CHAPTER XXVII
Epilogue (i)
Our
MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS:
MY EXPERIENCES
I call
our medical instit utions as
‘Dhanwantari temples’ and my visit s
to such 129 temples have been for a sacred mission of the National Medicos
Organisation (NMO). Interestingly, the
NMO was founded in the cit y of the
holy temples i.e. Varanasi
For me, the first such temple was the Darbhanga Medical College it
had been and incidentally the so named (the Temple Medical School, named after
Sir richard temple, the Governor of the then
Bengal, comprising of Bihar and Orissa) Medical school was shifted from Patna to Darbhanga as the Darbhanga
Medical School in 1924 when Maharajadhiraja of Darbhanga, Rameshwar Singh, donated huge
amount of money in lieu of it to
start the then Prince of Wales Medical College at Patna which was later renamed
as the Patna Medical College, throwing away the shackles of slavery.
But when I became a student of the Darbhanga Medical
College , I started to call the DMC as
‘Dehati Medical College it y
for hours, for nights, and even for days together.
When I came to Ranchi
to study in my PUC classes, I used to visit
the RMC in Ranchi it
was named as the Rajendra Medical College *
not as the Ranchi
Medical College it ially.
* Again renamed as the Rajendra Instit ute of Medical Sciences (RIMS)
on 15.8.2002.
on 15.8.2002.
Truly, the college when founded was called
the Ranchi Medical College; just after a couple
of years Deshratna Dr. Rajendra Prasad died i.e. in 1963 and the college
was renamed after this great son of Bihar . But amazingly, still the post office there,
is called Ranchi Medical College Post Office; the guest house of the medical
college for external examiners, etc. is illegally occupied by police pers onnel and they have opened a police station
there despit e it
being in the knowledge of everyone. None
bothers even to celebrate the punyatit hi
of the great Deshratna, Dr. Rajendra Prasad.
When I went for my counselling for medical
admission, I could see the Patna Medical College which was one among few oldest
medical colleges of the country but to me it
looked like sit uated in din and
bustle of the cit y though it was sit uated
on the banks of the peaceful holy Ganga.
Later, for the NMO work, I saw and stayed in almost all hostels and even
attended some classes of Dr. C. P. Thakur in it s
‘Hathwa Ward’, probably donated by Hathwa Maharaja. Later, the TISCO and the Coal India had also
donated for uplifting the hospit al.
These companies or their officers became our neo-maharajas!
No doubt, Patna Medical College is among the
oldest but the premier medical instit ution
of our country is at Calcutta named only and merely as the ‘Medical College’,
in the famous College Street there. When
founded in 1835 there was a ‘huge’ murmur and even protest- march by the
Muslims of the cit y who wanted
medical teaching to be continued only in madarsa. During the II NMO
State Conferences, I had occasions to address galaxy of doctors of the
college. Once, I spoke on the AIDS
prevention and ridiculed the use of condoms instead of promotion of the ethical
way of life, “Would you advise wearing a mask if the AIDS virus strain takes a
mutation and starts transmission of infection even by kissing like that of the
virus of infectious mononucleosis?”
My visit to the Deccan
College of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad it ecture wit h
1416 Hijari (1995) inscribed on a plaque as it s
year of inauguration which naturally attracts mostly Muslim patients and
barring a few, almost all students and teachers, I found, were Muslims. The A. P. High
Court on 24.3.1998, in it s welcome
verdict had limit ed only 50 per cent
of the seats exclusively to the minorit ies
and that too on merit s.
A
broad-based similar judgment on various issues related to the minorit ies’ instit utions
came from the Hon’ble Supreme Court on 31.10.2002 that the state governments
would have the power to decide — wit hin
a reasonable extent the percentage of minorit y
students to be admit ted into
Govt.-aided minorit y educational
instit utions and the minorit y status would be determined on the basis of the
demographic composit ion of states.
It asked for admissions, on the basis of merit
and to be conducted in a transparent manner.
No wonder, I saw the SIO’s (Organisation of
Islamic Students) big posters there and also there was a notice board in which
some verses of the Koran were displayed.
Religion-wise segmentation of a secular
science like Medicine will never be appreciated particularly if it is built wit h
petro-dollars. Activit ies in the DRDL (Defence Research &
Development Laboratory) could be watched from it s
upper floors and it was surprising
how this medical college was granted permission to be built in that strategic
location.
No doubt, the Medical College of Calcutta
was founded and grew but the so called progressive thinkers of the Muslim
communit y felt it all right to have domes like that of a mosque in
the medical instit ute of Aligarh,
aptly named after Jawaharlal Nehru who very enthusiastically wrote, “By culture
he is a Muslim, by thought an European and merely by the accident of birth he
is a Hindu.” Not only this but also the
Muslim teachers dress themselves like maulvis. Once, on the Republic Day
also, National Tricolour Flag was dishonoured there. This event was protested by the nationalist
forces vehemently. I told my accompanying NMO worker, Dr. Jagdish Prasad Goyal
that the reply to kurta-pyjama is dhoti. Pakistan
was conceived in the portals of the AMU and in the whole of India only at Aligarh
I
had also an occasion in the NMO, A.P. State Conference at Hyderabad being in dhoti
(where in fact, I could not change my dress just after presiding over a Mait hili meeting where the chief guest was the Hon’ble
Chief Justice of A.P., P.S. Mishra, where almost all dignit aries
were in dhotis and so I, the youngest among them had also decided to
wear dhoti. While in tours, I saw at Imphal a marriage party was fully
dressed in whit e dhotis.
The Govt. Medical
College it h the
hostels amidst thick shrubs and the hospit al
there is far off in the cit y, part
of which collapsed in 1998.
But the Govt.
Medical College ,
Kozhikode (Calicut it did
not happen so in any of the festivals of the Hindus. Remember, it was the area of Mophlahs and onslaughts of Tipu;
Vasco-da-Gama had landed there first in India it to the Medical
College , Kozhikode ,
in the canteen, I saw on the menu chart ‘beef curry’ and in protest I refused
to take anything.
The
fellow medicos told me that even Hindus took beef in Malabar area. I told them it
was not the matter of vegetarianism or economy but of the fait h; however the economic factors are also against
cow-slaughter and beef is also carcinogenic as was referred to by Prof. A. B.
Khan of the Darbhanga Medical College ,
during his lecture at the V National Conference of the NMO at Bhagalpur
I
asked medicos to go in depth whether this unholy practice was adopted under the
coercion of Tipu or was influenced by the non-Hindu communit ies of Kerala. An old fellow Mangalorian passenger
in the same night exclaimed to know the beef story, which was news to him
although he was living just north of the Malabar region.
Yet, I found a practicing doctor, an alumnus of that instit ute offering puja at the Guruvayoor
temple, very early in the morning, and there, at Kozhikode ,
the NMO had organised a Sanskrit -speaking
course for the medicos.
Fig. 37 __ The Hon’ble Governor, A. P., H. E. Dr. C.
Rangrajan and R. J. Reddy, the Hon’ble Minister for Health & FW, A. P.
during the inaugural session of the XII National Conference of the NMO,
Bhagyanagar (Hyderabad) on 28.3.1998.
Fig. 38 __ During the
XII National Conference of the NMO, Bhagyanagar (Hyderabad Hyderabad , Dr. Dhanakar
Thakur, Ranchi , Dr. Mrit yunjoy
Kumar, Patna it Dhar, Calcutta,
Dr. Narendra Prasad, Patna, Dr. J. P. Goyal, Harigarh (Aligarh), Sit ting -- young
medicos of the NMO.
and
again during 1926-1947 for the MBBS
course though during 1885-1925 it was
made English which was made again so since 1948). It is also a befit ting reply to those who say that only English can
be the medium of our instruction.
At the OMC campus, when I had first visit ed the Indian Instit ute
of the History of Medicine in 1984, I had incidentally asked an elderly
gentleman to send his article for the Aayurvigyan Pragati. When I
asked for his address, he told me that he was Dr. B. N. Sinha, President,
Medical Council of India, and knowing that I had already sent him a copy of the
Aayurvigyan Pragati, he patted me wit h
affection, “You are doing a good work.
My friend, Dr. B. N. Das Gupta, is doing a great work in this regard.”
Next time I visit ed there on 7.11.2005 to procure a reference copy
of the Charak Shapath when I could not get it
in the NIMS (Nizam's Instit ute of Medical
Sciences it ed
the School of Diabetology
Though Osmania has no dress code, I found that
in the M.G. Instit ute of Medical
Sciences, Wardha medicos do wear khadi – being in the neighbourhood of
Sewagram and Pawnar, which was no wonder.
Contiguous is the SRTR (Swami Ram Tirth Rural) Medical College
The same village like feeling I had at the Tirunelveli Medical College it a point to visit that college, but the pers on
matters not the instit ution. I went
several times there but when that very teacher Dr. S. Ganapathy Sundaram was
transferred, we could not get any more article of that nature.
Here,
at Thirunelveli, a girl medico had init iated
the Hindu Medicos Organisation. When I
visit ed the college, first time in
1984, the boys took me to the Girls’ Hostel.
She had gone to her home, however, I saw big posters invit ing for mahapuja.
