WE WILL MISS YOU KHOKON-DA

We lost Khokon-da yesterday. He valiantly faught against the dreded Coronavirus for eleven days but God felt his days of earthly struggle were over and he would be happier in heaven. 

Khokon-da was like no one else. He was an inspiration to us all. He was our eldest brother in law. My didi, Jathababa and Bara ma's eldest daughter, was married to him way back when I was just a child in school. Right from that time I was always attracted towards him. Though he was elder to me by almost a decade and a half, he was always very approachable, very helpful and very friendly. 

When we were young and studying in Lucknow, visiting Kolkata was almost an annual event and every summer vacation we would spend in our ancestral home in Jadavpur with Jathababa and Bara ma. My other uncles from Delhi would also join us with their family and we all used to look forward to Khokon-da and Didi's visits as invariably they would be occasions for joyous reunions. He was loved by everybody and he would enquire about everyone's wellbeing. My parents, whom he would call Nakaku and Nakakima, were particularly very fond of him and would often inspire me to be like him.

Khokon-da's parents, Abha di and Jamaibabu, were also related to us in a distant way and his Mama and Mami, Nilu-da and Boudi, used to stay in Lucknow and were family friends of my parents. Abha di and Jamaibabu were, like my parents, people with modest means and resources but that did not prevent Khokon-da from excelling academically and pass out as a Civil Engineer from the prestigious Shibpur Engineering College. He was an outstandingly brilliant student and used to teach my Didi as well.

Khokon-da was less of a brother in law and more of an elder brother to all of us. He would make it a point to be present in all our family functions and was always by our side whether in joy or in grief. I remember he came to our wedding and our son's wedding in Lucknow and such was his loving nature that he never forgot Neeta's parents and siblings, whom he had met only once almost 36 years ago. Every time we met or we rang up each other he would never forget to ask about their health and wellbeing!

Time spent with Khokon-da was invariably quality time. I would usually put up with him and Didi whenever I was in Kolkata. In the morning we would walk to the bazaar to buy vegetables and fish and every time this reminded me of my childhood trips to the bazaar with my father. Just like my father he knew every vendor by his/her first name and he was invariably greeted with a smile by everyone. There was a small Kali temple in the bazaar where he would always stop for a moment with eyes closed and hands folded in prayers before returning home. 

Watching cricket with him, whether it Eden Gardens or in front of the television was an absolute treat. He was a huge fan of Ganguly, Dravid and Tendulkar and the Kolkata Knightriders and enjoyed his cricket. 

As I grew up I realized that he was an idealist to the core both in professional as well as personal life. He managed a very successful Civil Engineering firm in Kolkata and like a true Karma-yogi, even in his seventies, he would personally go to supervise all his out-station work sites, even when they were in far away states and involved tedious travel by air, rail or road. During these visits if he was anywhere near any member of his large circle of friends and family, he would invariably call up, and if possible, meet in person. Keeping a tab on this circle of acquaintances came naturally to him and that is what endeared him to all of us.

The most distinguishing characteristic of Khokon-da was his clarity of thoughts and his decision making ability. I still remember about two decades back he was extremely incapacitated by pain in his knee joints. His doctors in Kolkata advised knee replacement surgery. He promptly gave me a call because he was not very convinced about the success of this surgery because our beloved Prime Minister Atal ji was not walking despite being operated by a world renowned American orthopaedic surgeon Dr. Chittaranjan Ranawat. I managed to convince him that Atal ji can afford not to walk and still be in his profession but he cannot. This very compulsion will inspire him to follow the post operative physiotherapy schedule and he will not only walk but add two decades to his professional life. I convinced him to go to the best knee replacement surgery unit in the country and we chose Dr. Sancheti in Pune for this job. Khokon-da immediately made an appointment, went to Pune, got both his knees operated, did all the drills and exercises without complaining and came out of this ordeal in flying colours! Never after that did his knees give him any trouble. 

Khokon-da was always a pillar of strength for our family. Whether it was settling a dispute and then renovating our ancestral home, or it was helping one of my cousin with her messy divorce or arranging marriages and employment for near and dear ones, he was in the centre of it all. Volunteering to take responsibility came naturally to him. While distributing duties he invariably kept the most difficult task for himself. Such was the strength of his persona and affection towards family and friends that one phone call from him was enough to arrange a grand family gathering.

Now having lost such a loving brother to the cruel curse of Coronavirus we are all feeling helpless and lost. It is a huge vacuum that he has left behind and this is a void that no one can fill. We all will complete our earthly journey some day and leave this world but the least that we can expect is a dignified exit with friends and family all around. A death like this, deprived of dignity, disposed in an unnamed body bag, incinerated in ignominy, away from the eyes of the loved ones, certainly did not do any justice to this wonderful person. This surely was a lapse in God's eternal system of justice.

 

We will certainly miss you Khokon-da. I cannot see any person fitting into your shoes. Didi, Babun, Suparna, Mamoni, Udayan and our grandchildren are all in pain and feeling your loss. The truth has not yet sunk in and my heart refuses to believe that I will never see you again. It seems we have to live with your memories only. Very sad.