Thousand Moon: Colonel Vishwanath
Dattatreya Deodhar “Bapu” (Born 1928, Age 85+)
Contributed by: Nandu
Col. Deodhar pursued a military career
since a young age. He attended Bhosla
Military School (BMS) in Nasik from 6th grade till matriculation,
followed by two years of college studies in Pune. For school, he would travel alone via train from
his hometown Bhivpuri to Nasik independently, without anyone accompanying him
any time at that young age. In Bhivpuri, Tata Company had opened a power
station, away from any major city, where his father was working as an Electrical
Engineer. As a starting establishment,
there was no school for young Vishwanath to study. So, right from the first grade, he studied in
elementary schools in different cities, staying with grand parents or maternal
uncle or aunt. People would joke with his parents asking if
they wanted Vishwanath to become a collector, a prestigious government post at that time,
for sending him away so young for schooling.
His parents certainly wanted him to study well. However, while completing his high school, he
frankly told his father two things, one not to expect higher studies from him and
second that he was to join military.
He remembered one incidence while
reminiscing. When he was to join
college, he reserved a bicycle as it was the main mode of transportation in
Pune. The place to reserve it, at the
closest railway station, was nine miles away from Bhivpuri camp. Tata Co. had arranged a small train-cart
shuttle for transportation that would leave in the morning and afternoon from
Bhivpuri. The last return shuttle used
to be in the night. So he traveled to
the rail station, reserved his bike, and found that for some reason the return
shuttle was cancelled. He was to leave
for Pune the next day. Had he waited for
the shuttle to return in the morning, he would have missed his train and disturbed the entire schedule. While
watching the train track, he suddenly decided to take control of the
situation and just started running. He ran
all the way home in dark, a distance of nine miles, reaching home very late night, and was all set to embark upon the
planned journey the next morning.
Another interesting story he recounted was
writing to his father to ask whether he could eat Goat meat during Dasara
celebration at BMS, this was significant since he hailed from a strict vegetarian
family. His father responded by saying
that “there is nothing wrong in wearing shoes and reading the Holy Gita while
drinking beer” giving his permission indirectly in his own special practical way.
Although he is not superstitious yet he has
experienced firsthand the “siddhi” or special power that some people seem to
possess. As a toddler, while playing, he had
met with an accident wherein he had fallen down very hard and had injured his backbone and spine. He was bed-ridden for
almost two years. A
little after the incident, while traveling in a train, a passenger told his his
parents that the condition and associated hurt was going to stay for a while
and he gave exact date of recovery after which the boy would be fine. Time passed and to everyone's surprise, one
day, the prediction came true and young Vishwanath was miraculously restored to
complete health. Not being able to
forget the mysterious prediction, Bapu tried to search for that individual, but
was only able to offer his respects at the shrine of this extraordinary Yogi.
Before completing the college degree, and
after two consecutive rejections for various reasons, finally he was selected
in the Indian army. He was in service
till his retirement. He recalled that
his father, an Engineer, always wanted to be a soldier during World War I, so
he believes that his father’s wishes were fulfilled through his selection.
He
was posted in various military establishments in the group for Repair and
Recovery Operations for military vehicles and ammunitions during peace
time. He was moved to different camps
almost every two years, with family moving along with him or at times family stationed
in Pune. Once, when he was transferred to north-east
region, he was to stay in bunkers with other soldiers. It was a scary part to live and sleep in the
night with constant fear of jungle animals and possible collapse as he would
hear cracking sounds of the stones above.
One day he decided not to stay there, informed his superiors, and left
the bunker to safer area. To his disbelief,
the same bunker collapsed two days after and he was thus miraculously saved,
with some kind of premonition.
After the war of 1971, he received a Gallantry Award of Mention-in-Despatch
for excellent work at Fazilka, Punjab in the Western Sector.
After retirement, on the social aspect, he
was involved in a tedious and time consuming task of compiling family history
of the entire Deodhar family tree ‘Kulavrutanta’. Its first compilation and publishing was already done
earlier in 1967. In 1992, he reviewed, revised, expanded, and coordinated the collection with the help of coworkers. He traveled to many different cities to gather information about
people with last name Deodhar, Dixit
and Dhamdhere, and associated ones, sifted through many old documents tracing the
family history over centuries, and wrote the information about additional families. Now more experienced, he once
again aspires to recompile and republish the ‘kulavrutanta’ with updated
information by 2017, with younger team.
He wants to keep everybody happy around
him. Due to love and support from his children and their respective families, he is not worried or depressed in the old age.
He attributes his good health to the hard work and exercise he did
during his school days.