Most people would have celebrated the Republic day in the usual manner – unfurling of national flag, some speeches, raising of ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ and ‘Vande Matram’ slogans and maybe sweet distribution. Since the anti-corruption movement led by Anna Hazare, the tricolor has been more widely used on various occasions, including the Republic and Independence day celebrations. Since Bhartiya Janata Party has come to power in the second round a more strident variety of nationalism has come into vogue which is assertive, and sometimes it becomes virulent when it takes the form of religious nationalism and starts looking for an enemy. People feel national pride in holding or installing this flag in their homes, on their vehicles, etc.
However, this feeling is only temporal so long as we’re involved in some celebrations, events, etc. Rest of the time we go about our normal activities without caring about the nation or its people very much. We are part of corrupt, exploitative, insensitive system and most people don’t do anything to try to change the system. They prefer to go along and are willingly-unwillingly part of it.
There is a psychiatric Dr. Prashant Shukla in Lucknow who runs a small hospital to take care of mentally ill patients. He treats patients suffering from ailments like depression, obsessive compulsive disorder. panic disorder, schizophrenia, mania and psychosis. There are some patients who he treats professionally by charging his fees but there are some who he picks up from the road, who obviously do not have a family who can pay for their treatment. Once he cures them of their illness to the extent that they can remember where they came from he makes an attempt to reunite them with their families.
The legal process requires such patients to be produced by the police before a magistrate who decides where they should go. This process is cumbersome. The official beggers’ home in Lucknow never had an inmate even though government continued to spend money on it by making payments to staff responsible for it for years. Dr. Shukla informs the local police station whenever he intakes a patient and when he takes them for reunion with their family.
Sometimes police themselves summon him and hand over such patients at the police station for treatment. There was one such patient from a village in Rajahmundry district of Andhra Pradesh who he found on streets of Lucknow. After treating him he took the help of Dr. Bharat Vatwani, who has been doing this kind of work on a much bigger scale in Mumbai, and circulated the photo of this patient on Dr. Vatwani’s social media network.
The patient’s village and family were located by volunteer Ram Krishna Raju in A.P. who were sent by him to Lucknow to take back this patient who had left home 13 years back. In this manner Dr. Shukla has reunited about 50 patients so far. Dr. Bharat Vatwani has reunited more than 5,500 such patients from his centre in Karjat, because of which he also got the Magsaysay award in 2018. Now Ram Krishna Raju is doing the same work in Andhra Pradesh in association with the government hospitals in Vishakhapatanam and Kadapa.
This Republic Day, in 2025, Dr. Prashant Shukla and his staff decided to reunite Ashish Sharma, resident of Lucknow who was picked up from outside Doordarshan office on 27 December last year. He was disheveled, untidy and unwilling to take any instructions. When he arrived at the Asha Welfare Hospital of Dr. Shukla on Lucknow-Ayodhya road, he would not stay there. He was screaming and made life of all hospital staff very difficult. But slowly under the effect of medication he calmed down and became more normal. Within a month he could recall his address and was in a condition to go back home.
On 26 January, 2025, while most of us were celebrating the festival holiday, Dr. Shukla, his pharmacist Pawan Verma and social worker Ashish Dwivedi, took Ashish Sharma to his home in Khojwa, Rakabganj in Lucknow through narrow roads. His sister was not at home with whom Ashish Sharma used to stay.
Ashish had left home some ten years ago. When his father was alive, he would go looking for Ashish whenever he left home. But after his parents’ death it became difficult to trace him. An aunt who lives in the neighbouring house recognized him and so did most of the neighbours and the doctor’s team handed over Ashish Sharma to his aunt with instructions on how to medicate him. Dr. Shukla explained to the aunt that Ashish Sharma was schizophrenic and if he were to be given the proper medicines and was kept engaged in some activities he would not run away. Dr. Shukla also took responsibility for sending medicines from time to time as they got over. Of course, he made it clear that he would not charge anything for his services.
This was a unique way to celebrate Republic Day. Silently serving the nation and its people, especially the ones who require our attention most and who are often treated as unwanted by the society. There was no flag unfurling, no nationalist slogans, no speeches, no dramatic actions, no sweets distributed. We are a hypocrite society. We talk of service and sacrifice. But we indulge in pomp, show and fanfare. Most of the times the nationalism on display is only for public consumption. It doesn’t do much good to the society. We need to learn from Dr. Shukla how to contribute in a concrete manner without attracting much attention for the betterment of society.
This writer considers it a privilege that he was invited by Dr. Shukla to accompany him when his team went to drop Ashish Sharma to his home on the Republic Day.
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*General Secretary, Socialist Party (India)
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