life made others better. As I write this, tears do not come from loss alone. They come from gratitude. From knowing that at a formative age, I crossed paths with a man who taught me not just how to read or recite, but how to live. Mug Sb may no longer walk those paths in the evening, or stand before a classroom with quiet authority. But his lessons remain in our prayers, in our language, in our choices, and in the values we carry forward. Some teachers leave classrooms behind. A few, like Mug Sb, leave people behind, better, kinder, more aware and that is a legacy no death can take away.   ( Author is RK reporter and can be reached at: malikshafat@risingkashmir.com)