An Indian who made us proud

 An Indian who made us proud

(Written in September 2012)

Some days ago a 90 year old man passed away.  A legend, who created national institutions, and who made us feel proud of being Indians.

Twenty years ago (April 1992), while my parents were confined to a hospital in Ahmedabad after a horrific road accident, my wife and I got away for a day to visit her alma mater at Anand.  IRMA was an institution that Verghese Kurien had created, and we spent a pleasant morning there, with my being shown around a well-maintained campus, and my wife being warmly greeted by her professors and invited into their houses, while I tagged along.  

But the high point of our visit was in the afternoon, when we went to the Amul Milk Plant.  We were met in the lobby by a young man, who welcomed us warmly, but told us that we would have to wait at least an hour (or more) for a tour of the plant.  Meanwhile he had to accord priority to another group.   This Very Important Party turned out to be a busload of village women, children and a few men,  the families of the Milk Producers who gave life to Amul.  The shareholders.  I was delighted.   Here was a place where we English-speaking, non-resident rootless cosmopolitans (*) had to make way for those who were the real stars of the Amul show.  Among all the wonderful things about Amul and Dr Kurien with Tribhuvandas Patel and HM Dalaya, this was another little gem.

Our young host, concerned about our having a long wait ahead of us, asked if we might be interested in joining the group, but warned us the tour would be in Gujarati.  We agreed immediately, and attached ourselves to this excited crowd.  While the gleaming machinery and the processes of pasteurization and churning and dehydration etc were interesting to see (at least to the vestiges of the engineer in me), it was far more fascinating  to feel the thrill in the air, to observe the excitement of the children on their tour of a local version of Willie Wonka's Chocolate Factory.  Here they were with their parents and aunts and uncles, rushing to see the tins of powdered milk being sucked up a chute, sealed and dropping down another before being stamped, wrapped and packed.  I don't think I have heard a happier sound in our country than that of the women chattering excitedly as they observed the journey of the buffalo milk which they had supplied, through the various vats and tubes and tins and packs, transformed into a variety of dairy products and sent on their way to market, to market.

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[(*) in '92, I was an NRI, and had lived more years of my adult life abroad than in India; Hindi didn't trip off my tongue easily any more, so I was indeed  at that time a "bezrodniy kosmopolit"]

If I were a Carpainter

Outside a market in a south Delhi locality is a signboard announcing the services of a handyman.  “Car panter”, it reads, leaving us guessing whether he  carries a hammer and saw or a spray painting kit.

M F Husain and his painted Fiat.

I was perhaps 5 when I first met M F Husain, well before he had become hugely famous, though by then he was a local celebrity in Delhi.   It was at the house of our dear family friend, the well-known architect Mansinh M Rana.  Husain was a close  friend of the Rana’s, and was often at their house.  He was a gaunt bearded man with a big smile, shabbily attired and without footwear.  He used to come in his Fiat Millecento, which was painted in his imitable style, different colours on each side.   We children were welcome to tumble in and out of the car.

Mansinh Rana in his living room.

Mansinh Rana had an endearing trait of befriending everyone — from the famous and powerful to the young.  I was his special friend.   On his birthday (September 1), we would always be at his house.   It was perhaps 1967 or 1968 that on his birthday Husain gave him a wonderful canvas.   Innocent that I was, I too pulled out a watercolour of a windmill I had made for my dear Rana mama (on the card sheet that comes in the packaging of shirts), with a “I too have made a painting for you”.  Everyone had a hearty laugh, and Husain, with a twinkle in his eye, ruffled my hair calling me "the little painter”.