Author: Syed Firdaus Ashraf in
Bombay
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: January 9, 2001
Opposite the Kennedy Bridge in south
Bombay is Model House. Unknown to the thousands of people who pass the
building every day live Leelavati Palekar, 83; 80-year-old Manorama and
73-year-old Dr Vatsala Kotnis.
Chinese leader Li Peng rescued the
sisters from obscurity when he asked to meet them on Wednesday morning.
The chairman of China's National Assembly is on a week-long visit to India.
Why would Li -- the adopted son
of the late Chinese premier Zhou En Lai and a former prime minister himself
-- want to meet the three sisters? Because their brother is Dr Dwarkanath
Kotnis, immortalised by V Shantaram's classic film, Dr Kotnis Ki Amar Kahani.
The same Dr Kotnis who died thousands of miles away from home in distant
China, and remains a symbol of the Sino-Indian relationship in good times
and bad.
"We are very excited and feel very
honoured. We are one of the few people whom Li Peng is meeting in Bombay,"
says Manorama Kotnis.
"The younger generation in our country
do not even know who Dr Kotnis was. In China my brother's name is very
familiar; the younger Chinese generation still respect him," adds Dr Vatsala
Kotnis.
In 1937, when Japan invaded China,
General Chu Teh asked Jawaharlal Nehru to send Indian doctors to China.
Five doctors embarked on the 'Indian Medical Aid Mission to China.' Four
of them returned; Dwarkanath Kotnis died in China in 1942.
"I was in my teens when my brother
left for China to help them on humanitarian grounds when they were attacked
by the Japanese. We did not know then that he would not return," recalls
Manorama Kotnis.
Their home has a bust of their brother;
a photograph hangs on the wall reminding a visitor of the turbulent times
when their brother lost his life helping the Chinese against the Japanese
invasion.
"Our father died four months after
my brother left for China. But my brother refused to return on hearing
the news because he had gone with a mission to serve humanity," adds Dr
Vatsala Kotnis.
Dr Kotnis married Kuo Ching-lan,
a Chinese woman, and had a son, Ing Hwa (Ing=India; Hwa= China).
Are the sisters in touch with Kuo?
"Very much," says Manorama Kotnis.
"We correspond with her. In January 1999 she came to Bombay and stayed
with us."
Kuo first came to India in 1959
with Ing Hwa, then 16 years old. Ing died in 1967; he was just 24. Kuo
married again and now lives near Dalian in northeast China with her son
and his family. She was an honoured guest at the banquet Dalian Mayor Bo
Xilai hosted for President K R Narayanan last June.
"When Kuo went to Sholapur, she
was in tears. My brother had told her about our village," recalls Dr Vatsala
Kotnis.
Dr Kotnis had two brothers and five
sisters. A brother and sister are dead. But Li will meet the second generation
on Wednesday as well. "We forwarded 19 names to them and Li Peng will meet
us at 11 am. We have been requested to reach the Taj half an hour earlier,
considering the security aspect," says Dr Vatsala Kotnis.
"The Indian government, especially
the Congress, never bothered to acknowledge that our brother left for China
on Pandit Nehru's call. They did not acknowledge his sacrifice," complains
Manorama Kotnis.
"The Chinese remember him and have
regular functions in his memory. In our country, we do not think of doing
such things. When Zhou En Lai came to Bombay in the 1950s, he too met us.
Nobody in India is bothered," adds Dr Vatsala Kotnis. Adds Manorama Kotnis:
"When (Chinese President) Jiang Zemin came to Delhi in 1996, he sent us
a flower vase to pay his respects to our family."
The Chinese released a postal stamp
in Dr Kotnis's honour in 1992; the Indian government followed suit three
years later.
What will they give Li Peng? "A
table cloth for him and his wife," says Dr Vatsala Kotnis. "From Sholapur,
from where our brother left for China to serve them in the war."
