anonymous

29th October 2019

MY STORY - 6

MY STORY - 6

DR SHANTILAL J. MEHTA

Sir Purshottamdas Thakurdas hosted a dinner at the Willingdon Club and I too had been invited. Sitting next to me was Sir Nowrojee Saklatwala, then the Head of the Tata group. While speaking to him I remarked that the Tatas had donated large sums of money for charity and were in the forefront of philanthropy and asked why they had not helped cancer patients by putting up a cancer hospital.

"Shanti” Sir Nowrojee replied, "cancer is not common in India”.

I asked him to come to the J.J. Hospital on any morning and I would show him cancer victims. So he agreed to come on the following Monday at 9.30 a.m. I collected 50 odd cases of cancer. When he saw the cases he could not believe that cancer was so rampant in India. "We will have a cancer hospital” Sir Nowrojee declared. He asked me to give a project and I produced one which would cost Rs. 48 lakhs. This is how the great house of the Tatas constructed the first cancer hospital in the country which has given relief to lakhs of patients.

At that time there was no cancer hospital and hardly any treatment was available. All cancer cases were referred to me. I had the opportunity to perform major surgeries at a very young age. In 1984, I came across an old patient of mine admitted to the Jaslok Hospital for prostate operation-he was 92. I had operated on him for cancer of the rectum in 1948. Somehow he had survived from 1948 till 1984. He had been a High Court Judge in Saurashtra.