Rahul Bose Instagram – She went at 45. I was 20. More years spent without her than with. Always taught me to stand up for my rights, always demanded I do my best, supported my playing rugby (my dad was dead against it), encouraged me to box, wanted to send me to boarding school (which I refused), wondered why I wolfed down my food (bacche, train pakadna hai kya?), never fought shy of expressing her opinion about my girlfriends, always thought my father sheltered us (my sister and me) too much, read Urdu poetry to us, slapped us memorably and hard when we stole apples from the neighbour’s orchard, ran with me in her arms and hailed a taxi to the hospital when I split my eyebrow at the age of 3, and…was always certain her second child (me) was also going to be a daughter. I like to think I gave her reason to overcome that disappointment. We all love our mothers. That love takes different forms but you can see it from outer space. I loved my mother too. And thank her for the world view she left me with. Many things have been added to it and subtracted from it, but her voice remains, clear as a bell, in my head : Rahul, come here and give me a hug. And I would. And I do.