The Kerala Aomsi & Me Prof. Dr. Krishnamurthy Bonanthaya

The KERALA AOMSI & Me

Prof. Dr. KRISHNAMURTHY BONANTHAYA

It is indeed an honour to write down these stray, nostalgic thoughts regarding the Kerala AOMSI. I am thankful to Nikhil Govindan for requesting me to write, and for coaxing me to send it despite not doing so after a few reminders!.

I have been a regular fixture at most of the previous state conferences and consider myself an honorary member of the Kerala chapter by now. There are a whole lot of sweet memories that flood my thought process as I write this.

I distinctly remember being part of the first meeting at a crowded Renaissance hotel ,where Rammohan organised the meeting and the last one I attended in 2018, again at Kochi ,just escaping the wrath of the floods around Independence Day!!.The meeting at Kottayam in the early days, which my friend Eapen reminded me a few weeks ago,was his first organisational venture, nicely done.

I clearly remember demonstrating a LEFORT 1 distraction with an RED at the surgical workshop there (with the help of my friend Anant from Chennai) and then organising

a homemade puttu and Kadala breakfast for him courtesy our good friend Sajish’s mother!. (Anant by the way is a vegetarian who landed in Kottayam!).Also that was the last extra oral RED device I used on a patient!.

I also fondly remember the scientific highlights from many of the meetings and to identify a few, the wonderful scientific feast at a Palghat conference many years ago and the concept of “back to basics “panel discussions that Aju Oommen engineered at the first Trivandrum meeting, of which I was the moderator.

I also had the privilege of listening to Mr Madhavan Menon ,one of the pioneer educationists of this country, lay down the vision for educational reforms in our country as a chief guest, at the same Palghat meeting one evening. Alas a lot of those plans have not seen the light of the day as we blunder along on the educational front.

The fellowship at these meetings has been exceptional and have drawn me and my ‘Keralite ‘colleague Sanjiv back together to the Kerala meetings year after year. I know I am at that stage of my career now where I have started sounding repetitive, and uninspiring to the youngsters and I hope I shall not overstay the generous welcome from this fraternity.

Yours truly

I have been a regular fixture at most of the previous state conferences and consider myself an honorary member of the Kerala chapter by now

Krishnamurthy Bonanthaya