CH 33: A SURPRISE PARTY

For students like me, the struggle for recognition had two facets. one was concerned with my degree and the other was concerned with my own recognition as a person. the college authorities were expected to do everything for the first part while, naturally, for my own recognition, i had to do whatever i could.
as i have elaborated earlier, the groups of like minded (and like funded!)started forming in our class. since we were averse to concept of closed walled groups, we never attempted formally to form any group. so we, i tapasvi and hemant remained aloof from all the groups, ultimately resulting in 'no group' group! our group also consisted students like bimal chhaya- a fanatic proprietor of no group theory, anish shah, chirag shah and of course biren gandhi-my room mate. but truly speaking, our 'no group' group was lacking in girl members.
as far as girls were concerned, hemant was least interested in any such relationship. in fact, though being a fair and chocolaty collegian, he was averse to girls! if any girl tried to take even a glimpse of  his face anytime in the class, his expression remained such, would never dare to speak with him.
for tapasvi, the case was different.It was  not that he was deeply interested in girls, but some how you could find him now and then in between bunch of girls and girls! may be he was very good communicator and knew exactly how and what to speak with girls.though he was a tall but an average guy,  his eyes were very caring and truthful, probably making him a very trust-able man.
in between these two, probably i was on a mid line. not averse to girls like hemant on one side and not a krishna kanhaiya like tapasvi on the other. i was a thin, a bit  dark skinned and serious appearing guy.honestly, i must say, not that i was not interested in girls but i never knew how to speak with them. as i have written earlier, my first experience of talking  with a college girl , that too my own classmate, added to my disability. i felt grossly insulted due to that bizarre event  and feared rejection every time when i talked with any girl.
thus, one day, when beji and jasmine invited us to join with them and to make a group,though facing full resistance from hemant, i was happy.  the original idea of forming a group was of beji.the group was officially formed and consisted jasmine, beji and anu from girls and tapasvi ramesh and me. But unofficially, all my other friends were in a way part of the group since they were joining us in one or other activity of their choice and this included hemant also.
beji was an uncontested dictator of the group activities. she was a keralian christian girl with big and naughty eyes, smiling face and sharp brain. she used to speak many a times in riddles that no one could ever understand (even today, if you wish to cross check my statement, just open up her facebook wall and look at her posts - half of them probably she might not be understanding herself!). still, to our gross irritation, she and jasmine would giggle and would say some words secretly in each other's ears, after such riddles!  she was very out spoken and liked to be at the center of the attention.she was a very confident girl assured of all her qualities. but strangely enough, though she appeared adult, sometimes she behaved like a child. the bottom line for her was - she liked to be liked !
jasmine, looked more like a shadow to beji, had a little desire to get noticed. it was her nature to study study and study. though she had thick glasses, i could notice, her eyes were full of tender innocence.she loved beji as much as she would endorse almost everything said by beji and would do everything to please beji. she was so much influenced by beji, she used to forget even her own independent identity in beji's presence.
to me, their friendship was something that made me feel valued for myself and added some answer to quest of my own recognition.
some times, beji and jasmine had weird ideas. like, on my very first birthday after my entry to psmc, they suddenly appeared on the gate of boys' hostel. it was hot evening time of the august. until now,all my birthdays were celebrated at my home. this was my first birthday away from my home. the whole day had passed like a routine one. how could i imagine, something would happen of such a kind, i would remember the day for the life!
" hello neh! let us go for party!" exclaimed beji and asked us to come for a surprise party. there was a colorful gift packet in her hand. i wondered what was there in! was it really for me?
we were summoned to our lecture hall's terrace. i tapasvi and hemant  climbed exhausting stairs to reach to our beautiful terrace. it was so high, you could feel like to be on a small mountain. since ours was a rural college, once you climb up, the eyes could feast on trees and farms all around, till the skies met the horizon.as the terrace was on the lecture hall there was natural almost forty five degree slope in half of the terrace making it a leisurely place. you could throw your body loose on the slope and enjoy the sun set. our psmc was a college with many couples and lovers - no doubt the terrace had many stories to tell and was full of hidden secrets!
jasmine, beji and anu were waiting for us.the sun was about to set.the air was clean and the terrace was glowing golden with setting sun's light. we all sat in one of the corner of the terrace and a candle was lit urgently.
Until now, i really hated the English way of celebrating the birth days. back at home, i used to celebrate the day with my friends without any kind of candle blowing or singing happy birth day. no friend was allowed to gift me. it was rule to give all something to eat but never a cake or a pastry. i used to ridicule my other friends which celebrated birth day in so called English way.
here, on the same occasion, things were up side down! everything was prepared beforehand. even, they bought some gifts for me. what gifts? they had a small packet nicely covered with a shining decorative paper.
'Hey neh, cone on! what are you waiting for? " looking at my hesitant expression, beji said. i was confused and was thinking if i could deny such a ceremony. but looking at the enthusiasm, it would have been too harsh behavior from me. i did not say anything and simply obeyed the order.
as soon as i blew the candle, all my friends sung "happy birthday"- the song i hated till date. before i could think more, the colorful box was put in my hand.  they asked me to open. to my surprise, there was a kite shaped water push button game of rings and there was a balloon attached with a noise making hollow wood stick.i was stunned.
"what is this?" i said in puzzled voice. what did they think of me? a child of 3yr ? a mentally challenged baby? i really could not understand how to react to it. i accepted it with a bit hesitation.
" cant you see boy?"within seconds, beji snatched my game and showed me how to play, as if i was the most dumb lad available around! she also blew air in the balloon with all her lung capacity and showed me how to blow in the hollow stick to make noise from the gifted balloon!
" so, you can play like this! " said beji tagging the line with her big smile. tapasvi laughed.
think of a situation when you are trying to behave more like a man but pushed by your girl friends to behave like a kid. any way, i had no option but to accept the gifts. i could have said no, but that could have hurt their feelings. i felt, the love and care shown  for me was far more important to respect than to stick to my beliefs and principles. probably that was not the time to have discussion on such a serious topic.
they had brought pastries and something more to eat. every one was happy. i was too! the evening was made special by making each of my friend sing for me something.
i remember, though i never played, i had kept those gifts carefully till recently with utmost care. it was a symbol of love and care showered on me by my new friends of the college. the quest of recognition started taking some shape.

CH 32 : MBBS OR 12TH PASS?

well, the strike was over and i soon joined my routine at psmc. since the time of the admission, i was very well aware of the un recognized status of the mbbs  degree of our college. however,.i and my parents were sure that the college would get recognition by the medical council of india. simlpy because we trusted name of hon. shree h. m. patel, once right hand of sardar patel. more over, there was no other option for me. i had to study at psmc if  i wanted my dream of becoming a doctor to come true. it was last chance for me.

however, many of my friends took the admission with sheer ignorance. like, as for example, my good friend jasmine mehta, opted for psmc leaving all big and recognized medical colleges of gujarat only because her home was just nearby at vallabh vidya nagar. she stood 1st in merit in whole of the anand district and was eligible for admission at any medical college! but unfortunately [and fortunately for me!] her parents never knew what the animal known as MCI looked like!

there were many such students which chose psmc only because of proximity of their home. most of such students were from ahmedabad and vadodara..

it was natural for all the students to feel depressed on the issue of recognition. so, though full of college life, fun and of course studies, our campus at that time had a kind of hidden depression. because, some where deeper in minds of the students the feeling of being un recognized reeled. even in happy moments of any group some one would unknowingly hint at the problem and the moments soon would perish in air.
once, when we were having some happy time, some one spoke of recognition. the discussion was going on at nursing hostel probably at bimal chhaya's room. ketan shah, popularly known as ketan dada, told some stirring technical facts.
" you know, we were knowing this since admission." he said " since we were paying full donation, we know all the technical aspects." all others become silent and his voice grew more serious
" presently, if you pass out even with flying colors, with your mbbs degree from psmc, you are not more than 12th pass student of the state." his statement stunned us." let me tell you no one from us would be able to claim any government job."
"so what hell will we do with such a degree?"
" just think over. we are hoping to get recognition of our mbbs course by medical council of india. till then, we are 12th pass!"
" and what does it mean when they say our course is recognised by the sardar patel university? i know our course is recognised by the university" said some one trying to console the group.
" it means nothing. i mean, you will be recognised graduates of the university but remember no one can practice medicine without recognition from the MCI."
"and why the hell this MCI is not recognizing our college?"
" you see, i tell you the process" ketan dada was son of a very well known surgeon from rajkot. his father and mother were in the profession since years. "any college when demands recognition from the MCI, it invites the inspectors from MCI to show the facilities provided to teach the future doctors. the inspectors would come and tell what still is remaining to comply with the minimum standards. the college would be recognized only when all standards are met."

