The Author's Story
And how this happened
by Basil McCall

In 1984, on a flight back to my office in Bangkok from Paris, I read an article about Mother Teresa. I was moved by the details of her selfless life and sacrifice.  I subsequently donated to her charity, and resolved, one day, to volunteer at her home for the dying in Calcutta. 

I managed to do this, in 1988. 

It was not what I expected. Although shelter and food were provided, there was no sign of what many donations, including my own, had, or were being used for. No soap was provided to wash the patients, no detergent to clean food plates, or indeed, to clean anything else. The nuns were frequently called to prayers when patients in extremis needed urgent attention. 

Suffering, Mother apparently thought, was a way to be closer to God, and there was plenty of it. Religious duties took precedence. Medical care was, at best, palliative, often absent. 

I shared my concerns with a fellow hotel guest. 

“So why not work for Dr. Jack? He’s from Manchester, and treats hundreds of poor people every day, on the pavement of Middleton Row, off Park Street. Go and see for yourself.” he suggested, with a hint of insistence

I had neither heard of “Doctor Jack” nor could I imagine how a British doctor could, or would want to, provide medical care to hundreds of people by working at the side of the road. Perhaps this traveller had been smoking something illegal, and was sending me on a wild goose chase. Still incredulous, I went to check next day. 

I was stunned. 

On entering Middleton Row, I could already discern a large crowd of people at the far end. On approaching, I realised this was not some small first-aid kiosk as I had imagined it could only be, if it indeed existed at all.  

What I was looking now at in the bright morning sunshine, was a rudimentary but comprehensive medical centre, some 70 metres long. It fully blocked the pavement, obliging pedestrians to circumnavigate it by walking on the road. Its ragged appearance contrasted sharply with the smooth architecture of St Thomas’s church located a short distance farther on. 

After all my travels, I had never seen anything like this, in any city, anywhere. 

Partially protected against the elements by sagging tarpaulins, and supported by bamboo poles, it was in fact everything you might expect from a fully equipped medical centre -- but minus walls, windows, roof, furniture, fittings, plumbing, electricity, and medical equipment, beyond surgical instruments, bandages, blood pressure monitors and stethoscopes.  

The man who was spreading manure that day, decades before, was now sat in the middle of this, flanked by Indian doctors, some of them as I discovered, volunteers, others, on small stipends.  

Medical records, and laboratory reports sat next to Jack in dented metal boxes. Facing him, was a ‘waiting standing room” of ill or injured poor people, anxious for medical help from this English doctor. I watched, disbelievingly, as he handled each one in turn with calm dedication, examining them through his half-moon spectacles; listening to chests with his ageing stethoscope, and periodically holding X-Ray films up to the bright sky, and writing on their file cards. Examinations of a private nature were carried out behind a bed sheet, held up by dutiful assistants. Many cases involved injuries, infections or burns which could be treated on site, medication prescribed, and followed up. In other examples, samples were sent for laboratory investigations or radiology. Serious or surgical cases including cancer and heart disease, were referred to hospitals. All expenses were paid for. 

Next to Jack, came the pharmacy and dispensary, ending in a welfare section at the tail. Here, the poorest patients received baby food, vitamins, and nutritional supplies, together with transport expenses. Many travelled long distances to reach the clinic. 

Jack had no license to practice medicine in India, or employ local staff, much less, to conduct minor surgery, administer first aid, give injections, diagnose illnesses, and dispense drugs, working from the side of the road. A permanent building was therefore out of the question, but this alternative filled a desperate need. Hospitals were already overstretched and overcrowded, and many of Jack’s patients had no address or identity papers. The authorities therefore turned a blind eye, as it was relieving a burden on the city’s health services. Ironically, Jack was later arrested and imprisoned on immigration charges, but the biggest threat however, came from the local street Mafia, demanding protection money.   

       Still stunned and overwhelmed, I quickly “registered” myself as a volunteer at the “out patients” department simply by giving my name and accommodation details to the friendly but clearly overworked English nurse. She equipped me with scalpel, forceps, iodine, and dressings. Minutes later, squatting on a low stool in the sun with the other volunteers, I was now in front of my first patient, likewise sitting on a low stool, thin leg extended towards me. 

