My Friends

6. My friend Hiresh - Hiresh Roy was another classmate of ours in Lakshmi Union High School. He was in our core group of friends with Malu, Mrinal, Gokul and Dipu. After graduation he served in the Indian Army for seven years and then took voluntary retirement. Since then he had been running a tea-leaves shop behind Chowkbazar, Jorhat along with his son Rajesh. This picture of him was taken by me during my visit to Jorhat on March 20, 2014. I had met him earlier in 2007 for the first time after we had left school. At that time, he couldn't recognize me when I paid him a visit in his shop unannounced. *Sadly, he expired on November 20, 2015. He won't be there any more when I shall visit Jorhat hereafter.

1. Kalpana - Kalpana Roy @ Gopa was our classmate in Lakshmi Union High School. She is the cousin sister of my best friend Dipu. After Matriculation she moved to Shillong along with Dipu and got admitted to I. Sc. course in Ladekene College, Shillong. She stayed in the College Hostel there on Cantonment Road. After Intermediate she did her MBBS from Dibrugarh Medical College. She later moved to West Bengal and served as a Medical Officer in Urban Local Bodies. In Calcutta, I got re-connected to her after long years courtesy, our common friend Mrinal. At that time she lived very close to my house at Salt Lake, but I was not aware of it. After some years she, however, moved from Salt Lake to a new apartment at Calcutta Green Phase I at Ajoynagar off EM Bye pass. Sometimes after moving to her new flat, she lost her husband. Her husband R K Roy worked in a senior position in Geological Survey of India and used to be constantly on the move.

She has a daughter and a grand daughter from her. After her husband's death she mostly lived with her daughter at her place in Kolkata. All of them have since relocated to Pune. Here is her single photograph and a photograph with Asu, Mrinal and Myself when I had arranged a get-together in my flat on the occasion of Asu's visit to Kolkata on Nov 18th 2012. Unfortunately, I don't have any photograph of Gopa's late husband whom I came to know through Gopa and had met several times. He was a nice man.

My other Female school mates - Bela Rani Pal and Maya Ghosh were two of our female class mates amongst others of their species in Lakshmi Union High School. After they passed Class VI they with other girl students of our class moved to the morning section of the school meant for girls of Class VII to X. Once separated, we the boys and the girls of the same class sparingly met though we kept track of our activities. Since I left school, I lost contact with most of my school mates. As for female classmates, I hardly had any contact with them even when in school as I have explained while describing my academic life in this website. It was only during my trip to Assam in March 2014 that I wanted to see some of them who were available to find out how they had shaped. Accordingly, I met Bela and Maya whose contact information I could gather.

2. Bela Chakrabarti nee Paul: Bela had retired as the Headmistress of Lakshmi Union High School where we had read. Post-retirement Bela used to live in Guwahati with her husband Biswajit Chakrabarti, only son, daughter-in-law and twin grandchildren. Her husband had also been a teacher in the same school as her.

She was very excited when I phoned her to tell that I was in Guwahati and wanted to meet her. She heartily welcomed me, took the address of the place where I had been staying and gave me the direction to reach her place. Next morning, she herself came down to meet me at my place. I had gone for breakfast when she had arrived. On coming back, I found a lady sitting in the lounge, The receptionist on seeing me told her, "He is the gentleman you were enquiring about." She could not recognize me nor could I recognize her. So much were the changes in us over the decades. We had last seen each other in March 1960. However, she took me to her house by the same auto-rickshaw by which she had come and which she had kept waiting. I spent some enjoyable moments with her family, had a heavy breakfast and left for my place. She had sent her husband all the way to see me off at my hotel.

I had last met her on 24th January, 2018 when she had come to meet me and Asu at Prashanti Tourist Lodge where we had been staying in Guwahati. We had some pleasant time over breakfast hosted by Bela in nearby Food Villa.

Sadly, Bela expired on March 28, 2020 in Guwahati. She had been suffering from Adeno Carcinoma and had been treated in Hyderabad for some time. She had been a soft-hearted, soft-spoken and simple-minded person.

We have lost a real good soul. The only friend we had in Guwahati will no longer be there if I happen to visit the place anytime future.

After leaving school when we enter a College we come to a new environment with new hopes and aspirations. Students passing out from different schools, and maybe from different locations come together when they join a college. There could be a few coming from the same school as was in my case but there are many who have hardly any old school friends joining with them in the same college, particularly when they move to a different town/city. In any event, in the new surroundings, and amongst the new classmates one has to find out friends of one's liking. Though I stayed in the hostel while at St. Anthony's College, I had only a couple of new friends in that sense of the term amongst the hostel mates. My new friends though few in numbers were mostly from outside the hostel and some even outside the college. Here are a few of them:

(a) Chittendra Shome @ Chetu: Chitta became a close new friend to me in the I. Sc. He hailed from Tezpur and stayed in the hostel along with us. He was a member of our core group in college. He was somewhat bulky and would always have a key chain rotating in his hand. After I. Sc. he did MBBS from Guwahati Medical College. I lost track of him after I. Sc. It was decades later, to be specific in July 2017, I got reconnected to him through Asu. Asu and Chitta (unknown to each other) had met on some occasion somewhere in UK. It was then in the course of some discussion between them after introduction to each other that my and Dipu's name came up when Chitta showed his eagerness to contact us. Later, Asu informed me of this and sent me the cell no. of Chitta. It was a pleasant surprise, and we immediately got connected. Chitta had migrated to UK and had been serving in Warrington as a Medical practitioner. He had since retired. He owns a flat in Kolkata and visits it once a year. I and our common friend in Kolkata, Subrata had visited him in his flat on Feb 9, 2018 when he happened to be here. We had a good time together reminiscing old memories. Here are a couple of photographs taken at that time.

