The Boy with the Jute-Sack Bag

I was born on 26 February 1956 in a mission hospital at Vashi, but my soul belongs to the dust of Pusad. My father, a man who could barely sign his name—his signature resembling a trembling kite in a high wind—owned a modest oil mill. Yet, with that shaky hand, he signed a promissory note of hope for his children. I attended the local Zilla Parishad school, watching the “doctor-producing” Brahmin schools from afar, quietly nurturing an ambition that I, too, would one day belong among the healers.

My path to MGIMS was forged in the disappointment of GMC Nagpur, which I missed by a mere two marks. Destiny, however, had other plans. I appeared for the joint entrance test for AIIMS, BHU, and MGIMS, securing the third rank in all of India. I could have gone to the capital; I could have gone to the holy city of Banaras. But my father feared the “spoiling” influence of Delhi, and the Hindu University of Banaras felt culturally daunting. And so, the telegram arrived from Sevagram.

The Borrowed Khadi and the Command of Badi Behenji

The interview in the Principal’s office remains etched in my mind, dominated entirely by the presence of Dr. Sushila Nayar. When she asked if I knew the Chief Minister, Vasantrao Naik, I admitted that my father had contested elections against his party. She laughed heartily at my transparency. Then, she eyed my shirt.

“You are wearing khadi. Do you wear it regularly?” she asked. “No, ma’am,” I replied truthfully. “I borrowed this from my tailor, Mirza. He stitched it for another client.”

It was this radical honesty that appealed to her. I was admitted, and my first fifteen days were spent in the Gandhi Ashram. There, I was asked to read verses from the Quran alongside the Gita and the Bible. My voice trembled on the first day, but by the third, I read with pride. It was my first lesson: faiths could meet without clashing.

Room 29: The Scholar Behind the Black Paper

Money was always scarce in those early years. My bicycle was a second-hand relic with a taped handle, and my mother had stitched my book bag out of washed jute cement sacks. I pedaled to the library with that rough, bulging sack tied to the carrier. While others frequented the Indian Coffee House for “Bombay Toast,” I survived on Babulal’s tea and aloo bondas.

My love for books, however, was a fierce obsession. I once saved my hostel fees for three months just to buy Sheila Sherlock’s legendary volume on liver diseases. It cost six hundred rupees—a fortune then. When my father discovered the deception, he slapped me in public. I took the blow in silence, knowing that the blue-covered book in my hands was worth more than comfort.

In the first MBBS, I read Gray’s Anatomy and Guyton’s Physiology. In the second MBBS, I went through Boyd’s Pathology and Satoskar’s Pharmacology. In the final MBBS, I studied Park’s Preventive and Social Medicine, Davidson’s Medicine, Sheila Sherlock’s Liver, Nelson’s Pediatrics, Holland and Brews’ Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Love and Bailey’s Surgery. No shortcuts. No cramming at the last moment. I studied from day one. I was fortunate to be gifted with an enormous capacity to retain and reproduce what I had learned.

In Room 29 of A-Block, I pasted black paper over the ventilator so the wardens wouldn’t see my bulb burning at 3:00 AM. I refused shortcuts. I read Gray’s Anatomy, Guyton, and Nelson’s Pediatrics from cover to cover. In every exam, the hierarchy never shifted: Satya Prakash Maheshwari was the untouchable first, Meena Kuranwadkar was the disciplined second, and I was forever the “Third Man,” trailing her by a single, agonizing whisker.

The first rank was untouchable—Satya Prakash Maheshwari. Brilliant, effortless, almost otherworldly. He later went on to become a pediatrician in Delhi, Gurgaon. He was simply outstanding, leaving the rest of us trailing by twenty marks or more.

Second place always belonged to Meena Uranwadkar. She was sharp, disciplined, and never more than a mark or two ahead of me. That narrow gap became the source of endless teasing on my part.

“Meena,” I would say with a grin, “you know I’m the better student. It’s just that in the viva, the examiners melt at the sight of a girl student. They slip you a couple of grace marks and push you ahead of me.”

She would laugh, never offended, just shaking her head at my mock-complaints. And then, results after results, the story repeated: Satya untouchable, Meena ahead by a whisker, and me—forever the third man.

