This was my sixth visit to India since I left for the USA in 1960. But now, seventeen years later, I was returning with my wife and two children; Shaku (age four) and Vivek (age one and a half). I was forty-six years old.

We landed in New Delhi at midnight on June 28th, 1977. We were received by Mr. Shaw who had booked our rooms in the Janata Hotel, near the Bahá’í Center. Our first visitor at the Hotel was my paternal Uncle, Vaidhyanathan. After a day of sightseeing in Delhi, Nana became ill with a stomach upset and at the suggestion of my uncle we moved into the apartment of his son, Raguraman, who was out of town. Although Nana had not recovered completely, we went to Agra by a train to see the Taj Mahal. This two-hour journey and was Nana’s first experience of traveling in Indian trains.

Our next trip was to Rourkela, in Orrisa, where my parents lived with my brother Srinivasan, his wife Gomathi, and their two sons Anand and Bhaskar. My parents received us in the traditional South Indian custom with red colored water and flowers, my mother putting a “thilak” on Nana’s forehead as we entered the house. Initially we stayed in the German Colony where we had western toilets and showers. After two days we moved into a two-bedroom partially furnished apartment with cooking facilities about ten blocks from the house. We took a bicycle rickshaw every day for lunch at my parents place and cooked our evening meals in the apartment. To Nana’s surprise, the rickshaw man came punctually every morning.

We could sense the discomfort of my parents, as they allowed Nana only in the living room where she ate her lunch while I ate with my father in the dining room. While at my parent’s place, Nana spent her time sitting on the porch looking after the children and doing her needle work. She embroidered a wall plaque which began “Bless this House Oh Lord….” This was later framed and is still hanging in our living room. Cheenu and Gomathi were neutral in their attitude and understandably did not want to take sides. Though I wanted to leave after a week, Nana advised me to stay on for the full three weeks as originally planned, lest my parents would think that it was Nana’s intention to depart earlier. Nana and I had some comfort when Cheenu and his colleagues at work gave us a grand welcoming party in a nearby community center. On our departure my mother gave Nana to keep as a family heritage a silver oil lamp which she herself had owned for a long time.

We traveled by train to visit my sister Lalitha in Calcutta for two days. I showed Nana our old place in Ballygunge and we took the street cars to visit my University and the Bose Institute where I worked for my doctorate. Here Nana experienced for the first time the conditions in Indian cities that I described in Chapter 1, and she felt that she was literally going through hell. She was shocked to see the poverty, the beggars, and the slums as we moved through the city.

Next was a two-day visit to Raipur where my second sister Subbulakshmi, and her husband Chidambaram lived with their two kids Ravi and Revathi. Then we took an overnight train to visit my eldest sister Muthulakshmi (Muthu) in Chennai, my birthplace. Muthu was the one individual who took the bold initiative of making the emotional appeal to my parents for giving the marriage consent. She and her husband GS were very open, understanding, and hospitable and we stayed longer than originally planned. Muthu had two children, a college going boy, Sridhar, and a girl, Usha. Nana got used to Indian toilets and bathrooms. She learned to eat while seated on the floor and to washing clothes by hand-rubbing them on the stone platform. Vivek ate only rice and yogurt while sitting on Nana’s lap, and Muthu allowed us to cook eggs for him in the garage. I took the family to my uncle’s home for a lunch in T. Nagar where I was born and grew up. I showed Nana my high school and the Presidency College where I studied. Muthu came with us to see the famous shore temples in Mahaballipuram, where we had a picnic. While in Chennai we also had dinner at the five-star Connemara Hotel, which was our first Western meal since we left Delhi six weeks earlier. Overall our stay in Chennai was very memorable.

We then visited my cousin Narayanan in Bangalore. His wife Malathi welcomed us warmly. They had two sons, Anand and Bappi. Narayanan arranged for a car and we visited the Royal Palace in Mysore, a section of which was converted into luxurious five-star hotel by the Government Tourist Department called “Maharajah Palace Hotel”. The next stop was in Mumbai where we were hosted by my Calcutta friend Goswami and his wife Chand in their modern Choupathi Beach Apartments.

Finally we arrived in Panchgani, the ultimate destination of this trip. The principal of the New Ea School, Dr. Ray Johnson, and his wife LaNelma welcomed us warmly. We stayed with them in their residence, a huge house with high ceilings situated in a ten-acre property called Kanga Hill about two kilometers from the school campus. Ray was a tall and charismatic figure, patient, cool, and collected under all conditions. He was well-liked by the entire community, in and outside the school. He had a right-hand man, George Menzies, a Bahá’í from the Zoroastrian Faith, as the dining hall supervisor. George was a man of many talents and a problem solver. Only the Principal was given a car, and the school had a Jeep. Ray was generous enough to loan either of these vehicles for our use when needed.