" and this would be done finally only when our first batch passes out." added vimal hemani, my good friend.
"suppose if the recognition does not come by the time the first batch passes out. what will happen to that batch? "
" that batch would remain 12 th pass!"
" you mean for their life time?"
" no no. it means they would remain 12th pass till our college gets recognition. they would be recognized as doctors retrospectively as a rule." said vimal.
there was silence in the room. all we could to was just to hope for the best.
" presently, the president of MCI is dr ketan desai, our doctor from gujarat university." some one added his knowledge.

so, soon after period of elation of getting in an mbbs course,  this was a shock every one suffered who entered PSMC !

" and what about the post graduation?" a very relevant question.
" but first, tell me, do you really think we would be able to pass this mbbs?" ketan dada's comment made every one laugh. "any way, as of now, our college does not have any post graduate course. and neither we would be eligible for other university's PG course till the MCI recognizes our mbbs first."
"damn! we are trapped "

for me, at that time, just to be a doctor was the goal and post graduation meant nothing. i wanted to be a doctor and that would be served even if i was only an mbbs doctor. but to remain only 12 pass after five and half years blood sucking course? leave me, any one would commit suicide !

thus the waves of depression remained under current. the discussion was not limited to our campus. it gradually came to be a social stigmata. the people around us when asked about our study, we proudly would tell them about our gorgeous medical college. after listening everything, they would say  " okay, so, PSMC ! is that your college? that unrecognized one no?"  and would add " so what are your plans with such a degree?"
we frankly had no answer to such life questions except to keep mum and feel depressed. some one would feel pity on us while some one would say some words of hope. some times even parents of my friends got frustrated because of such discussions around them.
once, out of such frustration, we went to meet dr haridas,  hardly knowing his technical position. he was the head of the department of biochemistry. he was living in a bungalow near the main entrance of the college. he greeted us with a big smile.
"come...welcome..."
" sir what will happen to our recognition?"  we asked in panic.
" i hope soon it would be resolved" said he with wishful thinking. "all are trying their best. we hope to clear the inspection next time." our tender and innocent minds listened to him as if  we were listening to the head of the MCI assuring us!
" and sir, what about our post graduation? our college does not have such courses."
" in that case, government may ask the other colleges to keep five five seats for our students in each  of the medical colleges."
"wow! can this really happen?" sir showed us our day dream.
"may be.. let us hope so.."
though, sir, out of sympathy, showed us a day dream, we all believed in him and went away to our hostel room  and slept nicely that night! the reality was far away from what he said and we were not knowing what challenges we would face in future.

our batch was probably were fourth in a row since the admissions started at the PSMC. the first batch was soon to go for the exams and we were waiting eagerly to see what happened to them.one day, some one said the team of inspectors from the MCI was to come to inspect our college. they were to ascertain the facilities at the college. their duty was to make our education a quality education by forcing the college authorities to provide minimum needed facilities.

the atmosphere of the campus became charged with buzz of issue of recognition. what facilities did our college have at that time? briefly, the college building was already like a new bride. the hospital was functioning since a few years more than the year of start of the college. our college had a vast campus, big and well designed building for running not only all the needed departments but also a good library and indoor sports facilities for the students. ( not mentioning dark corners and open huge terraces essential for lovers and official couples!).

our library was studded with big big cupboards stuffed with thick and horrible medical books. the journal section was rich with probably all possible uninteresting books subscribed from world over.
. we had a huge play ground surrounded by eucalypti trees on one side and mango trees on the other.same way, we had rainbow of teachers in each of the departments starting from head to tails. the labs had adequate equipment and experts of the subjects. all the teachers of the 1st mbbs were full timers. looking at all these, we felt, how any inspector could deny us recognition? what was lacking then?

even if being students of first mbbs, we used to go to the hospital sometimes just out of curiosity. our shri krishna hospital was a big hospital with all the major departments functioning with full time staff. the hospital had different wards. but that is where we saw the problem.since ours was a rural medical college away from any populated city, the patient turn over of our hospital was low. we used to see hardly a few patients admitted  in wards.to be a good doctor, a medical student ought to be exposed to large number of patients.

when the dates approached, the college authorities started organizing health check up camps in near by villages and poured indoor patients in our hollow empty hospital wards to make up the needed number of patients ! we saw buses coming in our campus bringing people for admissions. god only could say how many of them were real patients! our wards looked like hospital wards first time ever since we joined.

i do not remember seeing the most wanted and still probably most disliked inspectors from the MCI but i do remember how depressed we felt when the news of denial of recognition arrived in the campus after few days of interval after the inspection.

there were different versions to explain. some people said, since h.m. patel was an honest man, he refused any favor to the inspectors and their bosses. some one said, dr ketan desai, the president of the MCI,  had some personal account to be settled with one of our senior professor. there were so many theories.hardly a few believed our college really lacked the facilities.

this was just start of the torture. we had to face the inspection by the MCI almost every year. plight of a student working hard in such an unrecognized institute can be understood only by his or her fellow students.

CH 31: MY ARTS COLLEGE

It has been now 22 yrs since I joined pramukhswami medical college. I do not remember why but there came a period of strike just after a few months of joining the college. It was the time when all of us just were getting familiar with each other and strengthening our new friendships.

As soon as the strike announced, all the students, freshly sick about their homes, departed immediately. I also left for bhuj. i promised my new friends tapasvi, hemant, biren, jasmine shah and others to keep in touch by letters. That time the world was devoid of any kind of mobiles! So forget about sms!

When I arrived back in my beautiful home town bhuj, apart from roaming around leisurely with friends, I had nothing to do. i already was awerse to reading medical books. There are only a few rare occasions in life when you wish to do something just to kill the time. It was such a time for me.

Three decades back, bhuj had only one arts cum science college and one commerce college. Both were and are on the same road and so the road is rightly known as the college road in bhuj.

The r. r. lalan college was one of the oldest and as old as my parents graduated from that college. Those of my 12th std friends opted to do B.sc. had to go to lalan college. Just to kill time and have some college fun, I joined my school friends suresh, yogesh and started attending the lectures at lalan college.

The college was a few kilometers away from the main city. I never had any vehicle and I used to enjoy riding my grandfather’s tall bicycle to join my friends in their college. The college campus was vast. After entering the campus, one had to go a kilometer or so to reach the red college building.the college was big but it was in many ways different than my college. it was big, but ill maintained. the corners were studded with waste papers, used ball pens etc.

while there were limited students in my college, i saw big herds of students in lalan college near every lecture all and corridors. in my college, boys and girls were seen freely interacting with each other. here, the groups of boys and girls were mostly seen non interacting. probably there was no social approval of good friendship between boys and girls. my friends told me most of such friendships were haunted by gossips.

the class rooms were big enough to accomodate about 100 students. but students were probably far more and each class was grossly over crowded. i remember a few lectures i attended. one day i went to a sanskrit class. the lady lecturer was a new one. she was to teach famous story by kalidas 'abhigyan shakuntalam'. it is a love story.

the class was full of students. all were talking to each other and there was big noice. some students were standing and some were still coming in while a few were going out. the big windows were good enogh to bring fresh oxygen for all of us and were also giving panoramic view of the beautiful campus outside. however, windows mainly were used to interact with friends peeping in from out side. entry of the lecturer hardly made any difference to the activities going on in the class ! the roll call was done and taking advantage of the chaos, many said "yes madam" on behalf of their friends wandering somewhere else! the crowd was such that it was imposiible for the lecturer to confirm.

the lecturer had some notes with her and she started speaking something from it. some good boys shouted "stop noice stop noice "to help the novice teacher. the noice lessened but coming in going out and peeping from windows continued. the lecturer was heard till a few feets.i was within that range.as she taught further a sanskrit word "paurush" was repeated again and again. succumbing to my nature, i stood up and asked "madam what is the meaning of paurush could you please explain for me?"

my question was totally un expected for her.it struck to her from out of blue.i was confident that it would be impossible for her to recognise me as an outside student. she was silent for a few moments letting the noice and chaos in class to increase. then she said paurush was a king and it also means a man. the answere not only dis satisfyied me but also the class. i really was astonised to find a lecturer in sanskrit unable to explain word paurush.

Not all class were same. husband of my 12th std chamistry teacher jyotiben, dr. trivedi was a prof of psychology and i attended his class after taking his due permission. that class was totally different and just like was any of class in my college. students sat with pin drop silence and greeted the prof by standing up as he came in.

" dear students, " said sir " before going for today's topic, let me tell you there is one guest student in our class, " he pointed at me "nehal  is a student of mbbs but out ou curiosity of the subject he has joined you friends today. i welcome him.."  i thanked sir by bowing by head to him. it feels very strange when all of the class suddenly starts staring at you. i took some time to settle my heartbeats ! sir's lecture was fine and like a learned artist playing his favorite instrument.

the experience in the lalan college thus was mixed. however, i also went to commerce college with my friends wich was couple of kilometers away from the lalan college. the atmosphere there was almost same.at commerce college, i had luxury to attend lecture of lecture of our respected professor dr vakhat sinh jadeja. he was teaching english to college students. and to my surprise, he had to teach from very basics as if he was teaching primary school children! i remember asking him a question in the class and he was so happy to answere it!

whenever i see any college, i always wonder wether the courses provided in such institutes have any meaning for leading a productive life. wether it confers even basic knowledge of living life, leave the honesty and mirality away. arts commerce and even science colleges add nothing to life except degrees.they eat away important years of our young generation. i feel all the courses should have either meaning in life or some kind of vocation. i feel no thrill to learn kalidasa when i know  that no one outside is going to offer me even a clerk's job even if i recite whole of the abhigyaan shakuntalam! i definately would enjoy learning it if it means getting creative writer's job in a news paper or something. 

meanwhile, the strike was to get over in my college. i had written quite a lot letters to my new friends and they also had replied to my pleasure. i still have copies some of those letters !

