Avijit Chatterjee- RIP
Asim Ghosh
Avijit Chatterjee joined our batch in 1964, though he had passed out of school a year earlier than us. The delay was due to his spending a year in Baltimore.
Avijit was one of the original multitalented people, good at the ‘official’ reason he was there for, which was Chemical Engineering, but even better at a number of his extracurricular activities which I shared with him, the Free Discussion Group, the IITEDE journal, of which he became Chief Editor, and photography. He developed a reputation for his wit, perhaps even more for his sarcasm - often the two go together.
After IIT, he went on to join one of the coveted jobs of the time, which was as Management Trainee at ICI. He rose up the ranks and was posted at various locations around India and the UK. For a few decades, we exchanged a letter a month. I met him twice by coincidence in London and once in Paris (coincidence indeed because in those days, international travel was not common for poor middle managers such as we were, and coordination of such meetings was even more complicated before emails and mobile phones). I stayed with him three times on my infrequent trips to India in Bombay and Madras, and then had an extended holiday with him in Madras from where we traveled with his family, with whom I became close, all over India.
In later years, his wicked wit and his penchant sarcasm were confined to his letters. When I told him once that he was wasting his talents and should start writing formally, he said that writing for his own pleasure was enough.
He lived life on many planes. He proved that to the very end.
T.S. Padmanabhan
He was active in the WhatsApp group and would not let a single post go uncontested if it was against ideas he held dear. Yes, the Clock collections, his comment about them ticking away, the Kitchen, his Living room they were available for us all to view in the group.
He will be missed, RIP Avida....
|
Feb 15, 2019, 9:30 PM (2 days ago)
|  | ||
Very sad. He was a good guy with a great sense of humor!
Ashok Sud
This is so, so, sad, and truly unbelievable.
Madhu Thakar
I did not interact much with him at IIT but found him pithy in his comments on this blog. My sincere condolences to his family.
Gulshan Kalra
Avi enjoyed when his friends called him. His unrestricted and full throttled laugh amused me. He mentally allocated U time for conversation and no sooner he felt that he needs to put a stop to it, he would give a polite hint and excuse himself. Just two days before his demise I had the previlege of conversing with him and enquired of he will come to Agra. He said he is winding up his establishment in Cal & shifting to Bby where both his children were based. Alas this Did not happen. A fine human being. Pride of IITD.
Rakesh Gupta
Avijit was one of the bright ones in the CH64 batch and he enjoyed his status. He achieved much and was a star performer of the Batch. RIP
Ramesh Shankar
I knew Avi while at IITD and unfortunately never had a chance to meet him after that, except through his posts on our group forum. He always had a ready smile, immaculately dressed.-- cannot forget his "bleeding Madras" shirts and his soda-bottle spectacles. Avi was a gentle soul, never a cross word but always saw the sunny side of life. Rest in peace, Avi!
RIP Avijit !
|
Fri, Feb 15, 8:30 PM (2 days ago)
| | ||
Shocked beyond words.
He will be deeply missed on Whatsapp.
An elegant soul, both in body and spirit.
RIP, my friend.
Avijit and I were in the same school in Bombay, Campion School. He was then a year senior. Last year, while going through my deceased father's papers, I came across a brochure of a prize distribution function in 1960. Avijit figures as the Best Scout and also as the Best Student in his class. He was so happy, that we went off on a chat on the happy times in Campion, Bombay, and childhood in general.
I find it difficult to get over the shock. RIP, my friend.
Janak Raj
This is so, so, sad, and truly unbelievable.
We will (probably) never know what really happened, and don't need to know. But the shock is too much, really.
Never got to know him well personally, but the image of Avijit biking down the IIT road on his green army disposal Enfied, jaunty pipe in place, is so clear in my memory.
Did he live all his post IIT life in Kolkata ?
May God Bless his soul.
I did not interact much with him at IIT but found him pithy in his comments on this blog. My sincere condolences to his family.
Gulshan Kalra
Avi enjoyed when his friends called him. His unrestricted and full throttled laugh amused me. He mentally allocated U time for conversation and no sooner he felt that he needs to put a stop to it, he would give a polite hint and excuse himself. Just two days before his demise I had the previlege of conversing with him and enquired of he will come to Agra. He said he is winding up his establishment in Cal & shifting to Bby where both his children were based. Alas this Did not happen. A fine human being. Pride of IITD.
Rakesh Gupta
Avijit was one of the bright ones in the CH64 batch and he enjoyed his status. He achieved much and was a star performer of the Batch. RIP
Ramesh Shankar
I knew Avi while at IITD and unfortunately never had a chance to meet him after that, except through his posts on our group forum. He always had a ready smile, immaculately dressed.-- cannot forget his "bleeding Madras" shirts and his soda-bottle spectacles. Avi was a gentle soul, never a cross word but always saw the sunny side of life. Rest in peace, Avi!
May ishwar give strength to his family to withstand the loss. We did exchange a few e-mails over the years. i wish that I had more opportunities to interact with him while we were at IIT D and beyond. Sant Gupta
ReplyDeleteComments by Biplab Bose his classmate on the anniversary of his death, November 29, 2019.
ReplyDeleteI read your moments of happiness spent with spectacular friend and batch mate Avijit who left us few months back in tragic circumstances. i am sure where he is now must be carrying on with his witty comments, hilarious life and enjoying life as he desired to live.
Avijit and I were in same group A for five years as well as in group A of English and humanities in first year. We were only two Bengalis in Chemical batch and both of us were 'Prabasi', meaning born and brought up outside Bengal and special memory of our seeing Bengali movies on Sunday morning show in his bullet motorcycle was a thrill and unforgettable experience. My relation with him was somewhat like 'blow hot blow cold' because both had strong independent views and Bengali DNA but at the end we were good friends till he left us.
One special thing, I remember when we were in IIT hostel, he would come and say "Biplab, why some bloke is opening my personal letters?" All his letters were written with pencil in inland letters (hope you all remember post cards and light blue inland letters) and finally one day I could not resist my curiosity to ask him who is the adventurous author of these letters written with pencil? He thought for a moment and replied very cutely "My lifeline and my priyatoma" I congratulated him.
Post IIT, I had couple of chance meetings at Bombay or Delhi airports when I was Tribeni Tissues (part of British American Tobacco-BAT group and later in Swedish MNC Flakt AB Sweden) and spent little time with coffee or tea but highly enjoyable time.
Later, when he shifted to Kolkata, I used to meet him in Calcutta club or The Lake club or get together of small IITDAA kolkata Chapter, I was the convenor. Sometime, our dear batch mate late Satish Makhija came to Kolkata, I invited Avijit and fun time at above clubs. He would poke me as Management Guru for having authored a voluminous text book on Marketing Management for MBA. Gullu was in Kolkata and Avijit came and met us at Calcutta club, we spent few hours remembering our IITdays and some old friends, he missed Batty (Ranjit Batra).
His wife passed away seven years back and was staying alone in south Kolkata, far way from my place in Salt lake City, near airport. He was lonely and often melancholic and his son told me that he had become highly spiritual and disciple of Goddess Kali Ma and he would visit Lake Kali mandir every Saturday morning at 5 am without fail.
Avijit was an extraordinary person but I always felt he wasted his God given talent of writing such literary english prose, why didn't he author some good books?
That question will now never be answered.
Avijit RIP
Biplab