Panchgani, (meaning “five plateaus”) was few miles from Mahabalshwar, a popular hill station and high-elevation summer resort, and a two hour drive from Pune. It had six high schools run by different denominations. Panchgani also had “The Moral Rearmament Center” started by the Englishman Dr. Frank Buchanan in 1938, who believed that moral rearmament is a prerequisite for any economic recovery. This Center held periodic conventions and seminars. It had a well-stocked library, modern kitchen and dining hall, and a fine auditorium where concerts were held.

The New Era School run by the Bahá’ís was founded in 1945, and was one of the first Bahá’í education projects in India. It was a residential coeducational school with 300 students and had only middle and high school students from ages ten and above. The majority of the students were from outside India; 90% were from Persian Bahá’í families. They wanted their children to attend an affordable school where English was the medium of instruction. The academic staff, more than half of whom lived on the school campus, were of various religious persuasions. The math teacher and the dance teacher were Tamil-speaking Hindus. The art teacher, Mr. Day, was a Bengali from Calcutta. I visited him often to converse in Bengali. Besides English, the school offered five other optional languages: Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Persian, and French. Extra-curricular subjects included Moral Education, Indian Classical Dancing, Art, and Music.

Ray briefed me on their plan to establish a Junior College. They hoped that in addition to the New Era graduates, students graduating from the other Panchgani high schools may come for their higher education. Ray had several well-placed contacts which included a multi-millionaire, Mr. Sabet, in Tehran. Mr. Sabet, who established the first Coca-Cola franchise in Tehran, had committed himself to fund the entire Junior College project. Ray was eager to get me to work as the director of this venture. Nana and I discussed the pros and cons of accepting this offer and finally decided to go ahead with a hope for a positive future. Nana had mixed feelings about this move, and it would not have been her choice to stay in India. My stand was that this will be an ideal environment for our kids to grow up as “World Citizens.” They will be in a multinational and multicultural environment where adherents of five Faiths lived in a ten-square-mile area. And Panchgani seemed a good place to live, with fresh air and an invigorating climate in contrast to other Indian cities.

With just a handshake, Ray and I settled for a reasonable financial compensation which included separate boarding and lodging as perks. We were to live in the ground floor in a two bedroom furnished flat with western toilet and tiled bathrooms in the same mansion where the Johnsons lived on the second floor with their three children. We were lucky to find a trustworthy housemaid named Nanda Bhai. Nobody else would employ her as she was a low-caste widow. Nana was extremely generous in her attitude towards this woman and treated her with respect as a human being, which she had never known. Because she lived in a not-so-clean environment, Nana gave her two saris and blouses to be kept worn only in our residence and made sure that this maid bathed herself and changed her sari and blouse every morning before she started the daily household chores, which included washing clothes, cooking, and taking care of the kids. Nanda Bhai gave Vivek the nickname “Babu.” I even now sometimes call him by this name.

Leaving Nana and the kids with Nanda Bhai, I flew back to Shutesbury, Massachusetts where I terminated the lease on the house, sold most of the household items in a weekend garage sale (including the high-fidelity stereo console I had acquired in Madison), vacated the house, sold our car, and shipped a carton of our needed belongings from New York to Panchgani. I made sure to include in this carton my portable electric typewriter, Nana’s selected wardrobe, the basic kitchen utensils, and the cake decorating gadgets. I was back in Panchgani in three weeks. The shipment containing our household goods arrived intact few weeks later.

Panchgani Project
My first order of business was to conceptualize and plan the Junior College. I officially set up an organization called The New Era Center for Higher Learning, and printed stationary for correspondence purposes. I took a cue from a report called “Neglected Early Years” recently published by UNICEF. The report strongly recommended a professional training program for field workers in communities which receive UNICEF grants for child care projects through the health ministries in developing countries. The report stated that UNICEF had no say in how the funds were utilized by the recipient countries and it was left to them to take initiative based on the local needs.