Students have lot of energy and can do a lot of
research work. In early issues of our
journal, a simple letter from a girl student, Shoba Philip, from the
Thiruvananthapuram Medical College had aroused a hope in me that there I could
get good workers and one decade later I found Narayanan organising a national
conference of the NMO in so called ‘left bastion’ – just before the day of his
universit y clinical examination and
he romped also successfully.
Fig. 39 __ The Souvenir of the XI National Conference
of the NMO, Thiruvanthapuram, February
8-9, 1997 .
Kerala
is green. Keralam means a
‘coconut’, a co-traveller passenger told me while passing through Shoranur-
Palakkad rail route.
During my visit
to the T. D. Medical College Alappuzha, on Oct. 1, 2002 , the whole of the college was
mourning the death of two medicos on the previous day in a motor-bike accident.
Such accidents have become common which should he avoided by all. On 3.10.2002,
I saw the principal of the MMC, Mysore
In
my first visit I could see only the
hospit al of the Alappuzha (Alleppey) Medical College
after my well-received lecture on the AIDS in the Kottayam Medical
College pers ons
had missed me at the railway station.
Kottayam is the first fully lit erate
district of the country and is the seat of the Christian culture. It is due to the high lit eracy
rate that we adore ‘Kerala Model’ of health for the developing world.
When
I talk of the Christianit y, no
doubt, they have rendered yeoman’s service in medical field but in no case I
can appreciate their proselytizing the Hindus.
Hence, it was difficult for
me to accept the catholicit y of the
CMC, Vellore UK Vellore Vellore
Later on I was
informed that the Amrit a instit ute treated 40 per cent patients free and also,
I’ve come to know that the Sri Satya Sai Instit ute
of Higher Medical Sciences, Prasanthigram,Puttsparthy(A.P.) offers free
service. Though I planned to go there it is said only when Saibaba calls, you can go
there. Let me see if my turn comes at
all?*
In
my first visit , due to lack of time,
I could not enter the St. John’s Medical College ,
Bangalore (though I had reached it s gate) and also I could not go to the CMC, Ludhiana it ive.
On
October 1, 2002 ,
I visit ed the Amrit a Instit ute
of Medical Sciences, Kochi (Cochin it ute having sophisticated instruments. There again
an attendant complained of the high charges. Do all religion-based hospit als coalesce on charging higher fee?
Next
time, when I visit ed the St. John’s Medical
College , Bangalore it h
keen interest. Though run by the
Catholic Church, the museum of the History of Medicine starts wit h Vedic medicines having a big portrait of Charak (which I had already obtained from the
500th issue of the Vigyan Pragati and only adding a Tilak, we had
adopted it in the NMO), and
Sushuruta, etc. However, there also an
attendant in the hospit al had told
me that the charges were exorbit ant
for a common man; yet, I was impressed by the book-stall there which sold books
on health issues. The students were
satisfied wit h the classes and
training being imparted over there.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Though I could go there and
had a close darshan of Saibaba on 7.10.2007, I could see this hospit al by road only . However, it s
branch at Whit efiled, Bangalore it ed on 24.6.2006 where really it had free
treatment to all.
There
are several medical instit utions
named after great pers ons or polit icians but I could find that only the RG Kar MC,
and the NRSMC of Calcutta, and the Dr. VM Medical College, Solapur are named
after doctors. Dr. D. S. Kotnish was also from Solapur who served and died in China it s
Solapuri chadars (Solapur sheets).
Bharat-kokila Sarojini
Naidu was remembered for Agra it was the NMO,
which only could present a portrait
of her
Fig. 40 __ Ma. K. Suryanarayan Rao presenting a portrait of Sarojini Naidu to Dr.Vijayalaxmi Lahiri,
Principal, Sarojini Naidu Medical
College , Agra
to Principal Vijayalaxmi Lahiri
in 1996. The cit y,
famous for the Taj, is even today, unaware of the fact that Mumtaz died during
her fourteenth childbirth. The hostels and the college are encircled wit h petha sweet shops. Medicos of the NMO are
providing blood to patients there.
Fig. 41 _ Dr. A. S. Asopa, ex-president, the
ASI presenting a memento to Dr. Dhanakar Thakur on 13.7.1996 during the NMO’s
NEC meeting at the SNMC, Agra
A
rickshaw-puller will take you to the SNMC, only if you tell him to take you to
the ‘emergency’. He does not know that it is the medical college. No wonder, Agra it al!
The Lady Hardinge Medical College of Delhi
has a good number of male teachers. I do
not know why it is not renamed after
the first lady doctor of India Delhi
Fig. 42 __ Ma.
Lakshman Shrikrishna Bhide addressing the NEC meeting of the NMO at the Lady Hardinge
Medical College ,
New Delhi
exhausted
from the journey, I preferred to sleep wit h
the patients near the gate of it s
hospit al named after Smt.
Sucheta Kriplani.
The Corporation Medical College of Nagpur
has been named after Indira Gandhi where I had once celebrated my birthday wit h the opening of the NMO unit .
Shimla’s Snowdown has also the H.P. Medical
College it .
In my first visit , I had to return
only after seeing snow-filled chairs meant for the Republic Day function, near
the Rajbhawan. The college is
small but surprisingly patients were given all sorts of medicines when I visit ed it .
But let me give my salute
to the people of Jhansi
Fig. 43
__ Dr. Dhanakar Thakur at the gate of
Mahatma Gandhi's home at Porbandar.
Mahatma Gandhi's home at Porbandar.
The list of the great pers ons after whose names medical colleges are named
are numerous and here too, the name of Mahatma Gandhi tops but no medical
college in Gujarat is named after him, the son
of the soil. Even the chowk of
Porbandar where Gandhi was born is called Kirti Chowk and the raids on
liquor shops are very common in this cit y
though Gandhi was born there. The cit y has become famous for a lady ‘don’, on whom a
film has also been released.
Apart from the MG Instit ute
of Medical Sciences at Wardha, as I have narrated, there is the MGM Medical College at Jamshedpur it ed
Medicos from all over the country for
the first time in 1986.
Message on the occasion of the IV National Conference of the NMO
at Jamshedpur Dec. 6-7, 1986 :
Fig. 44 __ Ma.
Bala Saheb Deoras
(11.12.1915 - 17.6.1996)
—
The
great organiser.
^^MkDVj ;g dsoy is'ksoj] /kU/kk djusokyk u cus] rks og
vR;Ur vkReh;rk ls :X.kksa dks viuk ekudj mudks jksxeqDr djus dh bPNk djusokyk
,d vPNk] lTtu] lektlsoh cus] ;g fopkj eq[;r% lkeus vkuk pkfg;sA vkt ;g O;olk;
cnuke gks jgk gSA dqN LokFkhZ yksxksa ds dkj.k&budks dSls cfg"d`r fd;k
tk, vkSj ;g ,d Js"B noble dke gS] ;g Hkko
tu-ekul ij vafdr gks] bldk fopkj gksuk pkfg;sA
gj ,d çSfDVluj us de ls de 10% jksfx;ksa dks
¼xjhc rcds dss½ fu%'kqYd fpfdRlk djus dk ozr ysuk pkfg;sA iSlk dekuk ;gh ek=
/;s; u gksA ,sls vusd fopkj vkt dh fLFkfr ns[kdj vk;s gSaA ;gk¡ vkusokyksa ds
eu esa Hkh vkrs gksaxsA bl n`f"V ls fopkj gksA
lEesyu esa lfEefyr gksusokys lHkh
Js"B egkuqHkkoksa dks lknj ç.kke &&& vU; lHkh cU/kqvksa dks
lLusg ç.kkeA
eSa lEesyu esa ugha vk ldrk] bldk nq%[k
gS &&& vkids ç;kl ;'kLoh gksa vkSj bl lEesyu }kjk ,d mn~cks/ku vkSj
tkxj.k gksdj uoksfnr fpfdRldksa dks ,d n`f"V çkIr gks] ;gh bPNk gSA
Hkxoku /kUoUrfj vkidks lQyrk nsaA**
Its founder principal Dr.
H. P. Sinha remarked that he had seen every brick of the college being laid in
his presence but seeing the pathetic condit ions
of the instit ute, he had left coming
to the Instit ute but through the NMO
he would like to dedicate rest of his life to it . The hostel is good, sit uated
below the Dalma Hill Range
After
a stormy mental conflict whether I should join a ‘capit ation-fee’
based medical college (thinking ultimately to be in any instit ution will help me in the NMO work), I appeared
for the interview for the post of a lecturer in the MG Mission’s Medical
College at Kalamboli, New Mumbai, but they preferred another candidate who did
not ask for a residence.
There is also a medical college named after
Gandhi in the cit y of Hyderabad
The
MGM Medical College of Indore has it s
hostels in a big barrack, once used for the horses of the Brit ish Residency.
When I first visit ed the
college in a December, the students were busy in a week-long carnival.
Fig. 45 __ Dr.
Dhanakar Thakur giving a prize to Dr. Manohar Bhandari for his contribution in
writ ing medical books in Hindi, as a
part of the celebrations of Rajbhasha Saptah on 17.9.1999 by the NMO,
Indore (in the middle --Dr. V. P.
Goswami).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*In 2005, to strengthen the Mit hila
movement, I was inclined to join the Katihar
Medical College it
was a Muslim minorit y college). In
the interview, the Director could not offer me Professorship on the basis of my
20 years experience in medical edit ing
as the MCI’s guidelines did not equate it
wit h teaching (which I think should
be given for promotion of science). I was offered Asst. Professorship which I
declined as the salary was not even
half of my existing pay. Similar had been the case when the lady Director had
felt deep sorrow at the interview at Nagpur in 1999 for the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Swangi, Wardha
where after seeing the same book (New Trends in Medicine) edit ed by me, she was very much willing to offer me
the post.
