Baba! I don't need Father's Day, which comes just once a year, to remember you. Because I do that every single day of the year. I remember all that you taught me through your words, your actions and your exemplary handling of the toughest situations in life. I remember the values you ingrained in me; the principles you lived by all your life (and often paid a heavy price for it) and the lessons you imparted in sharing the joys of life. I wish I could be a quarter as good as you were as a person, as a father, as a head of the family and above all as a member of the community.
When I think about it now, I am amazed how much you managed to pack into a life that did not last a day more than 61 years and a week! Amid all your official business, which was not restricted to the usual 10 am 5 pm routine, you still found the time to read almost all major classics in Odia, Hindi, English and even Bangla; to play badminton with friends and colleagues in the evenings; to follow cricket on the radio; to write plays and poems and to regale us with wonderful stories and anecdotes from the past.
I miss you every single day, Baba. Miss sleeping by your side and being taught to sing “O’ Basanti Pawan Paagal” as a four-year old. Miss mounting on your shoulders as a child to get a better view of a passing procession or the deities on a puja pandal. Miss those sleepless nights in adolescence listening to old Hindi film songs on Indonesian Radio or the Overseas service of All India Radio. Miss those late-night quiz contests on the making of the songs, which you always won hands down. Miss waking up together in the wee hours waiting for the radio commentary to begin as India played Tests in New Zealand and Australia. Miss analysing the key moments in the day’s play at the dinner table. Miss your jokes, banter and full-throttled laughter at dinner time. Miss your wonderful sense of humour that left all of us in splits.
I remember how you inculcated the love for reading in me pretty early in life. I remember the picture book you presented me (with which you learnt the English alphabet) to assuage my hurt after a round of severe thrashing for some mischief even though I was not yet ‘eligible’ to study English alphabets. I remember how that picture book, with its cover long torn off, inculcated in me a lifelong love for the English language. I remember how you encouraged me to read all kinds of stuff and in all possible languages: stories, novels, biographies, hunting tales, cricket tales and so on. I remember how you used to book whole series of books on a particular topic from Star Books or Jaico Paperbacks and – wonder of wonders – found the time to read each one of them despite your packed schedule as an administrative officer at the field level. I remember Maa telling me, when I was still young in the profession; “Your Baba read an article written by you and then told me, his chest swelling in pride, that you had done something not many people had done to him; forced him to consult a dictionary to know the meaning of a word!” I remember how you literally forced me to listen to cricket commentary when I was a teenager – and made me a lifelong aficionado of the beautiful game in the process.
But what I remember most is your compassion, your empathy for fellow human beings and your willingness to provide succour to people in distress, financial or otherwise. I remember the time when you asked the driver to drive to the top of a hillock on your way back from tour so that an old man, who could not come to the office 15 kms away due to his poor health, could receive his old age pension. I remember the time when I visited the Sambalpur district collectorate on a reporting assignment a couple of years after your death and found the whole office gather around me to pay their respects to you in absentia.
I also remember the ‘price’ you had to pay for your unwavering commitment to honesty. How you were hounded, slapped with a ‘departmental proceeding’ for allegedly causing ‘pecuniary loss’ of the princely amount of Rs 143! to the state exchequer and denied your richly deserved promotion for your twin ‘crimes’ of refusing to heed the nudge of a minister to illegally appoint his protegee in a school run by the municipality and to contribute an amount of Rs 5, 000/ towards the marriage expenses of a deputy secretary’s daughter in the department. I remember how you stayed strong right through the year and half long fight to have the proceedings quashed and your honour restored. I remember this incident every time I have been in a similar situation and derive strength from it to fight it out and hold my head up, as you did all your life. “What would have Baba done or advised me to do in such a situation?” I ask myself every time I am faced with a dilemma, confusion or indecision and you have unfailingly goaded me to the right decisions in life.
Your boots are too big for me to get into, Baba. But I can assure you I have done the best I could have to live up to your ideals, your principles, your values, your egalitarian beliefs and your love for life.
How I wish you were there to share my joys and sorrows, the highs and the lows of life; to regale me with your seemingly inexhaustible stock of jokes and humorous anecdotes and – above all – to be just by my side!!
(DISCLAIMER: This is an opinion piece. The views expressed are the author’s own and have nothing to do with OTV’s charter or views. OTV does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.)