The nurse glanced at his ragged file card. “You need to debride his foot ulcer, clean it, disinfect, and cover it” she said, showing me the wide but partially healed lesion, and pointing to the dead flesh destined for removal by the blade. The old man looked at me, trustingly. I felt nervous, but began the procedure. The western volunteer squatting next to me with his elderly patient, noticed my trembling fingers. “Don’t worry about causing pain, they’re tough.” he advised, reassuringly. 

He was correct. When the nurse returned to quickly finish the job, she cut deeper than I had dared. The old man did not flinch. As I secured a white fresh bandage, he opened a toothless smile of gratitude. 

This now was the real world, very far away from my air-conditioned office in Bangkok; a world I had never seen. My heart swelled.

I thus became another western face amongst many others on Middleton Row, most of them overland travellers who, on learning about Jack, had halted their onward journeys to volunteer. Several were experienced hospital nurses. Others, mostly were gap year students, travelling overland to Australia, a fashionable adventure in the days long before the internet, or even Lonely Planet.

I immediately shared their dedication and respect for the Englishman sitting under the tarpaulin, constantly surrounded by dozens of waiting patients. To watch this happening every day pushed my comprehension to the outer boundaries. Despite the heat, noise, and the crowds of people, he emanated an aura of calm. My desire to talk to him grew, but he was rarely alone, and clearly unavailable for simply chatting with the curious.

The opportunity came at dusk one day when the clinic was being dismantled, piece by piece, pole by pole, rope by rope. In less than half an hour, the pavement would be again clean, a swept, empty space, as if nothing had been there. It would reappear next day, at dawn, except Sundays - for 14 years. 

It will be difficult for anyone reading this, to grasp this unreal reality. The average Westerner would find it difficult to sit at the roadside in Calcutta for more than 14 minutes.

Jack accepted my offer for tea at the stall along the road. Between sips, our conversation centred on the obvious need for sustainable long-term funding for the clinic. Most donations now came from overseas. Although some support was forthcoming from foreign companies in the city, rich locals viewed their own often considerable wealth as karmic rewards from previous lives, well lived; conversely, the misery of the desperately poor, as commensurate suffering for karmic debts, thus, there was no need, conveniently, to interfere in this perceived cosmic court of justice. 

I tried to get the measure of this man sitting across me at the tea-stained table. From the multiple criss-cross stitching repairs visible on his shirt, it was clear that he spent nothing on himself. What was he doing here? Why not in a comfortable surgery in the West? What provided his motivation; his reward? I was keen to know this, but we discussed only fund-raising, perhaps a photo book about his work, and we agreed to keep in touch. I returned to my comfortable, air-conditioned, Bangkok office, now thinking very differently about the world. 

During the following months, I realised that a book of photos would be no substitute for Jack’s own story, and knew this would not be easy. He did not mind talking about the “work” but revealed no wish to talk about himself. I touched on the subject in subsequent correspondence. As I expected, there was no reaction. But there was at least the beginning of a personal relationship which provided easier communication. It required a second visit to Calcutta; in the hope he would reveal aspects of his life, and his motivation.  

Chapter I describes this first meeting, held at dusk in his tiny, primitive, rented room, basically a bed and tiny bathroom, surrounded by medical journals and hanging laundry. A bottle of Irish whiskey provided a helpful beginning, and finally, Jack agreed to doing cassette-taped interviews. These are distilled into the following chapters, mostly just as it was recorded in various city locations.

The content of this book is therefore not in any way a smooth, professionally-written biography. Rather the opposite. It is an assortment of Jack’s personal memories; a jumble of different topics engendered by our conversations. These took place at various times of day, in varying moods, dining or drinking, walking, or sitting, in different locations, including a Hindu temple, a Christian church, his school, and the site of his former clinic at Middleton Row. Recollections of his childhood merge with the present, amusing and sad; uplifting, and tragic. The whole provides the reader with an overview of Jack’s personal experiences, his doubts, disappointments, and his philosophies in the autumn of his extraordinary life. 

At this time of repeated, and tragically, often religion-based, wars; of senseless human suffering and of pure hatred, I hope that Jack’s story may help renew faith in human nature. 

I hope too, that for religious people of any faith, it may reinforce their chosen belief, and their love for one another. 

For the seemingly increasing numbers of atheists and agnostics in the West, this story may provide some food for thought, and perhaps, make you wonder what kind of strange and powerful command it was, and where it came from, that told a farmer driving his tractor, to become a medical doctor. 

The genesis of this story.