Through my first, second, and final professional exams, my place in the class never changed. I was always third.

Clinics That Lasted Forever

Internship brought him under the spell of Dr. Khatri, a visiting cardiologist from PGI Chandigarh. His clinics stretched for hours.

“History is half the diagnosis,” Dr. Khatri would say, eyes fixed on the patient’s chest. “Listen carefully. The heart is talking.”

Khan listened, spellbound. He became a favourite student. Yet when he opted for pediatrics instead of medicine, Dr. Khatri was so disappointed that at the railway station, while leaving Sevagram, he refused to look at Khan.

“I carried that hurt,” Khan later admitted. “But I also carried his lessons into pediatrics.”

The department was fortunate to have two contrasting guides—Dr. Chaturvedi, a meticulous academician, and Dr. Shashi Ahuja, a practical clinician. Between them, they shaped Khan’s craft.

The Strike of 1978 and the Bite of Desperation

Sevagram, July 1978.

The monsoon clouds hung heavy over the red-brick hostel. Inside the mess, the students huddled over watery dal and rice, their voices low, their faces drawn.

“Only MBBS?” someone muttered, staring into his plate. “How will we survive in the real world?”

A silence followed, broken only by the clink of spoons. Another voice rose, bitter, trembling.
“Without MD or MS, we’re finished. Our classmates from Nagpur, Delhi, Chandigarh—they’ll fly past us. And we’ll be stuck.”

The room buzzed with fear. It wasn’t just about prestige—it was about survival. Without postgraduate training, what would they become?

At the center of the storm stood their Principal, Dr. Sushila Nayar. Dignified, resolute, she repeated what she had always believed.
“I founded this college to serve villages. Degrees like MD and MS will only lure you to cities. Sevagram is for rural India.”

Her conviction was reinforced by the formidable Dr. L. P. Agarwal of AIIMS, who visited frequently. He was also his chief advisor and was a senior member on the panel. His words were blunt, immovable.
“You want MD? MS? Forget it. This is not your place. Villages need you. Stay there.”

The students listened in stunned disbelief. Villages? For life? No opportunities, no growth, no future? They had never imagined this bargain.

Whispers turned to anger. Anger to defiance.

Then, one afternoon, it all erupted.

The interviews for the incoming batch were being held in the Principal’s office. The corridors were tense, packed with restless students. When Dr. Agarwal finally emerged, briefcase in hand, the crowd surged.

“Sir, hear us out!” voices shouted.

“Don’t destroy our future!”

Dr. Agarwal’s stride quickened. The students closed around him, a human wall of desperation.

And then—something no one expected.

Asha Ramachandran, eyes blazing, dropped to her knees before him. She clutched at his trousers, her voice cracking.
“Sir, please… please don’t do this to us. We have nowhere to go!”

He tried to shake her off, but she clung harder, arms wrapped around his legs like iron. His collar was pulled, his sock tore. In a frenzy, she bit his ankle.

Dr. Agarwal froze, aghast.

“Have you all gone mad?” he shouted, staring at the mob of students, their faces contorted by fear and fury.

That was the last anyone saw of him in Sevagram. He never returned.

In the uneasy quiet that followed, something shifted. Dr. Nayar, who had stood so firm, now looked inward. She too had once been a student—an MD herself, with a DrPH from Johns Hopkins, a traveler who had seen the best of medical education. Could she really deny her own boys and girls the same chance?

Wiser counsel prevailed. Within a year, postgraduate courses in medicine, surgery, pediatrics, and gynecology opened at MGIMS.

I was among the first group of MGIMS graduates who began postgraduate studies in clinical streams when they finally started at Sevagram. Along with me were Asha Ramchandran (medicine), Pramod Raut (orthopaedics), Meena Kurundwadkar (obstetrics and gynaecology), Vikas Kulkarni (surgery), and Sudhir Chavan (anaesthesiology). I took my seat in pediatrics.

The strike of 1978 had etched itself into history. What began in fear and desperation had ended in triumph.

