It was 1974 โ a year when Sevagram went to sleep early, and the nights belonged to the crickets and a handful of restless medical students in the JN Boys’ hostel. MGIMS was still young then. The world had no screens or smartphones to stare at, and evenings found purpose on a small wooden stage behind the hostel mess โ a few planks nailed together.
That year, the Hindi Drama Committee chose Ramesh Mehtaโs ๐๐ข๐ฎ๐ข๐ข๐ฅ, a social satire in three acts. Bhaskar Chopde , tireless and cheerful, was the secretary. He gathered around him a merry company โ Vijay Gedam, Subhash Jain, Pramod Gupta, Kuldeep Gill, Rajeev S Chaudhari, and Manoj Verma. Between dissection tables and physiology lectures, they rehearsed lines, borrowed curtains for backdrops, and quarreled over the lighting โ those were their early days in Sevagram.
At the heart of the play stood Chhajuram Goyal, the pompous municipal inspector โ brought to life by M. J. Khan of the 1973 batch. Years later, he would become Chandrapurโs leading paediatrician and the first to earn an MD in Paediatrics from Sevagram. That evening, however, the 18-year-old Khan was all swagger and comic bluster โ his drawn-on moustache, starched uniform, and booming voice had the audience laughing long before the first act was done. Opposite him, Manju Sachan of the 1971 batch played Dolly โ poised, quick-witted, and entirely convincing.
The story was a lively confusion of love, greed, and mistaken identities. Chhajuram, hungry for dowry, deserts Dolly and sets his eyes on Kamala (Anita Jindal, 1972 batch), already engaged to his friend Hariprakash Sharma (Sanjay Date, 1973 batch). Despair drives Hari to the edge, but in true dramatic fashion, a twist rescues him. Kamala marries Hari, Chhajuram repents, and, in a scene that melted the audience, ties a rakhi on Kamalaโs wrist โ promising lifelong brotherhood.
The MGIMS auditorium that night was alive. When Baijnath Gupta (1973 batch), as Kamalaโs irate father Seth Badrinath, struck the stage with his cane, the crowd roared. When Hari was dragged off to the police station, someone shouted, โPoor fellow!โ And when Chhajuram confessed and redeemed himself, the laughter softened into a hush โ broken only by the ceiling fanโs slow, rhythmic creak.
Three prizes were given that night. M.J. Khan took the first, Manoj Verma the second, and Baijnath Gupta โ in his very first performance โ the third. He would go on to become one of MGIMSโs most beloved stage artists.
Others โ Satyaprakash Maheshwari, Avinash Shankar, Kusum Arora, Shashi Pasi, Parvin K Ansari , and Madhugandha Patwardhan โ lent colour and strength to the play. Behind the curtain stood Dr. B.V. Deshkar, the Physiology professor and Dr. Hariharan, the dental surgeon โ guides, critics, and cheerleaders rolled into one. They laughed as heartily as the students when a prop fell or a line went astray.
Half a century has passed. The hostel walls are painted anew, the stage rebuilt, and new voices fill the mess yard. But among the early MGIMS alumni, Damaad endures โ like the echo of a long-ago song.
Sadly, Subhash Jain, Avinash Shankar and Anita Jindal are no more. But even today, when two old classmates meet, one is sure to say,
โDo you remember M.J. Khan in Damaad?โ
And for a brief, shining moment, 1974 returns.