Search for perfection in every sentence- Siddharth Krishnan

As one of Shobha's  very good friends, I had heard a hundred stories from shobha of Mr. Vasudevan's generous personality, but nothing prepares you for the perpetual humility that his company bestows upon you. I remember the first few times that I met Mr. Vasudevan, all the way back in 2005. His demeanor had the assured confidence of a personality unaccustomed to challenges that have bested him. His style of speech is something that I knowingly try to emulate, even today. Every sentence is designed to have no flaws, even if it means long pauses in the middle of each sentence. Like students in a class taught by a nobel laureate, we just sit and wait out his search for perfection in every sentence (usually well worth the wait). His understanding of the world was matched only by his boundless curiosity in what had not crossed him before. I never had the opportunity to work with him or watch him at work, but it was not too difficult to imagine how this person was, while making far reaching decisions that most of us never have to worry about. Since his passing, I've managed to gather from Vandana's website and a few books, how far reaching his thoughts, actions, connections and achievements are ... I'm now very surprised and humbled by how he would let me talk about my mostly academic opinions garnered from newspapers and books and would still express a very keen interest in what I had to say. This wonderful interest in life, this extraordinary youth and vitality was very unusual and striking and more ironically, belied all that his family had told me about his state of health (I met him after he had been diagnosed with this disease). If they had not told me that there was something wrong with his body, I might have guessed otherwise and might even have (however foolishly) have asked him what the secret to his energy was. 

             I had the superb fortune of spending ganesh chathurthi, 2009, exactly a year back with him and his family in Urbana Champaign. I had one of the best times of my life, primarily because of my interaction with Mr. Vasudevan. Like I said before, it was difficult to compartmentalize any frailty in his physical or mental faculties. His sense of humor was confidently self-deprecating, his politics socially capitalistic, his views on marriage and family, thoughtfully conservative and his interactions with and thoughts on people dissimilar in background to his own, violently modern. What a fun personality!!! Not a dull moment ... Even his anger sparkled with good humor. 

            His biggest successes were not in the very grand personality that he had built; not in creating states and in creating viatical quadrilaterials; not in heading large corporations that create the ramparts of the society of modern india lives in security of. In my opinion, his biggest success is me. 

His biggest success is in spending 4 hours with a 30 year old modern indian in the US, with very set views and a complacency in mediocrity and instilling a very strong desire to achieve something that would positively affect other people. His biggest success is in making me laugh and cry at the same time and making me understand why I'm doing either. His biggest success is in inspiring me, by just being himself. 

            I can only imagine the impact he has had on people who had the good fortune of having him as a closer friend than I did. 

Vandana, Shobha and Vasudha Aunty - He could not have lived a more complete life. His passing is not of frailty or age, but of the satisfied reaching of potential, in my opinion. We don't need a book to immortalize him. His life and its impact on all of us has already ensured that. 

For that wonderfully unscripted life of perfection, 

Thankfully, Siddarth.