Tribute to a Perfect Gentleman

There are very few people in this world who are perfect. There will invariably be some inadequacies in them. There are of course some exceptions. My good friend of 50 years N.Krishnan who passed away this morning, was one of the few exceptions. He was a perfect gentleman. After battling with Covid and related problems for ten days he died at the age of 84 at Apollo Hospital.

I first came to know Krishnan when I met him at the first ever Round Table India AGM which I attended at  Delhi in  1970. I was a rookie Tabler having joined the Bombay West Round Table no 6, just a year before. I never imagined that within a couple of years I would move to Chennai  and join Madras West Round Table No 10 in 1974, where Krishnan was a founder member and a Past chairman. He was also active  at the national  level becoming the President of Round Table India in 1978. From the word go we clicked as friends. He became my mentor in Round Table. He recognized my capabilities and pushed me to take up challenging projects in Round table. He was the man who explained to me the meaning of true fellowship and how around the Round Table (a youth movement)  every one is equal. I learnt the value of true friendship from him. Round table opened up a whole new world to me, helped  me get  legions of friends across the country over the years . I am sure Krishnan had a role to play in my being selected for a WOCO Travel Grant of Round Table India which  saw me going on my first ever travel abroad visiting five countries in five weeks in 1976 or my getting the coveted Distinguished Service Award from Round Table India in 1984.

Later when I decided  to quit my job and  start my own  ad agency Anugrah, he readily agreed to be one of the founder directors of the company. His sound advice and practical approach to any problem would help me run the company efficiently. He was always available to me whenever I needed any help whether it was a personal issue or official. Both he and Hema always showered their genuine affection on me and my wife Prabha. He was proud of my achievements as a professional and so when I invited him to attend the function of Rural Marketing Association of India  in November 2009, where my autobiography was launched, as a guest of honour , he readily agreed and felicitated me. I was delighted and felt privileged when he invited me as a speaker at the launch of his own autobiography a couple of years ago. Even after I retired from my company and he ceased to be a director of the company, our friendship continued through 41 Club no 7 ( ex- round tablers club) where both of us were members.

The last time I saw his face was at the zoom meeting of the Madras Book Club on 7^th April. We both greeted each other. I never imagined that within two weeks the dreaded Covid will take him away from us.

I will always remember Krishnan as a friendly, simple, methodical, meticulous person who left his foot prints on the sands of time of every organization he was associated with; be it Round Table, Rotary, or other professional bodies with which he was involved.

Personally it is an irreparable loss to me. I can imagine the sense of loss that his family must be feeling at the demise of a remarkable person  who was a good son, good brother, good husband , good father, good boss , good friend and of course a great human being!

 Though you have left us physically, you will always be in our hearts and mind. RIP Krishnan!

    

 

 

Biography as History- A tribute!

Two days ago an old man, in his early 90s joined our coffee group at Velu`s coffee shop. Talking to him I found that he was  S V S Raghavan, an   IAS officer who retired as the Chairman of MMTC. When I mentioned my name he said,` Oh you are the writer Rajan. You write well`. My day was made!

My mind went back to the time when I had started writing on a variety of topics because of the success of my autobiography published in 2009, post retirement. The person who had motivated me to write was Mr.S.Muthiah, the well-known writer/ author and a mentor for scores of writers who are popular today. I was also one of the lucky few to be mentored by him.  He would always say that I was one of the first persons to respond to his appeal to senior citizens to write their memoirs. Because `Biography is history` he would say.

Since his passing away I have been carrying his message to all my friends, many of them senior citizens like me, relentlessly persuading them to write their biographies. In fact a motivational talk I give on the topic `Getting hooked on writing post retirement` has influenced many to start writing. Some of them have used the forced confinement at home because of the pandemic during the last twelve months to write their life stories. I am happy to report that in the last two months five have already published their autobiographies including my younger brother Seshadri who literally followed my footsteps in the world of advertising.  Ten others had  published their books earlier. Five more have started writing. I am thrilled. I am sure Mr.Muthiah, whose second death anniversary was two days ago, would be very happy to know that I am vigorously following up on one of his pet projects- making senior citizens write their memoirs. It is my way of  paying  tribute to a man who was  responsible for my new Avathar as writer/author. But it is another matter that he never wrote his own memoirs. I think his talented daughters ( Parvathi -you write well) or his favourite `chela` V.Sriram, should take up writing Mr Muthiah`s biography.  They owe it to the legions of Mr.Muthiah`s admirers.

 

 

My encounters with Yama

Almost all people above 60 have the habit of turning first to the obituary section of their favorite newspaper, every day, to find out if any of their friends/ acquaintances have passed away in order to count their blessings!

 

During our younger days, we think that death happens only to others – especially the older people. We never associate it with ourselves unless we are involved in some accidents or serious illnesses.  I am going to share with you a couple of my encounters with Yama!

 

The first incident happened almost 50 years ago, when I was still a bachelor in Mumbai! I was leaving my job in Grant Kenyon & Eckhardt to join ACIl; Delhi.  My boss in Grant was not happy. He tried to brainwash me from leaving. The day after I met him, I was very confused. Skipping office I decided to take a long drive in my car ( Morris Minor) to clear my head. I chose the National Park in Borivali, a Western suburb in Mumbai, which is located on a small hill. It was a winding road going up and down the hill. As I was driving on the lonely road down the hill, I was totally lost in thoughts. Suddenly I saw a dog cross my path. Jolted out of my reverie, I applied the breaks. To my shock I discovered that it was not working. Narrowly missing the dog, I tried to bring down the speed of the car by changing gears and my repeated attempts to bring the car to a halt failed.

