A day when I met my inspiration Dr. Narendra Chirmule with an emptiness

14 April 2022, precious day of my life. I happened to meet & spend some time with my inspiration “Dr. Narendra Chirmule” Ji. He invited me to have a lunch with him by 1pm. So, I completed my lab work by 12:30pm, & waited for 1 pm to happen.

Fortunately, I had his book Good Genes Gone Bad to make it autographed. By 12:55 I was nearby Prof. Atul’s (VC of Shoolini University) office and I spotted Dr. Naren sitting on the large seat with a pen in his right hand, which was pointed at the bars in graph that he drew for some analysis of survey in his regular notebook.

There were 3 more people (Mr. Atul ji, Ms. Sreerupa ji & Mr. Sagar ji). Dr. Naren saw me, welcomed & introduced myself a bit to everyone & Atul ji and I propounded that in Hindi (briefly).

He saw that I was holding his book on my right hand. Instantly, I placed that on the table and asked for an autograph. He opened the first page of book & wrote “Dear Gaurav, thank you for following everything I’ve written in the book already” and then put his signature on the bottom of page. First goal of my meeting was successful!

With a hungry expression, he asked me about the place where we could have our lunch. So, I brought him to the nearest cafeteria, one floor above the place we were. With his nature, excitedly he holds his bag, where (probably) his covered bansuri’s (flute) rim was staring outside the bag. We reached café & ordered lunch. We had to wait for 15-20 mins, meanwhile we continued our conversation.

When I have to meet with an eminent person, I go with an empty mind (considering as box here). My box is most of the time empty. I don’t fit (inculcate) any shape of learning, thoughts, information at that time. So that I could fit everything the person says within my empty box without any judgement & discrepancy. It is my way of perceiving.

Suppose that you are carrying a box with circular shape, then you can/will fit only that substance with similar shape. Rest of the things you won’t include. Similarly, with a concretized mindset if I go to meet a person, then intentionally/unintentionally, I will have a thought process to perceive things in my way only. But I wanted to perceive his way!

So, I speak and share less in that moment, & listen more to fit everything for my prospective introspection about that meeting & what valuable that I do not know, perceived. As I am tired of my research strategies, so the reason was more obvious.

We talked about my research projects on agriculture/healthcare, talked about arts/destinations in Shimla, library that sells the copies of PhD thesis. He asked me a few questions with his curious mind, I gave an overview (less information) based answers to him.

While talking, I didn’t even realize that he is “The Dr. Narendra Chirmule”, CEO of symphony tech biologics with 11,525 citations, h-index of 48, i10-index of 83 and an author of the book “Good Genes Gone Bad”. Instead, I saw a highly inquisitive life, imbued with the curiosity to know, and seek more & more. It is like he intends to break that perpetual point of seeking for an arrival in an unknown destination of knowing everything.

He gave me the new perspectives about to address several things in life. Lunch came, and we ate that after having a glass of sweet lassi with an unusual rasgulla (that seemed more like an ice cream). We interacted, discussed, joked until 2:05pm. I clicked a picture with him for a memory with a goodbye & came back to my lab. I looked at our picture & that autograph again and again.

               I was and I am so happy because this experience is valuable/precious & lifetime opportunity for me to seek some gems. Because alongside, I perceived his nature to enhance mine more for the growth.

As for me, Growth is not in the achievements that we seek. It is in the way; we transcend the idea of our limitations. Once we are in touch with growth, then there is no success or failure.

 There is Transformation!

 And I utterly achieved that.