I drafted a plan for a pilot project training program for the graduating High School students. After pursuing a two-year course in early childhood development, they would receive a “Child Development Associate” (CDA) para-professional certificate. With this certificate they could be suitably employed by the Health Ministry receiving grants from UNCEF, or they could go on to get their four-year college degree in Education. I had confidence that there were qualified teachers in the state of Maharashtra that could be recruited as faculty members of this junior college. I also had access to the curricular materials from the VEAP (Very Early Anisa Program) in Suffield, Connecticut for such a CDA course. This plan was cleared, at least tentatively, by the National Spiritual Assembly of India, which had one of its meetings in Panchgani. Later I also got favorable feedback on this plan from of Dr. David Ruhe, an individual Bahá’í who was an MD in his professional life. He was a member of the Universal Justice who happened to come to Panchgani to inaugurate the new auditorium and dining hall at New Era. I met with the Health and Education Minister of Maharashtra, with Ray accompanying me, and later with the UNICF liaison in New Delhi. Ray and I also met with the Chancellor of Pune University under whose authority the diploma would have to be offered in order to give the diploma an institutional validity. This was the most difficult part of the planning as the Chancellor could not envisage a novel approach to the delivery and conduct of a program away from their University campus, and that also employed adjunct faculties paid by an outside organization. This became a never-ending struggle.

Ancillary Projects in New Era
There was no provision for pre- or elementary-grade education in the New Era School. Mr. Flyriva Taffaki was a native of the Tuvalu islands in the South Pacific, married to an Australian Bahá’í named Irene. They arrived in Panchgani to operate a Bahá’í-run agricultural project in the neighboring Chickley Valley with its headquarters in Panchgani. They had two daughters under the age of five, and Irene was an elementary school teacher. Irene was enthusiastic about a plan that Ray and I proposed to set up a preschool/kindergarten on the school campus. There were more than a dozen children in the community who could be placed in this school. I assisted Irene in setting up a well designed and equipped one-room preschool/kindergarten class with a sandbox and plenty of outdoor activities. We were fortunate to have an experienced Montessori Teacher, Ms. Padma, from South India who happened to be in Panchgani looking for a job. She worked well with Irene. Ms. Padma was the first teacher for our two-year-old son. Vivek enjoyed the new surroundings.

On the other hand, Shaku was put in the St. Josephs Convent School not too far from the New Era campus, but because of developmental delay she could not cope with the program and had to be taken out of this school. Mrs. Behin White, whom we had known since the day she came to Amherst, was now in Panchgani to deliver her first child. She instructed Shaku privately.

I located a renowned neurologist in Mumbai and Nana and I took Shaku to him for a first-ever thorough neurological examination. Based on her EEG he diagnosed Shaku with “petite mal”, a form of epilepsy with very brief, unannounced lapses in consciousness. He put her on medication immediately, but this was late to come.

The construction of the auditorium and new kitchen/dining hall was underway at New Era when we arrived there. Through the director of The Moral Rearmament Center I came to know of a firm specializing in installing steam cookers in commercial kitchens. A steam-generating boiler enables large batches of rice, lentils, and vegetables to be cooked hygienically in a short time, with excess steam used to warm the “Bain Marie” in the serving line of the dining hall. Ray and I had an opportunity to see such an installation and invited the owner of this firm to come and see the school. He came to Panchgani and after taking some measurements in the kitchen gave us a reasonable bid for installing the equipment and also training the kitchen staff to operate and maintain the units. There was also a provision to add a unit later to wash and sterilize the plates, cutlery, and utensils used in the dining hall. After full consultation with George, the dining hall manager, the bid was accepted. This was a turnkey operation and was executed in three weeks. The units were in full operation when the auditorium/kitchen opened.

We had the pleasure of having my dear maternal uncle, Vaidhyanathan and his wife visit us in Panchgani. This is the uncle who became so close to me during my teen years in Chennai. Nana made the typical South Indian hot sauce called vattal kozumbu and the meals were served over banana leaves in the traditional South Indian style. Nana got an A+ for her cooking, particularly for making his favorite sauce.

Seven months after our in arrival Panchgani, Nana attended a Bahá’í fireside meeting at the Johnsons’ at which Dr. Tim Ross, an educator from Africa, gave a presentation on the Bahá’í Faith. Though the meeting was held just one floor above ours, I stayed at home with the kids. Nana returned home with a smile saying, “Now it is my time for wearing this medallion, since I feel the truth in Tim’s presentation.” By “this medallion” she meant a necklace with the symbol of the “Greatest Name” which was given to her as a parting gift by Ms. Rosemary Sala when we moved to Amherst just after our marriage. I was thrilled beyond description as Nana joined the Bahá’í community. She got a warm reception at her first Nineteen Day Feast.

