by Laila Tyabji, New Delhi, 17 January 2023, via Facebook

We lost Hindal, my eldest brother, yesterday evening. He went suddenly. We’d all been together at lunch the day before, celebrating my second brother’s birthday. Apart from a slight cough he’d been his usual warm affectionate self.  His passing leaves us stunned and bereft.

Elder brothers, however much you tease them, nag them, fight with them, take them for granted, are a solid rock on whom you depend.  Hindal was all that, despite his quiet ways.  Six years older than me, I thought he’d always be there, as he was in my childhood, teenage, and adulthood. I was always his little sister, whom he sat on his knee till we were well into our 30s.  Like all younger sisters I could effortlessly exasperate, annoy, amuse, upset,  astonish,  and very occasionally please and even make him proud.  He celebrated my successes as his own.  Eschewing social media himself,  he enjoyed reading what I wrote, even going through the comments, then WhatsApping me his views, often dryly humorous, embroidering them with a trail of hearts and smileys! A late comer to smart phones he really enjoyed the expressive ease of emojis.

Apart from wonderful holidays in his postings in Kashmir and Ladakh, one of my fondest memories of Hindal is when I was about fifteen. One of my mother’s friends warned her that now I was a teenager I should not walk alone to the Club library every evening. I could be molested. Hindal, who was present, snorted with laughter, “What nonsense,” he said. “If anyone tries anything, she just has to knee him in the balls.” It was typical of him. Mild-mannered, he was also practical, funny, and full of sense.  In Kutch many years later, when a BSF sergeant jumped me and attempted to rape me. I remembered his advice.  I acted on it and it worked!

Very different,  luckily we agreed on all the really important things.  Secularism,   justice, the absolute equality of women, that religion should be a part of one’s inner self, not a ritual or public display, that India’s greatest strength was its diversity.  The importance of aesthetics, a sense of humour,  manners, and good food.  Value systems we’d imbibed from my parents.

Probably the brainiest of us all, Hindal  was also very laidback; lacking both ambition and the faculty to flatter his bosses or push his self interest. Nevertheless, he made it to Oxford, the IAS, and Chief Secretary Kashmir.  I was both touched  and amused when a decade or more after his retirement, one of his IAS juniors in Srinagar, by now a very senior official, told me that when Hindal left his office for the last time, one young bureaucrat said to the other, “The last gentleman has left the Secretariat.”

Out of all of us four independent-minded siblings, Hindal was born to be a family man. Sadly his first marriage didn’t work out.  His second, to Nalini, gave him the happiness and, (through her first marriage), the children and grandchild he’d always wanted.  They’d just celebrated their 17th anniversary on Sunday.  I grieve for her.

We will all miss Hindal terribly. It is unbelievable that he is gone. But I  rejoice that his passing was peaceful, without pain, and with the quiet dignity that was always his characteristic.

He wanted no tamasha, no ceremonies. The cremation will be at the Green Park Electric Crematorium at 4 pm.

- via Laila Tyabji FaceBook Post on 1/17/23

He gave Jammu and Kashmir almost 37 years of his career during which he remained Chief Secretary for a brief period following which he moved to the Public Service Commission for a five-year term.

Scion of the rich Tyabji family - he was the son of Badruddin Tyabji. Hindal Tyabji was married in Srinagar when he wasa young officer but the union ended in divorce. It was much later that he marries Nalini Misra and adopted her family.

 

His death was widely condoled in Kashmir, especially by people who have worked with him. He is being seen as a “friend of Kashmir” who was hugely rich but lived a modest life and would spend most of his earnings on charity. The cigar-smoking bureaucrat was faith-neutral but very well-read, dignified and a positive human being. He was briefly the law secretary of the Government of India as well.

“In 1990 he was part of the officers who fled Kashmir in protest,” one former bureaucrat said. “He was later brought back and made chief secretary but the governor was not comfortable with him and he was changed. Taybji was the only officer in the history of Kashmir officialdom who worked as Additional Chief Secretary after being the Chief Secretary first.”

The former officer said he was briefly taken as an adviser but was sent out of Raj Bhawan soon. His only full term was in the Public Service Commission.

“With deep sorrow, we announce the passing of Hindal Haidar Tyabji, I.A.S., beloved husband to Nalini Misra Tyabji, son of the Late Badruddin and Surayya Tyabji, and dearly loved brother of Adil, Laila and Khalid Tyabji, on 16th January evening.  He is survived by his wife Nalini, his two children Satyadeep and Chinmaya Misra, his son-in-law Apurva Pande and his granddaughter Anvaya Pande,” Taybji’s sister Laila announced on Facebook.

“One can never forget his chivalrous and cavalier traits,” Irfan Yasin wrote. “A perfect gentleman, who set very high standards in courtesy, mannerism and uprightness.” Added Yedullah Saleem: “My heartfelt condolences on demise of this extraordinary soul. Had the privilege to work under his guidance when he was Agriculture Production Commissioner in the early 1990s and then again when he was Chief Secretary J&K. Will continue to be his admirer all my life. Learnt a lot from this highly intelligent, humble and efficient officer with unparalleled dedication, command over English and the subjects he dealt with.”

While condoling the death online, former officer Farooq Peer wrote that he worked under Taybi between 199 and 2002. “He was an intellectual par excellence. He had his own set of values which he would guard jealously.”

Taybi was one of the many former officers who were the first to move the Supreme Court in August 2019 against the reading down of Articles 370 and 35A. He was part of various groups that would show concern over the Kashmir situation publicly.

Dr Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah have expressed profound grief over the demise of retired IAS officer Hindal Haidar Tyabji. The duo prayed for peace to the departed soul and much-needed strength for the bereaved family to bear the irreparable loss. They said that the deceased will be remembered for his ethics, Integrity and aptitude for public service.

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by Laila Tyabji, New Delhi 16 February 2023, via Facebook