Residency: The Religion of Patient Care

I enrolled in MD Pediatrics in November 1979. Six months later, in April 1980, Sanjeev Chugh and Arvind Garg joined. A year later, Pardeep Handa from the 1975 batch and Rajiv Tandon from the 1976 batch followed. In those days, the department had very few postgraduates.

Dr. Khatri, who taught us in the medicine wards, often reminded us: “During your residency, your religion is patient care.” We lived by those words. In the wards, we would keep a toothbrush, toothpaste, razor, and soap handy. We brushed our teeth, shaved, took a quick bath, and got back to work without returning to the hostel. At times, we slept in the ward itself, on whichever bed was free. Luxuries like uninterrupted sleep in the hostel were rare. It was an exhausting life, but the hard work paid off.

When my MD examination came, the external examiner was Dr. K. N. Agrawal from BHU, Banaras. He was known to be a staunch member of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad—“He wears Hinduism on his sleeve,” Dr. B. D. Bhatia, our internal examiner, warned me. The other external examiner was Dr. Katwa from Kolkata. Alongside Dr. Bhatia, Dr. Avinash Deshmukh stood in as internal examiner for Mrs. Pushpa Chaturvedi, who had left for Libya on sabbatical.

A day before the exam, Dr. Bhatia hinted to me, “Remember, Dr. Agrawal is from Banaras, a staunch Hindu. You are a Muslim.” The implication was clear. But I was confident. “Let him ask me anything,” I said. “I am fully prepared to answer.”

One of the best lessons Dr. Bhatia had instilled in us was to examine every child from head to toe, never presuming or skipping signs. That discipline helped me in the exam. My long case turned out to be tubercular meningitis, which I diagnosed correctly. When asked about the latest diagnostic test, I suggested one that Dr. Agrawal dismissed outright. To settle the matter, he called for the standard pediatric textbook and a journal from the library. Together, we went through the references, and there it was—exactly as I had said, straight from published sources.

That day, Dr. Agrawal nodded, satisfied. And I passed.

The Road to Chandrapur

I dreamt of America and even saved ₹7,000 for the journey. But just before I could leave, my father was injured in a bus accident. Looking at him in pain, the allure of the United States vanished. “My place is here,” I realized.

I chose Chandrapur, a coal-and-cement city, as my base. My hometown, Pusad, thrived on farming, but opportunities for growth were limited there. I began with a modest OPD, then set up a small four-bed nursing home. Slowly, I expanded it to fifty beds.

Patients started coming not only from Chandrapur but also from surrounding districts. My reputation spread by word of mouth. I used every bit of what I had learnt during residency—how to work with scarce resources, how to manage when nurses were not well trained, and how to treat patients who had very little money. Innovation was the only way to keep costs low.

Each week, I also travelled to nearby towns—Kagaznagar, Bhadravati, and Wani—to see patients. Villagers would often fold their hands and say, “Doctor saab, my child was almost gone. You brought him back.”

For me, there was no greater reward.

Kaka Kichasha

Beyond the stethoscope, I discovered another gift—words. In Sevagram, I acted in Hindi and Marathi dramas. In Kaka Kichasha, Alhad Pimputkar from the ’72 batch played one of the Kakas, and I was Kisha. It was a farce about impressing a girl by producing a false “Kaka,” but through a hilarious mix-up, three Kakas landed up together. The play was a superhit—we kept hearing stories about it long after.

By 1975, I was acting in Govind Gopal, performed in front of a visiting President, and even did a memorable bathroom-themed monoact. The following year, I was part of Kayapalat with Shobha Lauthare, Nitin Gupte, Mamta Jawlekar, and Mridul Panditrao.

I also loved sher-o-shayari. At conferences, my speeches sparkled with Urdu couplets, often leaving the audience surprised. “How can a Muslim doctor speak Marathi like a Brahmin?” people would ask in wonder. I only smiled—languages had never been barriers for me.

Legacy of Hard Work

My son became an orthopedic surgeon, and my daughter a radiologist. Even at seventy, I still work twelve-hour days, diagnosing children with the same passion I had back in my hostel room under the black paper. I continue to travel four times a week to nearby towns to see sick children.

“There is no substitute for hard work,” I often say. “Sevagram taught me that. Every sick child who leaves my clinic smiling is a reminder.”