Dr. Paul Marett
The unique qualities of your character and ideals will remain our treasured inheritance.
EXPLANATORY NOTE
A biography of Meghji Pethraj Shah was written in Gujarati by Shri Tarak Mehta
and published by Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in Bombay in 1975
under the title
An English translation was prepared and this has now been completely re-written by Dr. Paul Marett, of Loughborough University, with the addition of much new material.
The maps were drawn by Anne Tarver.
For English readers an explanation of some terms may be desirable.
The suffix -bhai (meaning 'brother') is used with Gujarati names as an indication of affection and respect: the female equivalent is -ben.
Shri, meaning 'honoured' or 'respected', is used as the Indian term for 'Mr.'
Shrimati is the word for 'Mrs'.
The Indian expressions of quantity, lakh and crore, have normally been translated in this text:
a lakh is 100,000 and a crore 10 million.
One point to be remembered, of course, is that, in many cases, sums of money mentioned in this book need to be multiplied by between ten and twenty to give their value in present-day terms. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This tribute to the memory of Meghji Pethraj Shah could never have been written without the help of those who knew him and contributed their memories. It is impossible to list them all here but their reminiscences are acknowledged in the text. Sincere thanks must be expressed to all those, in Kenya, India and the United Kingdom, who have made possible the writing of this book.