Nana’s Mother Visits Us
Nana invited her parents to come for a visit to India to be with her and the kids. Nana’s mother proposed to Mr. Guerard that the two of them make the trip, but since he was afraid of flying, he gave her the green light if she wanted to go alone. Nana’s mom, without wasting any time, got her passport and arranged her flights via Paris to Mumbai. It was an unforgettable experience for Nana seeing her mother come out of the plane to collect her luggage and find that the suitcase has not arrived. Nana, on an impulse, boldly rushed through the “no entry” gate to assist her mom in explaining the situation to the airline officials as Madam Guerard did not speak a word of English. She was cool and did not make any fuss about the lost luggage. The airline promised to locate the bag and deliver it to Panchgani. In fact she got her bag in two days, but a few things were missing.
She stayed a month with us. She enjoyed walking in the pleasant weather, and her BP went down considerably. Ray was so magnanimous that he specially requested her to make the presentation of the gifts and credentials in the Annual School Prize Distribution day. Nana and I could not imagine the joy with which this woman from Quebec, who spoke not a word of English, took part in the ceremony.

During her stay, I had to go to New Delhi to meet with the UNICEF director and the Secretary for Health Education to get an approval for the training program in the Junior College in Panchgani. I took Nana and her mom with me. After my first meeting at the UNICEF office in Delhi we did some sightseeing and planned a trip to see the Taj Mahal in Agra while I was waiting for the second meeting with the health ministry. I had arranged travel by train to Agra and booked hotel rooms in that city. Just the evening before the day of departure, I got a call from the Health ministry that I can come the next morning for the requested meeting. Without any second thoughts I put Nana and her mom on the morning train and promised to join them the next day in Agra after my meeting. Since Nana was by this time used to train travel in India and how the taxis operate in airports and train stations, I had no fears in sending them alone. As Nana had the hotel reservations all that she had to do was to take a taxi from the train station to the hotel. But it did not turn out that way. The taxi drivers in India generally compete among themselves to carry foreigners. The taxi driver in Agra (who had a companion with him) took them by a dubious route, then stopped and complained that there is something wrong with the car. A bicycle rickshaw puller who happened to pass by smelled something fishy when he saw the taxi driver arguing with his companion while two foreign ladies sat inside the taxi. He immediately came to the scene, rebuked the taxi driver, and offered to take Nana and her mother to the hotel in his rickshaw, saying not to fear, that he was a Christian and they were safe with him. He drove them safely to the hotel promising to come back the next day to take them to the Taj Mahal if needed. He was their “Guardian Angel.” The next day we went to see the Taj Mahal and returned home without any further incident.

Move to the School Campus
After almost a year of staying at the Kanga Hill residence, which was too isolated for Nana, we moved into a small newly built staff apartment on the school campus overlooking the grand Chickley valley down below. Nanda Bhai continued to be our maid. Though this apartment was not more than 900 sqare feet in area, we had more interaction with the community. Nana, as usual, made this a cozy residence. We were very fortunate to have as our next door neighbors the Narulas, a Bahá’í couple from the Sikh background. The kids got attached to them, especially Vivek who would visit Mr. Narula every day to get cookies. Mr. Narula served as the maintenance manager of the properties while Mrs. Narula was in the administrative office.

Soon after we moved, Nanda Bhai came with the bad news that her sister had passed away in the hospital after delivering a baby girl. She did not know what to do with the new born as the infant’s father did not want to take any responsibility. Nana without any hesitation asked Nanda Bhai to bring the child to our place so that we would take care of the baby instead of it being abandoned. We named her Anita (the faultless) and Nana gave her all the love and nourishment that was needed. This was the most generous and benevolent act of service — saving a new born infant — on Nana’s part. For the next six months Anita grew up steadily to be a charming and smiling baby. We thought of adopting Anita, but the fact that her biological father stood in the way and would not grant the needed approval meant that we could not pursue it. He was not interested in getting his daughter but just saw an opportunity to make some fast bucks. As we refused to make such a payment, he took the child back and left her with Nanda Bhai the same evening.

Following those sad happenings, good news came that Nana’s favorite aunt, Paulette, was planning to visit us in Panchgani. We were thrilled to meet her in Mumbai and went straight away from the airport by taxi to the train station and then to Pune. Aunt Paulette was in excellent spirits as she traveled for the first time on Indian trains and busses. Although we were cramped in that small apartment she was very accommodating and the kids fell in love with her. As a whole family we made a trip to the famous Ajanta Caves to see the Buddhist monuments. We had a reliable taxi driver who took us to all the places we needed to go.

