Traced: Mumbai doctor who saved Mickey Nivelli from poverty in 1952 Legendary filmmaker Mickey Nivelli's six-decade hunt for the man who rescued him in 1952 comes to an end after a SUNDAY MiD DAY reader tracks down the saviour's family
April 28, 2013 Sometimes, truth really is stranger than fiction. A week after SMD carried the story of legendary filmmaker Mickey Nivelli aka Harbance Kumar’s hunt for the man who saved his life 61 years ago, an enthusiastic reader managed to trace his saviour’s family. On reading the story, avid SUNDAY MiD DAY reader, Vijay Mumwani, a businessman from Warden Road, recalled a story his friend told him two months ago. “Norma Talker, a family friend, narrated a similar incident to me over coffee. She told me about how her father had once brought home a starving young lad, who he had found lying in a maidan and nursed him back to health. There was an uncanny resemblance between her story and the SMD article, so I simply had to inform them,” he said. An old photograph of late Dr Joe de Sousa, who saved a young Mickey Nivelli’s (top) life when the latter was jobless in Mumbai in 1952 The ecstatic Talker family got in touch with this reporter and emailed photographs of the late Dr Joe de Sousa, his daughter and granddaughter to Nivelli. After listening to the doctor’s daugher Norma’s recollection of the events of the fateful day, and looking at the photos, Nivelli confirmed that de Sousa is indeed the man who saved his life. Dr de Sousa’s daughter, Norma Talker (right) identified Harbance Kumar as the boy her father once got home. (Left) Talker’s daughter, Deborah Meet the Talkers Narrating her story at her spacious Mahim flat, Norma Talker recalled, “We stayed on the first floor of Karamchand Mansion, close to Metro Cinema. I was around 12-years-old, when one morning my father found a young teenaged boy lying unconscious in the maidan on the way to his clinic in VT. The boy was wearing tattered clothes and had probably not eaten in days,” recalled Norma, an Indian Oil Corporation retiree. Norma added that her father was always dressed in a white coat, which is probably why Nivelli had mistaken him for a priest. (Circled) Dr de Sousa’s home in Karamchand Mansion near Metro cinema, where he provided food and shelter to Mickey Nivelli, aka Harbance Kumar, in 1952 “My mother, Miquelila, was told to cook something to feed the young man, who was made to sit on the terrace,” added Norma, who identified Nivelli’s photograph on the front page. “But he was much younger when dad brought him home.” “My mother has narrated this story to us repeatedly. Each time we would playfully tell her change the topic. Who knew the future course of events would be so fascinating?” wondered Norma’s daughter Deborah. Taking after her granddad, Deborah’s compassion is evident from the eleven dogs she provides a home for. She also supplies regular food and medicines to numerous strays in the neighbourhood. Nivelli overjoyed When Nivelli received the email with the photographs, he was overwhelmed. “I am crying as I write this. All those memories have come back. I do not have to go to a church, temple, mosque or a gurudwara to get a glimpse of god. I saw it in the good that people did for me. My heart is filled with gratitude and loyalty,” he wrote in response. “It is too much of a coincidence to ignore. Gazing at the eyes of Dr de Sousa’s photograph, I do see the same kindness which had struck me when I first saw him,” he stated, adding that Norma was right his age. “At that time my moustache had not sprouted yet. The photograph with Shammi Kapoor is about four or five years after that incident. I had collapsed due to lack of food and fatigue when a priest-like man dressed in white took me home and from the compound shouted to his wife to make some food, even before I could crawl up to their first floor flat,” he recalled. The good Samaritan Norma recalled that bringing destitutes home to nurse them was common for her father. “He once brought home a tuberculosis patient, a scary ailment at that time. TB was his area of expertise and he was able to nurse him back to health. He even got home a man who had stab wounds after a local hospital refused to admit him, much to the anguish of my mother, who was scared of the consequences if the patient succumbed to his wounds in our house. But my dad could not bear to see human suffering,” she said. Ironically, Dr de Sousa’s patient list included Bollywood greats like Nargis Dutt, Kamini Kaushal and even Dev Anand, who he was in close contact with, until his recent sudden demise. Nivelli has been close to the Dutt family too. The Dutts, he claims, invariably stayed at his apartment when they visit New York. An extremely grateful Nivelli concluded, “I do not want to forget those days and I do not want to fail to thank those who reached out. Thank you SUNDAY MiD DAY.” http://www.mid-day.com/news/2013/apr/280413-lost-and-found-mickey-nivelli.htm * * * SEE ALSO: http://www.mid-day.com/news/2013/apr/210413-mumbai-millionaire-filmmaker-searches-for-man-who-saved-him-from-poverty.htm He saved my life 61 years ago: Mickey Nivelli Revered today as the Father of West Indian cinema, Mickey Nivelli aka Harbance Kumar, asks Sunday MiD DAY to trace the family of the man who gave him food and a job when he collapsed from hunger outside Oval Maidan as a homeless pauper in 1952 April 21, 2013 Mumbai Shailesh Bhatia Half way across the globe, sitting in his plush home next to Times Square in New York, Mickey Nivelli had tears in his eyes when he read SUNDAY MiD DAY’s cover story on his laptop last week. As he read about Syed Mohsen Mirjalili, the rich Iranian youth who was rescued from a footpath in Chembur and reunited with his family by good Samaritans, Nivelli, often referred to as the Dada Saheb Phalke of the West Indies Film industry, was forced to roll back the years and recall his own life story which also began on the streets of Mumbai. (Below) Harbance Kumar, aka, Mickey Nivelli; (above, centre) Kumar with Shammi Kapoor in Tumsa Nahin Dekha The Indian expat, better known as Harbance Kumar, now in his mid-’70s, is often credited with pioneering the art of filmmaking in the Caribbean, way back in 1969. Maker of noted West Indian movies such as The Right and the Wrong, The Caribbean Fox and Girl from India, the award-winning film maker however has one regret in life — he could never thank the man who saved his life when he was a homeless teenager from Quetta in Pakistan, roaming the streets of Mumbai in search of his next meal. Hardships in Mumbai “I was about 15 years old, in 1952. Post Partition, I was forced to leave my home in Quetta (now in Pakistan). Looking for a job, homeless and hungry on the streets of Mumbai, I used to roam around Basant Studios in Chembur, after being promised a job by its owner JBH Wadia. With things moving very slowly, I decided to try my luck at a leading publishing house in South Mumbai. With no money in my pocket, I remember travelling ticketless to Marine Lines station. Mid way through the maidan near Metro Cinema, the days spent without food finally took its toll and I collapsed,” recalls Kumar. The good Samaritans Kumar remembers everything going blurry for a while, until he saw a “priest-like figure” standing over him. “The priest lifted me up and asked me what happened. He took me to his house, which was on the second floor of a nearby building, and even before entering, called out to his wife to start preparing something to eat,” he remembers, as if it was yesterday. Regaining his strength after a hearty meal, the topic of conversation moved to his future career plans and his dire economic condition. “The man promptly handed me a note addressed to one of his followers in Chembur, who ran a coffee bean shop. I remember it was on the left side as one goes from RK Studios towards town. The owner respected the priest’s wishes but told me that he could only offer me Rs 5 per week. This was big money back then, enough to ensure I did not go to bed hungry,” he recalls. In a few weeks he finally found a room at the Salvation Army home in Byculla but his duress was far from over. “I soon joined Basant Studios and worked for a few months as a peon and a watchman, but when one of their mega projects produced by Homi Wadia, Rajputani, failed at the box office, the studio suffered huge losses and I was fired. I was just 17 then,” he remembers. Filmmaker Harbance Kumar, a close family friend of the Bedis, now lives in New York Rags to riches Luckily, SL Puri, the manager at Filmistan studios, was moved by the plight of the young lad and offered him a job as a junior artiste. Kumar (then known as Mickey Nivelli) even did a cameo in Naseer Hussain’s Tumsa Nahi Dekha, starring the late Shammi Kapoor. By 23, he joined the late Sunil Dutt’s staff, and finally in 1969 moved to the Caribbean where he made history as the Farher of Cinema in the West Indies. The story which inspired Harbance Kumar was published on May 14 The man with no name In the years that followed, Kumar made his name and fame. Accolades followed. But even happy reunions would kindle in him that eternal question: Who was his saviour, the man he had forgotten to thank? “Tracing the Salvation Army was easy and I am happy that I could make a sizable donation to them to help the poor. But my dream is to return to India and track down the priest or his family and the coffee bean seller from Chembur. I just cannot recollect their names after 61 years but I owe them my life. My intense desire to meet and thank them personally has been rekindled after reading about the Iranian man in your paper. I hope and pray that MiD DAY and its readers help me fulfil my wish,” he signs off. [NOTE: Thanks to Leroy Veloso for sharing this link. --FN] -- FN Land +91-832-240-9490 Cell +91-982-212-2436 f...@goa-india.org