Introduction to Subbulakshmi

It was somewhere in the year 1971 or 72 , when i was in primary school , I got introduced to a voice that captivated me and has remained the most cherished one - the nectarine voice of M.S. Subbulakshmi.

I was playing Football during the PT period and i got hurt. There were abrasions on my shin and my knee. The P.T.Master ordered to get tincture applied from the First Aid Room. The wound was hurting but the stinging sensation of tincture would be more dreadful . I was hesitant but a repeat order got me step my foot towards the school . The first aid room was close to the entrance of the school and it was opposite the Principal's room.

Our Principal ,Mr.Seshan , was fond of music and a LP record invariably played in his room. I approached , a peon and asked him to apply tincture. He opened the bottle, drenched a cotton ball with it and bend down to apply . I closed my eyes tightly , clenched my fist and try to concentrate on something else. That is when i paid attention to the music coming from the Principal's room. It was sweet voice and was singing a song called " Chakar Rakho Ji, mane Chakar Rakho ji" . I could not figure out what chakar meant and didn't understand language. It seemed funny and at the same time very pleasant. While i was still in these thought , a gruff voice came in " chalo  ho gaya " . It was the peon . The tincture was applied and i didn't even feel it.What could have happened , i wondered ! . Didn't he apply , it was there , what could have soothed this pain . It should me that singing voice and nothing else.....Boy that voice was so powerful to capture my total attention and absolutely soothing , whose is this ?

I waited outside the principal 's room and waited for him to look at me . The next song got over and playing side was also over. he got up to change the side of the LP and that is when he spotted me. I was frightened at his sight but slowly picked up courage and asked him who was the singer. That was M.S. Subbulakshmi singing Meera bhajans. Like an engraving on the rock , the voice & the name got registered in my mind .

Our house was full of carnatic music and the radio played it all the while and i could have heard her all along. But it was this episode which got me introduced to her voice, the one that mesmerized me and will continue to do that and hopefully will be last one to be heard before i become extinct.

Growing up with Pradeep 3

It was sometime in Dec 2001, 2 or 3 patients of mine relapsed in a row and one of them had died. I was very upset and wanted to go for a long drive. Pradeep , Patti and I set for a whirlwind tour of the Nilgiri mountains. On saturday morning we started from home reached back sunday evening in between we touched - coonoor, ooty, mudumalai , mananthavady, kapletta vythiri ,biderkad , gudalur,ooty .

When we were at Mudulamulai we went to see the famed : Jungle resort " run by hindi film actor Mithun Chakraborty. I just parked the car and went to look to out for a loo for patti. That is when I heard our boy, pradeep shout out ecstatically _ enna Saar ithu ( what is this) repeatedly. He waved me to come to where he was standing and excitedly saying the same phrase . Did he spot a Zebra . No. What he saw was a bevy of Firang girls , barely in their teens in bikini swim suits. They were enjoying a swim and this guy enjoyed seeing them . Seeing so many of white skins together in scanty clothes had literally got him into epileptic fits.

The Boy had become a man !

Smoker is a suicidal killer

Ask the man who sends little circles from his cigarette; the answer would be who cares. It is time you did, one of them could become the noose around your neck !

A passive smoker is at equal risk as an active one to get cancers and all other diseases associated with tobacco use. Legislations have come aplenty but implementation is scarce. The heavily hyped ban against smoking in public places has had little effect. At every street corner, parks and other public places young and old puff away to glory. The passive smoker has a passive stance. He is bound by decency, fraternity, magnanimity & serendipity. This passivity has to go and the passive smoker has to actively outcaste the active smokers. When this happens the smoker gets pushed out and at least quit smoking in public. Smoker is like a suicide bomber, he kills himself and others. This realization should come this World No tobacco day, 31st May 2010.. That is the sincere wish from the Vasantha Memorial Trust.

Growing up with pradeep 2

“stop Stop Stop “
During his initial days with me at coimbatore ,pradeep would stay home most of the times . On some errands he would accompany me. One such time we were off to Nilgiris , the popular dept store. We bought all the groceries, loaded them in the car & were off to the somewhere else. Slowly he asked me whether I would stop the car somewhere , I said not now . I asked him why .he said nothing. Minutes later he asked again, I enquired he was hungry, I had just bought him a cold drink at the store..he said he wasn’t . In a few minutes time he again asked the same . Slowly his request became more frequent and transformed to a command and at point of time he shouted “niruthu niruthu niruthu ( stop stop stop ) “ . I screeched the car to halt. In seconds he jumped out of the car and ran towards the edge of the road. I was taken back and wondered what happened. But in seconds I burst out in laughter, he was taking a leak !After he came , I scolded him for not telling me the reason and taking a piss in front of hundreds! Eppadi solarathu ( how to tell u ) i was feeling shy he said. And added It was the air conditioning at the store ,then the cold drink that did the trouble and it is impossible to control ……………he justified himself and crouched back in the seat in a deadly silence.

My first encounter with cancer

I was about 5or 6 years old and we used to live in Ghatkopar , a suburb in Mumbai. we were in the ground floor of bldg "L" and on the second floor lived Mr.Pandurangan. He had two daughters - Manju & banu. Manju was my classmate and Banu was about 4 years senior. Banu took ill and after some time manju told that her sister wouldn't come to school anymore as she developed a swelling inside her stomach. I didn't understand what it meant and soon the whole bldg talked about her illness and it was progressing. Repeatedly we would watch her go by the ambulance to the hospital. Invariably she would be wearing a royal blue long skirt & blouse , her head would be bend down and eyes full of tears . She would look terrified. Manju will be left with us,when her sister wen to the hospital and she would relate all that happens to her sister at home. I cannot recollect what she told me but i remember her crying when she described what happens.


My granny told me that one day her abdomen will swell so much that it will burst and she will die. Although i did not know exactly know what death meant a, i could perceive it as something terrible !


Once i learnt this , whenever i saw banu , i would look at her tummy and try to measure her abdomen visually to assess how much it was grown. this I would do even if she was covered with a bedsheet.


Soon the inevitable happened , banu had died at the hospital and they were to get the body home. All Children in the building were housed in one flat from where body cannot be seen when it is transported to the crematorium. But all of us wanted to see at any cost. We sneaked to the kitchen from where we could get a view. When we looked at the body that was carried , the only thing i wanted to see her abdomen and it was still swollen .. this disturbed me badly


Moment we were released from this temporary prison i ran home. I thought a big mistake was made and banu was wrongly declared dead. I rushed to my mom and burst out" banu 's abdomen was swollen and it didn't seem to have burst , she can't be dead. .....


She probably had a cancer ,either a teratoma or lymphoma. Fortuantely today children like banu need not die. They can get cured with good chemotherapy and surgery . But what is sad that our prception about cancer has changed little

a cactus flower in bloom

a beautiful flower was on bloom on a cactus plant at the terrace of vasantha memorial cancer centre. A rare event that lasted only for a day !

Growing up with Pradeep 1

It has been quite an experience watching pradeep grow. He hailed from a place called bitherkad midway between Gudalur and Sultan battery , deep inside nilgiris. His exposure to the world was limited . He could speak and write English but they sounded different . He had some weird pronunciations and he rationalized them too.

" Landry " was the word that bamboozled me for the first time. I corrected him , the word is laundry is pronounced as lawndree. No Saar it cannot be he replied emphatically. Dhobis wash clothes and put them for drying on rocks, they dry clothes on land that is why landry ! I was left speechless