In the spring of 2026, Dr. Mahesh Kuriyal stood at the window of the IMA Dehradun Branch office on a quiet afternoon when the Doon Valley still held the last cool breath of winter. Beyond the glass, the ridges of Mussoorie caught the late light, and the distant line of the Bindal River glimmered like a silver thread. Behind him, the newly elected Honorary Secretary, Dr. Ankit Parashar, sorted through files that carried the faint scent of old paper, ink, and decades of careful record-keeping.

“Mahesh ji,” Ankit said, looking up, “the installation is tomorrow. The members want more than a list of names and years. They want the living story—the people who carried this branch from 1936 until today.”

Kuriyal turned from the window. He opened the leather-bound register that had survived monsoons, bureaucratic indifference, and the slow forgetting that comes with time. On the first page, in careful copperplate handwriting, someone had written long ago: Founded 1936 by Dr. Bhupal Singh.

“Then we give them the story,” Kuriyal replied. “Not the dry chronology. The hands that held the pen, the voices that argued late into the night, the quiet decisions that kept medicine human in this valley.”

He began to speak, and the register became a doorway into ninety years of service.

1936 – The First Circle under the Hills

Dr. Bhupal Singh had walked the dusty lanes of Dehradun when the cantonment still answered to the King-Emperor and the forests beyond Mussoorie were thicker than the settlements. Tuberculosis moved through the barracks like a quiet thief. Malaria rose with every monsoon. Childbirth often ended in silence broken only by the weeping of relatives.

One evening in a small clinic near the clock tower, Singh gathered a handful of colleagues. The room smelled of carbolic and wood smoke. Dr. Durga Prasad sat with his coat still buttoned against the evening chill, his face lined by long nights. Dr. Mitra Nand, already carrying the quiet authority of a man who had seen both war and peace, leaned against the wall. Mrs. F. I. Chatterjee, one of the few women doctors in the region at that time, adjusted her sari and spoke first.

“If we do not speak for ourselves,” she said, “the administration will decide what medicine means here. And it will decide in the language of ledgers, not of patients.”

Singh nodded. “Then we form an association. Not for titles or photographs. For the patients who cannot reach the civil hospital before nightfall. For the villages where the roads turn to mud and the fever does not wait.”

They named it the Indian Medical Association, Dehradun Branch. The first meetings were held in borrowed rooms, sometimes by lantern light when the electricity failed. Dr. Durga Prasad served as an early president; Mrs. Chatterjee as honorary secretary. They argued about fees, about whether to accept government grants that came with conditions, about how far a doctor should walk into the villages when the nights were long and the dogs howled on the ridges.

Dr. Mitra Nand, who would later hold the presidency from 1936 to 1943 with Dr. P. C. Hoon as secretary, is remembered for a single sentence spoken during one of those early gatherings: “The association is not a club. It is a promise that no doctor in this valley stands entirely alone.”

The war years pressed hard. Soldiers returned with wounds that civilian wards were not ready for. Quinine was scarce. Morphine scarcer still. In one meeting that later became legend, Hoon stood and declared, “If the military hospitals will not take our civilian cases, then we will open our own night clinics. The association will stand surety for the cost.”

They did. The branch became a quiet network of referral, shared instruments, and relief. Young doctors learned that membership meant more than a certificate; it meant someone would cover your ward when your own child fell ill, or send a colleague into the hills when a landslide cut the road.

Independence and the Long Middle Years

When the country became free in 1947, the doctors of Dehradun did not pause for celebration alone. Independence brought new diseases of poverty, the sudden responsibility of self-rule, and the slow building of institutions that had once answered to distant authority. Between 1943 and 1951 the names rotated with the seasons: Dr. R. S. Shrivastav and Dr. Madan Mohan; then Dr. Durga Prasad again with Dr. S. L. Vyas as secretary. The association’s small office became a place where ration cards for medicines were discussed as seriously as clinical cases.

In 1951–52, Dr. Ram Murti Sharma took the presidency and Dr. K. L. Singh the secretaryship. Sharma was known for walking the hospital corridors at odd hours, checking that the junior doctors had eaten. One night he found a young house officer asleep on a bench after a thirty-hour shift. He sat beside the boy without waking him at first, then said quietly when the young man stirred, “Tomorrow you will rest. Tonight the association will cover your ward. A tired doctor is a danger to the patient and to himself.”

