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During my childhood, like almost all children, I had always taken my mother for granted. When I was hungry, she should give me food to my liking, irrespective of the time. I never used to think whether she may be tired, or due to late hours, food may not be unavailable etc. Also, if I had any problem with anybody whatever, and I was at the receiving end, I used to come to my mother and shout at her as if she was to blame for all my troubles. Also, if my father could not give me a cycle which I wanted, or took me to task for some wrong doing, it was invariably on my mother that I used to vent my frustrations.
Even after reaching adulthood, taking my mother for granted did not disappear though shouting at her due to my frustrations stopped, as my wife had taken my mother’s place for this purpose. However, whether I asked or not, whenever I came home hungry, my mother always gave me my favourite food and snacks irrespective of time. After I went away to North India for my job, I used to come home once an year. On such occasions, I was the only person taking food in the house as far as my mother was concerned. ‘Bring Keerai, she used to order my father, Gopalan likes it.’ Similarly if Parthasarathy does not like bitter gourd, he had to fend for himself as Gopalan likes it. When I think back now, I wonder what I had done for my mother to deserve so much love and affection.
While my mother used to take special care of me (may be to avoid my caustic tongue, or due to special affection for me as I prefer to think), she did not ignore others. If she made bitter gourd curry, she would make some other vegetable for Parthasarathy, as she knew his dislike for the former. Only a mother can give such unselfish love to all her children irrespective of their different natures. The Tamil proverb,  (Petha panam pithu, pillai manam kallu) aptly describes it saying ‘ A mother is mad when her children’s welfare is involved, whereas the children on whom she showers her love are stone hearted when her needs are concerned.’
In this connection, I remember a story I had read in some magazine some years ago. A mother showers all her love on her only son. She lost her husband, and after that her son was her world. The son also doted on his mother, and life was going on smoothly. Alas, all good things do not last for ever.. The son reached adulthood, and one day fell in love with a very beautiful girl working with him. He proposed to her. Even though she also liked him, she was not prepared after marriage to have a mother-in-law in her house, whom her husband loved . Even though her lover told her that he would keep his mother in some other place, she was not satisfied. She was afraid that she could not claim full love from her husband if the mother was alive. Therefore, like the fisherman whose daughter King Santhanu(Bhishma’s father), wanted to marry, she put a terrible condition for the marriage. He should kill his mother and bring her heart. Only after that, she would agree for the marriage to be performed.. Like King Santhanu, the boy also had a conscience, and could never agree for such an atrocious condition. However, being madly in love with her, he was pining for her and could not eat or take part in any normal activity. He used to be very cheerful and discuss many matters with his mother, now he was listless and was always staring fixedly on the roof. His mother was worried to death by his eerie behaviour, but her anxious queries only brought vague and evasive answers. His mother then made enquiries from his office friends and came to know of his love affair. She then went to the girl herself and pleaded with her to marry her son. The girl told her that their married life cannot be smooth, if her husband had to divide his love between his mother and his wife. She then told the mother about her condition for the marriage. On reaching home, the mother went straight to her son and chided him gently for not confiding his love and the condition put by the girl for the marriage. She told her son that the girl was right . She also told her son that she had grown old, and was suffering from lot of ailments. She had no interest in living any more, and what could be better than to die in the hands of her son for fulfilment of his happiness. The son, selfish fellow that he was, was only waiting for his mother’s endorsement of her own death, and quickly killed her and took out her heart. He proceeded to his lover’s house holding his mother’s heart firmly in his hand. On the way, he slipped and fell down, and the heart in his hand also fell down. The heart then suddenly talked and this was what it told the son:- “ Are you hurt, my son? Be more careful in walking in future.”
The above story narrated by the author to show the unselfish and lofty nature of mother’s love had a great impact on my mind. I did some introspection, and realised that my mother’s love to me had been very similar and she had always been self-effacing when showering me with her love. I also could see that what I had done in return to my mother’s unselfish love had been an absolute zero. I took a mental vow then and there to return my mother’s love somehow. But being a creature of habits, whenever I used to visit Chennai, I could not even tell her how much I felt indebted to her. If I had told what I felt to my mother, she would have been very much worried about my sanity, accustomed as she was to my rough and rude nature.