CH 30 :NEHRU'S FOLLOWER IN PANCHVATI THE SLUM

For me, going to panchvati slum every week became a ritual to feed my soul with my dreams and ambition to serve the needy. Amongst all my friends, I was one of the most regular in visiting panchvati. As I described earlier, panchvati was a typical slum with all the bad and a few good qualities. to be good friends was one of such good qualities they had. As our visits became regular, people started trusting us more. many became our friends and started sharing about their life.

Most of the people of panchvati worked in the farms nearby. Some had little jobs at karamsad. Many were not employed at all.so It was nothing surprising to see some one jobless. however, those which worked, they had to work very hard to earn their bread and butter.

While most of the workers looked tired in the evening, There was one man of around 50 yrs, which looked afresh most of the times. also, he had better hut and better clothes than his counter parts. his hut was just in front of our slum clinic. i really wondered as to what he was doing to make such a living?
" hey, kaka,may i ask you a personal question? what do you do for living?" one day i asked him ultimately, when he was leisurely passing by our clinic.
" me? " he stopped.
"yes kaka. i never have seen you working. how do you make living?" i exclaimed my curiosity completly to him.
he stood still for a while. might be he was hesitant to reveal. probably he might be a retired man living on his son's income that he disliked to reveal i guessed. i felt my question was too personal and intrudive. i thought i should not have asked such a personal question.
after a few seconds he made up his mind to reveal the secret. "my son, do you know? when i was young, there was a great leader..."
-leader of his times? hey, what is he up to? would he talk about some swamiji? a bhagat? or might be ganghiji? no no. he might not even know gandhiji. his talk made me more eager.
" yes kaka.."i said trying to hide my curiosity.
" his name was javaharlal nehru.." wow! kaka knew nehru! what a blow!
"he used to tell all the indians to go back to villages and start gruh udyog (small scale business managed totally at home). this would uplift not only your family but also your village and the state and the nation ultimately..." he gestured totality with both of his hands to mark his point.
"so my son, i decided to start a gruh udyog here. that is what i do for living..." he smiled. i never knew he was such a great man! His hut was just in front of our clinic and we were totally unaware of his gruh udyog. but what exactly was he doing? should i ask him to show us? his talk gave me more confidence.
" that is simply great kaka! we never knew it! but can you allow us to see your gruh udyog?" i was eager to see and so i asked him.
Again he looked in a bit confusion. might be, he was doing some gruh udyog like making papad or khakhra that is mainly percieved as women's work and so he was again hesitant. again he needed some more time to think on my demand. probably he was making up his mind to say no.
" okay son i will show you what gruh udyog i run." he agreed.
" thanks a lot kaka! may we, i and my friend tapasvi come with you right now?" i jumped immediately.
" that will not be feasible. you can come next week when next time you come here in your clinic.you need to come in the late evening." it was difficult to wait till next visit but there was no option.

Usually, we worked at panchvati in evening. After finishing our routine clinic or some community work, we used to return to our hostel at around 7.30 pm. we could visit kaka after that time.

that evening, while returning from panchvati, curiosity about kaka's gruh udyog had studded my mind. i and tapasvi talked about the kaka on the way wondering about his gruh udyog. the man was really great as he came to his village just for following advice of our great first prime minister.

and again the day came. i and tapasvi both were eager to reach to panchvati and go to kaka's hut to see his gruh udyog. both of us started our routine work. while examining patients, suddenly we heard a big cry outside. the voice was of some old lady. both of us ran out side our hut clinic along with our other friends.the cry was from the next street. we ran in that direction.

we saw an old lady of about sixty loudly cursing her husband for something.she was standing outside her hut and her old husband was on char pai -cot- sitting loosely with dirty clothes. the grandma was shouting and her husband who appeared half asleep, was probably not listening to her at all! to our surprise nobody but it was only us who ran out for the shouting.

we all were puzzled as to what to do. a local from nearby hut came to us to solve our confusion.

" just leave them..." he gestured at the old couple." both of them are drunk and this is their daily business..." damn! what kind of people they were! drunk every evening and quarreling?As i saw them again i immediately recognized the grandma. she was none other than one which was coming to our hostel in evening to sell carrots cucumber and tomatoes.she used to sit at the big gate of our girl's hostel and was very popular amongst girls. all used to call her "masi". she was very keen in observing the boys and girls. some times her awkward comments were enough to give a spark to quarrel.it was her routine to come to our campus daily.

and here she was buying liquor daily from that money she earned from the hostels! really, such kind of people waste even something they have. it was pity she and her husband both could get the liquor. some one must be supplying the whole area. home service like milk man!

masi's shouting lessened, as she started crying.for all the neighbors, this was probably routine. no one seemed concerned about her crying. rather, some people were smiling looking at the poor old lady.

i had heard about the ill effects of liquor- physical economical and here i was witnessing social. i felt liquor must be banned. no one should be able to get it. for masi, apart from witnessing her sorrows, we were unable help. gradually her crying lessened and we went back to our work. we felt very sorry for the old couple.yes, we forgot kaka's invitation to go to see his gruh udyog because of this mess. we remembered suddenly when we were packing up our clinic.

"hey,tapasvi we almost forgot kaka's invitation today. let us go." i told tapasvi
"yes. that masi's cry made us forget even our souls! it still hurts inside.any way, let us go to kaka." said tapasvi.

kaka was sitting outside his hut on char pai in his routine clothes. he was expecting us. he stood up as he saw us coming.
" ram ram kaka." we greeted him.
"ram ram. come here with me." kaka gestured to come into his hut.
his hut was a typical one of a slum with a few steps to climb to enter a chali outside. the door was little smaller than needed for an average adult to enter. i had to bend my head but tall tapasvi needed to bend whole of his body to pass from the door!

there was small main room poorly lit with tungsten bulb. there hardly was any furniture. walls were studded with photos of different gods and goddesses. a kitchen was attached to main room that hardly could accommodate a person.there was small window in the main room.
kaka guided us further in again from a small door. the room we entered had no windows to my surprise. kaka stopped near a steel drum of about half a meter hight. the drum was kept on a chulha. fire was lit with sticks below. smoke was filling up the whole room from the burning sticks. drum was tightly closed and a pipe was coming out towards a glass bottle kept at some distance from the chulha. some clear liquid was coming out from the open end of the pipe along with some steam. a white big funnel was kept to stop spillage outside the bottle.

" now tell me boys isn't it like your laboratory in your college?" said kaka in proud voice. "when i was young, javaharlal nehru told the youth to go back to their villages and start their own gruh udyog." he went near his assembly and put his hand under the end of the pipe to get a few drops of the liquid he was making.
"see? it is pure!" he showed his hand to us.
"what is this kaka?" looking at the hand smeared with the liquid, i inquired.it was smelling bad like a hell.
"don't you know? this is liquor!" kaka opened up the damn secret! so this was his gruh udyog! it was nothing unbelievable but surely it was unexpected. tapasvi looked less surprised than me may be because he had seen mone villages than me.i really was surprised.kaka, a hero for me just before a few minutes suddenly turned villain! he might have his own excuses for staring such a devilish production center. but no excuse can be entertained for any work that can ruin lives of other poor people.
" i will show you how to check when it is perfectly ready." kaka started enjoying his show. "i learnt all this when i was young at ahmedabad." he extended a small container under the open end of the pipe to get a few drops in it. he put it on the floor and lit it with a match stick. biff! the liquid caught fire immediately.
" can you see? if it is ready and pure, it will immediately catch fire.i take utmost care for the quality." kaka explained his deep knowledge.with a blow of air from his mouth, he extinguished the fire.
" when nehru told the youth, i was wondering as to what could be done by me at my village. then i learnt this. this is my small scale business." he was as proud as any self made business man. i and tapasvi both were speechless. technically, kaka had created a wonder despite the fact that he never had seen a school. but morally, was he right? the law of land in gujarat would not permit sell or making of liquor. but what would we say if an industrialist starts an official plant of making wine out side gujarat? lawful? simply because he could throw money to make it lawful? difficult question to answer.
kaka showed his business with zeal.thank heavens, he did not offer us free treat of his pure product!

now i could understand from where did the masi and her husband got the ticket to hell. in fact, On the way from panchvati to our hostel, we used to see a lot of whitish empty plastic bags. I wondered about those bags. In those days, plastic bags were not as commonly seen as today. In fact, the plastic revolution had not started yet.I had seen such bags, as I remembered, in bad lonely streets of bhuj. Some of my friends had told me such bags were used to pack locally made liquor. There used to have very typical rotten grape or jaggery like smell in the air around areas where such bags were thrown. Same smell and same bags were seen on the way back from panchvati to our hostel. the major waste seen in and around the ugly pond was of these bags.

naturally when production was local, it was very easy to get. but weren't they worried of police and jail? not at all. gradually it came our knowledge police used to come to panchvati, not to arrest people but to get hapta! so no tension for those making or taking! some times they used to stop their business for sometime to restart again after new setting. we heard that panchvati was notorious for this and they were supplying to even agents at ahmedabad!!

