WAISE MUJHE KAAFI AWARD MILE HAI , LEKIN ISS AWARD KO MAIN KABHI BHUL NAHI PAUNGA

The Mother Teresa Award for journalist was presented to me by Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar - BY ALI PETER JOHN

I was told that I would be the first journalist to receive the Mother Teresa Award for journalism. I would only be a mad man if I said I was not thrilled.

I had the greatest reverence for Mother Teresa, who I had the honour of meeting personally in her simple room in Vile Parle where she was just sitting on a plain coir mat without any pillow to rest her old body on.

There were hundreds of people standing in a queue waiting to have a darshan of the “devi” on earth and among them was the emperor of acting, Dilip Kumar and his wife Saira Banu and several leading industrialists, writers, people from all classes of society down to the poorest, the Harijans who were also known as Shudras even in these modern times, the lowest according to a system that has been ruling the country in spite of all the laws passed by the government and the highest court of the land.

For Mother Teresa all human beings were equal and she proved it by practice that she believed in all human beings being the children of the same God.

My excitement about receiving an award in her name grew into a blessing which I was to receive. I however had an instant condition for the organizers.

I told them I would not receive the award from anyone else but Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar.

The organizers asked me if I could arrange to get the Nightingale of India to do me the honours. I said I would try.

One evening I was passing through a bungalow “Swarlata” in Mhada which was now her favourite recording studio in Andheri and was surprised to see her car parked outside the bungalow.

Her man, Mahesh came running after me and told me that “didi” was inside and all alone.

I did not want to disturb her but Mahesh asked me to call him the next morning and he would get me to talk to “didi”.

I followed his instructions and called exactly at 11.30, the time he had asked me to call.

He immediately gave the phone to “didi” and I wasted no time and told her about my award and said I would not receive the award from anyone else but her.

She in her heavenly voice said, “Aap ke liye main kuch bhi karungi”. Those words were much more precious to me than any award in the world.

She asked for the date and time and everything was fixed within a minute. She even agreed to book the hall for the function herself.

I was in some seventh heaven during all the days before August 18 when the function was to be held, and which was also incidentally the birthday of my mother.

She and her man Friday, Mahesh, kept in touch with me almost every day wanting to know if I needed anything from “didi” to make the function a success.

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I had to assure them that all things would be arranged and all I needed was her blessed presence on that most important evening of my life.

That evening finally was a reality. I was surprised to see the huge crowd and the army of the media.

She came down from her first floor apartment and for me it was like an angel descending from heaven to specially anoint and bless me.

Among the others who graced the momentous occasion of my life were the well known filmmaker Manoj Kumar, criminal lawyer, Mr. Ram Jethmalani, singer Anup Jalota, actress Neetu Chandra, filmmaker Sanjiv Jaiswal, and Mr. Kiran V. Shantaram.

“Didi” was all praise for me and I wondered if I was really worth all the words she had used in her sweet voice to describe me and my association with her.

I was in sheer ecstasy when she referred to me as a part of her family and talked about our “dosti”.

How could I, a no body, be a “dost” of the woman who is the pearl of India? I kept asking myself and remembered how I had an aunt who worked as an “aayah” in the same building where she lived, “Prabhu Kunj” and I was living in a slum in Andheri where I had only one dream and that was to be a bus conductor.

Mr. Manoj Kumar who seemed to have read my autobiography “Life-bits and pieces” told the packed audience all about my struggle from my days “in the gutter to the place I had made all on my own”.

The moment Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar draped me with a shawl and presented me with the trophy was the greatest moment in my long life full of ups and downs and will always be.

The only award I can now expect is an award from God himself because there is no one like Lata Mangeshkar who can present me with an award again.