It was fate, and nothing but fate which helped me in a very tragic and unexpected way to do a very small deed for my mother. My sister-in-law, Choodamani died of a heart attack at 5 AM on Friday, 30th June 1995. My brother, Sampath, nephew, Shyam, and niece Sujatha were a very close knit family and were literally obsessed with love of one another. Myself, Vijaya, Vanaja, Raghu, Parthasarathy and Amritha had all gone to Calcutta to participate in the last rites and Subha Sweesharam on 13th July 1995. I can even now recall vividly the deep anguish felt by Sampath, Shyam and Sujatha, even though they seemed to be talking normally with the close relatives who had come for the last rites. As the memories of the dead loved one haunted them wherever they went in their flat, they decided to exchange their flat for IBP Guest House. As Sampath was Finance Director of the company, it was a very simple matter for him to make the arrangements for shifting. The month was Aadi, supposedly an inauspicious month for house shifting. I can even now remember one lady colleague of Sampath, a Tamilian, pleading with Sampath, with almost tears in her eyes, not to shift in the month of Aadi. But Sampath, Shyam and Sujatha were so much tortured by the memories of Choodamani in their flat that they did not listen to any one’s advice, and shifted to the Guest House immediately after Subha Sweeharam, after the departure of the relatives who had come for the last rites. Alas, the lady’s fears of shifting in Aadi month seemed to be portentous.   On Friday, 28th July 1995, exactly 4 weeks after Choodamani’s death, at 5 AM,(the exact time at which Choodamani died), the portion of the building in which Sampath, Sujatha,Shyam and Baby Ramya, Sujatha’s 11 month old baby were sleeping peacefully in their bedroom suddenly collapsed killing all of them. Shri Sundararajan, Sujatha’s husband and Sujatha along with the baby had earlier booked their flight to Mumbai for 26th July 1995. But Sujatha had stayed back with the baby to console Sampath and Shyam, while Shri. Sundararajan went on 26th as planned. It looks now, as if Choodamani had taken all her family members, while sparing Sundararajan, not being her family member by blood.
I cannot describe in words the cry which came from my mother when the news about the death of her beloved and dutiful son along with her grandchildren and great grandchild was told to her. It looked as if the cry came from the bottom of her stomach. My mother, who was cheerfulness personified till that day, became very gloomy and depressed. I can say with certainty that her last days on this earth started from that date, though she lived for another 8 years after those tragic events . I could do some small things for my mother during those eight years only ,after Sampath’s death I shall narrate in the next paragraph how I came into the picture.
As I had already indicated, my parents and Sundararajan were the immediately affected ones by the great tragedy, though others like me, Vanaja etc. could feel the impact to a lesser extent only. Our great sorrow was to see our parents hit by a devastating tragedy at such ripe old age. The bodies of all the deceased were brought by flight to Chennai, and cremated at Besant Nagar crematorium. The last rites for 12 days for Sampath and Shyam .were performed by Raghu, while Sundararajan performed the rites for Sujatha and Baby Ramya. These were performed at a suitable place in Thiruvanmiyur. At that time, our family and Sundararajan were really very close, bound together by a common tragedy and trauma. I can even now remember very vividly Sundararajan’s father holding Parthasarathy’s hands, and telling him with tears in his eyes, “Sir, please take care of my son”.
On the Subha Sweeharam day, my father along with his sons and Sundararajan had a meeting in which my father told Sundararajan that even though our dear ones have died, others have to continue to live till their time comes, and that Sampath's and Choodamani’s properties should be claimed, and shared between my parents and Sundararajan in the ratio of 2:1, as Sampath and Shyam were our family while Sujatha was his family. Sundararajan fully agreed and my parents gave Power Of Attorney to Parthasarathy. Parthasarathy and Sundararajan who were both in Mumbai and were good friends visited Calcutta once again and gave letters to IBP, RBI and various banks claiming the dues 2:1 as per agreement. So far so good.
When my parents were expecting their share of the property ( Only for the sake of their other living children, and not for themselves as their needs were very little), one fine morning, my father received a notice from Calcutta High Court which said that Sundararajan had applied for Succession Certificate for Sampath and Choodamani claiming the entire property of Sampath and Choodamani, with nothing to Sampath’s parents. Sundararajan, after claiming the dues jointly with Parthasarasthy had consulted some lawyers who advised him that because all died together, as per a legal presumption, the baby is presumed to have died last, and so inherited the entire property before her death, and as the legal heir of the child, he in turn inherited the property with very little share to Sampath’s parents.