CH 29 :PANCHVATI: SEARCHING SOUL IN SLUM

The elusively named slum panchvati near karamsad village was 2-3 kms away from our hostel. Dr Mehta’s health circle used to work there. As a part of the health circle, we used to go there weekly. The slum was just touching a small dirty pond. (Presently there is sardar patel memorial in place of that pond.)

“So friends, how will you approach the people in the slum?” before leaving for slum, dr mehta asked us all “you first need to introduce yourself in proper manner. Let us play a role. Uma sister, can you please be a slum dweller for a few minutes?”

Uma was a senior student from nursing college and was very enthusiastic lady. She was natural leader of the nursing students. Our pre slum visit meeting was as usual at the small garden of dept of psm.

“Ok sir. This is my home and I am sitting outside.” She said as she folded her legs on the lawn. “Who is coming to my home?” she smiled.

“Yes neh and tapasvi go to her and introduce yourself. Do it as if she really is a lady from slum!” dr mehta asked us.

We both stood up as all other friends of ours watched us. We approached ‘the slum lady’, uma sister. She was not shabana aazmi or something but was very honest about the role play.

“Ben,” started tapasvi “namaste! My name is tapasvi” he turned to me “this is my friend Neh. We both study in medical. (That is what the local public used to call our grand college!)

Uma looked to us skeptically “so why are you disturbing me then? Go to medical and study for yourself. Let me do my home chores.”

“Ben, we are here to teach you people about how to keep healthy.” I said a bit in proud manner.

‘just a minute there neh,” dr Mehta interjected immediately “ you must remember you are not obliging her but rather she is obliging you by allowing you strangers to go near her home. Be more polite.”

“Ben namaste!” I folded my hands made my tone softer and shabana- I mean uma sister- could not help herself from smiling. “My name is neh. May we talk to you for a minute?”

This time uma acted less apathetic to my request “yes please” she said
“We both study in medical near your village. We are here to talk with you and others. We want learn about how you live. We will also run a small clinic here and you and your family can come to us if anyone is sick.” I tried my best.
“You are welcome here.” Said azmi at last. Dr Mehta approved.

Dr Mehta gave us small bag of drugs and we started walking towards the slum. It was 2-3 kms away from our college. It was evening time.

The entry to slum was typical. There was filth and dirt every where on even the main road. Native dogs stared our party but somehow allowed us in as it was not complete dark then! The goats wandering outside were very indifferent to our movement. Dr Mehta and our seniors already had contact with the people of slum and so some of the people greeted dr Mehta as we headed in.

The houses were ill ventilated and mostly were made with mud and stones. There was collection of dirty water here and there. As it was evening, it was time to cook and so sagdis were lit near some houses with thick smoke coming our from the coal. The smell of the smoke filled our nostrils admixed with the smell of dirty waters. Probably there were no bathrooms and toilets in any of the house. The pond near the slum served as a huge open toilet for them. It also provided the luxury of water to wash their clothes.

some men of the community were probably coming back to home from the farms where they worked. some old men were relaxing on hand woven char-pai just at the entrance of their huts. some were seen in groups-relaxing, smoking bidis and talking something to each other. they hardly noticed us. we also noticed some age old grandmas outside their home smoking bidis! this was a strange and striking similarity of page thee celebrities and slum grandmas!

a few mothers were seen with their babies in their hand.they were hardly concerned about the house flies irritating en mass on the nose eyes and mouths of their loved ones. by looking at them, it was horrifying and obvious, they must had not been given bath since days.in schools, we read what mahatma said "uncleanliness is our national disease". this was live demonstration of that terrible fact.

we heard there was no any school or anganwadi! but how any one could forget god? of course there was a small temple of some goddess just at the center of the slum. it was probably the cleanest part of the slum.

Some children were playing on the street. They were first to be disturbed by our movement. As they looked at us, I could see feelings of amusement in their eyes. Some of them started following us. Some ran to walk in front of our small procession. A few dogs also joined their friends. Soon, a herd of children collected around us.

Dr Mehta stopped for a while and turned to children “children, can you all please repeat loudly what I say? Let all of your friends and mothers in kitchen listen to you.” The children were already excited to do something.
“Je khay chana, te jive gana” (those who eat Bengal gram, live more) he shouted the slogan. And the mass of children repeated pulling their vocal cords apart!

“ je khay bhaji, eni tabiyat taji!” (Those who eat green leafy vegetables, have good health) again the repetition was like to break the sky in pieces! ‘How come such a post graduate of medicine shouts slogans on the road? Isn’t he worried of his social status?’ I thought.

“Je khay mag, ena jor ma chale pag” (those who eat green gram, walk with strength) dr Mehta banged the ground with his foot as he spoke “pag” making a thud. The sounds of thump made by small children with their tiny unclean feet filled our ears and I still can hear that!

As we progressed in, other children joined us. The elders saw us with questions in their eyes. From the streets, our circus traveled to a small hut. One school aged boy, probably his mane was ramesh, as I faintly remember rushed to us with some keys in his hand. He was probably son of the head of the community.

The hut was given to the health circle for running the weekly clinic. Some of my senior friends soon arranged the drugs and took out the hallmark of the doctors- the stethoscope!

kp, one of my seniors, was a great enthusiast. He took all the children to a small ground and arranged them in rows. He stood in front of them and asked the children to do physical exercise with him. others sat down in the hut and started the slum clinic as a routine.

This was a completely new experience for us. we had read about true India in our books. This was in front of our own eyes- poor, dirty, illiterate, crowded, un organized, backward… far from the world we came from. It was a different world.

but still, despite all disturbing facts, one striking fact i must remember- the people of the slum were caring for each other. whole slum was probably a single family. if some one was sick, he or she was accompanied by relatives and the neighbors - without any yearly premium paid! like many parts of india, families were joint. no elders were thrown away from their homes however sick or dying they were!

we could see love and affection in eyes of the elders of the community for us.they relied on dr mehta, relied on us unconditionally.

With all odds, they still were making their living. They welcomed us and soon accepted us.

ye mera India! I love my India!

CH 28 : MARU JIVAN ANJALI THAJO!

it was not only me, my best friends tapasvi and hemant both were also touched by dr rajesh mehta.

"tapasvi, i intend to go to dr mehta's weekly meetings. will you join me?" i asked tapasvi. though hailing from ruthless darbar community, tavasvi's make up was all different.though tall and powerful, he had very soft heart and was very emotional. he was a son of a famous poet,writer and director shree indu puwar. probably he and hemant were my only friends which could understand some of my odd ideas and emotional outbursts.

"yes neh, definitely we will go together. hemant also would like to come." i was almost sure of that.dr mehta casted a kind of magical spell on us.hemant, son of a medical officer, dr. ghanshyam shah, working at an interior village gothwa, was fanatically charged with emotions to serve the underprivileged. his family originally lived in today's pakistan before partition. on sundays when all others, including tapasvi, were gone home, i and hemant used to enjoy our solitude.many a times we had hot discussions for burning issues of our people. we would agree most of the times and some times not. we highly depended on each other to bring our ideas to action. when we discussed, he used to be very emotional. i remember one such night,when we had a very hot discussion. there was some dis agreement at a point. after fierce arguments, no one could convince. it all culminated in deep silence ultimately. after a few minutes i saw tears rolling by hemant's eyes.that made my eyes wet too. that disagreement was the greatest agreement made between two friends!

some of our seniors were already going to dr mehta's health circle.some had gone just for their curiosity. naturally different persons had different view points for dr mehta " that weird doctor? what he feels is he? his dressing and way of talking just irritates me! i never can accept such a doctor." said one of our seniors.

" you will spoil your time for nothing. he will take you to nearby slum and ask you to serve! he is a kind of half mad man.if you join him, you will also be like him! people laugh behind all those who go to his meetings!" another opinion from a senior.

