Early life of Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal: Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal was the son of Ganeshi Lal and grandson of Chiranji Lal. Those were difficult times for the country. Facilities for education were extremely limited. Opportunities for fruitful work and employment were scarce. It seems that he did not have the normal benefits of education during his formative years. However, he grew up with a strong will, sharp commonsense and unflinching dedication to do anything and everything, that he encountered on his way and gradually stitched together a success story of his own. Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal was working as a contractor for military works during the first world war. He enjoyed the regard, respect and confidence of most of the senior military officers with whom he came in contact during that period. By the end of the first world war, he was able to amass a reasonable surplus. It seems, that, he utilised the surplus money of that period for the purchase of lands at Roorkee and a nearby village known as Chiriapur. He was very fond of planting fruit gardens and naturally, a number of orchards nurtured by him were scattered all over the area. He was also fond of building houses and bungalows for the utilization of idle labour and materials from his works. At some time, he owned nine bungalows in the cantonment area of Roorkee, which were made available to the officers of the army from time to time. He also built a number of houses on the city side, in the area known as Amber Talab. It seems, that, at some time he owned fifty percent of the land and houses in Amber Talab locality. He also laid out orchards and built a residencial complex known as Ganesh Vatika on station road at Roorkee, which sometimes covered an area of more than 100 acres. Most of this area is presently occupied by the Kanahiya Lal Group of institutions, which include a Post Graduate College, a Degree College, an Intermediate College and Polytechnic. He was awarded the title of Rai Sahib after the first world war and was nominated in 1924 as the only Indian Member of the Cantonment Board of Roorkee.
Vanprasth: Sometimes in the year 1927 Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal renounced everything and handed over all his property and business to his son Shyam Lal and started living as a vanparasthi at Jwalapur near Haridwar. However, it seems that shortly afterwards, he was informed by some of his friends and well wishers that all was not well at Roorkee and that, if he continued to stay at Jwalapur, his holdings and business are likely to suffer irreparable damage. Consequently, he returned to Roorkee and picked up the threads again and brought back his business on an even keel. However, the seeds of renunciation had taken root and continuing disenchantment with normal hubbub of life, pushed Rai Sahib to think, that, it was time to call it quits once again. This time he constituted a trust entitled as Kanahiya Lal Trust and after making suitable provisions for all members of the family, the residual income and property was assigned to the trust.
He vacated Kanahiya Kunj, the residential bungalow in Ganesh Vatika and started living as a vanparasthi in a small room inside the main gate. For the rest of his life he continued like that, a lonely person, looking after all the developmental activities of the trust and welfare of the family.
Family ties of Rai Sahib: Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal was married to Moola Devi of Landhaura at a very tender age. She was an extremely simple lady and took everything in her stride as the life rolled on. On one occasion she narrated, that, she was only thirteen years old at the time of her marriage. The marriage procession of Rai Sahib included 150 bahelis (bullock carts). Those days, proper reception and feeding of the bahelis, which included the bullocks and drivers of the bullock carts, was considered as more important than looking after the accommodation, feeding and comforts of the relatives and guests who formed the marriage procession. The challenges were awesome. However, the people of the villages of those days were bound to each other with fraternal feelings and ties of love and affection and a sense of deep attachment to each other. They stood as one man for sharing all types of tasks during the marriage. After her marriage, Moola Devi shared all the ups and downs of life with Rai Sahib during his early struggles. When the first world war ended, they were living comfortably in Kanahiya Kunj of Ganesh Vatika at Roorkee with a painstakingly nourished orchard, sprawling open lands and a retinue of attendants, enjoying the privilege of being the most distinguished and respected citizens of Roorkee.
Moola Devi took everything in her stride, when Rai Sahib became a vanparasti and started living at Jwalapur and thereafter, during his subsequent return to Roorkee for stabilizing his crumbling business. When Rai Sahib renounced everything again, formed a trust and started living alone as a vanprasthi in a room inside the main gate of Ganesh Vatika, Moola Devi started living in one of their houses at Ambar Talab with their son Shyam Lal and was seen shuttling from there to Ganesh Vatika off and on. In spite of all that she was going through, she was always cheerful and full of love and affection for everybody, till she breathed her last.
Shyam Lal: Shyam Lal was the only son of Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal. He was extremely social and caring by nature and was well known in the town and in the community for providing a helping hand to almost anybody and everybody. He was a senior warden of the city during the second world war and had the physical capacity and mental toughness to provide dedicated and selfless service, anywhere and everywhere, under all types of circumstances and exigencies. Sometimes, goodness of a man turns out to be a bane. That is what happened, when Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal embraced vanprasth and entrusted his business to Shyam Lal. As soon as he was at the helm, self-seekers started hovering round him and very soon the foundations of the flourishing estate became shaky. Rai Sahib returned from Jwalapur and brought the whole business back to normal, but, that left a scar in the relations between father and son. For the rest of his life, Shyam Lal was very well looked after, but, he was never able to regain the former trust of his father. Shyam Lal was married to Shyama Devi, from a family settled at Roorkee. They had one daughter Bimla Devi.
