I have lived abroad most of my lifetime. Whatever short time I have spent in India, I feel fortunate that I have come to know Babubhai very closely and personally because of his love for Shobha, his daughter and my wife.
I never knew Babubhai and his family until I got engaged with Shobha. I have come to know him personally through my wife.
Most of the evenings, he would sit down with us to enjoy different flavours of ice cream. It was such a pleasant social celebration that even today, I remember he is there every time I eat ice cream.
I used to live on the second floor. The only way to get up there was by stairs. Babubhai was very careful because of his heart problem. However, he seldom failed to visit us on the ground floor in the morning before he went to his hospital.
I have met so many people from different walks of life sharing their personal experience with him as a doctor who is missed nowadays. After surviving a massive heart attack at his young age, he decided that his second chance of life is given to serve others. His medical profession took him to new heights.
One time one very well known surgeon friend had joined in an evening meeting. He was a bit disturbed because he was experiencing some pain in his body. He was explaining his analytic diagnosis leading to his heart. Babubhai almost slapped him in front of me saying you are making it complicated because you are so good in medical science. Stop this analysis and see me after two weeks. He was so thankful when he met Babubhai. I have learnt a very important lesson. Do not run to anyone for help if it is not an emergency. You know your body better than anyone else and let your body give a chance to use its healing power.
One villager came to me and told me he was very sick and he was delighted that he was under Dr Babubhai’s care and recovered completely. Babubhai used to visit him and his family during his recovery. One time he saw some gold ornaments missing on his wife. He immediately inquired and found out that she sold them to pay the bills. Babubhai immediately took care of the bills and got her ornaments back.
My son, Shashin’s finger, got split open in the door. As soon as Babubhai knew about this, he quit everything and he stitched his finger back. If he had not done this immediately, Shashin would have been without one complete finger.
One time I was suffering from malaria. I had my third bout of malaria. Babubhai immediately called my family Dr He told him to give me a Quinine dose that my Dr. said he would not even give to his son. Babubhai told him he was taking responsibility. I was completely knocked down, but so was my malaria.
On many occasions, he had planned a family vacation, but he cancelled it because he needed to attend to an emergency.
I came to know two unbelievable stories from Shobha. Babubhai advised his Dr. what to do during his last breaths and it did not work. He immediately told him it is his time for him to go. Shobha realized that he used to get up in the middle of the night, open his medicine chest, and go back to sleep. One time Shobha asked him what he was doing and she found out ever since his massive heart attack, he used to get angina pain in the middle of the night that he treated himself.
I have met so many of my relatives sharing their concerns about who to go to for unbiased medical advice after Babubhai’s passing away. Even here in the US, people remember him fondly as his patients.
