Today both China and India remember the great Dr Dwarkanath Kotnis on his 67th death anniversary. He was one of the five doctors sent to China by Indian government on a request made by China to treat the wounded soldiers during the second Sino-Japan War in 1938. The doctor did a great job disregarding his personal comforts and safety and stayed on in China, and got married to Qinglan Guo.
Dr Kotnis is a national hero even today in China . His untimely death at the age of 32 was itself a tragedy .There are two great monuments in China commemorating the Doctor’s death and his contribution to the humanitarian cause of China during the war. The life and achievements of Dr Kotnis has been ably captured by late V Shantaram in his movie ” The Immortal Life of Dr Kotnis “, Shantaram himself played the title role . An autobiography written by Dr Kotnis’s elder brother Mangesh Kotnis symbolically titled ” The Bridge Forever ” also captures the great Doctor’s life in all its glory.
What is Dr Kotnis’s relevance today? . Is it the symbolic “Bridge” of Internationalism practised by India during the last six decades by proactively sending help and medical aid to any part of the world to mitigate natural and man made calamities or is it a pointer to the likely international collaboration as ” CHINDIA” as Jayaram Ramesh , the central government Minister envisaged when he coined this acronym ?. It is also interesting to note that Dr and Mrs Kotnis named their son “YINHUA ” which means India and China. Does all these augur well for the future relations of the two great Asian Giants?.