People light candles at Mizra on Tuesday. Picture by UB Photos

Mirza (Kamrup), Nov. 29: Mamoni Raisom Goswami’s long-cherished dream to inaugurate the primary health centre (PHC) at her ancestral village died with her today.

The litterateur donated Rs 40 lakh — she had received the prestigious Prince Claus Award in 2008 — to the Assam government to upgrade the dispensary to a 12-bed PHC at Amranga Borihat village in south Kamrup, nearly 40km from Guwahati.

Her father, Umakanta Goswami, had donated the land over which the dispensary was constructed, in 1952.

“When the foundation stone to upgrade the dispensary was laid on August 17, 2009, health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma requested Goswami to inaugurate the PHC, and she readily accepted,” said Apurba Talukdar, the in-charge of the PHC.

“Unfortunately when the PHC was ready for inauguration in February this year, she had to be admitted to hospital and since then the people of Amranga Borihat were eagerly waiting for her release from the hospital,” he said.

The state government had renamed the PHC, which is yet to be inaugurated, after her father and paternal uncle, The Umakanta and Chandrakanta Goswami PHC.

Talukdar said the government was now planning to turn it into a 30-bed hospital.

“It was her childhood dream to build a hospital in her native village for the poor and needy when she grew up,” her khuri (paternal aunt/wife of father’s younger brother) Nirmala Goswami said, sitting on the veranda of their ancestral house.

“Memories of a young Mamoni taking a fun ride on the back of our domestic elephant and picking berries in the backyard of our house are still very fresh in my mind,” she said.

“I vividly remember attending her marriage with Madhavan Raisom Iyengar, a young and dynamic engineer from Chennai,” she said.

She said Iyengar had come to Guwahati to supervise the construction of the Saraighat bridge over the Brahmaputra in the early sixties, when he fell in love with Mamoni and they decided to marry.

“He had rented a house next to Mamoni’s residence at Chenikuthi in Guwahati. At that time, Mamoni was teaching at St Mary’s School,” she said.

“She grew up in this village and the plots of many of her novels are inspired by this place. She loved this place even though she spent most of her later life away from it,” Nirmala Goswami added.

People of Amranga Borihat also loved her so much that since she was admitted to the hospital, regular prayer meetings were held in the village for her recovery.

“Despite being a celebrated writer, she was such a down to earth and caring person. She has always been different and was undoubtedly a great humanist,” said Kalyani Prava Thakuria, a health worker of the PHC.

“It was only because of her that we got a PHC here. I am not sure if anyone else had donated such a huge amount of money to a government hospital,” she said.

At Dakhin Kamrup College of Mirza, near Amranga Borihat, classes were suspended after a condolence meeting.