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In England, away from Surgical wards and with the Trumps of Hyde Park
Dr.Rathin Datta FRCS (England, Edinburgh & Glasgow).FFIMS (Athens)
In England, away from Surgical wards and with the Trumps of Hyde Park
PHOTO : London Skyline

In early forties, during the second world war, Shillong was the HQ of the allied forces under General Aisenhower of the US army and was the C-IN-C of the joint Allied forces to fight the invasion by the
Japanese army and ofcourse the Indian National army (I N A) led by our own Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. Shillong, a pleasant hill-station was swarming with foreign soldiers of multiple nationalities, was unsafe for the Indian families who by compulsion had to live in the city, then capital of undivided Assam.

The ‘Tommy’ as the British soldiers were popularly called, was the quarter master sergeant, incharge of the army stores and grateful that he was to our father, for curing from the very painful condition that Gonorroea was, used to bring lots of goodies for us.He was the source of our first can of Margerine, canned Australian butter, large no of tins of herring fish and chicken and endless supply of Chocholates and Lozenges, then not available in local Shillong shops.

Back to the Salvation Army barracks, I asked my Tramp uncle:

"Do you remember your doctor’s name”? Of course I do. How can I forget? It was Dr.Datta, I informed, he was my father, and the little boy that he played foot ball with, was me. Father was the only Indian doctor Bacteriologist in Shillong & the Pasteur Institutute whose Director was the famous Colonel Anderson; Father had died 6years back in Shillong in 1956. I pulled out father’s photo from my wallet and  showed - “that’s him!! “He instantly recognised my father, his microbiologist doctor in Shillong during the forties & during the second world war.


Story begins in 1962:


It was in 1962, in Farnworth, Bolton a neighbouring town of Manchester, Lancashire, England.

I was training as Registrar of surgery in a large hospital near Manchester.During christmas time while on duty along with John, a northern Irisman, the registrar of nephrology and Roberta,the extremely beautiful staff nurse of Anglo-Austrian origin, we dialysed a comatosed woman with mistaken diagnosis of Renal failure.In fact later at post mortem cause was found to be highly lethal variety of Viral hepatitis,highly contagious variety known as the Acute Yellow Atrophy of Liver (AYAL). Roberta came down with jaundice after ten days and died within another ten days. John developed jaundice after another week, had exchange- transfusion, survived but ended up as a hepatic cripple. Lastly it was my turn to fall ill and go into hepatic coma from where my physician colleagues salvaged me.

After a month was released from the indoors and was granted 3 months leave with full pay with offer to return to the same post.

I had a few days stay in an Indian guest house run by Patel aunty. A kind British lady, the chief Librarian of the RCS who had connections and later became my 'mommy', found me a university flat, an excellent comfortable flat where I lived till I went back to my job. My aim was to recover my devastated body and clear the very tough primary FRCS examination, so bought a good pair of running shoes & started the regular trip to the Hyde park--travelled by the tube (the underground rail) , got down at the Marble Arch station, of the Circle line entered the park and practiced the running. It was light jog for half an hour to start with, slowly progressed to run a mile and during weekends when the Library would be closed it went upto 10 miles. It was on a week end that I met then sitting on a bench. They were the famed tramps of the Hyde park

The Tramps

I saw my first Tramp in the Casualty dept. of Hemel Hempstead hospital.  Hemel Hempstead was a beautiful township on the northern fringe of London,where I was posted as the Senior house officer in the Casualty, Trauma & orthopaedic dept, doing the job, as the  training was necessary to qualify for the FRCS exam. The beautiful town near London was a posh one, but being near the M1 highway often saw crashes, keeping the casualty dept busy.In my time in six months quite a few major automobile crashes occurred bringing in fairly large number or emergency admission. After one of such accidents the casualities included a Tramp who was hitch-hiking in a truck which had crashed in a big accident.

The tramp was a sight! Long hair, long beard and moustache unmanageably long, dirty skin, filthy apparel, boots in tatters, socks super-smelly, it was difficult to go near him. Wonderfully the nurses
worked on him. Gone were the long beards which were clipped away, long dirty knotty hair clipped away, the naked man was thrown in a bath tub full of warm soapy water and scrubbed like hell and ultimately a handsome English man of 60 emerged. He was given the hospital uniform as his own apparel was thrown into the incinerators. He had cracked ribs, which was easily treated. So long he was in the hospital, we the doctors and the nurses constantly chatted with him & he, ultimately agreed to go back to his lost family in Cheltenham, near south of London.

Tramps started to appear on the streets in America after the industrial recession of 1870 and afterwards. The jobless and the homeless,called, “the men with no fixed abode” took to the streets.They moved from place to place on foot, usually carrying heavy baggage on their shoulders—the heavy foot steps trampling of the roads gave them th name “Tramp”. The famous author Kennedy,who claimed him self to be one of them,made the Tramps famous.Then came the very famous  Actor-Director Charles Chaplin (better known as Charlie Chaplin)  with his famous film on the tramps.