The next morning the roster had been rearranged by silent consent. No formal resolution was needed.

The 1950s and early 1960s were years of continuity and quiet expansion. Dr. (Maj) Mitra Nand returned to the chair. Dr. Jagmohan Singh served as honorary secretary for an extraordinary stretch—1952 through 1959, with only brief interruptions. Members joked that Jagmohan’s pen never left the register. When asked why he stayed so long in the often thankless role of secretary, he is remembered to have answered, “Because someone must remember who promised what to the patients in Rajpur, and who still owes a visit to the leprosy clinic outside the town. The presidents change; the promises remain.”

Presidents came and went with the years: Dr. S. K. Shome, Dr. H. S. Maini, Mrs. F. I. Chatterjee again in 1955–56 (a quiet affirmation that the branch valued competence over convention), Dr. S. D. Chandra, Dr. S. L. Goyal, Dr. K. K. Mathur, Dr. M. D. Sharma. Each left a small mark—a new piece of equipment for the branch clinic, a scholarship for a medical student from a hill village, a protocol for handling cholera outbreaks when the monsoon floods cut the roads to the upper valleys.

In 1960–61, Dr. A. R. Sikand and Dr. K. K. Mathur faced a measles epidemic that swept the lower valleys. Mathur later told a younger colleague over tea, “We had no vaccine then that reached far enough or fast enough. We had only isolation tents, the stubbornness of nurses who refused to leave their posts, and the association’s willingness to pay for what the government could not yet supply. The fees we collected were for those tents and those nights.”

The conversation turned often in those years to the ethics of practice. In one general body meeting, an older member is said to have asked, “When the patient cannot pay, do we still open the clinic door?” The answer that rose from the room was not a formal resolution but a shared understanding: yes. The association existed, in part, to make that answer possible.

The Seventies – Weight and Resolve

By the 1970s the branch had grown into a recognized voice in the region. Dr. R. P. Gupta, Dr. T. C. Tandwani, Dr. R. P. Verma, Dr. G. R. Kalra, Lt. Col. D. P. Puri, Dr. Bhim S. Pandhi—the names accumulated like the layers of sediment in the Song River. Secretaries changed more frequently: Dr. Baldev Verma, Dr. M. Shamsi, Dr. M. C. Luthra, Dr. B. Kumar.

In 1975–76 the records show a dual presidency—Dr. Shamsi and Dr. Chandola—reflecting a year of transition and perhaps disagreement. The minutes of that period are sparse, but one surviving letter from Dr. B. Kumar to the state branch reads with characteristic clarity: “We will not allow internal division to stop the free eye camps planned for the villages beyond Rishikesh. The patients do not know our arguments. They know only whether the doctor arrives, and whether the light is good enough to remove the cataract.”

The eye camps continued. Cataracts were removed under makeshift lights powered by generators that coughed in the night. Patients who had never seen a city returned home able to walk the steep paths without a guide’s hand on their elbow. In the evenings after the camps, the doctors sat together under the stars and spoke of the strange privilege of restoring sight in a place where the mountains themselves seemed to watch.

Dr. V. P. Dutta, Dr. M. L. Peshin, Dr. B. Kumar again, Dr. S. K. Gupta, Dr. M. C. Luthra, Dr. R. D. Verma, Dr. Arun Kumar—the decade closed with the association more organized, more formal, yet still capable of sudden human gestures. When a junior doctor’s father died in a distant town, the entire executive committee rearranged duties so the young man could travel without the guilt of abandoning his patients. No one recorded the rearrangement in the formal minutes. It was simply done.

The Eighties and Nineties – New Voices, Old Duties

The 1980s brought new energy and new tensions. The medical landscape was shifting: private nursing homes multiplied, specialization deepened, and the expectations of patients began to change. Presidents included Dr. S. N. Gupta, Dr. J. N. Kalhan, Dr. S. L. Gupta, Dr. N. D. Bahuguna, Dr. J. D. Sharma, Dr. Mahabir Singh, and Dr. V. K. Chopra. Secretaries included Dr. J. M. Kalhan, Dr. Kiran K. Kalra, Dr. G. R. Sethi, Dr. Deepak Kalra, Dr. V. K. Chopra, Dr. B. K. Endlay, and Dr. Anand Goyal.