The Gandhi Medical College ,
Bhopal it uated in the heart of the cit y,
has a picturesque view of the big lake.
Near the college are sit uated
the biggest (Tajul) mosque and also the smallest (Dhai Seedhi _Two and a
half steps) mosques, in India it
was, had served it s Hamidia Hospit al India
It
seems Gandhi-Nehru legacy will have no end. Even the Medical College of
Allahabad is named after Motilal Nehru as if the town of Triveni it al,
again named after Sarla Nehru though Allahabad Allahabad Universit y
I do not know why Sanjay Gandhi’s name was
given to the PG Instit ute of Lucknow it s; I found that it was a budding centre of medicine in a backward
area.
Lately, Medical College of Bhagalpur was
also renamed after Jawaharlal Nehru.
However, to be christened after the renowned Vikramshila would have been
better and proper. My scores of visit s to that medical instit ute
forged a bond wit h it s hostels and
the college building, which is named as Naulakaha Palace
Rajasthanis were also duped by the name of Jawaharlal in Ajmer , which, in fact, is the Shrine Cit y it y
on 8.10.1988, concluding an anti-smoking week (October 3-8, 1988 ).
She was also running a Git a Study Circle it a.
When I went to the Sun Cit y, Jodhpur it ical
leader, Dr. Sampurnanand. There, a
senior teacher Dr. L.S. Dashora told me that he had not heard about the NMO
(then in 1988). I told him that the NMO
had survived 11 years and would continue to survive. A few years later he came
to see me at Jaipur.
But I remember, Jodhpur it her in the hostel or in the
canteen; they use only mugs.
In
the deserts of Bikaner it y)
has medical college named after Sardar Patel, and it s
administrative building has beautiful pictures of the legendary Ayurvedic
physicians and surgeons. Here, the NMO
workers had developed a garden in the memory of the revolutionary Pratap Singh
Barhat (1893-1918). No gift can be
better than a garden in a desert!
But the Pink
Cit y
Jaipur’s SMS Medical College
Let
me salute the people of Rajasthan, for naming the Lake Cit y, Udaipur
W.
Bengal people could not remember Rabi Thakur in this way.
I had warned the NMO workers of Udaipur that till they invit ed
the medicos from all over the country to visit
Chit torgarh by organising a national
conference of the NMO at Udaipur it the glorious Vijay-Stambh. Dr. Vijay Singh Rajput and later on Hari Om
Garg could sense my Chanakya/Pratap Pratigyan.
After few years when the NMO’s national
conference was held at Udaipur , I made it a point to visit
Kota first — the home of Hemant, Amit and their sister, Prajnya all three brothers and
sister from one family who were the NMO workers, studying in the RNTMC, Udaipur
Again,
I could only see the Vijay Stambh from the Chit torgarh
railway station while catching the immediate train for Kota it
is probably a record for the studentship in the same medical college and definit ely as workers for the NMO so far. My formal visit
to the Govt. Medical College, Kota on that holiday only assured me that one
day, it will come up to the
expectations of this industrial cit y
of Rajasthan.
I was worried that there had been no medical
college named after Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, however, the Govt. Medical
College , Jabalpur it al is running). Sit uated
near the famous Hirakudh dam, the VSSMC, Burla (near Sambalpur named after the
Goddess Sambleshwari__the
Varahi incarnation of
the Bhagawati) has also a Git a-Bhawan,
where the students pray in the evening.
How I could forget Faridkot – our frontier,
where there is a medical college named after the great Guru Govind
Singh, where the NMO took shape after Bihar *
and Orissa.
The Meerut it s medical college after him. I had a good meeting wit h
the medicos for the NMO under it s
founder principal Dr. G. K. Tyagi.
Gautam Buddha and Dr.
Rajendra Prasad were born near Gorakhpur after
whose names hostels are named in the Baba Raghav Das (a freedom fighter) Medical College it is took a heavy toll in 2005.
I reached there in a cold mid-night after a
strenuous bus journey from Kanpur
*including Jharkhand
Owing to the increased
number of admissions, there single-seated rooms were converted into
double-seated one’s. I could not visit
the Git a Press but I visit ed the cit y-deit y Baba Gorakhnath (an incarnation of Lord
Shiva) wit h Dr. Dharmanand Jha. I could see, Dr. Jha after 12 years. His
concern for workers’ financial self-sufficiency for continuing social work
seemed genuine.
Lucknowit es
were protesting till late against changing the name of the King George’s Medical College
to Kasturba Gandhi, for small donations from the U.K. it as the Chhatrapati Sahuji Maharaj
Medical Universit y it wit h Chhatrapati Shivaji, Chhatrapati Sahuji (1874-
1972) was a ruler of distant Kolhapur in Maharashtra who appreciated Ambedkar’s views but choosing
his name had a Dalit bias,
which was not liked by many. Mulayam Singh Yadav’s Govt. (2003) reverted back
the old name of king George to this universit y.
This college has old tradit ions and hostels are trans- and cis-Gomati. One of the abodes of mine (whenever I used to
visit there), S. P. Hall had a
picture of Sardar Patel and a library named after him was donated by the NMO
workers.
Biharis have also tried to remember it s local leaders.
But not to confuse, it is on
Srikrishna Singh’s (not Lord Krishna) after whom in his caste-dominated area of
Muzaffarpur, the medical college was named there, forgetting that Khudiram Bose
was executed in that very cit y.
Likewise, Anugrah Narayan Singh’s name was added on the same grounds in one of
the holiest cit y, Gaya ’s
medical college that was init ially
named after the historical kingdom
of Magadh ANM
Medical College ,
I think will be read as ‘Auxiliary
Nurse Midwife Medical College
The
Nalanda Medical
College is not in Nalanda but in Patna and strangely the Patliputra
Medical College
is sit uated 334 km south of
Patliputra (Patna
However,
the hostels of Dhanbad and Muzaffarpur are similar archit ecturally.
I
do not know how and what Maulana Azad had contributed for the premier medical
college named after him in Delhi but surely the instit ution
caters to the needs of the millions of Delhit es
who cannot find place in overcrowded AIIMS (which is simply called as ‘Medical’
by common public and in fact, most of the products of the AIIMS are brain-drained
to the benefit of the West at the
cost of the nation’s wealth).
Likewise
the Safdarjung Hospit al where the Vardhaman Mahavir
Medical College it e
to the AIIMS pulls a large number of patients.
Adjacent to the AIIMS are the ICMR and the
National Board of Examinations and the National Medical Library.
Due to a bundh called by the BSP, I had
to return from Rajghat, while I was on way to the UCMS for the first time,
where young NMO workers were wait ing
for me in September 1997. I appreciate
the Supreme Court’s verdict of banning the bundhs.
The RG Kar Medical College named after Dr.
R. G. Kar in Calcutta was previously known as Carmichael Medical College it ed it s hostel, the boys were thrilled as if I was
someone very important.
I went to salute the Calcutta National Medical
College where Dr. Keshav Baliram Hedgewar (founder of the RSS) had studied
Medicine .At the college entrance, in the overhead name-board’s insignia it is writ ten
that the college was established in 1335 Bangla year (no Gregorian i.e., English calendar year
was given deliberately) and the college is named the Calcutta Jatiya
Aayurvigyan Vidyamandir – Jatiya is not meant for any caste like that in
Hindi but means national and also Vidyamandir sounds more than merely a college.
I do not know when Dr. Hedgewar’s legacy
will come to the lore of this great medical instit ution,
which at present is infested wit h
red flags, obstructing the democratic entrance of the NMO in the college. The walls of the office were also defaced by
the posters of the SFI.
The
NMO never allowed it s workers to
paste posters in such shabby manner, that too, not more than 5-6 on college
hospit al notice-boards and one each
in every hostel and canteen, etc. The NMO workers have a challenge to clean the
atmosphere wit h this stinking red,
already mummifying in place of it s
origin in Russia , China Bengal
will revive the legacy of Raja Rammohun Roy, Dr. Mahendra Lal Sarkar,
Aurobindo, Rabindranath Thakur and probably the inherit ors
of Dr. Hedgewar (genealogically a Telugu, brought up in Marathi Vidarbha and init iated to revolutionary national work at this Sonar
Bangla’s medical college) will do it
predictably in the years to come.
Here, in this medical college is located the
Central Finger Prints Bureau and the Central Examiner of Questioned Documents
of the Bureau of Police Research and Development.
However, the unforgettable scene of Calcutta it y of Joy
is based. The old tram and
neo-metro-rail are other new features of Calcutta it ings in original which he had corrected and edit ed himself as beautiful paintings related to the
themes of writ ings on erasable
portions of the original writ ings.
When I went to meet a girl medico in the NRS Medical College girls’ hostel, I was astonished that it was still carrying Lady Elliot’s name though
there was also a ward of the hospit al
named after Dr. U.N. Brahmchari, who found urea stibamin for kala-azar and had
organised the first blood donation camp in India
The Bankura
Sammilini Medical
College is called Monday to Friday
College since most of the teachers leave Bankura for Calcutta it s Gynae. & Obst. Ward.
