surat how far would you go to pursue your hobby meet jagdish mehta a ham radio enthusiast who has spent lakhs on nurturing his passion a gst consultant he has set up his ham radio control room at home where he spends hours talking to his friends about geopolitics and science and technology on high radio frequencies and very high radio frequencieswith hf it is possible to communicate with anybody anywhere in the world while vhf restricts the communication to a few kilometres but with a greater clarity in soundhe says it is more than a hobby for it is the most reliable medium of communication during natural calamitiesduring the 2001 bhuj earthquake the 2006 surat floods and the recent cyclone i was able to communicate through ham radio when all other modes of communication failed said mehtahis wife kalpana too holds a ham radio licence i sometimes communicate with him over the radio when he is out said kalpanamehta who has been using the ham radio since 1989 is an inspiration to newbies like umesh tarsariyai learnt about ham radio operations during the recent cyclone in saurashtra and got interested said tarsariya a native of bhavnagar who now lives in suratthanks to my hobby i am never alone i find friends in any city i go to ham radio buffs rarely come face to face but when they do they treat each other like family it is fun catching up with them said mehta