A father whose 11-year-old son accidentally choked to death in school two years ago will hand over his child's computer to Ajoy Mondal, the 19-year-old who lost everything in a fire.

Palak and Saswati Dutta had bought the computer for their elder son Aryan on his fifth birthday. After a freak accident took the life of the Delhi Public School New Town student in 2013, the Duff Street couple could not bear to look at the machine. The computer was dusted and cleaned daily but nobody tried using it.

But when they read in Metro how a fire razed Ajoy's home and along with it his computer and the money that he had saved to do his master's, they thought it would be best if they gifted him their son's computer.

"It was lying unused... we thought of giving it to him because he genuinely needs it and I believe he will make good use of it," Palak said.

Ajoy's father is ailing and his mother, who works as a domestic help, is the only earning member in his family. She had taken a loan of Rs 20,000 from her employer to buy her son a computer. It was reduced to a mangled mass of circuits in the blaze that gutted their hutment and eight others' on Nilambar Mukherjee Street, about 300m from the Shyambazar five-point crossing.

"After reading the report in Metro I called up the boy who said that several others had phoned him to say they would buy him books.... But I told him that I would give him a personal computer and if he needed more books he could tell me," Palak said.

He has sent the computer for upgrade before handing it over to Ajoy.

The Duttas will also install software in the computer so that Ajoy can use it without having to make trips to computer shops. "I want to give him the computer in such a condition that he can use it without any hindrance," Palak said.

For the couple, many memories are associated with the machine. "We had a big celebration on Aryan's fifth birthday and this was a special gift," he said.

The desktop with a wireless keyboard and mouse now sits in Aryan's room with his other personal effects, including clothes and guitar in their north Calcutta home. "The computer has several of his pictures... we will try to retrieve those before handing over the computer," Saswati said.

"I thought my younger son would use it but he doesn't," Palak said. "But I am happy that it is going to serve a purpose."

Saswati said Aryan would use the computer for chatting with his father when he shifted to Qatar in June 2007 and the family went there after some eight or nine months. The computer travelled to Qatar with Aryan. Later, Aryan would also use it for his school's project work. "The desktop serves as his memory... but there's no point holding on to them in this way... if my son couldn't use it someone else might," Saswati said.

Ajoy, however, needs time to do up his home properly before he can bring in a computer. "It makes me sad to hear about their loss... but it also touches me that they think me deserving enough to use their son's computer," Ajoy told Metro.