The Burdwan Medical
College it y of rich paddy-field area where incidentally the
CPM is dominating but my guide, a Sangh worker, working in the college office
told me that on Raksha Bandhan day, he tied rakhi on everybody’s
wrist.
When I visit ed
the North Bengal medical College it was the nearest medical
college from my birth-place and home-town, Forbesganj. How the boundaries of the artificial states
do make a joke wit h the geography!
And, on the way I found the small village Naxal notorious for the Naxalbari
Movement.
People of the north-east are most dear to me and even
before my marriage; I had association wit h
Birendra of Imphal and had gone to Nagaland for medical camps.
Fig. 46 __ Dr. Dhanakar Thakur examining a
patient at the Health Camp in Tenning (Nagaland). __ A long queue of
patients wait ing even in late night
(30.12.1987) .
I
visit ed the Silchar Medical
College (which is called ‘small’ medical college) and went to the Regional Instit ute of Medical Sciences, Imphal, where the
principal, Dr. E. Kuldhwaj Singh, an alumnus of the Darbhanga Medical College,
came and sat on the floor for the NMO’s meeting.
The Guwahati Medical College it uated on a hill-top and there
one of the NMO workers was having irreversible pulmonary hypertension (his ASD
was not diagnosed by the treating doctor in childhood). I found there, another worker of the NMO, Dr.
G.C. Jain, a surgeon (in the rank of professor) who told me that he had been on
duty for the previous 36 hours wit hout
any break.
The Assam Medical
College it uated around the tea gardens. This premier medical college of the
north-eastern India had my wife as a student, hence, several memories come
crowded in my mind but more so, it
was she who init iated there a unit of the NMO, and also went for organising a
medical camp, in distant Dumduma near Arunachal border.
Gods have
been remembered in only few medical colleges like Tirupati’s for Sri
Venkateshwar. Tirupati Devasthanam had
provided the college it s campus and
building. When I visit ed it for the second time in 1997, the medical college
authorit ies were busy there for the
MCI’s inspection for increasing the seats in the NRI’s quota. Many temporary
transfers of the teachers were made to dupe the inspectors. I feel sorry to mention that
commercialization of medical education is being done like instit utions offering the MBA course which ultimately
will turn our medical instit utions to produce money- minded doctors rather than
service-oriented healers.
There I also saw a beautiful Hindi
poem displayed on the notice board writ ten
by a Telugu medico narrating the formation of a river from melting of ice like
in the Himalayas , probably keeping the Holy
Ganga in mind. A few years earlier in an
IMA family meet of doctors at Aluva (Alwaye) in Kerala, I had listened to a
Malayalam song devoted to mother Ganga sung by
a senior doctor. The languages may
differ but the theme is the same all over the country depicting the unit y in diversit y
of Hindu civilization and culture.
Being
confused between vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes at Aluva, I preferred not
to eat anything (in 1984, in the house
of a medico at Madurai it was
a vegetarian preparation). After
returning to nearby Angamally, my friend Dr. Gisy had to cook for me late in
the night recalling her father’s view that not having food in a party was like
refusing prasad in a temple. In
fact, she had gone amidst ladies and her husband among other group. I could
have asked any other doctor but I had preferred not to take anything for having
a light meal in Gisy’s house cooked by her affectionate hands, which she was
not able to comprehend and usually it
is difficult for me to make myself communicable to the ladies!
Except
at Silchar and Burla, the NMO conferences have been vegetarian and it was the first such conference and a hot news in Amrit sar it nessed
in one conference of the Neurological Society of India at Delhi
But in the medical conferences, drinking and
smoking need to be prohibit ed as
these give wrong signals to the communit y
at large and also the five-star culture, extravagance in the medical
conferences and meetings need to be curtailed which would only make conferences
independent of the pharmaceutical industries’ undue advertisements and selling
pressures, including that of gifts and physicians’ samples which in my
experience mostly expire, and rarely reach the poor patients or the research
work, etc. This fund may be diverted to
the R&D activit ies and the
publication of the medical journals.
This I say on the basis of my participation
in the various medical conferences since 1981, viz. the API, Nagpur (1981), N.
Delhi (1982), Hyderabad (1984 and 2004), Udaipur (1986), Madurai (1987),
Bangalore (1985 and 1998), Madras (1995), Varanasi (2003), where I also
presented on 14.1.2003 a paper, My Suggested Model of Medical Education
(given as Epilogoue-ii: pages
246-248 and in brief on page 342 in this book); the ASI, Patna (1980), Madras
(1984); the NSI, Varanasi (1984), Patna (1985), Delhi (1986); the International
AIDS Conference, Delhi (1992); the Medicine International, Ranchi (1991,1999
and 2003); the A. I. Steel Medical Conference, Vishakhapatnam (1993), Ranchi
(1995), Rourkela (1998) where I delivered for the first time a pure technical
talk on Diabetes Control and Complication Trial (DCCT); the A. I. Coal Medical
Officers’ Conference, Ranchi (1996); the Zonal Pediatric Conference Ranchi (1997); Zonal Neuro Conference Ranchi
(1997 and 2001); the IMA, Bihar*,
Conference, Muzaffarpur (1981); B*apicon,
Ranchi (1999); Japicon, Ranchi
(2003); VII Post-Graduate Course in Diabetology organised by the Research
Society of the Grant Medical College and
the National Diabetic Association of India at the Lilawati Hospit al,
Mumbai(1997) and the annual conference
of the Research Society for the Study of
Diabetes in India (RSSDI) at Chennai (1997), etc.
Our medical
conferences should promote knowledge, be cost-effective, and ideal for which
the NMO has already put up a model.
*including Jharkhand
The Siddartha Medical College of Vijayawada
is named after Lord Buddha. Under the
impression of it s being a capit ation-fee medical college, I was postponing my visit to it
for several years but when I visit ed
it finally in 1997, I was informed
that capit ation-fee was charged only
for a few init ial years. I saw that
the Govt. of Andhra Pradesh ran it
and also it was the seat of the Universit y
of Health Sciences Health Universit y it s
officers who ordinarily remained busy in conducting examinations, etc., did not
impress me yet, it was a good
beginning.
To me the concept of a Health Universit y is like a dream of neo-Nalanda, neo-Taxila, etc.
where on entering you are thrilled to know the arts and science of Medicine and
more so the concept of ‘posit ive’
and full health. It should be a training
centre for the trainers (teachers) of health science, where continuously such
teaching programmes, etc. are being carried out.
Yet, it
was worth noting that Vijaywada’s medical students were studious. A reading room was opened round the clock
though there I found only three students around 8.45 p.m. I counted 38 more heads in the adjoining
library, which remained open till 9
p.m. ; 60 per cent medicos were girls in the instit ute. I found half-built super-specialty medical
block, the funds for which once allotted by N. T. Rama Rao, were later wit hheld for long by his successors though they
subscribed to the same Telugu pride. Polit icians please, do not make Medicine controversial,
as it is the most universal thing.
I found this controversy in nearby Chennai
at Porur also where I visit ed the
Sri Ramchandra Medical College & Research Instit ute
to see ailing Ma. K. Suryanarayan Rao, the successor of late Ma. Dr. Abaji Thatte as the guide to the NMO.
To me, the name echoed Lord Rama, but now it was again on a polit ician,
M. G. Ramachandran, who had somehow made possible the allotment of vast lands
in Chennai outskirts for the college.
Though the DMK Govt. of Tamil Nadu changed the name of the districts,
transport, etc. named after pers ons,
it did not touch medical and other
instit utes.
Probably, the name of Sri
Ramchandra needs no change – even in a time-capsule, if you freeze such
documents, after a lapse of few hundred years it
will be difficult to recall who this Ramchandra was other than Lord Rama, in
fact, on whose name, parents of MGR would have named him – where is the
Arya/Dravid controversy?
I
also do not recall more than three pedigrees – my father, grandfather and
great- grandfather though my father had printed a genealogy of some 10-14 generations. No wonder, in an examination answer-book
someone had writ ten that Indira
Gandhi was the daughter of Mahatma Gandhi, and during the National Emergency
(1975-76) a time-capsule describing the Gandhi-Nehru legacy had been put in the
earth which was un-earthed when the Janata Govt. came into power in 1977.
But a Deemed Universit y,
the Sri Ramchandra Medical College & Research Instit ute
has the idol of goddess Saraswati at it s
entrance and in the hospit al
entrance the History of Medicine is carved on the plaques, vividly describing
the evolution of medical sciences in Bharat and other parts of the world,
really stimulating but the admissions were made on capit ation-fee
and I had an unexpected interrogation by the care-taker why had I visit ed the hostel, as if it
was a prohibit ed zone! Or, was he
suspicious that I was a pers on from
the intelligence despit e my
introduction?
Few days prior to it
(11.12.1997), I had visit ed the
Boys’ Hostel of the Stanley Medical College
and while talking to them I could know that Stanley
I
had told the final year students that the name of college should better be
changed to Subramaniyam Bhartiyar or Thiruvalluvar like great inspirers. When I
talked to the first year students, assembled in good numbers, searching for any
prospective worker for the NMO, I asked
if there was anyone interested in social work, lit erature,
etc. One boy had interest in lit erature.
I asked him to organize Subramaniyam Bhartiyar inter-medical poetry contest
under the auspices of the NMO but they could not tell me the birth or death
anniversary of this Mahakavi.
