KAYARE THE GANDHIAN

Khaliqur Rahman

Kayare has been my friend since childhood. You can

call it a superb stroke of divinity; he's been with me in school,

college and service. Now that we've retired, we keep meeting at

least once a week or talk on telephone for more than normal

lengths of time.

Kayare comes from a middle class family but when he

was just about to take his matriculation examination, his father

had to undergo an operation for glaucoma that unfortunately

turned him blind for life. But Kayare took it in his stride.

At school, he had read about some of the Gandhian principles

that touched topics like non-violence, co-operation and

all round development of mind, body and spirit. Immensely influenced

by these principles, he quietly started practising them in

life.

Like me, he was madly in love with Cricket. He has told

me many times, he wanted to become a cricketer. But in those

days it was very difficult for middle class boys to even think of

playing the game because Cricket was well beyond affordable

limits. But Kayare was undeterred. He started a Cricket Club

and asked his friends and others to join him in the fray. He promised

net-practice to the members for six months, from September

to February, for Rs 7/- only, per annum! But every member

was expected to collect Re 1/- per month from at least ten neighboring

houses. This meant that each member would bring Rs

120/- plus his own Rs 7/- every year. Soon we had about forty

members that meant we had an approximate budget of Rs 5000/

- which was clearly three times more than the normal allocation

in a good government college.

Just a rupee every month for a family was simply so

Learn English & Follow-up Essays // 128 //

meagre and acceptable that they thought they readily would, as

they were contributing to a good cause.

Kayare, himself, would make simple Visiting Cards out

of a blank foolscap sheet. He'd write Kayare / for Secretary,

Raipur Gymkhana Cricket Club on each 'card', would visit

Office Heads like the Chief Engineer or the Civil Surgeon or the

District Forest Officer or the like. He'd push in his card through

the peon and talk to the Officer when called. He presented his

case - and this is very important - in English. "Those were the

days," he recalls, "no one said 'No'"!

We used to take out three to four new balls everyday for

nets. Every opening batsman had sufficient practice of facing the

new ball every day as had all the new ball bowlers of hurling the

new cherry with pace and swing.

We played Cricket like real Lords! Kayare recalls, our

team, for a match, carried 11 bats, 11 pairs of gloves and 11

pairs of pads and a box of six new balls, just to show off! Who

says, "Cricket is the king of all the games and the game for all the

Kings"? I tell him such is the level of the power in a co-operative

approach!

Kayare could not become a cricketer. He has retired as

a Professor of Physics. But he has quietly followed the Gandhian

principles in life. He hasn't told me but I know how he managed

to help a fakir get his daughter married. This fakir, I later came

to know, had approached Kayare Sa'b after getting to know

about his philanthropic helping hand. In those days, Rs 2000/-

was a big amount and he requested Kayare Sa'b to help him

with Rs 2000/- against the papers of his hutment. The fakir promised

to return Rs 100/- every month. Kayare did not take the

papers but collected Rs 100/- each from 20 persons. He convinced

them to come forward and help in a just cause. These 20

benefactors were invited to the wedding and they were gracious

Learn English & Follow-up Essays // 129 //

enough to be there in the ceremony. After a month, when

the fakir gave Kayare Rs 100/- to be paid back to one of them,

Kayare told him no one wanted the money as it was help not

loan.

Much later, when I asked Kayare about this wedding,

he told me that this fakir was a Muslim and a mureed (disciple)

of a reputable saint, a Pir Sahib (Gurudev) of about a lakh of

mureeds. About 300 of these mureeds, the fakir's pirbhais

(gurubhais) were present at the ceremony and the dinner of

baghare chawal and dal.

I thought if only each pirbhai had contributed just Re 1/

-, to this fakir, he would have had a lakh of rupees for the wedding!

When I asked Kayare (now I must reveal, he is a Hindu)

what he thought about this, he said he wouldn't bother about all

these things. He thought he ought to have done what he needed

to, no matter what.

Where have all the Kayares gone?