Dear Dad, Give it time they said ...time will heal all wounds they said...!! Easiersaid than done “Pyaari .... Chai “your all too familiar signature call ...half expect itto ring out anytime now ... It’s been a year and it still feels surreal and weird and empty and justnot right. Like something missing from our lives, we can still feel you, butnot see you or touch you or talk to you. You have left such a vacuum in ourlives that we will never feel whole again. Your wicked sense of humour almost sardonic and morbid at times, yourability to quote Nietzsche, Premchand and Feynman in the same sentence, the strengthof your character, your integrity, your compassion and your fine sense ofjustice and fairness is not something that can be replaced in a hurry. Youlived your life till the last day on your terms, unyielding and uncompromisingand without any regrets. Whilst it is understandable that we as your childrenmiss you deeply, but the indelible mark you have left on the lives of hundreds ofpeople from all walks of life that can in contact with you is just phenomenal.Every day we run into people in the most mundane and obscure places one of yourfriends, students, close or distant relatives and each one sharing someexperience of theirs of meeting you at some stage of their lives and howinteraction with you however small left them richer and happier and every time,their small stories brought a smile to us. We all miss you in one way or the other as a good a person, a husband, afather, a grandfather, a son, a son-in-law, a brother, a friend, a relative oras a mere acquaintance and last but not the least a “TEACHER” You always took great pride in the fact that you were a teacher who madea difference in other lives. We sometimes never understood why ... the massiveoutpouring of gratitude we have seen from your students over the last 50 years...now we know why. We miss you so deeply that it’s difficult to put in words.It’s the constant ache and yearning in our heart .... To quote one of your favouritebooks and literary Characters. “I was happy, I knew that. While experiencing happiness, we have difficultyin being conscious of it. Only when the happiness is past and we look back onit do we suddenly realize - sometimes with astonishment - how happy we hadbeen.” ? Nikos Kazantzakis, Zorba the Greek                                                 Gautam and Amrita