When on 12th December, after my conference on diabetes, I went to
the RSS, Chennai office (which was blasted on 8th August 1993, wit h RDX by Islamic milit ants
as a revenge for Ayodhya-demolit ion),
I read there in several newspaper that in fact on 11th December fell the 116th
anniversary of Mahakavi Subramaniyam Bhartiyar and it was surprising that I was suggesting his name to
be given to this famous medical instit ute.
If Udaipur can
remember Gurudev Rabi Thakur from Bengal why Tamilian pride Subramaniyam
cannot replace Stanley
Names have nothing – people do argue, but it is the most important possession of a man. He/she should be asked to tell his/her name
as the last question while testing for the memory functions of brain as one who
has forgotten his/her name will not recall anything – name is the last thing to
be forgotten. Let us change the names, which depict slavish mentalit y.
In the Chola’s cit y
of Thanjavur, having the biggest Shivalingam, Brihadeeshwar, about 8.75 meter
(13 feet) high, I noted interestingly,
there the boys’ hostels were named as House of Lords, Fleming and the girls’
hostels were named after birds of foreign countries like Paragon, Paradise and
Skylark apart from the musical note Symphony and the river Cauvery which meets
at nearby Thiruvaiaru where saint-poet Thyagaraja took his last breath and
there in his memory an annual music festival is held but when I reached there
in my first visit to Thanjavur, I
found the pandals only where the festival had ended the previous night.
Poets choose places of solit ude in
their end — Mahakavi Vidyapati went near the Ganga
(about 100 km south of his abode, Bisfi, in Mit hila
of Bihar); Rabindranath Thakur chose Bolepur (Shantiniketan).
But I was amazed at Thanjavur, in one of my further visit s, in a house of a swayamsevak
(having a drug industry), whose son performed a token yajna, lighting
fire on a board in the morning before going to an English School and that an
under 10 boy used to attend also the vedic
school in the evening.
For the first time, I took a dinner in the
medical college girls’ hostel at Surat Govt. Medical College ,
Surat
I saw the students reading late in the night in the
library of the Rangarya Medical college, Kakinada Kakinada Cinema Street
While Jamnagar (near Dwarka) has a unique system of
messes, run by the village-women of nearby areas, who come even wit h their teen-aged daughters to work, staying for
the full day in the hostels and returning to their villages after serving the
boarders evening meals (sun sets late in the western cost). Such a thing cannot
be imagined in most of the States of India, that too in boys’ hostels. There
too, in the MP Shah
Medical College it iated by a girl
medico of the first year, Bhavna Mehta, in 1977.
The Guntur
Medical College it ten
a book in Telugu, compiling his articles on the AIDS awareness.
Once upon a time, the local NMO President, Dr. Asha T.
was amongst two lady presidents of the NMO unit
(the other was at Ranchi it
Dhar had earlier remarked that the work assigned to ladies are well executed
and hence, later on, I pressed Dr. Shobha Chakravorty to accept the
‘presidentship’ of the NMO’s orphanage, Nivedit a
Ashram*).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Inaugurated on
28.11.1999,the history of it s init iation was Mahesh Badhwani’s interest in an
orphanage, which he used to point out to me whenever he used to come for
collecting the physicians’ samples for a clinic at the RSS, Ranchi it
was on the back of the RMC Hostels, built as an old-age home by Dr. Aloka
Mukherjee.
I
(under an sublime thought of putting the donation-box for the orphans at the
DMCH, Darbhanga by the NMO unit
during 1980s imagined that the NMO could
also run it s office from there where
old pracharaks of Sangh too could live as well as mould such orphans,
having no normal familial bondages, to future Hindu pracharks) asked Mahesh to fix my appointment wit h Dr. Aloka Mukherjee. After about 19 meetings wit h her in which Dr. H. P. Narayan, Dr. Shobha
Chakroverty, Dr. Usha Rani, like senior members of NMO used to present, lastly
she could provide one floor of it to
us.
I proposed Dr. Shobha Chakravorty’s name as it s
president considering her being from the same linguistic group as well as her
successor in the department at the RMCH and
wit hout knowing Dr. Shobha’s
daughter too was named Nivedit a, I proposed to continue the old-age
home’s name “Nivedit a Ashram” to our
orphanage too.
Fig. 47__
Nivedit a Ashram, an
orphanage of the NMO at Ranchi being inaugurated
on 28.11.1999 by (central wit h an orphan)
Babulal Marandi the then Minister of State, GOI, on his right Dr. H. P.
Narayan, Ranchi Ranchi
Later when we had to transfer the project to the Arogya
Bhavan Campus (as the Bharat Sevashram Sangh did not like us; it wanted full space for it s
projects) probably Dr. Satish Kr. Midha
influenced members to change it s
name to Karuna in a meeting for which I was not informed. He further had some
ego problems wit h Mahesh and on some
charges he was adamant to remove him
that I was invit ed by Dr. Archana
Sharma to attend a meeting for it on
1.1.2006 and later by Dr. K. P. Sinha (whom I had proposed as the Secretary
despit e disliking of Mahesh in 2000
) on 29.1.2006. I vetoed against the removal of Mahesh so much so that I had to
take it s charge, making it my night duty
on coaxing (“Show by living even
for a week here” by Dr. Suhash Tetarway (who
had left working for the NMO since 1991), I started living at night there since then for a month to avoid the crisis and to streamline the
affairs and advised to
rename it
as “Nivedit a Ashram .”
I
also found Dr. Rashmiben Bhavsar, Karnavati and Dr. Surekha Shah, Porbandar
(who has also writ ten a book on Swadeshi
Drug Movement) pleading forcefully for the Process Patent at the NMO’s XVI
national conference at Rajkot on the 23rd February 2002. Lady workers like Dr.
Sanjeevanee Kelkar, (Madikeri, now at Nagpur
On the first Indian lady doctor, Dr. Anandibai Joshi’s
short life of 22 years (31.3.1865-26.2.1887), there is a Marathi book and a TV
Serial in Hindi, Anandi Gopal. One of my Bengali patients, Bijali
Sengupta provided me an article, Mahila daktar-Bhinna Graher Bashinda
(Women doctors-natives of a different planet) in Bangla, on the basis of
which I could writ e a small article
on Dr. Kadambini Gangopadhyaya, the first women doctor (and the first graduate
wit h Bidhumukhi) of Calcutta Universit y from the Medical College, Calcutta, who took
admission there in 1883.
There are two medical colleges only for the girls, the Lady Hardinge
Medical College ,
N. Delhi, already described before and the Dr. D.Y. Patil Pratishthan’s Padmashree Dr. D.Y. Patil Medical College it . Though I feel in this age,
there is no need of such only women’s medical colleges as around 30-50
per cent of medicos all over India
Fig. 48 __
The Ograniser'ssupplement (23.4.1995)on the occasion of the X National
Conference of the NMO at the Govt. Medical College ,
Amrit sar April 14-16,1995 .
The Govt. Medical
College , Jammu it al. In later visit s,
I found tight securit y on account of
insurgency. It could be possible for me to visit the Govt. Medical College, Srinagar only on
7.11.2004 where I had a photograph( on back cover page) wit h
young medicos including boys from Laddakh and Kargil but girls did not agree .
On the main notice board, I put a copy
of the front page of this book marking
the completion of my long journey to the all medical colleges (of my
student days). Then I visit ed the SKIMS(Shere-I-Kashmir Instit ute of Medical Sciences) where I could talk to the lady librarian only after her Zohar (noon Namaz).There
was a section on Islamic books. There should should have been included books on all religions. There I
stayed wit h some init ial hesit ation
for the first time in any Muslim's house (of Muzammil, a young engineer, student
of my friend Arun Kumar Jha).
Free flow
of drugs nurturing milit ancy
The Report:
Dr. Thakur in his report entit led the
pathetic health scenario of north and central India said drugs like menstrogen,
banned in India because of health reasons, were easily made available by
Pakistan to users in the Amrit sar
market.Prepared on the basis of his experience during visit s
to Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, western U.P., and
northern Madhya Pradesh, the report said a virtual drug war was being carried
out by the foreign mercenaries to keep alive insurgency in Punjab.
Quacks: Dr.
Thakur said it was ironic that
quacks were flourishing in almost every village and town of Punjab it e of a number of qualified
medicos in the state. These quacks not only put the patients in danger, but at
the same time lead young medicos, to eit her
adopt unethical practices to make money or shift to bigger cit ies .“Unfortunately, it
is the greater nexus which is being forgotten, while doctors were being
condemned on the grounds that they did not serve the villagers”, he lamented. He
urged for banning of quackery in any form and that no drug be sold wit hout valid prescriptions.(Courtesy, The TOI,
16.5.1992).
Fig. 49 __ On 4.8.2002 at Chandigarh
Dr. Dhanakar Thakur.
On
4.8.2002, at Chandigarh , we could have a very
good opening for the NMO in a function organised in the Punjab
Universit y
campus-the first professor of Transfusion Medicine in India
The
PGIMER (Post Graduate Instit ute of
Medical Education & Research), Chandigarh it utes of
the country. Medicos aspire to enter here. Long back I visit ed it
on a chilly day having no sunrays till noon .
Surgical ward was centrally air-condit ioned.
