Stories About Men

Siddhartha Shastri is originally from Nagpur, India and leads a retired life in Michigan with wife Shubhada. An engineering graduate from Nagpur University, he studied for his MBA at IIM, Ahmedabad. He worked for Tatas in India and Europe, before eventually migrating to the United States, working in the Computer Industry.

Just a couple of days ago, I was talking to my wife about late Shri Sharad Muthe, who I was privileged to know as a child, later on as his student, and as someone whom his students continue to admire even today.

Sometime in 1956, when I was only a primary school student, the Ramdas Peth Grihini Samaaj organized an evening program to present this handsome young, rising star of Nagpur to the residents. Shahir Sharad Muthe, known as an upcoming poet of exceptional talent, was also a terrific singer. India had recently become independent, and every corner of the country was full of optimism and effervescent enthusiasm - an environment that was tailor-made for Powada style (martial songs) lyrics, and the gusto with which they are typically delivered to the audiences.

Yashodhan Parande is a retired civil servant. He was born in 1951 in Nagpur and attended Hadas High School, with which both his parents were intimately connected as described in the accompanying article. After finishing his B.Sc. and LL.B., he qualified in Civil Service Examination in 1974, and joined the Indian Revenue Service (Customs and C. Excise) in 1975, and held various assignments in government of India. In the course of his career, he also obtained an MBA degree from Southern Cross University, NSW, Australia. He retired in 2011 as a Member of the Central Board of Excise and Customs, and has settled down in Delhi. He now indulges his passion for music, particularly Hindustani classical, exclusively as a listener and reading and travel (a fair bit being armchair travel!).

Baba, my father the late G.T. (Bapu) Parande, would have turned 100 on August 25, 2020 had he and my mother not been snatched from us in June 1995 in a road accident. Losing them together was such a wrench! And for me it was it was made worse by the fact that I was far away from home when the tragedy struck and could not be with them in their last moments. But, looking back, I realise that they went as they would have wished - in their shoes and together. It is impossible for me to think of one them without the other.
 

G.T. Parande. Nagpur circa 1985.

Bapu Satyanarayana, born 1932 in Bangalore, retired as Chief Engineer, Ministry of Surface Transport. At present, he is the presiding arbitrator of the Dispute Adjudication Board appointed by the National Highway Authority of India. He lives in Mysore, and enjoys writing for various newspapers and magazines on a variety of subjects, including political and civic issues.

My maternal grandfather Sri H.R. Venkatasubba Rao, who died at the age of 52 in 1932, contributed a lot to the then Mysore state during the rule of Maharaja Nalvadi Krishnaraja Wodiyar. My grandfather was an executive engineer. The fact that a road named after him still exists 'Road to Uttana Halli'- on Chamundi Hills is indicative of recognition of the honour bestowed on him for his services to Mysore State. I have a picture of him in Darbar dress.

Left, Smti Venkatlakshamma, wife. Right, my grandfather Sri H.R. Venkatasubba Rao in darbar dress. Mysore. 1920s.

My grandfather H.R. Venkatasubba Rao with his wife Smti Venkatlakshamma. Child on her lap is my mother Smti Jayalaksamma. Mysore. 1912.

Meenakshi Hooja (nee Mathur) was born at Jhalawar on 26th June, 1952 and after spending early years of her childhood at Jhalawar, Bikaner and Ajmer moved to Jaipur with her parents and family.
Meenakshi taught Political Science at the University of Rajasthan before joining the Rajasthan Cadre of Indian Administrative Service in 1975.  She served on many important positions in Government of Rajasthan and Government of India.
She is widely travelled in India and abroad and was a visiting fellow at Queen Elizabeth House, Oxford in 1999-2000.  Post retirement, she was a Member of the Central Administrative Tribunal.
She has written on a number  of development and administration  related subjects  She has also so published books of poetry in Hindi and English.

Khemchand, our father or Daddy as us siblings addressed him, was born in Alwar on 10th April 1911. Our grandparents, Shri Ramchand (Babaji) and Srimati Lakshmi (Dadi) had strong roots in Alwar, though the family was originally from Delhi.  Our Babaji served the Alwar State as In-charge of Gardens and Horticulture, after having done his studies from St Stephens College, Delhi and Forestry from Dehradoon. He is credited with building the special Shimla area in the Company Bagh gardens of Alwar.

Ramchand, my grandfather. Alwar. Early 1900s.

Editor's note: This obituary was written by Hooja sahib's son, Rakesh, and edited at that time byt Rakesh's brother-in-law Subodh Mathur.

Bhupendra Hooja. London. Late 1940s.

Bhupendra Hooja (1922-2006) came to Rajasthan in the beginning of 1959, which, as he wrote in a 2002 article "Life at Eighty", became his "Karmbhumi" as he became "a small petty agent" in the sustained efforts for the development of the State. By the end, Jaipur and Rajasthan had adopted him as its own.

As regards the influences of his youth, he once wrote "having been born in an active and committed Arya Samaj family (I was) baptized by the mantras of social change, freedom and revolution as preached by Gandhi and Nehru and Subhash on the one side, and the revolutionary youth like Shaheed Bhagat Singh and his brave and young Comrades on the other". His older brother G.B.K. Hooja, who preceded him into the IAS via the undivided Punjab Civil Service, was a major source of inspiration to him, as was Marxist Socialism until the Soviets crushed the Hungarian uprising in 1956. Both in his youth and later as an adult, he could never appreciate the growing consumerism and commercialization in society. As a student he is known to have more than once given away his woollen clothing to poorer friends, and helped many others with their studies.