"see, going to slum for service, talking about countrymen and how to uplift their life....all sounds sooooo good! but in reality what difference would it make to crores of such poor people? does he believe he can change the world just by this? i don't believe him!" some had more rationalized version to spell their negativity for dr mehta's activities.however, apart from a few such strong critics, most of the students, even if not going to his meetings, had respect for dr mehta and his activities.

on the day of meeting,there was nothing much to discuss amongst ourselves. we all three went there. the meeting was in our college building at a small garden of deptt of PSM. some students from medical college and some girls from the nursing college were sitting folding their legs making circle on the lawn.it was evening time after the college hours. dr mehta was also in the circle.he looked nothing different than in the class room.somehow i felt very soothing there.it was as if my hidden wish to do something for the poor was about to be granted. there were no any formalities. soon, dr mehta closed his eyes for prayer.from the way he sung, it was obvious he was not a singer but you could feel he could sing from his heart. all others joined him to complete the chorus. i remember only a few lines of that prayer presently.

jeevan anjali thajo maru jivan anjali thajo!
bhukhya kaje bhojan banajo, tarasya nu jal thajo!


( but i got full prayer from the net and copied it here!)


જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !

મારું જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !

ભૂખ્યાં કાજે ભોજન બનજો, તરસ્યાનું જળ થાજો;

દીનદુ:ખિયાનાં આંસુ લો’તાં અંતર કદી ન ધરાજો!

મારું જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !



સતની કાંટાળી કેડી પર પુષ્પ બની પથરાજો;

ઝેર જગતનાં જીરવી જીરવી અમૃત ઉરનાં પાજો!

મારું જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !



વણથાક્યા ચરણો મારા નિત તારી સમીપે ધાજો;

હૈયાના પ્રત્યેક સ્પન્દને તારું નામ રટાજો !

મારું જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !



વમળોની વચ્ચે નૈયા મુજ હાલકલોલક થાજો;

શ્રધ્ધા કેરો દીપક મારો નવ કદીયે ઓલવાજો!

મારું જીવન અંજલિ થાજો !



કરસનદાસ માણેક







the prayer churned our heart. it reflected our emotions soaring high at that time.it could wet corners of our eyes. but to be emotional was not everything. that emotion had to transform to a definite action. probably, i felt, dr mehta was able to give us that chance.

"friends, we have some new friends with us today" said dr mehta pointing to us." can you please introduce yourself?"
" tapasvi puawar from ahmedabad."
" hemant shah from visnagar"
"neh vaidya from bhuj"

"ok ...let me tell you something about this activity. health circle is a like minded friends group interested in doing activities which could help those who are in need.routinely , we go to nearby slum and run a clinic from them.we provide them free drugs.we also do preventive activities in the community. we believe in holistic medicine and rational use of drugs. we believe all human beings equal may they come from any religion, social or economic status. we have equal respect for all the religions. we want youngsters who believe in humanity and are determined to work for the change in the society."

thus our journey with dr mehta started. it was because of him, we could meet several good friends like kp, ragnesh, neeraj pandit, chavli, kadri, uma sister, meghna sister and many more. how could i forget jagdish soni? a gem of the persons i ever had met. he turned to be a true friend forever. dr. bhalendu vaishnav was a very good physician devoting time to activities of the health circle.

dr mehta's push gave us capacity, strength and determination to do what we really wished. he nurtured our tender feelings. it was because of him , we could meet some great people like vinay charul, daxaben-anilbhai-rashmibhai, dr ketan zaveri, dr shreedhar, dr anurag bhargav.they all were great inspiration for us ( and stll they are! they all need separate chapter for proper introduction.)


of course, not every thing about dr mehta's personality i liked. he was a staunch devotee of shree swaminarayan bhagwan. he had great zeal to read and to follow the holy book written by bhagwan shree swaminarayan, the shiksha patri. live me alone, i never even liked to go to any temple. some of his ideas were simply away from my routine reasoning. even if working vigorously in the villages, he would not eat anything from the market. leave the market, he would not accept any kind of food from the homes of the villagers- not even as a reciprocation of love shown by the villagers to him! he used to keep chana and peanuts in his pocket. that was the only thing he used to eat while working hours in the villages.

most strange part of his personality, however, was not this. even though he had master degree in preventive medicine, to our gross surprise, he was against the routine vaccination! this was completely weird! it was digestible if an illiterate villager refused the vaccination but when you know everything about vaccines and the diseases prevented by vaccination, how could you refuse it? still, he did. probably that had some strong religious reasons beyond my comprehension.

but still, could you stamp dr mehta a half mad man like some of my seniors? just because he dressed differently?just because he had some ideas to work for the poor? just because he was religious? for those who work for some change in the society, probably had to face such a strong criticism some time in their life. history is full of such so called half mad people which has contributed enormously to betterment of our daily lives. to my perception, dr mehta was one of such person. his dedication, determination and truthful nature was unquestionable.

dr mehta remained teacher, guide and a good friend for life time for all of us.

CH 27 : THE ENCOUNTER

Most of the professors in our college, especially in 1st mbbs, were typical professors. They had a specific way of dressing, usually, wearing suit and tie, nicely ironed, well polished shoes, and tidy haircut and always clean shaved. As for example, take dr mazoomdar, head of deptt of the physiology. He was seen in suit and ties most of the times and used to speak mostly in English. He had a halo around him. When he taught, his body language was like any professor teaching since ages! We also had seen real professors like dr s d nishith, an ex army man, teaching physiology.

Our dean was dr gulati, a pharmacologist, a very serious man,was always seen well dressed. His expressions some how appeared a bit concerned and tense. He had big spectacles with thick plastic frame. I never met him, rather may be because of his halo, some how, never dared to meet him. Our vice dean was dr rey, again an ex army man,who even though serving in medical college, probably still believed himself in the army! He had typical army like way of dressing and talking. I had to meet him couple of times for getting my identity card signed.

Barring a few, most of the teachers were unapproachable for a simple student like me. May be, it was because they were from different cultural background or mostly because my perception was so. for me and probably most of the other students, it appeared, professor of medical college meant a highly polished English speaking suit tied person.
however, if there are no surprises, it is not the life! It was a routine afternoon lecture of preventive and social medicine[psm], a subject disliked by most of the students. Usually, dr arya, who dared to teach richettesia (an organism somewhere between the viruses and the bacterial world, mainly responsible for trachoma, infection of eyes) in the very first lecture of PSM, used to come to teach us, I mean, to bore us with the subject.

However, since it was necessary to attend at least some 70% of the lectures to be eligible to give exams, the class remained mostly full in even such boring lectures. We were expecting dr arya in his routine professor’s suit, but that day, an odd man, rather, a highly odd professor entered our class.

He was lean thin and of average height. He was not in suit, neither he wore shoes, rather, even his chappals were not polished! He was dressed simply in shirt and pants. He probably did not care to do in-shirt. He had simple plastic framed spects and there was a big swaminarayan tilak on his forehead. His Hairs were immersed in hair oil. He looked more like swaminarayan devotee than a professor!

“ mitro”, to our surprise, he started in gujarati as he climbed the stage! “ maru naam dr rajesh Mehta chhe. (my name is dr rajesh Mehta).” And he continued in gujarati “ friends, can you all tell me why did you choose to become a doctor?”
He asked a very basic question. Probably a soul searching one for all of us.the class was a bit taken for a surprise.

“ when you did choose, you must have thought of about this. I really am interested to know about it. Can we go for a simple exercise?” his eyes were on all of us. “ I am giving you options. You choose from them and tell me.” The class responded silence as the agreement .

“ these are the choises… first, to earn a lot of money, secondly, to earn and to serve the society, thirdly to work and to see the god… be honest.. this has nothing to do with either your curriculum or exams..” and he started asking from the first bench onwards.

Almost all students chose the second option. but many of honest students emphasized on good earning too that made dr. Mehta happier. For me, money was not important at that time, I must confess. And my idea was mainly to serve the masses for which I left my much liked physics and engineering career while choosing branch at the time of counseling after routine 12 std exam results.

As far as seeing god, no way! Even a half believer at that time, I never had a zeal to encounter god. if suppose, i some how saw god, what difference would it make to others?would it improve their lives anyway? It probably was not important to see god but was important to care for his creation as I believed at that time.
So, for me too, it was the second option when was asked.
“ I really am happy. Almost all of you are truthful.do you know with what dream i entered the medical college?” Said dr mehta, looking deeper in his own heart.”i entered medical college dreaming to be a humble servant of villagers and poor people. through their service, i wanted to realize god. i dreamed myself going to interior villages on my own bicycle carrying essential medicines in a small box! friends, this dream, in a way , has not changed even today." he looked on our faces, unknowingly appealing some where inside." Ok let us now move to the subject..” he paused a bit before starting.


" do you know there are thousands of people getting dreaded disease like cancer just because of tobacco chewing? do you know so many deaths can be prevented just by saying 'no' to alcohol?....yes..probably all of you know this fact." he continued further in his unimpressive voice and un polished gujarati. "we need to spread this message to our people. we can go to people and tell them the facts,educate them and their lives can be saved."

"sir" suddenly i stood up. "sir how to convince those which already are addicted to alcohol or tobacco?"

" you can tell them the ill effects and tell them that they would die if the continue to their bad habits." dr mehta tried to convince me first.