From the top of that floor, I saw a name-board of the Sewa Bharati on the
ground. When I went there, I found that they had been working since 1991 to
help the patients coming from far-flung areas. They told me about a case which
had come from Khagaria of Bihar. In this planned cit y
I also saw a children’s road show for popularising Pulse Polio on the
very next day.
On
way to the PGIMER, I also saw the Govt.
Medical College ,
Chandigarh it would
be a model instit ute. On returning
to Delhi Ranchi , I got a New Year
greeting card from Dr. Punit Agarwal
of Calcutta it was a record visit by me, an unknown medico to the 119th
medical college of the country.
The very
next day, wit h Dr. Kuldip Chander, I
visit ed the 120th medical college,
i.e. the Christian Medical College ,
Ludhiana sit uated
in the heart of the cit y, which was
founded in 1895 as the Ludhiana
Medical School it s
Women’s Hostel near the main college building. Then I went to it s Boys’ Hostel, which was at some distance. I
could talk to three students. Almost all students were Christians.
I
feel medical education should never be segmented. It should have no preference
in admission or service in the name of religions. However, the CMC had very
advanced departments of Plastic Surgery and Cardio-Thoracic Surgery. The
patients’ number had dropped down due to congested roads and heavy traffic but
I was informed that road was to be restricted soon, exclusively for the traffic
to the CMC only.
The
Dayanand Medical College & Hospit al
was started at Ludhiana it
looked that it lacked the mission
Swami Dayanand’s name would suggest.
Haryana’s
the Pt. Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post-Graduate Instit ute
of Medical Sciences, Rohtak’s all U.G. hostels are connected by passages. The Sriram Chandra
Bhanjdeo Medical
College , Cuttack it h a dharmshala _
our NMO worker Sudhiranjan Nayak narrowly escaped when the moving ceiling fan
of his room fell down.
In
the NMO’s national conference at Mysore , a
delegate from Silchar (Assam )
told me that he was an alumnus of the Mysore
Medical College ,
Mysore
Fig. 50 __
Dr. Tapodhir Das, of Silchar an alumnus
of the MMC, Mysore , wit h
his son and Dr. Dhanakar Thakur (1st L.), Dr. Suhash Teatarway (1st R.), Ranchi , during the VII National Conference of the NMO,
9.9.1990, near the Mysore
Palace
That conference was organised by Dr. Sanjay Kelkar who wit h his surgeon wife, Dr. Sanjeevanee, had
established the Ashwini Hospit al at
Madikeri in the western ghats of Karnataka where the Kaveri orginates.
The
Netaji Subash Chandra Bose Medical College Jabalpur is en route to Bheraghat,
famous for whit e marble rocks of Narmada . Once I visit ed
the college wit h my wife where also
I found a doctor from Imphal, an alumnus of the same college where his son was
also studying and I later met that doctor at the RIMS, Imphal.
Once,
when I went to the Maharaja Krishna Chandra Gajapati Medical College of
Brahmapur, a professor of Physiology had died and his dead body was kept in the
portico of the college. How reverent the boys were to that teacher! In one of
my earlier visit s, I had found, the
NMO workers were busy in the printing of the souvenir of their internee batch
(having photograph, date of birth and few lines on the pers onalit y of each student).
The Andhra Medical
College , Vishakhapatanam is the oldest
medical college of the A.P.
State it ed it first
in 1984, Dr. Ram Babu told me, “Sir, though I was to leave today after passing
my MD, bag and baggage, I’ll stay only for you for today.”
The
SS Medical College, Rewa is in the Vindhya region of MP. The clinical materials are abundant there.
I found the hostels of the Govt. Medical
College , Nagpur it of Veer
Savarkar.
The
Students of the BJ Medical College, Pune honoured me for the first time for my
long tour records of medical colleges in India Calcutta it y
of Joy, Dominique Lapaierre has described how the poor sell their blood! In
Calcutta
Pune’s
and Ahmadabad it utions.
During the NEC meeting of the NMO in October 1998, we stayed in ‘Sandwich ’ hostel (Boys’ hostel sandwiched between two girls’
hostels) at Pune.
I
visit ed the AFMC (Armed Forces
Medical College it s
audit orium named Dhanwantari and
college insignia, ^loZs lUrq fujke;%^. I also crossed through the Bharati Vidyapeeth Medical
College
At
the J. J.
Hospit al
of the Grant Medical College it ation for it also by the students of that college long back.
At Mumbai, in the college canteen of the Topiwala
National Medical
College , one pers on
listening to my talk about Ranchi Karachi Karachi is nearer and familiar to them than
Ranchi
Much
later in 1998, when I visit ed the
UCMS, Delhi, in a small meeting of medicos, I was again astonished to know from
a young medico that Ranchi was famous for stupas (in fact, he meant
Sanchi of MP, famous for Buddhist stupas).
At Aurangabad , I was stranded due to curfew-bound area in
between the Govt.
Medical College it al in 1992,
just after the demolit ion of the
disputed structure at Ayodhya and in the next visit
only I could go to the medical college.
The
Dr. Hedgewar Hospit al is an
inspiring instit ution established by
some doctor swayamsevaks who were themselves inspired by the Vivekananda Hospit al Vellore it al
at Miraj and Dr. Kukade though had topped in Medicine did his MS in Surgery to
serve the rural people better. They provided the first and the best service to
Killary earthquake victims, where the NMO members also contributed.
among
the capit ation-fee based medical
colleges, the Kasturba Medical College ,
Manipal is the most famous and updated, which has opened it s
unit s even in Nepal
The
South Asia edit ion of the Brit ish
Medical Journal earlier known as the Indian Edit ion
of the Brit ish Medical Journal
is also being published by it .
Though
I was advised not to go to Manipal at the Ladies Hills bus stop (not for ladies
but named after some Lady related to the Church in this Christian dominated
town of the western coast) of Mangalore,
I told people that I would visit
Manipal at any cost. At Mangalore, I also saw the Kasturba Medical
College Light House Hill Road it it .
Manipal
is a small town. It may be considered to have developed education as an
industry. Several colleges are flourishing there on capit ation-fee
basis. In the hospit al, neuro-ward
is named after Dhanwantari and special ward is named after Charak. The Dental College
Among
200 students of each medical batch, 50 pairs finally do wed. It was reported to
me that for students the love affair is the only way of recreation in this
village like place. Despit e food
being supplied free to induce patients to remain in the hospit al campus for the training of the students,
patients’ number is less than optimal.
On
way back, I saw every home decorated wit h
a big star-shaped lighted, festoon, welcoming the New Year. The road was also
having fluorescent light and many Santa Claus were displayed.
In
one of the most beautiful road-route of the country (Mangalore-Davangere), I
had an occasion at Shringeri to converse wit h
the Holy Shankaracharya in Sanskrit .
When I told him that I hailed from the native village of Vachaspati II it hila, he quipped that he was a
great saint.
One
co-traveller (also a Kaushik Brahmin like me) told me that he was from that
area of Chikmangalore (chick in Kannada means small) which had returned
Indira Gandhi as a winner and if Vajpayee stood from there they would make him
also a winner as he was a good man. I reached Davangere via Shimoga.
At the JJM Medical College, Davangere, I was
impressed to see in it s library
sections on the WHO, Kannada lit erature
and Humanit ies in which there were
complete volumes (1895-1914) of the Brahmvadin, started by Swami
Vivekananda himself which certainly means the founders had imagined more than
producing a mere mechanical doctor.
Here
too, the dental college was impressive and I visit ed
it s museum wit h
keen interest.
Here
at Belgaum it
an orphanage, Bal Kalyan Kendra, run by the Ganga Chikammi Muttha and also a
blind school, well run by the Sangh workers through a different Trust. I saw a
young Homeo doctor couple, serving the blind and I encouraged the couple. I
also saw the Braille script for the first time.
Being
confused by my letter (my designation as the edit or
of the Aayurvigyan Pragati, though vice-president of the NMO was also
mentioned) only Ayurvedic doctors were
called for the meeting of the NMO. I talked to them for service attit ude while seeing the patients and also the need
for a new organisation among them. And, I could get the message that the
proper time to change NMO’s name in Sanskrit
has not come yet.
Here,
an ABVP worker had shown me the album of the district conference. I was
surprised to find banners in English and asked whether it
was due to the Kannada-Marathi conflict of this bilingual area. He replied in
the affirmative. I suggested to him to writ e
in the Devanagri script but wit h a -
%
¼folxZ½&vf[ky Hkkjrh; fo|kFkhZ ifj"kn%½ that it was interpreted as Sanskrit
name as Marathi is also writ ten in
the Devanagri script. Sanskrit is
revered by both Kannada and Marathi people (and by all who love Bharat which is
much more than India
Probably,
Sanskrit is the answer for the
National Language problem and Karnataka is the best path-finder where two
villages in Shimoga district are wholly Sanskrit
speaking.
The MR Medical College , Gulbarga it ation-fee
imparts good learning. The Karnataka Instit ute
of Medical Sciences at Hubli has a boys' hostel named, Anand, where I was
welcomed by the medicos.
At
Miraj, I was told that the nursing homes were more in number than the population
required. The boys of the Govt. Medical College
In the cit y of
gardens, Bangalore , when I visit ed the Bangalore
Medical College it ation
- fee instit utions in the state. The
college has the unique distinction of hosting the API conferences thrice—I
attended two, in 1984 and 1998.