In Britain, Tramps started to appear after the Second World War when the disillusioned and mentally traumatised men took to the streets. As Britain became a welfare state unlike their counterpart in the states, who were earning their living by begging or doing the odd jobs or scavenging, the British tramps could take the social service help and live in the Salvation Army hostels. But during the last half a century the whole status has changed.The Tramps in London mostly moved around the Hyde Park where I found them.

Hyde Park (and the twin park kensington garden) is the finest example of parks in the world. While, the central park in New York is the largest (840 acre), second is the Phoenix in Dublin [707 acres].
The Hyde Park is the 3rd largest Park [625 acres] in the world and is unique by the presence of the Speaker's corner at the south east end where there is no restriction of speaking. Only restriction is on obscene speaking and against the queen of Britain. Anyone can climb a wooden box and speak, whether there was any listener or not. I, normally a shy public speaker, improved myself, speaking to unknown faces.

I used to travel by the circle line of the London underground (popularly known as the 'tube') and came out at the Marble Arch station and proceeded to the nearest entry gate, which was the largest gate and then took one of the wide lanes for running.That was a warm summer morning on a saturday, I ran 10 miles, was breathless and sweaty and finally sat on the other end of the bench gasping. One of them, got up and came near me, asked in a kind voice whether he could help. Nothing was wrong, I was recovering from a serious illness and was trying to recover by excercising and running- informed him.He whipped out a quart bottle and offered me a swig. I felt better. ‘Have you got a place to stay’? He asked. I lied--no!  ‘Then come with us , you need rest’ he said. I went with them, took a bus. It was the Salvation Army hostel in the central London some where near the Russel square.

I checked in, not many questions were asked. In early sixtiescommonwealth citizens were treated at par, did not require a visa. It was a fairly clean hall with clean 3 story beds dormitory in line, only objection was the odour of the unbathed bodies. Frugal lunch, frugal dinner.The story was similar, the friendly one was Sergent in the Royal British army, the grumpy one was in the Royal Navy. Both were decommissioned in 1947, when the second world war ended and on return found their wives living with other men, had children thinking them to be dead in the war. Shocked and disappointed both the [demobbed] soldiers came back to the streets.

The grumpy one in navy was involved in the famous Selona invasion of the Italian mainland from North African coast during the end of the second world war.However he cound not recollect the tall Indian Major in the medical part of the invading army,  Dr.H.C.Datta - my elder uncle who led the landing of the medical unit & the x-ray plant., and was decorated for bravery and dedication to his duty.

The friendly sergeant had an interesting story to tell.He was posted as the quarter master sergeant [QMS] at, of all places, Shillong,India my home town. He had befriended a very good looking Anglo-Khasi girl who gave him gonorrhoea, a venereal disease.Gonorrhoea caused by he bacteria Gonococcus for men is an extremely painful condition—causes intense burning pain while the affected  person passes urine.He was sent to the Pasteur institute,the pioneer research Institute in Eastern India ,along with his girl where he was examined by a kind Indian bacteriologist (now a days called the microbiologist) who diagnosed his disease ,confirmed it and treated.In the mid forties the magic drug Penicillin had just come to the market.It was the first antibiotic,invented by Prof.Dr Alexander Flemming,but at the beginning the crystalline penicillin had to be dissolved in 12 doses in ice cold distilled water and injected every 2 hours ie  12 injections in 24 hours.His good doctor accommodated him & his girl in his own Drawing room,provided food and accommodation free and completed the therapy and cured them.The doctor had recognised the girl and took this extracare.

I recalled.
In the early forties, I was preteen. And then had recognised the girl who lived in a big house in the neighbouring hills, Wahigdoh, their family was a well to do one.She was classmate of my eldest sister {Bordi} in the premier school for girls Pinemount school, which was mainly for the British girls who came from the Tea gardens of Assam valley and Surma vally, they were Planter’s girls, The civil servants of the capital city also had their daughters in that elite school. Only few Indian girls were taken. Our Bordi also went to this school. Agnes who was from a well to do anglo Indian  {anglo-khasi] family was didi Arunima's class mate.Agnes’s only ambition, as our Bordi (eldest sister) told us, was to marry an Englishman and live in England.Her hobby was to chase Englishman, trying to hook the whiteman and travel to England.We later learnt that she never succeeded in her aim to hook a whiteman and later joined politics.
His eyes were teary, he wept and hugged me, saying if he had any chance he would return to Shillong where he was so happy and where people were so nice and loving..
On Monday they went to the Social welfare office which was next door for collecting their unemployment benefit & insisted on taking me with them, as they believed I unemployed and homeless, I quietly met the officer and told the lady my story ie I am already a fulltime surgical Registrar and really do not need any money.She had a good laugh and I slipped out from the office, leaving my uncles behind. I was ashamed for doing so but had no choice. Never met them again, but could never forget them and their kindness.

Dr. Rathin Datta, FRCS (England, Edinburgh & Glasgow).FFIMS (Athens) 

Surgeon & Sports Medicine Specialist

Padmashree Awardee, winner of the Bangladesh Liberation war honour 

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