What Institutions Remember—and Forget

The end, when it finally came, was a study in contrasts.

On one side was my work family—the people in the trenches who keep a hospital breathing. The office superintendent, the matron, the biomedical engineers and the pharmacy chief organized a modest farewell in the MS Office on January 21, 2023.

It was unpretentious, practical and deeply felt.

I spoke in Marathi for nearly twenty minutes, trying to thank everyone for standing by me through the thickets of administration. I was determined not to become emotional. I wanted to leave with the stoic poise of a Sevagram boy.

That resolve did not last long.

Colleagues spoke next. They recalled midnight emergencies, long days that blurred into nights, and small victories that rarely made it into reports. Shaily then presented me with a beautifully crafted frame, a collage of photographs from my years in office.

I was deeply moved when I learnt that Manish, the office attendant, had stayed late into the night at the Wardha bus stand to help put it together.

That small act of kindness undid me.

Messages also began arriving from former students, Sister Genie and Abhishek Raut. They said generous things about my years as Medical Superintendent and about my decision to leave. Reading them, I felt reassured that perhaps I had chosen the right time.

Later that day, I published a reflection on Facebook. I described my years as Medical Superintendent through the language I knew best: cricket.

“This morning, I hung up my shoes. I stepped down as medical superintendent of the MGIMS hospital. Twelve years ago, I became a reluctant MS… catapulted straight into test cricket, forced to make my debut at Sabina Park without ever having played first-class cricket… The pitch was treacherous, the sky overcast… Over weeks, I learnt where my off stump was…”

I wrote that I wanted to leave at the right time and hand over the reins to a younger, brighter faculty. I quoted Vijay Merchant: “Retire when people ask why and not when.” And I wrote about what I hoped to do next—teach, care for patients, particularly those needing palliative care, return to research, and spend more time reading, writing and being with my grandchildren.

Writing those words felt liberating.

Then came the other side of the contrast.

There was no formal send-off from the top management. No official acknowledgment from the institution I had served for four decades.

I had not expected a ceremony. But I had expected, perhaps, a handshake.

The silence hurt more than I had anticipated.

Perhaps that was my final lesson as Medical Superintendent. Institutions remember work differently from people. They need people intensely while they are there; once they leave, the machinery moves on. The work remains in the records. The people move on with their lives.

What stayed with me was not the silence at the top but the warmth below it—the people who had worked beside me, shared the difficult days and remembered the small things.

I left the MS Office behind. I surrendered the designation without regret. I carried with me memories of ten thousand kilometres cycled, countless patients seen, students taught, crises survived, friendships made, and a hospital that was, I hoped, a little better than I had found it.

The “SP” bookshelf remained.

The letters on the door changed.

And I was free.