A few weeks after Nana’s aunt Paulette’s visit, my aunt Savitri and her husband Srinivasan came from Perambavoor, Kerala, to visit us. They stayed in the dormitories as our apartment was too small. Once again they relished Nana’s cooking, especially the dessert, rava kesari.

Back to the US and a Mini Vacation
In those days the US Immigration Service required that residents holding green cards could not be absent from the country for more than two consecutive years if they want to retain their resident status. This meant I would have to be in the USA, even if it was for just a day, before the summer of 1979 to keep the green card valid.

Dan Jordan had moved to San Diego leaving his tenured status at U. Mass and was spending an exploratory period with an institution called California International University (CIU) founded by Ken Blanchard, who was an ex-colleague of Dan at U. Mass. Dan informed me that he was still running his teacher training projects in New England. Knowing that I had to be in the USA to maintain my immigration status he graciously invited me to deliver a workshop to a school district in Portland, Maine, and later two more presentations in Southern California, for which I would be adequately compensated. So at the end of 1978 I traveled to the USA to deliver the workshop and the presentations as requested. I visited Dan and Nancy in their small apartment in Escondido; their household, with Dan’s entire personal library, was in storage.

I had also planned to give Nana and the kids a mini vacation to Bangkok and Singapore where my dear friend Dr. Natarajan lived. The plan was that Nana would fly to Bangkok with the kids and I would meet them at the Bangkok airport on my return from the States. Travel tickets for them were purchased before I left for the States.

I finished my assignments and arrived in Bangkok as planned. Nana and the kids left Mumbai on December 29th, but arrived a day later than I expected as their Polish Airlines plane was delayed due to heavy snow storms. After spending a memorable week of sightseeing in that noisy city, we took the overnight train to Singapore. We arrived at the train station but surprisingly there was no sign of Dr. Natarajan waiting to receive us. As we were waiting and looking around for him, a young lady approached us saying that she was sent to meet us by Mrs. Padma Natarajan, as Dr. Natarajan had passed away few weeks before. It was a rude shock for both Nana and me. We then decided to go to a hotel as this did not seem like the best time to visit the bereaved family. The next morning Mrs. Natarajan showed up at our hotel and pleaded with us to come and spend few days at their home with herself and her four daughters as this would lessen their grief to a large extent. Although this was Nana’s first-ever meeting with this woman, we did spend a few days at their home and Padma took us around the magnificent city. Singapore was transformed since my last visit in 1963. Nana and I saw Natarajan’s kids and our kids playing together, just as envisioned years earlier by Natarajan in Montreal. We returned to Panchgani on January 24th 1979.

Revolution in Iran
In February of that year there was a tremendous political revolution in Iran. The Khomeini regime took over and the Shah of Iran escaped to Egypt. Thousands of Bahá’í families lost their possessions and their businesses and fled Iran. This included the well-meaning businessman, Sabet, who had promised to fund the Junior College project. Iranian student enrollment in New Era dropped significantly as the families had to withdraw their children from the school. As these Iranian students brought a significant percentage of New Era’s income, the school now had to operate on a lean budget.

It became obvious that there were no more funds to continue my project. I would have to leave Panchgani, look for other job opportunities back in the States, and relocate the family. Since Dan Jordan himself was still struggling to reestablish the ANISA project in California, I once again sent my resume to every institution I had contact with in the USA. I wrote a personal letter explaining my situation to the Dean of the Tropical School of Agriculture, Dr. William Furtick, at the University of Hawaii, whom I had met in Amherst. Surprisingly, two months later in June I got a letter from him saying that I should contact him as soon as possible by phone. One of the professors was going on a sabbatical leave and there would be an opening for a Visiting Professorship in the Nutrition Department of the University. I rushed to Pune where international telephone calls could be made without any interruption or difficulty. To my delight, after talking for a few minutes he offered me the Visiting Professorship with an adequate salary. I was to join the faculty in the fall of 1979, but this was to be just for a two year period. Within two weeks I received an official letter confirming his offer. I thanked my “Guardian Angel”.

In early August I shipped our household belongings to Hawaii. These now included a nest of Indian-style coffee tables made of teak with carved inlaid marble work. There was also a stunning framed oil-paint portrait of Abdu’l-Baha, done by Mr. Dey, the Art teacher at New Era exclusively for us as a parting gift. Earlier had he had also painted in water color the Panchgani landscape on a cheese cloth which hangs in our living room even today.

Later in the month we were off to Honolulu.