Kiran Kalra’s tenure as secretary in the mid-eighties is remembered for her insistence that the branch open its meetings more fully to women doctors and that pediatric nutrition become a standing agenda item. “The children of the tea gardens and the villages on the slopes are not statistics,” she told one general body meeting, her voice steady. “They are the reason we still have a profession worth defending. If we do not speak for them, who will?”

The room was quiet for a moment. Then several members nodded. The agenda was amended.

In the early 1990s the association navigated the changing landscape of private practice, the first wave of specialized hospitals, and the growing pressure of litigation and regulation. Presidents included Dr. Anil Kumar Agarwal, Dr. Rakesh Thapliyal, Dr. Anand K. Goyal, Dr. Ravinder Kumar, Dr. Suresh Goyal, Dr. Avdhesh Gupta, and Dr. Kiran K. Kalra again—this time as president. The secretaries—Dr. Ravinder, Dr. Suresh Goyal, Dr. Rupinder Kapoor, Dr. Avdhesh Gupta, Dr. (Maj.) Nand Kishore, and Dr. D. D. Chaudhary—kept the administrative machinery running while the medical world shifted under globalization.

One story that survived those years concerned a late-night telephone call during Dr. Avdhesh Gupta’s presidency. A landslide had blocked the road to a village clinic higher in the hills. The honorary secretary, Dr. D. D. Chaudhary, organized a team that walked the last four kilometers carrying portable equipment and emergency drugs. When they returned, muddy and exhausted, Gupta met them at the gate of the branch office with tea and simple food. He said only, “This is why the association exists. Not for the photograph in the newspaper. For the walk when the road is gone.”

Dr. (Maj.) Nand Kishore, who brought the discipline of a military medical background to the branch, later served as president. His presence reminded younger members that medicine in the hills sometimes required the same calm under pressure that soldiers learned in different fields.

The New Century – Continuity in Changing Times

The turn of the millennium brought longer tenures and clearer records. Dr. (Maj.) Nand Kishore and Dr. R. N. Singh; then Dr. Harish Kohli with Dr. Rajesh Tiwari for two years; Dr. D. D. Chaudhary, Dr. R. N. Singh again, Dr. Rajesh Tiwari, Dr. B. S. Judge, Dr. Pradeep Kumar, and Dr. B. K. Oli. The secretaries—Dr. Pradeep Kumar, Dr. S. S. Aswal, Dr. Girish Goyal, Dr. Sandeep Ahuja, Dr. Tarun Mittal, and Dr. Ajeet Gairola—handled an increasing volume of continuing medical education programs, ethical disputes, and disaster response after floods or earthquake tremors.

In 2009 Dr. D. C. Dhyani and Dr. Amit Singh faced the early questions of pandemic preparedness, though the full force of that challenge would come later. The 2010s saw a rapid succession of leadership that reflected both the growth of the branch and the willingness of newer generations to step forward: Dr. J. P. Nawani, Dr. Ajeet Gairola with Dr. Praveen Jindal, Dr. Rakesh Kalra with Dr. Sudhanshu Kalra (a father-son continuity that members noted with quiet affection), Dr. Alok Ahuja with Dr. Anoop Kaushal, Dr. Kuldeep Datta (remembered as a veteran pillar of selfless service), Dr. Asha Rawal with Dr. Utkarsh Sharma, Dr. (Prof) J. P. Sharma with Dr. Mohit Goyal, Dr. Geeta Khanna with Dr. Lalit Kumar, Dr. Suman Sethi, Dr. Sanjay Goyal with Dr. Vijay Tyagi, Dr. Ajay Khanna, Dr. Amit Singh with Dr. Roopa Hanspal, and Dr. Alok Semwal with Dr. Akhil Kukreja.

Women held the presidency with increasing frequency and distinction—Dr. Asha Rawal, Dr. Geeta Khanna, Dr. Suman Sethi. Their leadership was not framed as novelty but as the natural continuation of a tradition that had included Mrs. F. I. Chatterjee in the earliest years.

During the difficult years of 2020 and 2021, when the valley, like the rest of the country, faced an invisible enemy that filled the hospitals and emptied the streets, Dr. Ajay Khanna and then Dr. Amit Singh worked closely with Dr. Roopa Hanspal, who served as honorary secretary across two presidential terms. The branch coordinated oxygen supplies, staff rotations, and quiet support for colleagues who lost family members. Meetings were held by video link when physical gathering was impossible. The association’s phone lines stayed open through the nights. No grand speeches survive from those months, only the practical record of help given and received, and the knowledge that professional solidarity had not broken under pressure.

