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By:

Bhalchandra Chorghade

11 August 2025 at 1:54:18 pm

Healing Beyond the Clinic

Dr Kirti Samudra “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.” This thought by Mother Teresa finds reflection in the life of Panvel-based diabetologist Dr Kirti Samudra, who has spent decades caring not only for her family but also thousands of patients who see her as their guide. As we mark International Women’s Day, stories like hers remind us that women of substance often shape society quietly through compassion, resilience and dedication. Doctor, mother, homemaker,...

Healing Beyond the Clinic

Dr Kirti Samudra “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.” This thought by Mother Teresa finds reflection in the life of Panvel-based diabetologist Dr Kirti Samudra, who has spent decades caring not only for her family but also thousands of patients who see her as their guide. As we mark International Women’s Day, stories like hers remind us that women of substance often shape society quietly through compassion, resilience and dedication. Doctor, mother, homemaker, mentor and philanthropist — Dr Samudra has balanced many roles with commitment. While she manages a busy medical practice, her deeper calling has always been service. For her, medicine is not merely a profession but a responsibility towards the people who depend on her guidance. Nagpur to Panvel Born and raised in Nagpur, Dr Samudra completed her medical education there before moving to Mumbai in search of better opportunities. The early years were challenging. With determination, she and her husband Girish Samudra, an entrepreneur involved in underwater pipeline projects, chose to build their life in Panvel. At a time when the town was still developing and healthcare awareness was limited, she decided to make it both her workplace and home. What began with modest resources gradually grew into a trusted medical practice built on long-standing relationships with patients. Fighting Diabetes Recognising the growing threat of diabetes, Dr Samudra dedicated her career to treating and educating patients about the disease. Over the years, she has registered nearly 30,000 patients from Panvel and nearby areas. Yet she believes treatment alone is not enough. “Diabetes is a lifelong disease. Medicines are important, but patient education is equally critical. If people understand the condition, they can manage it better and prevent complications,” she says. For more than 27 years, she has organised an Annual Patients’ Education Programme, offering diagnostic tests at concessional rates and sessions on lifestyle management. Family, Practice With her husband frequently travelling for business, much of the responsibility of raising their two children fell on Dr Samudra. Instead of expanding her practice aggressively, she kept it close to home and adjusted her OPD timings around her children’s schedules. “It was not easy,” she recalls, “but I wanted to fulfil my responsibilities as a mother while continuing to serve my patients.” Beyond Medicine Today, Dr Samudra also devotes time to social initiatives through the Bharat Vikas Parishad, where she serves as Regional Head. Her projects include  Plastic Mukta Vasundhara , which promotes reduced use of single-use plastic, and  Sainik Ho Tumchyasathi , an initiative that sends Diwali  faral  (snack hamper) to Indian soldiers posted at the borders. Last year alone, 15,000 boxes were sent to troops. Despite decades of service, she measures success not in wealth but in goodwill. “I may not have earned huge money,” she says, “but I have earned immense love and respect from my patients. That is something I will always be grateful for.”

The Collapse That Had to Happen

Geert Wilders was right to walk away from a coalition that refused to confront the reality of mass migration.

The Dutch coalition government has fallen, and good riddance. After barely eleven months in office, the most right-leaning government in Dutch history has come undone not because of Geert Wilders’ obstinacy, but because of the refusal of his coalition partners to honour the very mandate that brought them to power: to radically curb immigration and restore national sovereignty.


The now-defunct coalition which was an uneasy marriage of Wilders’ Party for Freedom (PVV), the agrarian populist Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB), the technocratic New Social Contract (NSC) and the centre-right VVD, was always built on sand. From the outset, the alliance had strained over the one issue that matters most to Dutch voters: asylum and immigration. The other three parties, desperate to appear reasonable to Brussels and Dutch media elites, balked when Wilders unveiled his 10-point asylum plan. His proposals, far from extreme, were clear-headed responses to the chaos wrought by years of lax policy which included suspending asylum applications, closing reception centres, restricting family reunification and ultimately restoring border control in the face of mounting demographic and cultural pressure.


The objections were predictable. Centre-right politicians clung to the illusion that Europe would offer a solution. But voters who gave Wilders the largest mandate in the 2023 election had already lost patience with such evasions. The Netherlands is a small country, not a sponge for the world’s displacements. Its cities are crowded, its welfare system strained and its social cohesion fraying. Wilders’ critics call him divisive. Yet it is mass migration, and the political cowardice that sustains it, that has done more to divide Dutch society than any politician.


Prime Minister Dick Schoof, a former security chief and Wilders’ handpicked appointee, tried valiantly to hold the line. But in the end, Schoof was a technocrat presiding over a political vacuum. His insistence that collapse was “unnecessary and irresponsible” missed the point entirely. What is irresponsible is to form a government on a promise to control migration and then abandon that promise.


The hypocrisy of the Dutch establishment that has been so eager to welcome Afghan interpreters, Syrian ‘refugees’ and Moroccan youths, but so hostile to the concerns of its own native citizens has been the fuel of Wilders’ appeal.


The usual critics in Brussels and the Dutch press have already resumed their familiar litany, dubbing Wilders as ‘far-right,’ ‘Islamophobic,’ ‘unfit for government.’ These epithets are now worn thin. It is no longer tenable to dismiss legitimate concerns about integration, security and sovereignty as hate speech. The Netherlands, like much of Western Europe, is waking up to the costs of multicultural dogma. In schools, teachers report censorship when discussing sensitive topics. In cities, knife attacks and gang violence have become unsettlingly common. In communities once defined by tolerance, women increasingly feel unsafe walking alone. And in politics, every attempt to discuss these issues honestly is met with accusations of extremism.


Wilders, who once stood on the margins of Dutch politics, now speaks for a large, disenchanted middle. Unlike his rivals, Wilders has consistently chosen principle over posturing. He refuses to be the useful idiot in a government that pays lip service to migration control while appeasing the same legal structures that neuter real reform.


Wilders’ decision to withdraw is a reminder that a government without direction is worse than opposition with purpose.


When new elections are called, the Dutch people will once again have a chance to speak. And this time, perhaps, their voice will be loud enough that even the liberal Muslim-lovers in The Hague will have to listen.


Europe’s political elite may sneer, but across the continent - from Italy to Denmark, from Hungary to France - the rules of engagement have long been changing. The migration debate is no longer taboo. In that sense, Wilders is not a relic of angry populism, but a harbinger of what’s next.

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