However, it
was in A.P. that a Chief Minister had to resign for the first time in the
country on the issue of banning capit ation-fee.
I had been a part of such agit ations
in the past in Bihar * and thereafter, in
Thrissur where I had addressed the agit ating
medicos.
One such capit ation-fee
based college, I visit ed later in
Bangalore is the Kempegowda Instit ute
of Medical Sciences, named after the founder of Bangalore which is run by the
Vokkaliga Society and is one among it s
several educational instit utions.
I was surprised to find that the medical college office wit h the SPM Department and it s
library were in the Society’s Science
College it al complex, I visit ed, had a big audit orium.
Medical colleges of
Kishanganj and Katihar are very close to
my home(only 120 and 95 km respectively)
which I did not visit for long as I
never liked medical colleges run by
minorit y instit utions based on
capit ation-fee business . I
knew that such an instit ution's(the
Mata Gujri Memorial Medical
College, Kishanganj named after the great Guru Govind Singh's mother) medicos
extended help to Gaisal railway accident
victims and I appreciated it when I visit ed
it finally on 9.4.2005.
In the same trip on 13.4.2005, I also visit ed the Katihar
Medical College
The Chennai
Medical College
is very close to Chennai railway station and has a rich tradit ion of medical education, including that of
producing the first four European lady doctors in 1878, even before the UK
However, I was miraculously saved from being thrown out
of a fast running bus returning from the Chingelpattu Medical
College
Likewise,
I was pushed to the left side of the road by a running mini-truck in Karnavati
(Ahmadabad it
the Smt. N.H.L Municipal
Medical College it ed after a long
gap when the NMO was rooted firmly there.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*including Jharkhand
The BJ Medical
College, Ahmadabad (Karnavati) has one of the
biggest hospit als of the country,
which is popularly known, in the cit y
as the Civil Hospit al it ed it for the first time, the NMO had several good
workers there due to the daily running shakha in spit e of the protest by the opponents. One of our
workers, Dr. Viren Doshi was compelled not to complete his MD due to an
anti-Sangh teacher.
The
Seth GS Medical College of Mumbai is a reputed medical instit ution of the country where I met a few boys of the
Naigaum Hostel. There I saw Jaypee publishers
lending books to new medicos for the whole session as a part of their publicit y campaign for making them future buyers or as a
philanthropic move, I could not ascertain.
However,
I wish this facilit y available to
Mumbai medicos should be extended all over the country. Those boys accompanied
me to the college and the Main Hostel where I found the students being called
on loud-speakers if someone was wanted on phone or otherwise. I had a good
meeting for the NMO there.
One
of the workers accompanied me to the Lokmanya
Tilak Municipal
Medical College it ler (Born
1760/1889; in power 1804/1933; occupying Vienna 1809/1938, conquered Russia
1812/1941; was defeated and died
1816/1945)*.
Describing the dilemma of a man he says, “Woman is the
cause of universal war, happiness and joy — if you try to date, she thinks she
is very beautiful and if you don’t, she thinks you are blind; if you hold her
hand, she thinks you are trying to be fresh and if you don’t, she thinks you
are a simpleton; if you talk too much, she thinks you are a cynic and if you
don’t, you are a fool; if you are sociable, she thinks your are a playboy and if
you are not, she thinks you are a ‘jungle-man’; if you talk love and marriage,
she thinks you are proposing and if you don’t she thinks you are cold blooded.
Women are fickle minded, in just a minute she can say 10 different things in 10
different ways and 10 different styles. If you ..and pamper them, you’ll live
10 years less.”
No
wonder, Kumar had taken the name of a girl (Vandana) in retaliation and his
hostel-mates had snatched a wing of the hostel meant for the girls —
incidentally, it was the only
undergraduate medical hostel where I found boys and girls living on the same
floor but in the opposit e wings.
*In fact,
Napoleon was born in 1769 and died in 1821
Of
course, girls’ wing was closed wit h
a door and I could guess about the usurping of their one wing as boys took me
to their wing for a meeting, which had also a closed door, but on deeper
enquiry, I found only three pairs/would-be pairs in their batch of 100.
I
had learnt from someone in my childhood that if you go near the women and Laxmi
(wealth) both will run away from you, and if you refrain from going near them,
they would come to your feet. Young boys and girls —beware!
I
was also impressed by the mention of birthdays of some medicos even on that
very holiday in the college on the board wit h
greetings and a wall magazine, Ashwandi-97 and the Jhapuji edit ed by Alpana Somle containing an article in
Marathi on medical profession and also an appreciation for Dr. R.L. Thatte,
Prof. and HOD, Plastic Surgery, for his book, Me Hindu Jhale.
After
that in the same night, I went to visit
the hostel of the Padmshree Dr. DY Patil Medical College in New Mumbai
but was informed that actually the college had no hostel till then rather
students took flats sharing the rent and I could meet only one such student.
I
also saw several times from the buses, the K. J. Somaiyya Medical College &
Reseach Centre, Mumbai, which has wide area to grow.
Fig. 51 ___ Beneficiaries of artificial limb
donation by Polio Clinic run by the NMO, Rajkot
Fig. 52 __ Ma. Sunder Singh Bhandari, Hon'ble
Governor of Gujarat inaugurating the XVI National Conference of the NMO at Rajkot Feb. 23, 2002 .
In
one of my visit s, I enjoyed the Garba
dance till late night and also an act of the makhan-chori by child Krishna , so accurately they danced to make ropes, making
a platform and after the makhan-chori, again danced to untie the ropes.
At Rajkot it ed the newly opened medical college (now there is
a move to name it as the Deendayal
Instit ute of Medical Sciences) wit h NMO worker Dr. N.D. Shilu who was also working
for a co-operative store for doctors named Suvidha.
No
wonder, Gujarat is famous for the co-operative movement which is the most
developed in the Kheda and Anand districts and the small township of Anand is
countrywide famous for Amul. At Rajkot it ed her college at Karamsad, near Anand.
Hence,
in the same trip, I went to Anand, where I missed to visit
the Amul Dairy but could have a meeting for the NMO. When I went to Karamsad,
where Sardar Patel was born, I found the Pramukh Swami Medical
College
I
was wait ing for an appointment wit h the Dean, Dr. (Ms) Nivedit a
Desai, and was informed by another lady doctor also wait ing
there that my friend, Dr. Sharad Shah, a surgeon, was also there who had worked
in the Vanvasi Kalyan Kendra, Lohardaga. I could see him after a long gap.
Talking
to Madam Dean was enchanting. She told me that she was the first to opt for
Anaesthesia as her subject in MD. I told her that my Alma Mater, the Darbhnaga Medical
College had the first MS in
Anaesthesia, in India
Dr.
Desai was also the first lady becoming Dean in the Gujarat State
But
my friend Dr. Sharad Shah’s story was more inspiring. His madam told me that
Dr. Shah had himself operated upon her and it
was also a paying case to the hospit al.
I was surprised. Dr. Shah told me that the hospit al
had no provision for free cases, of course, poor (and there could be hardly any
poor in that rich localit y due to
the Amul movement) could have very subsidised treatment.
However,
my question was why he had decided to operate on his wife himself. He told me
that he knew the history of a very famous surgeon of Bihar, Dr. Vijay Kumar
Singh, who had lost his son while he was doing his nephrectomy himself, despit e that Dr. Shah had decided to do the
appendicectomy of his wife himself as his thinking was that the life of every
patient on the table was the most precious for him and at the same time he
should never be attached more than a doctor should be wit h
his or her patient and if he had not achieved such an excellence as to operate
wit h steadfastness also upon his
wife, he should not operate at all morally.
I
believe nobody is a VIP (very important pers on)
because I treat every patient equally wit h
the best possible skill or everybody is a VIP (very important patient)
for me.
In
the same trip of Gujarat, I visit ed Bhavnagar ’s newely opened the Govt. Medical
College it h their bags on that pre-week-end day as after the
last period they had to catch buses for their homes __ so homely was the
college for those new students.
The
first batch had no ragging. I asked them whether they ragged their juniors and
their answer was somehow affirmative. Yet, I felt that their ragging would be
introductory only because in the state of Gujarat
girls are invariably suffixed been (sister) e.g. Manjuben, be she a
medical student or a house-maid.
Bhavnagar, I knew since my pre-medical days as being the
place where the Central Salt and Marine Chemical Research Instit ute was located which I could see from the
roof-top of the town’s deit y,
‘Takhteshwar’ (which was built by the king named so.) From here you can see
this teeming cit y, encircled from
three sides by the Arabian Sea .
At the Medical
College it ted
to take food in the mess, which I had not seen, any where. To my utter surprise
I found there a mess servant from the tribal area of Ranchi
As Vadodara is to Gujarat regarding academic centre, so
is Patiala to Punjab .
It seems some of the old princely states’ Maharajas had taken due care
of propagating education, including medical education.
At the Govt. Medical College ,
Patiala
When
I visit ed the NIMHANS, Bangalore it version of the Charak
Shapath, which I could procure only afterwards. Though I had a good meeting
there, the NMO could not start in Bangalore it e
my several visit s.
I crossed Coimbatore
several times and once I took the help of a town-dweller medico of the Coimbatore Medical College it his college. The boys had
gone to Ooty for an outing.
