Story by Dr.Christopher Canagaratne

            All of us would remember Dr.Christopher Kanagaratne, who was Resident Surgeon, when we were in our 3rd year, at the Medical Faculty. He later became Surgeon at Trincomalee Base Hospital. He ended up as Professor of Surgery at the Private Medical College at Ragama. He passed away a few years back.

            He told me this story of his medical student days. He had first classes, in his exams. and took neat notes of lectures. Dr. Miss. Sriskandaraja, Eye Surgeon, was his junior at medical college. One day he was 'copped' for riding a bicycle at night, without lights. He appeared before Mr.Sriskandaraja, father of the medical student, the then Magistrate at Hulftsdorp, Colombo, and was fined Rs25/=, by him.

            A few days later, while he was at home wearing his sarong, the doorbell rang. He went to the door to see the magistrate Mr.Siriskandaraja, standing at the door. The magistrate probably did not recognize the miscreant, in the sarong. He introduced himself asked the man wearing the sarong whether he was Christopher, the medical student and being answered in the affirmative, said that he had come to ask him a favor. He told Christopher that his daughter was much impressed with the lecture notes that Christopher made and whether she could borrow it. Christopher said that he had to search for the notes and that he would hand over the notes personally, to the young Miss.Sriskandaraja.

            He did this subsequently and asked the young miss, why she did not ask him direct. She had told him that he along with the Aloysius brothers used to rag her and that she was scared of them. Such was life at the medical college in the late 1950's.

Hi there

I remember Christopher Canagaratne. He was an excellent and meticulous Surgeon who liked to maintain high clinical standards, even during his era. I clerked with him alongside my batch mates. I used to get pulled by him for being sloppy at my surgical brushing up to assist him at his surgery. One day he called me Johnny Walker (as in the picture on the label of the Whiskey bottle) I did not understand why, but thought perhaps I appeared skinny.

Incidentally one day I was assisting Prof. Milroy Paul at his surgical operation. During the procedure I remember him saying ‘’ Gentleman we are in the era of bloodless surgery’’. However he was pulling out ‘swab after swab’ all dripping with blood from the surgical wound. Needless to say being terrified medical students we could not even point out to him the ‘bloody swabs’

Regards

Sadiq