Yesterday a journalist asked me to recall a few incidents where people have tried to help people from other religions. I mentioned about Prof. Jagdish Patel, who helped Tahira of Aligarh Muslim University in getting Kidney transplantation. Suddenly I got stuck, as I recalled Dr. Vijay Bothra, who was a living God for many and who introduced eye donation in Western Rajasthan, which enabled hundreds of blind people to see this beautiful world. Motivating people for donating a body organ (after death, the body part is used for someone else) is not an easy task. People ascribed religious reasons and opposed it. There was one person, who could ask for this and people would come forward. It was Dr. Vijay Bothra. He asked and people willingly donated their body parts. I recalled 24/7/13, the day, when I got a telephonic call at about 5 pm. I heard a very mature, melodious but saturnine voice, which I heard for the first time "Mr. Jain, you don't know me, we have never met, but you also admire Dr. Vijay Bothra, and for me, he was the GOD, the person who was always there to help the poor and the downtrodden, the person who always lived for others....."

"Yes, for every common person in Bikaner, Dr. Vijay Bothra is a God", I agreed to him. He wanted to say something but remained silent. I heard some attempts on his part to speak out, but except for a few utterances, nothing meaningful came out from him. I was getting curious. What is the matter? Who is this person? Why is he calling me? There were so many questions. I asked in curiosity, "Who are you?"

"I am Rajendra Joshi...", he kept speaking but I was not listening. I recalled about my memories about Rajendra Joshi. He was an accomplished Sitar Player, who had left the USA to settle down in Jaipur and was involved in social service. I was musing about what Rajendra Joshi had to say to me. I probed, "What were you saying about Dr. Vijay Bothra?" He got silent again. We have got habitual of fast speaking people; so every silence is almost intolerable and every minute passes like a Yug (a long period of time). He finally spoke, "Dr. Vijay Bothra - THE GOD is no more, I just wanted to inform you." What is he saying? What is he talking about? How can this be possible? I had just fallen from sky to nowhere. Having lost all my senses, I tried to pull up some strength to ask "What?" He again replied, "Yes, The God is no more. I lost the opportunity to meet him. He suffered a heart attack and himself drove his scooter to the hospital. Some other patient of Heart Attack had also come at the same time. He asked the doctor to help the other patient first. He suffered a major attack in the meantime. Today he left us all and I missed his last Darshan." The world had changed completely in just a few minutes.
Dr. Vijay Bothra was not just a doctor. He was the living God for thousands of people of Bikaner. He was incomparable to any other doctor on this planet. Free Check-up, Free Medicines, and always freely available person. He was accessible to everyone. Even a slum dweller had the courage to enter into his room any time with a slogan - "Doctor sahab to mere apne hai" - meaning 'Doctor Bothra is his own person'. Not just that, he would never, never get angry and you could always find a smile on his face.

Long back, once I visited ESI hospital, Bikaner, where he was the Doctor in charge. The typical schedule of the Doctors was 8 am to 3 pm. I reached at about 3.45 pm. All the doctors had left by that time except Dr. Bothra, who was surrounded by a large number of patients and he was examining each of them calmly without looking at the watch. It was by 5 pm that he was able to get free. This day was not an exception, it happened every day.

A few months back, I had landed in Bikaner at about 2 am in bitterly cold night. As I was strolling outside the Railway Station searching for an auto, a familiar voice struck me. It could only be Dr. Vijay Bothra's. On his age-old Bajaj Priya Scooter, he was returning back after serving some patients. His ever living smile and warm greetings were enough to freshen up any tired person. He was quick to realize that I was waiting for some auto. After two minutes, I was sitting behind him on his scooter - as all my requests (that I would go by an auto) were turned down and I had to accept his verdict and sit behind him. He left me at my home and then went to his home. A rare role model for the doctors of the modern generation, Dr. Vijay Bothra always practised "Simple Living - High Thinking".