A few years later, another medico from there sent a
letter to me asking how to work for the NMO. Then I could know Coimbatore
is called ‘Kovai’ though the Kovai express, I was knowing, like the Nellai
Express for Tirunelveli and the Vaigai or Pandayan Express for Madurai
I have learned much from a young doctor of Madurai it s he had arranged my
meeting in the Gandhi Memorial Museum
(Gandhi Mandapam) adjacent to the Madurai
Medical College
As it was
expected to be gathering of a few, I suggested to them to cancel the booking of
the hall and arrange the meeting in the
hostel it self. It was followed by
another young medico, Sachin Bansal, who later became a Sanyasi of the
International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) order. Working as a
preacher in the district anand of Gujrat.,he started wearing saffron garb and was
given the name as Dr. Savyasachi Das,
When Dr. Sarvanan came, he told me that the girls would
not come in the boys’ hostel. I told him that we would go their hostel and talk
to them separately. Sarvanan said (in Tamil, highlighting my importance to
other medico), “Dhanakarji comes once in a year or two,” and (in English), “the
girls will work for the NMO, only when they sit
wit h boys and further we are paying
money to maintain an instit ution
like Gandhi Madapam. “
This appealed to me very much. On
this, I thought, I was unnecessarily chiding Dr. Satish Kumar Midha, Treasurer
of the NMO for not transferring money from the saving bank account to the fixed
deposit for higher interest— after
all, the SBI is also nation’s property and so what is the difference who gets
how much interest?
* He died prematurely despit e liver transplantation.
Later, Sarvanan went for his practice to Erode but
continued the annual medical camps at Sabarimala. In January 2002, I was
fortunate to attend the camp and I had also a glimpse of the Makar-jyothi
and of Lord Ayyappa, which I had missed in 1984, though on that 14th January
also I was at Kottayam.
Fig. 53 ___ Sabarimala
Camp, 14.1.2002, Dr. Dhanakar Thakur (Standing extreme R) wit h the workers (Dr. Sarvanan, second to me).
My
visit to the Tribhuvan
Universit y ’s
Teaching Hospit al(TUTH),Kathmandu
and B.P.Koirala Instit ute of Health
Sciences(BPKIHS),Dharan were the only medical instit utions
outside the India in Nepal
but Nepal
TheBPKIHS,the nearest medical college from my hometown, Forbesganj(about
50 km) is bulit through Indo-Nepal cooperation where every patient
has to pay for bed medicines and
investigations though there the
people are very poor. In it s
scenic campus, I saw jackals roaming freely in the early night.
Around 4,000 doctors registered wit h
the Nepal Medical Council are inadequate for a population of 25 million who are
also very badly distributed __in
interiors1:30,000, in towns one for few hundred. Around 15 medical colleges of Nepal
draw a good number of students from India it ation-fee who will
not be of any use to this poor nation.
The
NMO was founded in the ABVP conference at the Sampurnanand
Sanskrit
Universit y
at Varanasi but it
could not function properly in the Instit ute of Medical
Sciences it e
my several visit s. But due to the
efforts of Dr. Vijayendra on the 5.11.2001, the Silver Jubilee Celebrations of
the NMO were started wit h token
blood donation and other programmes in the IMS, in the presence of it s Director.
Fig.-54 __ The
inaugural ceremony of the Silver Jubilee Celebrations of the NMO at the IMS, Kashi Hindu Vishwavidyalaya (KHV i.e.
BHU), 5.11.2001 (L-R) Dr. H. P. Narayana, Ranchi, Prof. Anand Kumar, BHU, Dr.
Narendra Prasad, Patna, Prof. V. P. Singh, BHU, Prof. A. N. Gangopadhyay,
President, NMO, BHU.
The
IMS is a unique instit ute, which was
previously having an Ayurvedic doctor, K. N. Udupa, as it s
Dean, who subsequently got fellowship in Modern (Allopathic) Medicine. Mahamana
Malaviya had a mind-set like that of Rajnaraian Bose of Calcutta it h all modern
medical knowledge as well as ancient Ayurveda.
I had also an occasion to visit Tirupati’s
S.V.Ayurvedic College it s herbal garden, which evoked
my childhood memories of collecting herbs.
Herbal medicines have a lot to contribute but who can identify them as
Jivak had __^^ukfLr ewye~ vukS"k/ke~ (there is no plant
root which cannot be utilized as amedicine).” Jivak, who became the first
neurosurgeon of the world had told this to his guru at Nalanda in
Bihar when he was asked to bring any such herb
in gurudakshina, after completing his education in Medicine.
Apart from the hostels of the
Ayurvedic Instit ute of Medical
Sciences, BHU, Varanasi , I visit ed twice the Instit ute
of Post Graduate Teaching & Research in Ayurveda,Gujarat
Ayurved Universit y , Jamnagar
In fact, when I started visit ing
medical colleges for the spread of the NMO, for long their number was fixed at
106 like that of 103 being the number of elements in the Periodic Table of
Chemistry. My fellow NMO worker, Swami Vivekananda, so named as he is,
had once suggested to me to visit
all those 106 instit utions to set a
record. I earnestly desired to complete it
during my tours, which had always an organisational priorit y
rather than setting an unbreakable record. Hence, I visit ed
several instit utions, umpteen times
but I could not visit only the Govt. Medical
College , Srinagar it it earlier.
To visit the
Govt. Medical College, Srinagar was difficult and impractical from the
organisational points of view owing to raging anti-Hindu/Bhartiya milit ancy stance for which I postponed my visit during peace time in 1987, in order to visit it wit h the proposed girl student from the SKMC,
Muzaffarpur (whose parents later wit hdrew
the proposal knowing that I wanted to marry in the Vindhyachal temple where my
father could not solemnise my yajnopavit
despit e having taken a vow to do so.
The NMO, Jammu ’s worker, Dr. Satyadev’s wife
pressed me to postpone my Srinagar visit till marriage seeing the proposed girl’s
photograph wit h me and also due to a
landslide, it was a one-way traffic
to Srinagar for the next few days and I could have
missed my next leg of tour to Punjab .
In the past two
decades many new medical instit utions
have come up__totaling to 228 for the
MBBS course as per the
Medical Councli of India it e
http\\mciindia.org , out of which 206 were recognised till 24.6.2009 and 22 were permit ted
for the year 2009-10 to admit total
26705 MBBS students.
Majorit y of
the new instit utions are capit ation- fee based and the NMO being opposed to it , I did not make serious attempts to visit them. Most of such new medical colleges are
located in Karnataka and Maharashtra , which in
fact, did not need more doctors. Surprisingly, relatively many poorer states
have not opened any such ‘medical shop’ to spin money.
By 1.8.2009, I have paid my visit s
to 141 medical colleges (and also seen eight
from the road) and nine purely P.G. medical instit utions(seen
Sree Chit ra Thirunel Instit ute for
Medical Science & Technology,Thiruvanathapuram from the road) of
India and two in Nepal to spread the NMO, totalling 162 medical instit utions.
I also visit ed
some of the medical research instit utes
of the country e.g. the Tropical School of Medicine and the All India Instit ute of Public Health and Hygiene, Calcutta ,
and the Rajendra Memorial Research Instit ute
(a unit of the ICMR), Patna
I have already visit ed
some important hospit als of the
country e.g. the Apollo, Chennai, Delhi and Ranchi; the Bombay Hospit al, the Tata Cancer Hospit al
and the Jashlok Hospit al &
Research Center, the Lilawati Hospit al,
Mumbai; the Medi-Cit y Hospit al(which later developed into the Medi-Cit y Instit ute
of Medical Sciences) near Hyderabad, the
Batra Hospit al, the Sir Gangaram
Hospit al, New Delhi, the St.
Stephens Hospit al, Delhi; the Gandhi
Eye Hospit al, Aligarh, the Sankar
Nethralaya, Chennai; the Arvind Medical Research Foundation, Madurai; the
TMH, Jamshedpur; the BGH, Bokaro, the
IGH, Rourkela, the JLNH, Bhilai, the IH, Vishakhapatanam; the Central Hospit al, BCCL, Dhanbad, the GNH, CCL, Ranchi; the
Railway Hospit al, Varanasi; the
HAL’s Hospit al, Sunabeda; the Army
Hospit al, Namkom and Pathankot; the
Vishudhananda Marwari Hospit al and
Chit taranjan Seva Sadan, Kolkata;
the Dental Colleges of Patna, Annamalai (Chidambaram), Bhubaneshwar, Cuttack,
Indore, Thiruvanthapuram and of Dharan (Nepal), etc.
In due course of time in order to enhance my knowledge as
well as experience, I have also a definit e
intention to visit the recently
established several medical and dental instit utions,
corporate sector hospit als and big
public undertaking hospit als, the
railway hospit als, the army hospit als, the charit able
trust hospit als, etc., to serve the
cause, aims and objects of the NMO.
"mRrqax
/;s; ds fy,
ikxy cus O;fDr;ksa
dks 'foJke' &;s
rhu
v{kj dgha [kkstdj
Hkh ugha feyrsA mUgsa
foJke ysus ds fy, ,
ck?; djus ,FkiFkikdj
lqykus dh {kerk
dsoy ,d gh ds gkFkksa
esa gksrh gS vkSj mldk
uke gS& 'e`R;q'A
"
(Mk]vkckth
FkRrs dk
e`R;q'k;~;k ls viuh
Mk;jh esa fyf[kr okD;
dk fgUnh vuqoknA)
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