Bottom The earliest beginnings were with my fingers on the wet sands of the beach, all a sort of a game of the infanthood. By seeing my inner inclination for art and promise, my drawing teacher made me appear for the intermediate drawing grade examination conducted by Govt. of Maharashtra, and paid my examination fees and also gave me drawing materials to be used in the examination. In that examination  I stood first in the subject of design and I was awarded a state award. That give me a big boost. This was in 1939. After matriculation and in search for new pastures I came to Mumbai (Bombay) in order to earn a living. I took  up a temporary Job with Govt. Rationing Department, which was something very easy in those days when rationing of food was just newly introduced and the department eagerly welcomed staff on a temporary basis for a immense paper work. Along with this job  I also started attending Khalsa  College ,  serving personals, with a view of doing a B.A with literature. However within three months I gave up and instead joined private painting classes and secured Govt. Diploma in art. Having gone through the mill and having completed a recognised art training course, I took the next logical step and started submitting my paintings to the various exhibitions in the country and gained many awards including Gold Medal of the Academy of Fine Arts , Calcutta. In the mean while I gave up my small accomodation of the Govt. Housing Board as it was to be demolished and I had to accept a larger one offered to me by the authorities at a higher rent. This naturally involved more expenses each month rather beyond the income from my regular job and so I was compelled to concentrate on my muse during all my spare moments and make it pay more so as to meet the proverbial two ends. Under the circumstances, for a quick turnover, I began doing small size water colours to be sold to friends and to the greeting cards publishers. Nationally famous greeting card manufacturer Vakil & Sons bought some ten of my paintings for their regular greeting cards and for their prestigeous card albums. This gave me  good publicity and soon I started selling my paintings to the internationally famous Air India and other nationally well known business and industrial houses.Some of the museums like Nagpur museum, Birla museum,Davangiri museum also acquired my paintings for thier permanent collection. Having thus won a certain status and popularity I started holding one-man exhibition of my paintings. I was already winning prizes and certificates, gold and silver medals at various important exhibitions right from 1956. I regularly showed my paintings at the Taj Mahal hotel Art Gallery in Bombay. The regular visitors to the gallery were the foreigners. They also took fancy to my paintings and purchased them for their collection. I am basically a figurative artist. However soon I came in contact with the paintings of Amrit Shergill, who was  my most favourite Artist, but I do not follow her deliberately. My views about art: Art is beautiful. It should always please eyes and minds of everybody. God has created so many good and beautiful things in this world which are worth painting. I am a committed  artist. I love to paint and decided to stick to paintings irrespective of whether I get money or not. There is a bright side to everything. There is darkness and ugliness but why should I be morbid and dwell up on it. It is only a perverted, destroyed mind and perhaps a frustrated hurt heart that abor light and beauty while there is a life, let us make the best of it. See as much as possible the bright side, life is for living. You will find in my paintings the bright side. In my paintings there is no place for ugliness and cruelty. I do not understand artists who want to depict horror and gloom. For instance I can never paint a dead cow lying in a field with vivious crows sucking it's blood spattaered all over the place. I am of the firm view, we must fill our minds and hearts with the good thoughts beauty. If reality is ugly, I would rather have illusions. Were modesty is a crime I would hate to plead guilty. An artist of modest means (in more than one sense of the word) my mental make up would not let me join the ranks of the high brow. By an inner inclination, I refuse also to join the abstractionists, the symbolists or follow any other fad or "iem" or join the band wagon of the pesudo modernists. I fesinate because I strive to discover my own path, albeit within the main stream of modern Indian Art. Today I am figurative artist with a strong basis of decorative elements. I idealize the rural belles and the chores of their daily life. More important  in the same year I ventured out of India for the first time and visited the United states and Canada. Apart from the study aspect of the tour, I also had a successful one man exhibitions in New York, Washington, Ottawa(Canada). I had upto now 53 one man exhibitions in India and  abroad.  Top:  Home:  Press Report:  Gallery:  Feedback: Contact