for everyone he was the doctor with the magic touch and nobody was really surprised when he walked away with the research man of the year award in england competing against fellow doctors from 56 hospitals during summer vacations everyone used to pack their bags for home but i headed to the anatomy dissection hall and started dissecting bodies he remains thankful to his wife a sociologist for taking good care of him and has depended entirely on her for food and clothes for almost 4045 years i have not had lunch it was never easy certainly not when you walk under the harsh sun and you do not have any pocket money to buy a sandwich along the way or once when you reach home you discover there is nothing for lunch he soon found himself at newcastle where coal issues meant an unusual number of people had backaches when i look back at life i feel a tremendous sense of satisfaction said ramani founderpresident of the neuro spinal surgeons federation india his next focus was constructing a modern gymnasium on the ramani property which he did and until last year was providing it to the villagers for free they all wanted me to continue in england but i wanted to be with my people his fascination with neurosurgery a relatively unexplored field took him places for a start he razed his ancestral house built in 1926 in wadi and constructed a onestorey building that had a library with 10000 books rooms stuffed with 2000 toys a play garden for children and a hall on the first floor where 200 people could be accommodated as a child dr ramani walked 10km to school from his village in wadi to aj de almeidas and if he had mocidade portuguesa now ncc lessons to attend the arduous walk spanned 20km everyday now a nominal monthly fee of 50 is being charged ramani never developed a taste for food or clothes so when a lifestyle magazine asked him to pick his favourite restaurant and food he was clueless all that i wanted to do was focus on my studies he said breakfast is laid out at 730am and at 8 he is ready for operations at the lilavati hospital for ramani this was a gold mine and he treated everyone at the outpatient department with alarming ease ramanis focus on studies was unwavering the determined ramani that everyone knew of in goa grew up not just to become a doctor as he always wished but one of the countrys top neuro surgeons his consultancy starts at 4pm and runs till 930pm and at the end of a tiring day all that he needs is just four hours of sleep i wanted to come to goa said ramani who got his wish when he was posted at the goa medical college in 1974 all this for free while ramani picked up the maintenance bill not surprisingly in goa he