 

On one side of the road there were rows of trees while on the other side was an open steep drop of about 200 ft. Added to the break problem, I realized even the steering was not moving in the direction that  I wanted it to. The Car was running zigzag, threatening to veer off the road anytime! As the car was rolling down hill faster and faster, I became panicky.

 

At that point I realized I was going to be involved in a major accident and that I may not come out of it alive. All sorts of thoughts crossed my mind and I was praying hard to the Lord to save me. Suddenly my car veered to the right and stopped after hitting a tree. In the impact I passed out. When I came back to my senses, I realized that I was in an awkward position in the car, almost upside down. My car had turned turtle and its four wheels were on top while I was sandwiched between the steering wheel and the seat. With great difficulty I extricated myself out of the car and came out to find that I had escaped a major accident with minor scratches. The car, however, was badly damaged (which was another matter), but on that otherwise empty road my favorite Lord Balaji appeared in the form of a local guy who helped me out.  Those few minutes my car was running downhill without control, I was literally facing death!

 

Another experience happened just a couple of years ago.

 

One morning I was driving my car to my office, on the narrow two lane road, not far from my home. I was driving slowly and though my lane was clear, there was bumper to bumper traffic on the opposite lane. Suddenly I found a call taxi coming towards me in the empty space in front. I thought the taxi driver  was trying to jump the queue taking advantage of the clearer space in front of me and would  try to sneak  his way back  again into the row of vehicles in the opposite lane.  While I was trying to steer the car to the left to avoid a possible collision, the taxi driver continued to come towards me. I knew something was wrong and thought in those few seconds we were going to have a head-on collision! Literally staring at death!

 

Fortunately, since I was driving slowly and the taxi also was not that fast, the collision only damaged the two vehicles. Nothing happened to any of us, in either of the car. While I thought the taxi driver was drunk, it turned out that he had dozed off at his wheel, because he was returning back to his garage after driving the whole night and was very tired! At least that was the explanation I got from him. I believed him as he was not stinking!

 

I have had all kinds of accidents involving my car during the last 50 years. Anyone else with a weaker heart would have stopped driving. But I have been carrying on putting full faith in my Lord to save me every time!

 

I realize that faith alone is not enough anymore. With advancing age and failing reflexes, I am finding driving very stressful and getting involved in `near ` accident situations. A friend of mine advised me, even God can’t help me if my time has come to keep my appointment with Lord Yama! So I have started using the services of the ubiquitous Call Drivers whenever I have to go outside Adyar, where I live.

 

Extracted from my book `This &That and Then & Now`

 

`Mastaken`Identity & Muffled talk

Since the Bessy (Eliots beach road) reopened for walkers, I have started meeting a lot of friends with the mandatory masks on. While it is nice to meet old friends whom you have not seen for over 10 months, this article is about how masks have put me in embarrassing situations because of `mastaken identity`.

This particular incident happened a month ago.  Among the walking friends whom I bump into regularly is a couple who are the parents of my grandson`s friend in USA. It so happened that the grand parents of my grandson`s friend had visited my home a week before. On that particular day I stopped the couple and enquired with the lady with her mask on about her parents. She hummed & hawed and said they are fine. While I was wondering why she was not responding properly, in walked another lady, almost a look alike who on seeing me said, `Hello Uncle, How are you? I didn`t see you yesterday`

 I was confused. I had assumed that the first lady I had spoken to was the wife of the gentleman because she was walking with him, whereas the lady who recognized me was the actual wife. Looking at my confusion, both the ladies pulled down their masks and had a hearty laugh. It was a case of mistaken nay `mastaken identity`.

There are times when a few other walkers have wished me confusing me for someone else.  Or others who recognize me in spite of my mask but I cannot place them. One day I stopped a gentleman, who was wishing me every day but I could not recognize  him. Apologising for interrupting his walk, I sought his identity. Promptly he pulled down his mask, removed his cap and exclaimed, `Enna sar, don`t you recognize me. I have been coming for a walk here for the last ten days`.  Of course now I could recognize him as the gentleman who lived in the fourth house from my house in the same locality. Needless to say that I felt embarrassed.  But how could I recognize people if they look like dacoits who have come to rob a bank?

An enterprising photo studio owner in Kerala found an opportunity to solve the problem of `mastaken` identity. He custom made masks to fit the face of the user, showing the photo image of the face of the user. Brilliant idea! But I think the idea did not catch on because of the high costs!

Another problem is the `muffled talk` resulting from people trying to talk with their masks on. While there is no problem understanding people with clear and loud voices, it becomes difficult to comprehend people with soft or grated voices. When such people find that they are not clear, promptly they pull down their masks and talk, defeating the very purpose of using the masks.

With the second wave of Covid on the horizon masks are here to stay for a long, long time. How we ensure that our identities are not `mastaken` or our voices are not muffled through the masks is going to be an art that all of us will have to learn.

In conclusion I must thank my friend (Sharan) Shankaran for inspiring me to write this piece. It  was from him that I first came to know the words used in the title of this article.