Shakun Banfield nee Chowdhary was born and brought up in the U.K.  She retains a keen interest in her parents' achievements in their adopted country England and has many memories of a happy family life with them and her brother.

She worked for 30 years in the criminal justice system as a probation officer as well as in the family courts as a welfare officer and mediator.  She is now retired and lives with her husband in South London.

My father, Dr Dharm Sheel Chowdhary, was born in a small village in Punjab, India in 1902. He was sent to a Hindu boarding school at the age of 7. Here the regime was physically  strict and the academic teachings intense. This equipped him with an extensive knowledge of Indian and Persian literature, Hindu philosophy and religious teachings, and a good knowledge of the ancient language of Sanskrit.

On graduating, he was ordained as a Hindu priest. However, as far as I am aware, he did not go on to practise as such. Instead, he chose to enrol at Lahore Medical College to study medicine.  He graduated with an MBBS in 1927, and came to London for post graduate studies the following year. He obtained further qualifications in Edinburgh and Liverpool as well as London. In 1931, he joined Dr Gilder's practice in Laindon, purchasing the practice from him when he retired.

Joshua Mathew is a first-time author, occasional photographer and enjoys reading about colonial history.

When the British ruled India, for many British men, especially those who lived in proximity to forests, hunting was not just recreation, but also a rite of passage. Conservation was unheard of, and tigers, panthers, bears and other mega fauna were often considered vermin, and hunters were rewarded for their destruction. However, the early hunters all hunted for sport, and not until Jim Corbett's book Man-eaters of Kumaon in 1944, did the colonial shikari's tales garner mass appeal.

Corbett was born in India, and, while a pucca sahib at heart, his love for India and the people were genuine, and there was a certain Indian-ness that transpired in his books.

Kenneth Anderson was his equivalent in south India. His ancestors arrived in India in the early 1800s from Glasgow. His father, who worked for the Army, settled down in Bangalore. Kenneth wrote eight books, that were not about hunting for sport like the early settlers, but putting an end to man eating tigers and panthers that were a menace to society.

After India's independence in 1947, Kenneth decided to stay on, a strange decision considering most of his peers decided to migrate, either fearing retribution or seeking greener pastures in the UK and Australia. He passed away in 1974, content to have lived in the country he was born in.

Meenakshi Hooja (nee Mathur) was born at Jhalawar on 26th June, 1952 and after spending early years of her childhood at Jhalawar, Bikaner and Ajmer moved to Jaipur with her parents and family.
Meenakshi taught Political Science at the University of Rajasthan before joining the Rajasthan Cadre of Indian Administrative Service in 1975.  She served on many important positions in Government of Rajasthan and Government of India.
She is widely travelled in India and abroad and was a visiting fellow at Queen Elizabeth House, Oxford in 1999-2000.  Post retirement, she was a Member of the Central Administrative Tribunal.
She has written on a number  of development and administration  related subjects  She has also so published books of poetry in Hindi and English.

My father, Shri Khemchand, was born on 10th April 1911 in a leading family of Alwar to his parents Smt Lakshmi and Shri Ramchandra.

Shri Ramchandra. My grandfather. Alwar. About 1920s.

Smt. Lakshmi. My grandmother. With her great-grandson, Gaurav. Front of our home B-87 Ganesh Marg, Bapunagar, Jaipur. September 1979.

Gautam Banerji has a Master's from St Stephen's College, Delhi, an LL.B. from Delhi University, and an M.Sc.(Econ) degree from the London School of Economics.  He taught at an undergraduate college in Delhi, 1973-85, and worked for UNICEF 1985-96.  Then he moved to London to practice law. He served as the Judicial Advisor to the Judicial Development Institute, Baghdad, 2009-10 as a U.S. government contractor. He was a member of Commission for Sustainable London (2007-13). He continues as a Trustee and Board Member of Hindu Council, UK. Now fully retired, he lives in Dilijan, Armenia, with his wife, who teaches at United World College, Dilijan.

Early years

The major part of my grandfather's professional career was spent in Burma. Initially, in 1889, he was a clerk in the Accountant General's Office under the British colonial administration. When my grandfather retired, my father had got his law degree from the Law College in Rangoon University after an Honors degree in Mathematics, in which he barely missed getting a Distinction.

Swamiji was very close to the family, I was told. He wrote this testimonial in 1949 at a time when my father had come to India to get married (1948) and was trying to stay on in India.

Exiled from Burma - looking for work in India

Born in 1941, Vinod was brought up and educated in Amritsar. He attended Government Medical College, and subsequently trained as a surgeon at PGI, Chandigarh. He left for USA in 1969, and retired in 2003 as Director of Critical Care Services at a teaching hospital in Michigan. Married with two grown sons, he continues to visit India at least once a year.

The year was 1975. I was surprised to see my wife in the lobby of the small motel in San Francisco. She had flown in from Los Angeles. I had gone to San Francisco to attend a meeting and had run into an old friend from Ohio. The friend had decided to move to the same hotel as me to save some money. After the day-long meeting we had eaten together and leisurely walked back to the motel. A couple of drinks each we had with dinner had left us relaxed and in a good mood.

But, she was serious and waved away my friend's hearty greetings. "We have to leave!" she said.

"I received a call from India, Satish is injured."

"Is it a scooter accident?" I asked, Satish was my older brother.

"No, he is burnt, and he is in the hospital. I bought a return ticket for you."

She tried to console me on the return flight to Los Angeles. I had difficulty in understanding how he could sustain burns. His work as a manufacturer of hand-made oriental carpets did not involve any fires or furnaces.

Next morning, we were able to talk to her father who also said that Satish had sustained more than 90% burns on his body, and was in a very precarious condition.