Gautam Banerji has a Master's from St Stephen's College, Delhi, an LL.B. from Delhi University, and an M.Sc.(Econ) degree from the London School of Economics. He taught at an undergraduate college in Delhi, 1973-85, and worked for UNICEF 1985-96. Then he moved to London to practice law. He served as the Judicial Advisor to the Judicial Development Institute, Baghdad, 2009-10 as a U.S. government contractor. He was a member of Commission for Sustainable London (2007-13). He continues as a Trustee and Board Member of Hindu Council, UK. Now fully retired, he lives in Dilijan, Armenia, with his wife, who teaches at United World College, Dilijan.
Mandalai, where I was born, was a quaint village fringed onto the outskirts of an equally small town in rural Bengal. Pandua, the nearby town, has a claim to connections with epic heroes of a bygone era. The Pandavas, according to legend, passed through it in their sojourns. Ruins of an old monument, rebuilt several times through its history, stand testimony to this tall claim of local residents. It’s a somewhat miniature version of the Kutub Minar and cannot be missed as the train approaches Pandua. Mandalai is only three miles away from Pandua but it’s a world apart.
