Thread by @mknid

PR Krishnakumar of Coimbatore AryaVaidya Pharmacy has passed away. We shared a puzzling bond; one that had no reason to exist other than his curiosity to connect with young people. It also belied my youthful rage that all great men are ego-maniacs. This is how we met: Thread

My father used to have a low-profile work under him in the Coimbatore AVP temple. Once, dad spotted Michel Danino's name in the temple premises and told someone that he had seen this name in a book on my table. Krishnakumar overheard my dad. He asked to meet me.

To be honest, in my youthful zest, I had hated this. Felt like the Padma Shri recipient is throwing his weight around by kind of summoning me. I was in college, all of 18 or 19 then. Still, on my dad's prodding, I boarded a train from our hometown Calicut to Coimbatore.

I met him the next day. He was sitting cross-legged on the beautiful AVP temple premises, making his daily morning visit. He said he was surprised that I'm reading Danino. I said it was not to praise the man, but to discuss in a peer group of wannabe Marxists. He gave a big smile

He asked about the group. I told him we'd pick one book every week, discuss it during the weekend at a public park. He said he missed being young. I said it's dull being young. Nobody takes you seriously. We discussed Danino, Osho, Krishnamurthy (all cliched now), and so on

I have now forgotten most of what we spoke about that day. But the touch and feel remain. I mostly remember him as a great listener, even to a teenager who can't possibly grasp fully all the big stuff he is saying. And when he spoke, he was like Dumbledore: wise and worldly.

He filled me up with hope. He asked to follow passions in life, not money. I rebuked that the rich can afford to say so. He disagreed, told strange tales of growing up in an elite Palakkad family, amidst people who were apparently jealous for the money and power that he'd inherit

In the end, he asked to shoot anything I want: I asked if Ayurveda was a fraud, how would one standardise it using modern science? "That is a good question," he said. "And that, young man, is the passion I've chased my whole life." I read on the AVP Research Foundation only later

Alas, he asked me to reach out for any help in the future. I never did, even when I was badly short of cash to study journalism, which he suggested! But occasionally, we wrote each other emails. Back then, having the choice to reach out to a great person was quite wonderful!

For ex, I was one of the last students to be recruited from my j-school. I walked out of a job intw (still don't regret). When a newspaper asked to essay abt the "degradation of journalism", I wrote abt how maintaining accuracy in their own reports would be nice (with examples).

The result was totally frustrating. Everybody was placed except a few of us. I wrote to Krishnakumar how I felt chasing passions. Pat came his reply: "let them be what they want or say... but you have in mind that u need a job n put up with all that"

Well, I didn't "put up with all of that". But I did go back to the office of the editor I had fought with, reasoned with him, and, by EOD, got my first job.

By then actually, Krishnakumar had gone behind my back and did some pujas! Both of us could brag that it was our doing!

Likewise for my wedding, surprisingly, he arranged someone to personally deliver me flowers. These gestures would happen once in a while, and they felt really, really nice. There was hardly anything I could offer in return to such a great man, except perhaps telling these stories