Anil Kumar Bhatt/New Delhi

Amidst many heartbreaking stories of close relatives and family members not touching the bodies of the Covid-19 victims for obvious reasons there are as many heartwarming stories of human kindness and bond that have stood the test of the difficult times of the pandemic.

One such story is based in East Delhi. It started some  35 years back, when my friend, now a retired Major General of the Indian Army, Vivek Sharma's father, a government servant,  bought his house in East Delhi.

While living there for 35 years, senior Sharma made many friends and acquaintances. One of them was Sikandar Khan, an electrician by profession. From a small-time handyman, Sikandar worked hard and graduated to opening a small electrical business and a tent house in the colony.

As time went by, Sikandar did well in his business and educated his children, one of them became a doctor. In this period, his relationship with the Sharma family also grew. What started as a client-service provider relationship grew to a closer friendly acquaintance. 

Vivek Sharma had left home early to study at the Armed Forces Medical College, Pune, in 1979. Decades later, in 2019, he retired as a General from Lucknow. He had served all over the country and hardly stayed in Delhi.

His parents continued to stay in East Delhi along with their domestic staff — a Nepali couple, Ganga and her husband Dhan Singh. The couple has been with them for the last 30 years. In fact, a few years back when Vivek Sharma’s mother expired, his father refused to shift to Pune and insisted on staying in his house. This was his comfort zone with the support of his friends, neighbours and of course Ganga and Dhan Singh. The couple was like close family members.

Ganga and Dhan Singh

This year on 22 April, Corona struck the Sharma family.  At first, it caught Ganga and her husband. They, however, overcame it with a mild fever and a cough. But as they recovered, they passed on the virus to Mr Sharma. As the old man developed fever, his son flew in from Pune.

At that time, knowing the dire conditions in the hospitals, the challenge of lack of oxygen and other complexities, and he is a doctor with adequate knowledge of the terrifying conditions in hospitals, decided to treat his father at home.

Apart from the medication, he was fortunate that a friend lends him an oxygen concentrator that was not readily available in the open market. Despite all his care, the old man breathed his last on 02 May 2021.

Well now was the challenge — what would be done for the last rites? Apart from the old domestic couple and a cousin who had rushed from Saharanpur, there was no one. The neighbours did come but because of the Corona, were rightly hesitant fearing infection.

At this time, there was one man and that was Sikander Khan. Not a neighbour or a relative but a distant acquaintance who emerged as the man Friday. He arranged for the last rites, the hearse vehicle, buying the coffin cloth, helped in wrapping the mortal remains and also provided one of the four shoulders as a pallbearer for Mr Sharma’s final journey.

The last rites of Mr Sharma were performed by his son, his lone nephew, the old domestic help, the very loyal ally from Nepal and of course, Sikandar Khan. 

As General Sharma rightly says, “My father was fortunate to have a good friend like Sikander, who, without any care for his own well-being in the most trying times came forward for my help.” He rightly sums it up when he says that we all need a Sikander in our lives.

(Major General Vivek Sharma  who has settled in Pune said he wants to pay adequate money to Ganga and Dhan Singh so that they can buy a house and stay comfortably in their native village in Nepal. This , he says, is a token of appreciation for all the care they took of his parents over the years.

(The writer is a retired senior officer of the Indian Army)