Marriage of Bimla: Bimla Devi was the grand-daughter of Rai Sahib and daughter of Shyam Lal and Shyama Devi. She was married to Ishwar Dayal of Libharedi in the year 1933. The marriage of Bimla was a grand affair in which almost all members of our families participated with their children. Those were the days, when people were comparatively free from the daily rush and hubbub of routine daily life and cherished family celebrations for meeting and living with their near and dear ones. Naturally, it was the biggest gathering of our family, with about 100 to 150 persons. People enjoyed walking, talking and frolicking and could be seen almost everywhere during the celebrations. After the marriage ceremonies were over, Rai Sahib bid farewell to the members of the marriage party, who left for their village. Rai Sahib told them that the bride and the bridegroom shall leave for their village, in his horse drawn buggy, in the early hours of the morning next day. Incidentally, there was some delay in the departure of the bride and bridegroom in the morning and Rai Sahib told them to leave in cooler hours of the evening, that day. Somehow, some of the evening shadows helped Rai Sahib to get the departure postponed again for the next morning. Some years later, Ishwar Dayal, while recalling the incident, told us, that, the postponements went on, like that, for almost one week and ultimately in utter helplessness, he requested his brother to come to Roorkee and to take the couple with him to the village.
Soon after, Kanahiya Kunj, the main building of Ganesh Vatika, where the marriage of Bimla was celebrated was converted into a school with Ishwar Dayal as the head master. Ishwar Dayal continued to pursue further education for intermediate, graduation, post graduation and teachers training degrees from time to time. Incidentally, as soon as Ishwar Dayal was able to equip himself with higher qualifications, the school was upgraded to high school and was subsequently raised to the level of an intermediate college and thereafter to a degree college and post graduate college. In the process, Ishwar Dayal, who started as the first head master of the school became the first principal of the high school and intermediate college and subsequently that of the degree college and the post graduate college.
Subsequent life of Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal: During subsequent years, Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal had a very austere and regulated life. He would get up in early hours of the morning and take a long walk, spending time at different orchards developed by him on the city side and thereafter, he used to cross over to the cantonment side and would visit some of his bungalows and have chats with the occupants of the bungalows. After the walk, he used to run an eye clinic inside the main gate of Ganesh Vatika. A large number of patients greeted him in the morning and he made it a point to talk to each one of them freely and put eye-drops in their eyes in a very relaxed manner. Thereafter, he met a large number of visitors, waiting to talk to him. In the evenings, he would go to the city and spend time with his wife and children. Rai Sahib was a vanparasti and had renounced most of the worldly comforts. However, he was always very thoughtful and concerned about the welfare and common needs of all members of his family. He was a fabulous host and took great pains and pleasure in serving personally the choicest fruits and milk to members of his family, friends and visitors. He spent almost all his savings in the development of Kanahiya Lal DAV Group of institutions, including Kanahiya Lal DAV Intermediate College, KLDAV Degree and Post Graduate College and Kanahiya Lal Polytechnic. These institutions are living monuments of the person who had denied almost everything to himself, but was deeply dedicated to the welfare of the family and the development of Kanahiya Lal DAV Group of institutions for the larger benefits of the community.
Our association with Rai Sahib: I met Rai Sahib Kanahiya Lal for the first time in 1933, when our parents and other members of the family went to Roorkee for participating in the marriage of Bimla Devi. I was only eight years old at that time and therefore, I had very little interaction with Rai Sahib during that period. When Kanahiya Lal Trust was formed in 1936, Ratan Lal, one of the cousins of Rai Sahib was nominated by him as one of the founder members of Kanahiya Lal trust. Ratan Lal died in March 1942 and Rai Sahib nominated me as a trustee to fill up the vacancy that had occurred in the trust. I was a college going student at that time. Subsequently, I had the privilege of staying with him for about a month in 1943, during my preparations for the entrance examination for admission to the civil engineering course of Thomason College of Civil Engineering Roorkee. That was the time, when I saw him living alone, denying almost everything to himself, but, looking after his family and deeply involved in the development of KLDAV group of institutions. Thereafter, I had a short stint at Mohammadpur and Pathri Power House Division as assistant engineer during 1948-1949 and my father and other members of the family had frequent occasions to stay with him at Ganesh Vatika off and on, which placed us in direct contact with his humility and hospitality. For the past sixty years, we had been visiting Roorkee, almost every year. So long as Rai Sahib was living, he was always full of energy, love and affection and he used to show to us, all that was going on in the fast developing group of KDAV institutions. He left for the heavenly abode in the year 1969.