She was an amazing woman - a scientist, a teacher, voracious reader, writer, artist and a thinker. A personification of simple living and high thinking.

Our home was open to all, so we had a full house at all times, full of people of all ages.

She would teach little kids drawing and painting in one corner of the house and help a Ph.D. student to write her thesis on the other.

Interspersed in between would be my classmates having trouble in one subject or another, a naughty son of a neighbour who needed discipline, a single lady student who needed a safe place to stay for a couple of nights, neighbourhood ladies who learnt knitting and English from Amma and children of housekeepers and rag pickers who worked in the neighbourhood who couldn't afford tuitions.

Our home didn't know religion,caste or any barriers that were prevalent at the time.

Touchables and untouchables ate together, learnt together and played together.

She would teach and feed all these people without charging a penny or expecting favours in return.

All this while working full time. Her day would start at 4am and end at 11.

I was 12 and my sister 11 when my father passed away.

As single mother at a time when widows were not treated with kindness, she excelled at her job, gave a damn about conservative neighbours with strong opinions on how widows should conduct themselves, and did what she did best, even better- teach and feed students.

She was a treasure trove of knowledge and could talk about almost anything on the planet.

I was 4 years old when she bought me my first comic book. It was a reward after a math lesson and a harsh beating (because I cheated).

She helped me build my collection (whatever is left of it) - she would skip a rickshaw ride from work and walk back home so she could use that money to buy a comic book for me.

So many of these books are a reminder of the hundreds of times that my mother walked back home.