From the branch’s own later records and public notes, the more recent leaders carried forward the same spirit with their own particular strengths. Dr. Alok Semwal and Dr. Akhil Kukreja were instrumental in modernizing branch communications and events. Dr. Sanjay Upreti, who later held state-level responsibilities including the role of Treasurer, was known for his commitment to organizational growth. Dr. Puneet Ohri, Professor and Head of Community Medicine at SGRRIMHS, brought the perspective of public health and teaching to the presidency, working with Dr. Siddharth Khanna, who continued as a key contributor in branch activities. Dr. J. S. Hanspal (Jairaj Hanspal), who had earlier served as secretary, returned as president with Dr. Siddharth Khanna again at his side. And in 2026–27, Dr. Mahesh Kuriyal and Dr. Ankit Parashar took up the responsibility once more.

The Living Thread

On the evening before the installation in 2026, Kuriyal and Parashar sat with the old register between them. Outside, the valley lights began to appear one by one along the roads and on the lower slopes.

“Do you ever wonder,” Parashar asked, “what Dr. Bhupal Singh would make of us now? Specialties, insurance forms, social media, the pressure to publish, the corporate hospitals, the medicolegal climate?”

Kuriyal smiled. “I think he would look at the free camps we still run in the villages beyond Sahaspur and toward the higher valleys. He would look at the junior doctors who still stay late because an old man from the hills has nowhere else to go at midnight. He would look at the way the branch still rearranges itself when one of its members is in trouble. And he would say the association is still doing the work it was founded for.”

He closed the register carefully, then opened it again to a middle page where the handwriting changed from copperplate to ballpoint.

“Tomorrow we will read some of these names aloud. Not all of them—there are too many for one evening. But enough so that the newest members understand they are joining a conversation that began before any of us were born. A conversation about what it means to practice medicine in this particular place, with these particular people, under these particular hills.”

Parashar nodded. “And when the next landslide comes, or the next epidemic, or the next quiet crisis that never makes the newspapers—the shortage of a critical drug, the junior doctor who is burning out, the family that cannot pay—the association will still be here.”

“Yes,” Kuriyal said. “Because the list is not a list of offices held. It is a chain of hands that refused to let go of one another or of the patients who depend on us.”

The next afternoon the hall filled with doctors of every generation. Some of the older members still remembered Jagmohan Singh’s long secretaryship and the way he kept the promises alive across changing presidents. Others had trained under Geeta Khanna or served alongside Roopa Hanspal during the worst of the pandemic years. A few had walked those four kilometers with D. D. Chaudhary after the landslide. Younger ones knew the more recent leaders—Alok Semwal’s modernization of communications, Puneet Ohri’s community-medicine perspective, Sanjay Upreti’s steady organizational work, the continuity of the Hanspal and Khanna families of service.

When Kuriyal rose to speak, he did not begin with policy papers or statistics. He began with a single sentence that had been passed down, in one form or another, since 1936:

“We are here because the patients of the Doon Valley deserve doctors who answer to one another as well as to their own conscience.”

Then he told the story—not the complete chronicle, for that would take days, but enough of it that the youngest house officer in the back row could feel the weight and the warmth of the hands that had held the association before him. He spoke of Bhupal Singh’s first circle under lantern light. Of Mrs. Chatterjee’s quiet insistence that women belonged in the room. Of Jagmohan Singh’s long fidelity to the register. Of the eye camps that restored sight under the stars. Of the walks after landslides. Of the nights in 2020 and 2021 when the phone lines stayed open. Of the one-liners that later generations would write about their predecessors—respectful, brief, and true: pillars of service, modernizers of communication, teachers of community medicine, guardians of ethical practice, keepers of unity.

Outside, the hills kept their ancient watch, the same ridges that had looked down on the first meetings in 1936. Inside, the Indian Medical Association, Dehradun Branch, continued its long, imperfect, necessary work—one president, one secretary, one quiet act of professional solidarity at a time.

The register remained open for the next name.

And somewhere in the valley, a doctor still answering a call after midnight knew, without needing to open any book, that he or she did not stand entirely alone.