Jazim Bazaz
Professor (Dr.) Upendra Kaul’s childhood unfolded in post-Partition Delhi, at a time when the city was struggling to absorb thousands of displaced families. His own family lived through those difficult years with very little. .Those were years of hardship. The family lived in a single room that served as both bedroom and kitchen, with a common lavatory shared by all the residents of the building. Material comforts were scarce, but those difficult years instilled resilience, humility, and an appreciation for the struggles of ordinary people.
For the first thirteen years of his life, he was a lonely child. Only later, when his younger brother was born, had the family’s circumstances begun to improve, and they moved into a modest two-room flat.
There were few material comforts. But perhaps those circumstances gave him something far more valuable—resilience, humility, resourcefulness,
Like every meaningful life, this was not a journey without disappointments or failures. There were setbacks along the way—moments that could easily have discouraged a young boy.
But perhaps that is where his story really begins. Behind it all stood one extraordinary woman — his mother, Gauri.
She was his greatest source of strength and courage, the one who convinced him that education was the surest way to serve humanity. Above all, she cherished one dream: that her son would become a doctor. He didn’t just fulfil that dream – he outgrew even her expectations of it.
Medicine became his profession. Cardiology became his passion. And excellence became his habit. His academic path took him through some of India’s finest institutions – G.B. Pant Hospital in New Delhi, PGIMER Chandigarh, and AIIMS, New Delhi.But wherever he worked, he was never merely a clinician. He became a teacher, an innovator, a mentor and an academic leader.
In the words of his daughter Dr. Amita Kaul: “I had the privilege of seeing a side of that commitment that perhaps never appeared on a CV. He would sometimes take me with him for his Sunday rounds. His office was on 7th floor ,
I watched him climb flight after flight without ever once touching an elevator and me literally crawling behind. This is decades before anyone had heard of “10,000 steps a day.” He’s been practising what he now preaches since he was in his thirties.”
She further said, “In a government hospital, a senior doctor could quite reasonably have considered Sunday a day away from work. But he would still come in, walk through the ICU, visit the wards and check on his patients himself. Those Sunday rounds taught me something that has stayed with me throughout my own medical career: Responsibility does not end when the working day ends.”
An incident, as narrated by his family, at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS) is worth quoting. Dr. U Kaul developed shingles – herpes zoster, which is one of the more genuinely miserable things the human nervous system can do to a person. The skin lesions on part of the body give such excruciating pain. Any reasonable person would have taken a week off. But he didn’t and continued his duty hours without any break. He put on his heavy lead apron, walked into the Cath lab, performed his usual procedures, and took painkillers between cases as though they were mints.
“I have genuinely never seen this man take a sick day,” said one of his colleagues. For him, duty was rarely negotiable. That same dedication eventually made him one of the pioneers who helped transform cardiovascular care in India.
He played a leading role in introducing and advancing several non-surgical cardiac interventions, including balloon angioplasty, the adoption of drug-eluting stents and modern electrophysiology. Many of the procedures that we now consider routine were once revolutionary. He was among those who helped bring those innovations to Indian patients.
His work soon received international recognition. He was invited as faculty at major scientific meetings across Europe and North America and throughout South Asia, including Bangladesh, China and Pakistan.
Through his lectures, research and teaching, he earned the respect of colleagues across the world and became one of India’s best-known ambassadors in interventional cardiology. But perhaps what makes his journey particularly remarkable is that his ambition was never confined to personal achievement.
After an illustrious career in premier academic institutions, he continued his work in leading trust and corporate hospitals. During this period, he also contributed to the establishment and development of charitable hospitals inspired by Sri Sathya Sai Baba at Puttaparthi.
Because somewhere along the way, medicine for him had acquired a meaning beyond science. It had become a service. And that belief would eventually bring him back to where his story had begun – in the cradle of snow.
“Throughout my childhood, he boasted in front of us and Delhiites that he had been “born in the cradle of snow.”It took me a little while to realise that this was, in fact, a rather poetic version of the truth, because he was actually born in June!But perhaps the story was less about the snow and more about the landscape that shaped him,” said Dr. Amita Kaul.
Perhaps the most inspiring chapter of his life began after he had already reached the pinnacle of professional success. Instead of slowing down, he chose to return to his roots in Jammu and Kashmir.
And he did so in memory of his beloved mother, Gauri.He established the Gauri Kaul Foundation. Through the Foundation, healthcare has reached some of the most remote and underserved communities in Jammu & Kashmir, including villages close to the Line of Control in Machil. It’s through this Foundation that telemedicine facilities and community clinics have brought specialist care to people who previously had little or no access to it.
Among these initiatives is the Prasad Joo Khan Heart Centre at Hawal village, reflecting his continuing commitment to making quality cardiac care accessible to those who need it most. In partnership with the Indian Oil Corporation Limited, he launched the innovative “Heart Clinic on Wheels” programme. It is a wonderfully simple idea with a profound philosophy: If the patient cannot reach the doctor, take the doctor to the patient.
The mobile clinic brings healthcare directly to people living in remote regions. It does more than provide consultations—it surveys cardiovascular risk factors, looks at the health of schoolchildren and identifies the needs of communities.
In doing so, it brings together treatment, prevention and public health.
There is another side to Dr. Kaul. He is also a writer. His thoughtful columns have appeared in several regional and national newspapers, where he has written not only about medicine, but about society, culture, food, people and life. He has written about the entire history of Haak, or trout, or a Nadru with exactly the same seriousness with which he would write about how to prevent a heart attack.
His daughter shares an anecdote: “My daughter Ira and I were reading his piece on Nadru the other day and just laughing. Not because it wasn’t good. But because who else writes about a vegetable with that much heart?
He recently released his memoir, When the Heart Speaks, which is much more than the story of a cardiologist.It is the story of a life lived with purpose. And perhaps that is what makes the book and the man behind itso interesting.
There is the doctor, the teacher, the innovator, the philanthropist and the writer.
But behind all these identities is simply a man who has always been deeply curious about the world around him—and deeply invested in the people within it.
As put by his family, “Today, as we celebrate the latest revised edition of When the Heart Speaks, we are therefore not merely launching a book. We are celebrating a journey. From healing individual hearts to touching countless lives. And perhaps most importantly, from achievement to service.”
Dr. Kaulhas spent a lifetime healing hearts. He has spent a lifetime teaching hearts. And, without perhaps ever intending to, he has taught how a heart should live.
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“For a long time, I was jealous. I was jealous of his patients, his students, his colleagues – of everyone and everything that seemed to get a little more of his time than I did. But with time, I began to understand something. Perhaps I was asking of him something he was never meant to give to just one family. I began to think of him a little like Lord Krishna. Krishna could never belong to just one person. His presence had to be everywhere, for everyone who needed him.And perhaps my father is like that too.
He has spent his life being there for his patients, his students, his colleagues, and for people who may never even know his story.So I stopped thinking of his absence as something I had lost—and began to see it as part of what made him who he is.And perhaps that is the greatest gift he has given me: To understand that love does not always mean having someone beside you; sometimes, it means knowing that their presence lives within you.”
– Dr. Amita Kaul, daughter of Dr U Kaul
