In December 1987\u2014exactly a year after my father passed away\u2014Bhavana and I decided to change the map of our lives. We moved out of the familiar comfort of Jaishree Bhavan in Wardha and into the MGIMS campus at Sevagram. It wasn\u2019t a grand leap. It was a quiet shift. But it changed everything that came after.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We were allotted Flat No. 13, first floor, in the \u201cType 2\u201d quarters near Kasturba Vidya Mandir. Two bedrooms, a small drawing room, and a kitchen that quickly became the busiest room in the house. We didn\u2019t own much then, so the move was almost embarrassingly easy. One truck, a few steel trunks, and we were done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To set up our new kitchen, I took my seventeen-year-old niece, Surekha, on my scooter to Sitabuldi in Nagpur. We returned like proud hunters with our trophies: a gas stove, a Sumeet mixer-grinder, and a 165-litre Kelvinator refrigerator. Soon after, a black-and-white Digichrome television arrived. Ulhas Jajoo and Mr. C.B. Taori helped coordinate it, as if buying a TV was a public health programme that needed teamwork and planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once we settled in, colony life took over\u2014quickly and completely. We were surrounded by young lecturers: Dr. Ramji Singh, Dr. Mendiratta, Dr. Ajay Agrawal, and many others whose doors stayed open more often than closed. Privacy existed, but it wasn\u2019t treated as a sacred right. In a two-minute walk you could meet twenty people you knew, and if you looked even slightly troubled, someone would ask, \u201cKya hua?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Evenings had their own rhythm. Badminton in the open, cups of coffee that never stayed hot, and snacks that travelled from one house to another without needing permission. Birthdays were not private family affairs. They were community events. One child blew the candles, and the whole block ate cake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
***<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n Sevagram was a village, but our colony felt like a little town square. It had its own characters\u2014warm, quirky, and unforgettable\u2014people who could have walked straight out of an R.K. Narayan story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr. K.K. Ghuliani, Head of Community Medicine, became our next-door neighbour when we shifted to Vivekanand Colony in 1989. In the department he looked stern, almost military. Students feared his punctuality more than exams. But at home he was a different man\u2014easy, affectionate, and addicted to Scrabble. Many evenings ended with him grinning over a triple-word score while the rest of us protested like injured parties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n His wife, Mohini, held the colony together in ways no official circular ever could. She taught flower decoration and knitting, organised children\u2019s programmes at the staff club, and somehow made every gathering feel like a family event, even when half the people were meeting for the first time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there was Dr. R.S. Naik from Forensic Medicine\u2014a paradox if there ever was one. He worked with death all day, yet he carried the liveliest spirit on campus. As warden of the boys\u2019 hostel, he followed one simple philosophy: \u201cBoys will be boys.\u201d And since this was the pre-cable-TV era, he started a Cine Club. Every weekend, films were screened, and the hostel boys got their dose of Bollywood, romance, and noise\u2014exactly what young men need when they are stuck in a rural campus with too much study and too little distraction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n But the most eccentric\u2014and most loved\u2014were Dr. Samit Kumar Ghosh and his wife, Laxmi. Dr. Ghosh, our Professor of Anatomy, lived with three passions: dissection, gardening, and dogs. He spoke English in a rich Bengali accent and carried a temperament that could switch from thunder to tenderness without warning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Ghosh household didn\u2019t \u201ckeep pets.\u201d They had family members who happened to be dogs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They had adopted two street dogs and named them Lali and Kali, based on their coats. These weren\u2019t dogs who slept outside. They slept on the bed, ate home food, and were spoken to in Bengali like small children who refused to study.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One Sunday morning, the colony woke up to a crisis. Lali and Kali were missing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mrs. Ghosh rushed out in panic\u2014hair uncombed, an informal house gown, and a big red bindi that announced she meant business. She stopped a passer-by and demanded, \u201cExcuse me! Have you seen Lali and Kali?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The man was Dhirubhai\u2014the formidable Director of the institute. He stared at her blankly. Lali and Kali sounded like nieces, or granddaughters, or maybe two important VIPs he was expected to recognise. When she explained they were dogs, his expression shifted from confusion to alarm. He muttered something, shook his head, and escaped before he could be recruited into a search party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Years later, when Dr. Ghosh moved to Kolkata, their devotion reached another level. They booked a special carriage on the Mumbai\u2013Kolkata Mail for Lali, paying a handsome sum, while Kali travelled by car. They were not dogs, after all. They were Sevagram royalty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n Dr. Ghosh could be fiery, but he also surprised you when you least expected it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1999, we bought a second-hand Maruti 800. Bhavana was learning to drive, while managing her job in the IT department, two children, and the daily chaos that runs every Indian home. One Sunday morning, while reversing out of the driveway, she misjudged the angle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Crunch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our car hit Dr. Ghosh\u2019s shiny, well-kept vehicle. A dent appeared\u2014clear, ugly, and impossible to hide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bhavana froze. She knew Dr. Ghosh\u2019s temper. She imagined the shouting, the humiliation, the long lecture that would follow. Still, she walked to his door and confessed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr. Ghosh came out, looked at the dent, then looked at Bhavana standing there with her head slightly bowed, waiting for the blast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instead, he turned to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cKalantri!\u201d he said sharply. \u201cWhy are you not helping her more?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I stood stunned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then his voice softened as he spoke to Bhavana. \u201cIt is not your fault. Reversing is difficult. You are doing too much.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He looked back at me. \u201cShe is managing home, children, job. You must share the load. Shoulder her burden.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And with a casual wave of his hand, he dismissed the dent as if it was a mosquito bite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bhavana came back home with tears in her eyes\u2014not from fear, but from relief. The car had a dent. But what stayed was something else: the unexpected kindness of a man who could have shouted, but chose to protect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n In October 1989, we moved to the first floor of Vivekanand Colony. Soon after, Bhavana went into labour. It was 10 p.m., and the hospital was barely five minutes away on foot. Dr. Chhabra arrived quickly, and within an hour, our daughter Amrita was born.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ashwini, then three and a half, was thrilled. Outside the labour ward he met Dr. Anuradha Gokarn, a house officer who was engaged to her batchmate, Fali Langdana. In a playful mood, she asked him about a recent staff club party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat did you do at the party?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI became Lord Hanuman!\u201d Ashwini announced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBut you don\u2019t have a tail,\u201d she teased. \u201cHow did you become Hanuman without a tail?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ashwini looked at her as if the answer was obvious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOh, that was easy,\u201d he said. \u201cI used Phali for the tail.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He meant the long bean vegetable\u2014phali. But Dr. Anuradha burst out laughing. The thought of her fianc\u00e9, Fali, being used as a tail in a toddler\u2019s costume was too funny to resist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s how those years felt: small homes, open doors, shared laughter, and the comforting noise of neighbours who slowly became family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We moved to Sevagram thinking we were only changing our address.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We didn\u2019t realise we were also choosing our people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Malgudi of Sevagram<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n
Lali, Kali, and the Director<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n
A dent in the car, a lump in the throat<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n
Amrita arrives\u2014and Ashwini finds a tail<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n