I noticed he didn’t go for lunch: “Oh, the hotels are all filled at this time sir, I usually go a bit late” he said – but, it wasn’t true at all. He never went even after lunch time break: I watched him drop and slump asleep in the car seat till it was time for me to return home. He was the driver of my office car. An old man, specially drafted for my service, recalled after retirement - a stopgap appointment – he known for his punctuality and road skills. I had refused to accede to the demands of the previous driver who ask me to endorse false petrol bills and overtime claims. The management sent this man. He was a diabetic and hypertensive, but a very good at the wheel.

'I have driven Vajpayi saab when he toured the state as BJP leader, and Advaniji, they always asked for me', he chuckled a toothless smile as he mentioned snatches from his faded memory bank. He was also the personal driver of Justice K. S. Hegde, my institute’s fonder, a man of principles who resigned from the supreme court and later became the speaker of the lok sabha.

He was terrified of retirement, and I bargained with the superiors to extend his tenure by a few months. An unlettered wife and no children. His was a lonely life, kept alive by liberal doses of insulin and anti - hypertensives.

Lakshmi was mortified when she heard that I had noticed he skipped lunch – maybe, to save up on the Rs.15 or so per day for the coming rainy days. She made sure he was fed with a plate full of homemade fare then on – a spread he relished, sometimes requesting for an extra helping or two.

I had made some enquiries around, and had found him a temporary job after his final retirement, two months off.

This morning I was woken by a call. I rushed in response. Lying inert and lifeless was Shivappa, the driver. He was in his uniform, ready to report to duty when a massive silent attack felled him. I stood by his cot in the hospital and shut my eyes., which filled with moisture rapidly. He was a good man. Sincere, loyal and honest. Few come these days in this model. In ten minutes, the entire ward, and the porch and the quadrangle of the hospital filled with mourners – Shivappa was an institution by himself. If only he cold see how many were here to pay him homage, he would have chuckled.

He was not childless. He had a host of sons and daughters, each on of them standing silently as they wheeled his corpse away. I returned home upset and drove to work, with Ravi doubling in as a driver. On the front seat lay a neatly folded pair of tortoise rimmed spectacles, thick lensed and heavy. Shivappa, I will miss you, your genial smile, your extraordinary politeness and most of all, I will cherish the moment, when the day before you passed on, you picked up baby Maitreyi and whispered into her ears – take care of the dean saar my child, he may have no one to when he is my age.

I hunched, squatting on my mat in the evening, unable to come to terms with the finality and closure death brings. Lakshmi gently places her baby on my lap – and then I see the most radiant smile a man can ever be greeted with.

Life must go on: the next generation is here, it is time for the last one to move on. Thank you Shivappanna and your chuckles, and thanks too, Maitreyi and your gurgling chuckle – for telling me, without uttering a word, the baton must passed on in a relay race.