User:Sdaulatram

Saroj D. Ram

Saroj Daulat Ram was born on May 6, 1930, in Jandiala Guru, India. Her mother Vidya Vati died when she was 1 year old, and her father Daulat Ram Kurl armed with his BA went in search of jobs in Uganda. Saroj was raised by her grandmother, Naina Devi, in Jandiala Guru in Punjab.

Saroj moved to be with her father and new step-mother, Avinash Markandaya, in Nairobi in 1939. Her childhood in Kampala was happy. She was surrounded by family and learned sewing and cooking. She soon had a sister, Pratibha, born in 1942. In 1947, Saroj went to Nairobi to begin her senior Cambridge schooling. She finished first in her class, and although her father thought it time for Saroj to get married, she was very keen to go to medical school. Her father supported her and sent her to India for her Interscience degree. Following this, she attended medical school in Mysore and continued to the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin, Ireland.

In her final year of education in Dublin, Saroj attended a moral re-armament meeting and one speaker, Dr. Anand, stated the tenets of MRA: honesty, love, unselfishness, and purity. Also, he spoke of his meeting Gandhi several times throughout his childhood and this was very impressive to Saroj, a true believer in Gandhi’s principles. After the conference, they met, and Saroj found that he was a kind and intelligent young doctor. Soon after this, they were introduced and well-liked by each other’s families. On the 24 of October 1960, Saroj Ram and S.V. Anand were married in London.

The happily married couple set out for Ibadan, Nigeria where Saroj received a job in the pediatric emergency room, and Anand worked as a surgeon. Here she frequently saw patients suffering from typhoid, tetanus, and malaria; the neonatal mortality rate in Nigeria at that time was 50%, so the job was very difficult. She then joined the anesthesia department for outpatient procedures. In Nigeria the moral re-armament was very active—the main objective was to discuss the benefits of democracy over communism to the hospital staff. Will Davey, and Kathy and Keith Gillison were two important members of this group, who became close friends with Anand and Saroj.

In 1961, Gitanjali (aka Gita) was born to Anand and Saroj in Nigeria. On September 6, 1965, Saroj and Anand courageously moved to Kentville, Nova Scotia in Canada, as doctors were needed. Sadly, soon after their arrival in Canada Saroj’s father, Daulat Ram Kurl, passed away suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 57. Saroj returned to Uganda for the funeral and was full of sorrow at the loss of her father, who had been a great man and had done so much for her. Once she returned to Canada, Saroj worked at the Blanchard Fraser Memorial (BFM) Hospital in anesthesia and also made house calls as a family doctor in New Ross, a town about a half-hour away. Anand worked as a surgeon in the same Kentville hospital and together, the couple affected many of the town’s families, saving lives.

On May 20, 1967, Anita Indira Anand was born, and Sonia Savitri Anand was born on October 1, 1968. Gita, Anita, and Sonia attended King’s County Academy in Kentville and grew up happily. The family integrated well into the small-town East coast lifestyle. After 20 years in Kentville, in 1985 Anand and Saroj moved to Napanee, Ontario, where Anand worked as a surgeon. Saroj started a residency program in psychiatry at the Kingston General hospital, and then returned to Nova Scotia alone to start up a counselling practice. Her practice was based out of Halifax, but while living there she was diagnosed with colorectal cancer so she closed her practice, and moved back to Napanee. After surgery, she was able to recover from this cancer.

Saroj and Anand moved to Georgetown, Ontario, in 1995 where Saroj retired and Anand continued to work as a surgeon at the Georgetown hospital and then began working at a walk-in clinic. Saroj had a great interested in poetry and created the Poetry group as well as the University Women’s Club which she was active with for several years and has brought many women together. She was a very present mother and grandmother, her three daughters and grandchildren lived fairly close to her home and visited her often.

Gita Anand is now a successful corporate lawyer working at the Miller Thomson law firm in downtown Toronto. Anita Anand is a former law professor at the University of Toronto and has recently become the Member of Parliament for Oakville, Ontario and the Minister of Public Services and Procurement. She resides in Oakville with her husband John Knowlton and four children: Anand (born 1996), Sonia (1998), Monica (1998), and Kashia (2001). Sonia Anand is a doctor in vascular medicine and a population health researcher at McMaster University. She lives just outside of Hamilton in the countryside with her husband Myles Sergeant and three children: Anjali (born 1996), Anand (1999), and Sachin (2003).

Dr. Ram published several books including Songs of Praise Based on the Bhagavad Gita Paperback – Oct 11, 2017; ISBN-10: 1926926102).