A tribute to a great man

Few people have the luck of growing up beneath the shadows of a great man and one such lucky person is I. No points for guessing who the great man is ... who else but Mama.

I had wanted to write something about him from the day I started my blog, but now when he has been selected to receive an award from the President for the 2nd time, I decided that it is high time my blog is decorated with a tribute to the king of jewels... the diamond shining brightly amidst the terrors of darkness … enlightening our lives…

The reason I couldn’t write about him earlier was that I really didn’t know where to start … there is so much I can write about him that I get lost.

If a physically challenged person leads a normal life then people say that it is quite an achievement, but here is a man who leads a supernormal life in spite of being blind and the most amazing thing is that you won’t realize that he is blind even when you have been face to face with him for quite sometime.

He is an epitome of hard work and determination. Even we have our share of problems while appearing for Chartered Accountancy Examinations and it is absolutely unimaginable how he could complete the course and not just that … he has gone on to become a very well known Chartered Accountant, with a number of books to his credit as well, one of which has won the Literary Award from the Ministry of Finance.

I have had the luck of spending a lot of time with him and I have learnt a lot from him. Principally, he is a very upright man and he can never sacrifice his principles for anything. His management capabilities are evident from the fact that he manages a petrol pump single handedly, in spite of this limitation, and this petrol pump is one of the premier Indian Oil outlets of the city … no mean achievement. As an income tax practitioner, his knowledge of the law is astute and he can turn any case in his favour. It is absolutely impossible to defeat him in an argument … be it a matter of law or be it a matter of cricket.

But the most amazing thing about him is his thirst for accumulating knowledge and spreading knowledge. He is a man who can learn from the lowest and teach the highest. He won’t even mind learning how to clean a drain from a sweeper. From medicine to engineering, from cricket to food, he takes interest in everything and he strives to know more about everything. They say that knowledge is the real light and though nature has been very unkind in taking light away from his eyes, he has lit the light of knowledge within his soul.

He has won innumerable awards from various organizations, but in spite of these achievements, he remains modest and maintains a low profile. When he talks to us, he gets down to our level and talks to us like a friend. Often he will call us and we shall spend long hours chatting on all kinds of worthless matters. He yearns for our company and will not let us go easily. He is an ocean of love – he has got love for everyone around him. It is not for no reason that when I broke my head as a 2 years old kid, I refused to get my head stitched unless he came and took me in his lap.

His ability to solve any kind of problem is just amazing. From cars to computers, from official matters to matters of police, from plumbing problems to electric problems, he has got the solution for everything. Whenever we are in any sort of trouble, the first person whom we contact is he. We know that once a matter comes to his knowledge, we can stop worrying about it because he will take the matter in his hands and deal with it accordingly.

I could go on and on writing about him. He is more than a father figure to me. He is my ideal – if I could achieve even an iota of what he has, I shall consider myself successful… hats off to the man who personifies the saying “Where there is a will, there is a way”. No obstacle can stop you if you are determined to achieve your goal.

Mama … you are my source of inspiration … I shall always remain indebted to you for whatever you have taught me…