Recalling this day that year

MUMBAI, Aug 15: When D P Patil, retired sub-inspector from Palghar, stood to attention singing the national anthem today, he was flooded with memories of 1947. “That year I was posted at the Lamington Road police station… people came to the city in trucks, overcrowded buses and even on top of trams to join in the celebrations. It was a frenzy then, the first breath of freedom,” he recalls, 51 years later, relishing a pure South Indian breakfast at the SIES College of Management Studies, Nerul.

Patil was among more than 50 senior citizens invited by the college to participate in the Independence Day celebrations.

“The programme was organised to light up the lives of the old at least for a day,” says Prof K Neelakanthan, principal of the college. If the glowing faces, bright smiles and sparkling eyes of the invitees were any indication, he had more than succeeded. The national flag was hoisted by a resident of Matra Sadan, a nearby home for aged women, K Alamelu. Later, at a small function at thecollege auditorium, the elders taught their “grandchildren” a thing or two about public speaking.