By George! Friends are forever

SS Chhina

What’s in a name? Everything, if you were to ask me! Going by the bonds we forge with people in our lives, it makes one marvel at how some of our closest friends turn out to have the same name, in my case, not once or twice, but five times.

The first George was my classmate in school at Dhariwal. There was no topic that we did not discuss in our free time, ranging from spiritualism to politics. He became a school teacher while I made it as a lecturer in Economics at Khalsa College, Amritsar. But we continued to meet with the same warmth.

While teaching in college, I met Dr George Mathew, chairman of a reputed academic body. Our meeting turned into friendship. He bestowed on me the fellowship of his institute, a big honour and made me part of a delegation visiting Pakistan, in the course of which I went to my place of birth — village Chack No. 96 — in Sargodha district. I cannot forget the reception accorded to me there.

In 1996, George Fernandes, then an MP who later became Defence Minister, came to my house along with RK Mishra, an office-bearer of the Railwaymen’s Union and a close friend of mine. Fernandes persuaded me to write the biography of Dr Ram Manohar Lohia, a great socialist leader, that I did. He wrote its introduction and managed to get Nirmala Deshpande, also an MP at that time, to write the foreword. Our meetings continued as he found time for me in the busiest of schedules. His concern to redeem India from unemployment and to extricate it from poverty was palpable.

While teaching, I was offered to become the dean of a college concerned with the Canadian education system at Moga, where the keyman was Dr George Louis. The objective of the college was to enable Indian students gain education here that they would have received in Canada, saving them vast sums of money. Though I did not join, but George Louis often sought my views on the curriculum. The college closed down but our friendship continued.

George Cherian was an officer in the Commerce Ministry. He met me at a seminar and introduced me to UNCTAD, the UN body looking after international trade. His friendship makes me keep visiting Bengaluru where he has now settled.

But the ties with George First, as I fondly call my first friend, remains special. It was the age of innocence, the camaraderie natural and unfettered, an initiation into pluralism without being mindful of it, also laying the foundation for the efforts I made in my calling, as that of a teacher. Through friendships, life, that great teacher itself, makes us learn to value and nurture that which we hold special.