(b) Subrata Purkayastha: He joined us in St. Anthony's College in the Intermediate Science Course. He was not a hosteller and stayed with his brother who was in Police Service posted at Shillong. Subrata was a good companion and a good friend. After I. Sc. he did Graduation in Electrical Engineering from Jadavpur University. When I had visited Delhi after skipping my first time M. Sc. Examination in 1966 it was a relation of his with whom I had put up at Delhi by Subrata's reference. I did not meet Subrata for long after he passed out from Jadavpur University. It was only in 2011 I had met him again and that too, through his efforts when he contacted me by procuring my telephone no. from one of my service colleagues with whom he happened to be in professional touch. He now lives in a multi-storied residential complex near Kasba in South Calcutta where he owns a flat. He has a son and a daughter. He visited me once in my flat and I reciprocated with a visit to his place along with my wife. We are on phone at times. A current picture of Subrata is posted on the sideline.

Only lately (Feb 2016), when I had been on a further trip to Shillong I accidentally came to know of the exact location of the house while talking to a local man in a tea-shop. Knowing the location, I had later visited the place. It was then that I came to know from a neighbour of that house that my friend Kishu had departed for the other world long back. I have given details of my efforts to find Kisu in my Travelogue Part B of this website. I place here a photograph of the house he had lived in. This was the house where we had spent many evenings in a family environment during our hostel days in Shillong. The left wing of this house had been under occupation of Kishu's family. As far as I recollect, he had his mother and possibly two sisters one of who was named Lopa living there. I don't remember to have seen his father.

Moving further in life when one enters service career one gets into a completely different environment where people, by and large, are self-centred and busy in promoting themselves. Bond of friendship amongst the colleagues hardly develops in this domain. However, as I belonged to a constituted civil service and moved from place to place, I was free from this constriction and did not have any inhibition in making friends with the ones I liked. Friendship could, therefore, develop with some of my colleagues of the same age-group in this phase of my journey. I shall describe some of them here.

(a) Balai Chandra Chakrabarti: While posted in Mekliganj in course of my service, I came in contact with Balai Chandra Chakrabarti. He was serving there and belonged to the same service as I did. He was newly married and had been staying with his wife. Soon I became close to both Balai and his wife. We became friends, and that friendship still lasts. We now live in the same co-operative building. In fact, Balai was instrumental in my acquisition of the flat here. Sadly, he lost his wife a couple of years back and now staying with his unmarried son. Here, on the left panel, are some pics of his younger days at the prime of service.

(b) Ashok Chatterjee: He has been a great friend of mine. I first came across him when posted in Midnapore. He was at that time working in Nehru Yuba Kendra and posted at Midnapore. He is a lion-hearted person and always tries to help others. When I was finding it difficult to get a place to stay in Midnapore, he offered his own allotted flat for my stay with family. He was at that time staying elsewhere. He did not even allow me to pay rent for his flat that I had occupied. Later, when in Kolkata he made out a separate portion of his ancestral house at Ratan Babu Road, Cossipore to accommodate me as I was finding it difficult for my daughter to commute to her school from where I had been staying at that time. The rent fixed for the portion we occupied was very reasonable. We lived there in a friendly atmosphere. He has been associated with various organisations while in service and more so after retirement. He has a son and a daughter. His son is a lawyer practising in Supreme Court and his daughter is an eye surgeon working at a reputed Nursing home in Kolkata. We now stay in the same co-operative housing estate. A very old photograph of Ashok, his wife and son is posted on the left panel.

(d) Bijan Saha: Though three years' junior to me in civil service, he is almost of my age (born on October 14, 1944). I first came in contact with him in December 1972 when he came to Mekliganj to relieve me on my transfer. He was the third of my relievers posted; the other two had managed to get their orders cancelled. Later, in Midnapore and Calcutta we became closer and relationship blossomed at family level. He also has two daughters like me and the daughters from both families are friends amongst themselves. Once, when I was on a training programme outside the state and my wife was staying alone with my daughter at Jhargram, she fell seriously ill. Bijan who was then serving in the Settlement wing of LR Department happened to be at Jhargram in course of his tour. Finding my wife ill, he stayed back at Jhargram and looked after her till she was OK. Bijan was a good soul. He always tried to help others even going out of the way. Unfortunately, he was detected with blood cancer and had to undergo chemotherapy. He was better after the therapy. But the disease relapsed after some time. He was again hospitalized and treated. He was brought back home after his condition somewhat improved. Sadly, he could not survive for long thereafter and breathed his last at his home in Golf Green, Kolkata on August 24, 2017. It came as a shock to me. I lost another good friend. He is survived by his wife, two daughters, sons-in-law and grandsons. May his soul rest in peace.