On getting this bolt from the blue, my father called me for consultations to Chennai from Bangalore, where I was working as I was a gold medallist in LL.B. degree. My chance to return in a small measure my mother’s unselfish love to me came to me from that moment onwards. I studied Sundararajan’s notice, saw the death certificates and studied the relevant laws in depth. Then I told my father that we have a strong case, but it will cost a huge amount to fight the case in a court of law. As all of us in our family had been taught the values of integrity, honesty and sincerity from our childhood, none of us had much money and never thought of earning money by illegal means. Only Sampath had saved some money as both he and his wife earned very good income and he had judiciously invested their savings in very good shares, and purchased a flat in Luz and another one at West Mambalam by taking office loan etc. Where to go for the money to fight an unwanted litigation?.But my father’s mind was firm on one thing. We should not allow injustice to prevail without at least fighting it to our capacity.
From that moment, till my mother’s death, for about six years, I devoted all my energies and brain to ceaselessly work for getting my parents the money left by their son, which was sought to be snatched from them by a greedy outsider. I used both lawful and sometimes not so lawful means for this purpose, as I felt that the end justified the means. First and foremost, we had to get some substantial money quickly to fight a costly litigation. If we did not fight, our clever foe (at that time) would simply gobble up everything by getting a favourable judgement. I immediately went to Mylapore tashildar’s office and applied for a legal heir certificate. This normally takes three months. I got it in the same evening by paying the fixed service charges for super fast work. (I request Santhanam, if he is reading this article, to ignore this portion casting some reflection on his subordinates). I then did a lot of detective work to find out Sampath’s properties, as all papers were lost in the debris, or with Sundararajan. From one small piece of paper available in Vedhachala Gardens house, on which Sampath had made some income tax calculations, I reconstructed his assets, some of which included some LIC Policies, Some credit cards carrying accident insurance, one Time share in Sterling Resort etc.I did not have a single piece of paper with me except the legal heir certificate in favour of my mother. With this, I sold the Time Share first, giving an indemnity bond for the loss of the original documents. I got Rs. 30,000/- in cash immediately, which was the first money I got from Sampath’s estate for my parents. This was indeed an auspicious beginning and we were sure that as justice was on our side, God was also with us.After that I visited various insurance companies in Chennai, Bangalore, Calcutta and Nagpur putting in my mother’s claim based on the legal heir certificate. Sundararajan did not have even an inkling of what I was doing. I do not know from where I got the energy to do so much work in such a short time, as I am normally a very lazy person. With my herculean efforts, within one month of Sundararajan’s filing for succession certficate in Calcutta, I collected about Rs. 4 lakhs from various sources viz. LIC, Credit card insurance, bank accounts etc. Durng this time, I noted two peculiar things. They were:
1. I got Sampath’s amounts without any hassles, and immediately after applying while for Choodamani’s money, there was always some impediment and receipt of money was always delayed.
2. I received almost all amounts on Fridays, (death days of all members of Sampath’s family).
Tears come into my eyes when I think back of my mother’s reaction in those days. She, being the sole legal heir(Under Hindu Law, mother is Class I Heir of a male Hindu, along with children and wife, whereas father is class II Heir only). Whenever I visited Chennai from Bangalore or from other places I had been for realising some dues, she knew that either I had brought some cheque, or I had come for taking her signature. She invariably used to tell Vanaja and my father as follows: “Be careful in spending the money, Gopalan has undergone great difficulties to get this money with his poor health” She never asked even once how much money was received, from where, or what to do with the money. A true Karma Yogi she was. Whenever I approached her, she used to sit up in bed for signing the papers brought by me. I am not exaggerating when I say that she must have signed at least 1000 times. My father used to say that it was an Imposition for her not studying beyond 3rd class in school in her childhood. She never bothered about my father’s banters, but used to say, “ Only Gopalan can bring Sampath’s money. Otherwise, Sundararajan will swallow my son’s money. Gopalan is running about here and there to get my son’s money. The least I can do to help him is by signing whenever he wants and wherever he wants. She had an absolute trust in me, which continued till her last breath.
To be continued....
S.Rajagopalan
October 2003
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