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        Neuro Sciences India Group has organised the Eighth E S Krishnamoorthy Memorial Lecture to be delivered by Prof Peter Whitehouse, director, Integrative Studies, Department of Neurology, Case Western Reserve University; Professor of Neurology, Cognitive Science , Psychiatry, Neuro Science, Psychology, Nursing, Organizational Behaviour and History, University Memory and Aging Center, University Hospitals of Cleveland, today (12-11-2006) at St Isabel's Hospital, Chennai. He is going to speak on a very interesting, relevant and contemporary public issue, not only in India but throughout the world: 'Who's Life is it anyway?- Ethical issues in caring for elderly people'.

        Prof C V Krishnaswami, the emiment diabetologist, will be the guest of honour.

        This lecture is dedicated to the memory of Late E S Krishnamoorthy (1905 - 1988), who was a model civil servant, a great scholar in Sanskrit and music and above all a lover of languages. He had a brilliant academic career standing first in the Madras Presidency in Intermediate Examinations conducted by the University of Madras in 1924. He was then a student of Victoria College, Palghat and he thus put that college on the map of Madras Presidency by this unique academic distinction. He took his Honours Degree in Chemistry from Presidency College, Madras by standing first in the University. He joined the Imperial Custom Service (FCS) of British India in 1928. Thereafter there was no looking back. He served as Assistant Collector of Customs and Excise at Karachi, (now in Pakistan), at Rangoon (now in Myanmar) and at Madras. During his tenure in Karachi, he took his Diploma in Higher Urdu and Higher Sindhi languages. During his stay in Karachi, he also acquired the LLB degree of Bombay University as an evening student. He was appointed by the Government of India as the Trade Commissioner for India in Japan in 1940. During this time he mastered the Japanese language. He also visited China and started learning Mandarin Chinese. He came to be popularly known as Japan Krishnamoorthy.
 

E.S. Krishnamoorthy and  Janaki Krishnamoorthy	E.S. Krishnamoorthy Leader Indian Delegation to the U.N. Narcotics Commission (New York)	The International Red Cross Ship which repatriated E.S. Krishnamoorthy as a prisoner of war in South Africa in 1943

        When Pearl Harbour was attacked by the Japanese in December 1941, England declared war against Japan. Krishnamoorthy was taken prisoner by Japanese Government and was interned at his residence in Kobe. In 1943 E S Krishnamoorthy was repatriated as a Prisoner of War to India in exchange for Japanese Prisoners of War. He was sent back to South Africa in a Red Cross ship via Lorenquo Marques, now called Maputo. On his return to New Delhi, he was appointed deputy secretary in the Ministry of Commerce. Soon after our independence, he served as the first Consul General for India in China at Shanghai with Sardar K M Panikkar as his Ambassador. This stint in China made him China Krishnamoorthy. After a distinguished career, he retired as chairman, Central Board of Revenue in 1960. Even when he was in active government service, he was appointed a Member of the UN Narcotics Commission and subsequently elected to the post of vice president of the UN Drug Supervisory Board. Even after laying down his office as chairman, Central Board of Revenue, he continued to represent the Government of India in the above United Nations Organizations till 1977.

        After his retirement started a new career in the field of Sanskrit and Music. He took his MA Degree in Sanskrit in First Class from Venkateswara University as a private candidate in 1975. What is worth noting is that he used to make up his attendance by an exacting bus travel every month from Madras to Thirupathi even when he was over 68 years old - a clear symbol of the primacy of his spirit over the flesh. He later acquired Post Graduate Diplomas in Music and Veena from Madras University, even after he had crossed the age of 80 years. His passion and enthusiasm for new learning in every sphere of knowledge were indeed phenomenal and extraordinary. He had registered for his Ph D degree at the Shri Venkateswara University, Thirupathi. The subject of his thesis was: 'Vedic Studies in Kerala'. He had completed his thesis and was about to submit it when he passed away suddenly on 29 June, 1988. A fitting tribute to him can only be in the words of Shakespeare: 'His life was gentle / And the elements so mixed in him / That Nature may stand up and say / This was a man'.