"sir, such people would say they would die someday even otherwise. why not to first enjoy the life by all bad and good ways and then die?"as the students listened the discussion, i cited one of the basic argument of all the addicts. sir could not reply for a moment.

to this,whole of the class clapped!probably the claps were for my argument.this was very first time when whole of the class showered claps for me. i was a bit flattered and felt like winner. dr mehta raised his hand to stop the noise of the clapping students.after about a minute, when noise lessened, he said "you can tell them they would die an early, slow and painful death."

i sat down and dr mehta continued with teaching.this man was really a weird one! could you imagine such a doctor? he was not at all worried for the way he appeared to MBBS class and even to his own counter parts. no one asked us the basic question that he asked.and why should he be interested in asking such a question? may be he just wanted us to introspect. or did he really had something in his mind? when he spoke of his dream, i felt probably that was my dream too. though his voice was not impressive but was really truthful and was perceived directly from his heart.

at the end of the lecture, he said, "if some one from you is really interested in serving the poor, they can come to a small friend circle we have created. we have named it 'the health circle'. we meet every week and we go to nearby slum and do different health activities. i invite only those who really are interested. this activity is not going to help you in any of your exams. it will eat away your time rather. so you are welcome only if you really are determined ." and he left the class.

CH 26 : WELCOME PARTY:A SECRET REVEALED!

arrival of new batch remains ceremonial in any college. since ours was a rural college, away from the city atmosphere, we had advantage and disadvantage of being alone. we were like a small village where every one knows each other in detail! addition of 100 new students every year added new strength and flavor to the campus. seniors were,naturally, interested in juniors to make new friends and add to their groups.for the boys of the campus, a batch was perceived beautiful when there were more beauties in it!

to show and to prove how the ideal introduction of the freshers should be, it was our dream to organize an introduction party for our junior batch. we could not arrange it for our immediate junior hardik's batch but we could do it for the next batch.(vasu, chaula, chavli,kanuji).our way did not include any ordering, questioning or forcing anything. we wanted our junior students to come on stage, give their introduction and perform any item of their choice.that could give a chance to show their talent.demoralizing them in front of the audience or making them feel low by commenting very absurd was not a part at all.

at the same time, routine ragging was going on despite our opposition. from those happenings, everyday, some news used to trickle about the juniors. there was one girl which threatened seniors with police because her father was a policeman! one other girl was very smart and also fearless. it was heard,her quick answered made the seniors speechless!

one of the boys was taken to the terrace and was made to sleep on the floor in burning sunlight. we opposed that type of ragging. and so we had quarrel with our seniors as i mentioned in my previous blog.on the other side, some of the boys had no fear of ragging whatsoever!

whole of our batch took the responsibility of the event.we already were meeting every Thursday. we used that platform to organize welcome party for the junior batch. the best part of any of our program was, we never invited any so called big people like dean, heads of the deptts or professors to our events. so the events remained highly personal and liberal for all. also, we never used money for any event. a fine evening was chosen for the event. our batch mates invited all the juniors with a great zeal.

to our surprise, the juniors were very much talented.there were good number of stage performers.soon there was list of students who wanted to present something on the stage apart from routine introduction. everything seemed so smooth. but it was probably peace before a storm!

"whatever you say or do, we are going to teach a lesson to a girl in the program." one of my good friend warned me." that girl is over smart. she feels she can handle anything. we have decided to pull her legs when she comes to stage. we will not let her perform!" surely, they had the news from the routine ragging about that girl!

"that can spoil our event. i urge you to not to do any thing that ruins everything!" i requested. they laughed at my point nastily.
"neh, we promise to not to spoil everything but we definitely do something that the girl remembers for the life!"the red light was from the most mischievous group of our batch but we had no choice. i told the situation to my friends. since we never invited the big heads in any event, the events had to be self disciplined. we felt we should handle the situation as it arises. so despite this, we went on organizing the event.

the day came and we assembled in our lecture hall. we had a very big lecture hall having capacity of about 500 people.the hall was full with the spectators.there was no space to even stand in the hall.the bunch of the students which warned us also took their position. the noise of the students subsided as jasmine shah started announcement. if i remember, beji and anish were also managing the stage. juniors were warmly welcomed by our batch.

the juniors started performing. what would happen when that girl comes on the stage? that was the question repeatedly striking my mind. the event was smooth and all were enjoying the performance on the stage. i saw that girl sitting with her friends in the audience waiting for her turn. she was a fair lady, had boy cut hairs and European eyes.she looked a bit fatty and doll like. Would it be possible for her to perform? only time could tell. at the most she might have to leave the stage, or we might be forced to take some action on our batch mates. still, it was a matter of worry.

the performers mesmerized with their talents one by one.chaula madhavi and vasu sung nice songs as i remember. there were many more performers including vimpal, shikha, chavli, ronak, jeet.(correct me and add to this please)

finally, name of the "over smart" girl was announced increasing my heart beats. i really was afraid as any mischief could hurt her a lot on one part and could spoil relations amongst us on the other part. also, our ideal way of taking introduction of the junior batch was at a stake. now, this is what i remember perfectly- the boys started making noise with the announcement. who would save her? i thought.

to my surprise, the girl gracefully climbed on the stage and introduced herself.her hight was less. i felt as if she was not at all deterred by the noise and shouting by the boys.she confidently went on the stage and started speaking. as she started, the shouting increased, but she probably was made of iron. she was speaking as if the mischief makers did not exist at all! the way she spoke, all the boys against her simply were over ruled! all had no choice but to stop the shouting! her confidence was far more greater than any mischief makers would have thought of! she nicely performed dance with her friends crushing all the expectations of my good friends like a big bulldozer.

i simply was speechless.the girl was none other than soniya! hats off to her!practically she ragged all the seniors. the event was a grand success.

CH 25 :RAGGING JUNIORS?

(i must admit that even after having bitter relations with some of the seniors in those days, after wards, almost all helped us and became good friends. it was just difference of opinion at that time. i must remember sanjeev rao and sajan nayar at this point.)

when our immediate junior batch arrived, we were just adjusting ourselves in the campus because that batch arrived within just six months of our admission to pramukhswami medical college. but since we had grown a bit, we had our own ideas of first time interaction with the junior batch. memories of our own ragging was afresh. we, especially, hemant, tapasvi and myself were highly against routine way of ragging.bimal, vimal, anish, kapil were with us.

when the new batch arrived, ragging re started like a routine college ceremony. some of the boys were made to do things which were highly demoralizing. it all disturbed us a lot and we felt ashamed of being senior students and doing nothing to stop this madness. even some of our good friends turned bad raggers as they became seniors.the girls' hostel was also not an exception to such activities.( beji, one of our best friend, was considered a good ragger. i still do not know for what reason!)

hemant being a highly idealistic man, complained about all of this to the authorities. naturally many of our seniors disliked his action. we had some good and fearless seniors like jagdish soni and amiruddin kadri to be on our side. there were some good teachers who wished to see good culture in our college. notably, dr rajesh mehta and dr bhalendu vaishnav.

it was not surprising to find most of the seniors and even our batch mates against our anti ragging ideas. while some of them just enjoyed ragging the juniors, others rationalized their actions in name of "good introduction leading to good friendship". some students had feelings of revenge translating into repeating what they suffered as freshers like mother in laws seen in tv serials! we saw our own batch mates, which were highly against ragging at the time of our batch's ragging, turning raggers when they become seniors. some wanted to rag just to prove themselves superior and authoritarian, while others believed to do such duty to save the culture of the college.

A few had an argument that since the world was full of bad people and experiences, they were just preparing their juniors for such a world by ragging them badly! they simply wanted to make the juniors bold. so in their opinion, they were doing a great social work!

we felt ragging an in human and cowardly act in which a group of seniors would order some weird and demoralizing actions to a helpless fresh junior.

but to our surprise, many of the teachers had pro ragging ideas. some of them used to ask seniors " teach some good manners to your juniors!" so, made up of such a students committee,even after hemant's official complaint, the authorities did nothing to prevent ragging. thus , in a way we were in a great minority and figures of dislike in the campus.

however, there was something more to happen. one day just when i was going to college, rao, our student leader,stopped me near the boys' hostel staircase.

"what do you believe you are? we are not going to tolerate you... understood?" he really was unhappy.i had no answer. he gave me a staring look for a few seconds and climbed the stairs making noise of his foot steps.

even today, i am not knowing, whether there was any relation of the following event with what rao said.

for some reason, hemant had to go to his home for a few days. at one good evening, i and tapasvi just were entering the boys' hostel. we were stopped by some strange looking outside boys.

"hey you both! stop here. are you friends of that white boy hemant?" one tall boy inquired. "where is that (...)!"
"what is wrong? he has gone home" i replied.

