As millions who read the Times of India just to catch the cartoon by RK Laxman, I too grew up with the “common man” of his. I never knew much about R K Laxman, but was very familiar with his brother’s work – the legendary R K Narayan and his Malgudi Days. I have read every book of his and much later in life I realised that R K Narayan and R K Laxman were brothers.
In an interesting coincidence I took the following picture on Republic Day 2014. We were in Gurgaon and Krishnan was recovering from his mini-surgery and Raahgiri had been launched. We went walking around all the activity stalls and I just randomly clicked this picture of Krishnan with the “common man”.
And an even stranger quirk of fate that R K Laxman passed away on Republic Day 2015. His common man has seen it all… From the Independence movement to In(dependent) India. He has been on every political roller coaster and we got a glimpse of them all through his eyes.
RIP R K Laxman… The word “chiranjeevi” was coined perhaps for people like you, because you won’t die till laughter dies and when laughter dies, the human race shall be no more.