        Smt Janaki Krishnamoorthy, wife of Late E S Krishnamoorthy, who is over 92 years old is still happily with us. She was born in 1914 about two months after the beginning of World War I. Lord Hardinge was the Governor General of India at that time and George V was the Emperor of England. She got married to Krishnamoorthy when she was barely 13 years old and travelled with him as his life's companion round the world. Without any formal university education, she has educated herself proving Bernard Shaw right when he said; 'The process of education is continuous from the cradle to the grave but for a brief spell in school'. I had the unique privilege of interviewing her last week. She narrated with gusto and enthusiasm how her husband had put her and her two young children in one of the last ships coming from Japan to India in 1941 when there was an impending threat of war between Japan and England. She brought back vividly before my mind's eye the interesting details relating to exciting political and other events from 1930 till our independence in 1947. Like the Memsahibs of British Raj going back to England with a rich store-house of stories and experiences relating to their stay or sojourn in British India, Indian Memsahib Janaki Krishnamoorthy vividly recreates the picture of her life and times in India in the last two decades of British Rule. She is an encyclopaedia of that period. Oral history narrated with verve by enlightened women like her gives us all an insight into Social History which is indeed a flickering lamp, stumbling along the trail of the past, trying to reconstruct its scenes,to revive its echoes and to kindle with pale gleams the passions of former days. Despite her very advanced age, she has retained her physical fitness, with her memory remaining razor sharp. She seems to tell all of us who care to meet her: 'To keep the heart and soul unwrinkled, to be hopeful, kindly, cheerful, reverent — that is to triumph over old age'.

        Eighth E S Krishnamoorthy Memorial Lecture is going to be delivered today by Professor Peter Whitehouse. Like many other developing countries in the world, India is also going through a period of what I call 'The Revolution of Rising Age Explosion'. This simply means that the percentage of men and women living longer is increasing at a fast rate creating n its train a cluster of insurmountable problems - economic, medical, social, cultural and technological. Today, we are challenged by the great responsibility of caring for the growing elderly population the world over, and especially in developing countries, like India. The magnitude of this problem can be seen from the basic figures relating to the changes in the age composition of our population between 1901 and 2001. From a level of 12 million in 1901, the number of the aged rose to 77 millions in 1990 and is expected to cross the 100 million mark in 2013. Not only has the absolute number of the elderly increased, their proportion in the population too has risen very significantly and this is going to rise more sharply in the coming decades. According to a United Nations projection, the elderly will become 21per cent of the population by the year 2050, as compared with a mere 5.1 per cent in 1901. The population of the elderly in India is increasing much faster than the total population, and is projected to increase still faster in the future.

        Professor Peter Whitehouse is going to deal with one of the most burning public issues of the day—Ethical Issues in Caring for Elderly People. In many families, almost all the children are working abroad. Old parents are living lonely lives in India without the anchorage, support and strength of a warm and friendly family environment founded on mutual affection and trust. From the dawn of history in India, the joint-family system served not only as a bastion of social cohesion but also as a fortress and power-house of social security. With the almost near eclipse of the joint family system, nuclear families founded on the western commercial principles of individualism, individuality and enlightened self interest on the one hand and misunderstood notions of privacy and self respect emanating from crass selfishness and divorced from the traditional roots of filial piety and family fraternity, have become the social order of the day. In the swirling waters of these cataclysmic socio-economic changes, the old people in the evening of their lives are finding themselves ship-wrecked and cruelly beached by the inexorable tide of history.

        At a recent meeting with a senior citizens' forum in Chennai, I raised the possibility of initiating a long-term medical study on the elderly. 'So you want to treat us as guinea pigs,' was the first question raised regarding my motive. The discussion then turned to the general issues of the elderly - from old age pensions and railway concessions, to health-related advancements and genetic factors in dementia. Clearly, the group was highly aware and keenly debated not just the latest media stories but the current scenario of the aged. The elderly in India, especially the urban, have long been active advocates of a policy on ageing. They see the issue as concerning not only the social welfare department but all departments of the government as a general issue relating to the special needs and requirements of the elderly.

        It is indeed a public tragedy for the aged in India that growing old is like being increasingly penalized by the family, society and Government for a crime they have not committed.