" he has assaulted our sister. tell that (....) we will break all his bones if we find him!" he warned us "take this as our last warning. tell him to behave well or we will create hell of his life... ok?". they went away.

hemant mis behaved with a girl? no one on this earth could believe that! in fact he was a boy never interested in any of the girls of the college or outside(except one- with whom he married afterwards.) he never spoke a single good or bad word for any of the girls.

it was very clear to us that the out side boys just wanted to have some point to start the quarrel. it was easy to blame any college boy for such a reason. any one would be furious to such a false accusation.

when he came back, we decided to not to let him go anywhere alone. he was a fearless man and nothing could deter him from what he was doing. despite threats, he continued to work against ragging. later, in his own secret ways, he met the leader of those strange boys and resolved the issue as far as i remember. they were locals from karamsad and were told to give threat to us, especially hemant.

since we were the minority, our movement probably could not do much in our perception. but definitely, it created a firm opposition to raggers which had effortless dominations till then. (only, students of our junior batch, chavli, kanuji, hardik, padhiyar,sejul can comment more on the impact of our opposition)

i remember taking introduction of some of my junior friends in my own way. sejul was one of them i still remember. i do not know how he remembers this event or if at all he has the memory!

i met him at old boys' hostel in bimal's room. bimal, not a flagship anti ragger but definitely a humanitarian, was talking to sejul and rajul. he asked me to have some word with sejul. i remember requesting sejul to come for a walk with me and we talked on the way. i asked about his native and interest, told about mine. we also talked about our hobbies and i offered him friendship which he accepted and remained so till date.

some of our seniors asked us a genuine question. " boys, if you are against the present way of introduction, how senior batch should interact with the freshers? the must be some way. or there will be no interaction between the batches at all. what kind of culture do you want in the college?"

But we had ready made idea- we wanted to arrange an introduction party to our junior batch. the idea was to invite all of the juniors to the function and let them perform on the stage any thing of their choice. our batch was already meeting every Thursday.so the idea clicked.(see my next blog story)

CH 24 :CONNED BY GIRLS?

CONNED BY GIRLS?

[kindly hit "like" button if you like The story]

Any medical college class is blessed with at least 50% population of girls! So was ours. Our engineer counterparts were very poor ! they hardly had a few girls in whole of the campus. If you want to really feel “the ground impact” of reverse sex ratio, just visit any engineering college campus! Our campus was colorful that way. Also, there were many couples in every batch, making our campus lively real college campus.

Every corner of our college corridors was mostly occupied by one or other couple. You could see the senior batch’s couples happily riding on bikes, chatting under beautiful mango trees, walking holding hands late night on our no traffic campus roads, eating together in the mess, reading side by side in the library, or sometimes some couples were seen in dark corners and deep eucalyptus jungle of our campus.

Heena, my classmate, sometimes used to say jokingly “ I really am fed up with these couples. No corner, no tree, no reading place is without them! They are creating indirect pressure on all of us!!”

Our seniors rightly named our campus mini Switzerland. It really was that in all the aspects- beautiful, near the heart of the nature, away from routine life of a city, perfect for romance! Chemistry of our magical campus also started to have its own spell on our batch.

Sameer, one of my good friends, was a tall, handsome, stylish and fair boy of my batch. Also, he was my dissection and lobby partner. Because of late admission, a girl was added to our dissection batch- margi. She was a frank and friendly girl. She used to talk a lot with all of us. as seen in our films, after meeting on dissection table, shortly sameer and margi fell in love. They got wholehearted support from almost all the batch mates. while Their union was matter of celebration for all of us, Their news created a shock wave in the campus because they were just 1st MBBS students! Some people were really not happy with the news as margi was from a hindu family while sameer was a muslim. However, I must say, they made a perfect couple ! soon, their families agreed to their decision and they became the first official couple of our batch!

From our senior batches, there were number of couples. A surprising fact about all the couples was, we had never heard any break up at that time! The couples were respected by all, even the teachers. The couples were graceful. I must remember priya and GD at this point. They were icons for us.

For me, naturally, the subject of love was more of human rights than a personal one! Like in any college, There were many boys in line looking for perfect love. All had their own way of presentation. Some were stylish, some were impressive. I must admit I never was part of the line but at the same time I was not completely averse to it.

To my perception, I was an average boy, un stylish, non impressive. Most of the time, I used to wear khadi clothes. i Never used anything more than a routine soap, not even shaving cream! Khadi gave me probably a staunch gandhian look. Was not this enough to be a repellent for fair sex? Add to this my inclination towards one of the most hated subject by elite class and most of the medical students - social work and community medicine! My portfolio was still not over. I was one of the most irritant student of the class as I used to ask many questions to the teacher when everybody else wanted to complete the class. despite my un ending queries, I neither was a ranker nor was a scorer of my class. rather, I hardly was able to clear the routine exams…. nothing impressive! I wasn’t a sportsman. Skating, cricket, swimming, table tennis even chess, carom – I knew nothing. Yes, I was a bathroom singer and a half poet! I never had a bike. leave the bike, in fact, I did not know how to drive even a gearless scooter like kinetic!

As our first terminal exam approached, I started reading the subjects my way. On the day of the exam, we went to big lecture room of our new college building. We were given seats and the examiners started distributing the question paper. The exam was of anatomy. It was my habit to not to read the whole question paper and start answering it. Hilariously, I used to write whatever I knew at length- so my short notes looked assay and assays appeared like short notes! I never used to see the clock while answering. It was foolish, I accept, but It was routine for me to sacrifice couple of compulsory questions as I used to write everything including the optional questions!

When I was trying to prepare myself again for such “heroic” blunder, suddenly , I noticed a crying girl in the class. I gazed there and saw a girl crying and telling something to our tutor and supervisor, dr rakesh Gandhi.

Dr Gandhi, being a perfect teacher, was talking empathetically with the girl. He persuaded something and within about 10 min, the girl again sat down for exam. Why should one cry at all for such a terminal exam? Was it as important as life? Even if you fail, there was not much to loose as it was only a terminal exam.. It sounded ridiculous to me. ( at that time I was not aware that the crying spells just at the time of exam were awaiting to create hell for me in future!)

When result was out, despite coming from gujarati medium school, that girl scored the highest, while I hardly passed. In our class, she used to sit on the first batch vigorously noting down probably everything spoken by the teacher. While I used to ask questions in the class, she never did that.

I had very little information about her as heard from others. She did not stay in the hostel. She was a local coming from vallabh vidya nagar. While I was sharing third rank with shantilal in my v.d. high school’s 12th std class and was second last to get in the medical curriculum, getting admission only at psmc, Some one said she stood first in anand district 12th exam and was getting admission in all the medical colleges of Gujarat. She opted for psmc only because it was near to her home. I came to psmc all the way from bhuj because I wanted not only to be a doctor but also wanted to learn independent life. She used to wear thick minus glasses. She also was the shortest girl of our class. she was the youngest too as some one told me. I was the oldest.

She used to come to college on her kinetic Honda. Mostly, she was seen with beji and anu, on her back seat while driving in the campus. I never had spoken to her.
Once just after the class, she asked me “ hey neh, how come you ask so many questions in the class?”
“Just like that….you know..” I fumbled. She smiled and went away. She was jasmine.

For my college day’s poetry, Good friends like vimal used to encourage me in those days( as today!). vimal was kind enough to share my poems with his like minded friends. Also, he used to read my poems to jasmine.
One day, just after our anatomy dissection class, jasmine was out side the hall waiting for some one. I casually said hi to her.
She said “ your writings are nice, neh! I like them. you are a good writer..”
“ when you stand in front of sun, your shadow will appear far bigger than what you are!” I told jasmine “ it is because you are kind enough to praise me.” thus, gradually, our friendship got tuned in!

Soon after, jasmine became an uncontested 1st ranker of our class. the second number usually lagged far behind her tally of marks. There never was neck to neck competition for her. Competition practically started from the second rank onwards in our class!

Jasmine was very good comparer on the stage and she had natural capacity to keep the audience spell bound. She could handle the whole college mob with microphone in her hand. Her voice was as sweet as honey. I witnessed her capacity in our college function ‘brain wave’. She used to win extemporary public speaking competitions. She did contest in a personality game conducted by dr hegde and gave tough competition to raju panjwani, the 1st winner.

Our Thursday meetings were probably best place for our interaction where jasmine and anish used to be the default announcers.

Amongst the three, jasmine, beji and anu, beji was not only talkative but also naughty. Her gestures and behaviors were sometimes difficult enough to interpret. She was able to create a slippery and mysterious land of her own. Probably she liked to be of such sort.
Jasmine was very transparent that way and anu was a bit narcissistic.

One day, beji and jasmine came to me and tapasvi.
“ hey, can you be a part of our group?”
I, hemant, tapasvi and bimal used to hate the groups. We believed in friendship with all. Groups were perceived against our discernment of equality. They also had same way invited ramesh, a ranker of our class.
However, I and tapasvi felt there was nothing wrong in being good friends wether you name it a group or not.

“ that is ok. But we dislike groups. We will be good friends…”said tapasvi. They both looked happy.
“ so we are to meet at college terrace today evening. Is that understood?” ordered beji.and we agreed.

