bhaskar saikia

Yesterday was a very sad day—one that left my heart strangely quiet, as if the world had dimmed by a shade.

I lost the professor because of whom I am in the field of taxonomy today. He was Prof. Kamal Choudhury, a teacher whose belief in me shaped the direction of my life. It’s hard to accept that someone who once stood so firmly in the world—guiding, teaching, encouraging—can suddenly become a memory.

His passing was not the only sorrow yesterday. A few other heavy moments layered themselves upon the day, each adding to a weight I wasn’t prepared to carry. It became one of those days when everything feels slightly fragile—life, purpose, even the ability to process what is happening.

As I sit down to write, I find that grief has a way of unmaking sentences. Thoughts float like scattered leaves, refusing to settle into shape. But perhaps this, too, is part of mourning—the inability to be neat, composed, or coherent when the heart is trying to make sense of loss.

What I do know is this: I owe so much of who I am today to the man who taught me to see the world close. To observe with patience. To question. To respect the small, the unnoticed, the overlooked. His lessons were never just academic; they were deeply human.

And maybe that is why his absence feels so large.