Back at the hostel, when hemant heard the news, he ridiculed us. “ girls and girls! You have fallen prey to them! Lattu thai gaya ne!”
“ hemant what is wrong with just friendship with like minded peoples? You name it a group or not. You also may join with us.” but hemant was staunch enough in his ideas as always.
“do you know neh, one of your group member had proposed to a boy while singing poem!! Now you are going to be part of such a group! Ha ha ha!” he made mockery of us. ( note : hemant was wrong. He had misinformation.)
That was not all. Bimal also had a very strong opposition. “ you have betrayed our ideas neh!” he said unhappily “ now you will do everything that we hated till date. I never can be part of such activity”

Still, they could not deter us from “joining” the group. We met on the terrace of the lecture hall.
CONNED? i still am searching the answer!!.... :))

CH 23 :STORY OF A SPECIAL DONATION SEAT

[this is a true story of a girl student of pramukh swami medical college, heard from a very authentic source. Obviously, the true names have been changed..]


When dr.joshi passed out from the medical college, before about half a century, there hardly were any doctors in the area he chose to practice. Dr. joshi could have been a money making machine like others. But he had a different mission. He believed in providing medical service to the poor people around him first. Money was a pure by product of his service. Day or night, winter or summer, dr.joshi was always there to serve his patients.

Soon, he became very popular in his area. The public around him recognized his services. One day, when he was busy in his clinic, a young vibrant sadhu rushed in his chamber.

“doctor, can you please come to visit my guru? He is very sick and is not able to come here…” said the sadhu breathing fast.

“ ok. Where is your guru?” dr.joshi was ready to serve as always.
“just a few kilometers from here..but I have come with a car. We can come back as soon as possible.” said the sadhu .

Dr.joshi took his emergency bag and went along with the young sadhu. Soon, they reached. the guruji was really very sick. The guruji was none other than shri yogiji maharaj from akshar purushottam sect of swaminarayan. Dr.joshi examined yogiji maharaj and prescribed medicines. Dr.joshi’s knowledge of medicine worked again like in his hundreds of patients and after a few days, maharaj became normal.

Then it became routine for the young sadhu to come to dr.joshi and escort him to his guruji whenever it needed. Guruji was very happy with his services and he blessed the doctor every time.

Years passed by. Dr.joshi almost forgot the incident but his selfless services continued. Meanwhile, dr.joshi became father of a beautiful daughter…meena. From his busy practice, he always would find time to play with his beloved daughter. She grew like the princess of fairy tales. She Not only was intelligent but also she was very studious. It became very clear to friends and family around her that one day she would become a doctor like her father. She also wanted to be a doctor. Dr.joshi was also very sure of meena’s academic performance. Soon , meena passed out her 10th std exams with flying colors, adding ambitions to her father and the family.

But life is full of surprises. Even after her genuine efforts, meena could not score the required marks needed to enter a medical college. She just missed it by a few numbers.

The dream appeared broken.

“ dr.joshi, is only because of bad luck that meena could not score in 12th std exams. Why can not you send her to pramukhswami medical college on a donation seat?” some of the friends suggested.
“ no. I can not do this. If she wishes to be a doctor, she has to be on merit. A doctor has to be meritorious.” Dr.joshi had his own ideas.
“ do you really believe that those who have scored few marks more than meena are far better than her? There are 10 donation seats. If you do not try for meena, they are to allot it to some one else with may be even far lesser marks than meena. Would it be good for the society?” at last after much more persuasion dr.joshi agreed to try for a donation seat at pramukhswami medical college karamsad.
“dr.joshi, don’t you remember your services to yogiji maharaj years back? Major donation to pramukhswami medical college is from them. You can remind them while you represent. They are the final authority for all donation seats.”

“oh. That was decades back. Who would remember that.? And shri yogiji maharaj has passed away years back.” dr.joshi was skeptical.

However, in whole of his life, dr.joshi never asked any favor from any one around him. It was really very difficult for him to go to some one and request. But this was different as it was related with life and career of his beloved daughter.

Dr.joshi finally convinced himself to go to pramukhswami maharaj and request him for a donation seat for meena.
“ in which words should I request? Will they listen to my request? Or they just will not let me represent? Would it be prudent to remind them of my services to yogiji maharaj?” dr.joshi had flood of thoughts in his mind on the way to meet the swamiji.

Finally, as per the appointment they reached the place to meet and request shri pramukhswami maharaj. Dr.joshi felt nervous more than he ever felt in his tough medial exams. His heart really beated fast.

As they entered the hall, they saw pramukhswami maharaj sitting graciously in front of them. Some one started introducing dr.joshi to swamiji.
“ he is dr.joshi from…”

swamiji stared at dr.joshi and to his and all other’s surprise, stood up from his seat !
“arre joshi saheb tame?”he was none other than the young vibrant sadhu who used to escort dr.joshi in the car to shri yogiji maharaj!!

Nothing more is remaining to end the story!

CH 22 :COLLEGE SECRETS :WINE (AND KETAMINE) HAS TRUTH !

WINE (AND KETAMINE) HAS TRUTH!

(I was not an eye witness of this incident but I am putting it here as was told to me… making minimal factual changes like changing true names)

Nishant was a real macho in our college. No one would dare to go near him. His speech was loud and clear. He walked like a tiger in the college corridors. He had a bike matching his body image. He used to wear a weird type of goggles when riding bike. Those weird goggles probably were a benchmark for him.

But this was not all. He was from a rich family and had everything a boy would desire to have. Rather, he could give everything a girl would desire from a boy. No doubt, he was a leader of our college.

“DO you know nishant? Girls of our class are dying on you.” Vikrant, his best friend told him one day when they were on the way to the library late evening.
“Yes I know…” he gave a flat answer not looking at vikrant.

“But probably I know whom you like the most.” Vikrant had something more to say. “I saw you staring at her many times... in fact you go to library just to find a seat near her. Am I right?”
Last few words were enough. Nishant stopped.
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean... you can not hide your feelings from me, good friend!” surety and affection in vikrant’s voice were enough to melt down the college tiger. There was silence for a few seconds before nishant opened his heart.
“You are right….apeksha… she is the only thing in the whole world I desire...” he stared deep in sky and continued “whenever I see her expressive black big eyes I forget everything. When she puts her golden skinned hand in her silky hairs, I get simply lost in her thoughts. Her smile gives me a zillion watt current. When she passes by, my heart stops beating. Faatko chhe yaar!”
“You are in love man! Go and tell her... what you are waiting for?” vikrant directly said what he wanted to. “You are a macho man. This is the time to prove it!”
“It is not that easy friend. I feel she has probably feelings for me but how can I be sure for that? If I confess prematurely then she may turn away from me. Many a times, still, I try to open up my heart to her but my brain becomes numb and my heart feels like failing at such times…”

“May be… if you wait for sometime, she may confess and make things easy”

Soon after, nishant’s choice became buzz of the campus. Every one was surprised how a man like him felt helpless when it came to confessing love to a girl! Probably all the boys knew nishant’s choice. The information also leaked to the girls very soon. For nishant, it was like…

Patta patta butta butta haal hamara jane hai,
Jane na jane GUL hi na jane baaag to sara jaaane hai!

In fact whenever some one referred to that girl, he used to use words like “nishant wali". Still, it remained impossible for nishant to go to her directly and open up his heart until a special incident.

Despite boasting healthy body, nishant had some anatomical problem in the nose. Because of this, he had a lot of problem in breathing at night. Finally the ENT surgeon decided to operate him for that.

A day was fixed for surgery. The operation was a small procedure. But it needed a general anesthesia.
“Hello nishant…I am to give anesthesia and you will sleep within a few seconds. Do not worry. There will be no pain at all...” the anesthetist gave him routine advice. Nishant was injected with a latest molecule available at that time. Soon, the procedure to correct the anatomical defect was started.

All friends of nishant were out side the operation theatre. Since ours was a small campus, every one knew about the operation. The procedure lasted for a few minutes. But mean time, gradually, whole of the nishant’s class gathered outside the theatre, including all girls.

At last nishant was out from OT. He was shifted to a recovery room on a stretcher. Whole of the class followed his stretcher. Everyone wanted to wish him early recovery.

Nishant looked half drowsy. His eyes were still closed.

“Hey nishant, how are you buddy?” some one asked.

In response, without opening his eyes, nishant just nodded his head. Everyone was happy to see him recovering from anesthesia.

Suddenly nishant started shouting.

“ APEKSHAAAA…….APEKSHAAAA….. I LOVE YOU!” everyone including apeksha was shocked by nishant’s shouting!

A confession which seemed very difficult even in private was made in public by nishant laboring under effect of the drug. The drug injected to nishant was the same that presently is used by forensic experts for narcoanalysis.

The effects of drug were known at that time also. It removes all controls and inhibitions on the subconscious mind. It was some one’s serious mistake that let the whole class to enter the recovery room when our tiger was recovering.

However, this story had a sad end. Since even after this incident, apeksha never showed any interest in nishant.


( fresh note: soon after our marriage, i had personal experience with this anasthetic molecule, ketamine, when i was injected with the same for a short procedure at resp dr ajay vyas's hospital. dr vyas, being friendly and jolly, purposefully asked me whom i love. i spoke jasmine's name at that time! )