The Untold Story Of Northeast India’s First Medical Guide

In 1983, Ashok Deb Goswami, a resident of Medhipara village in Assam’s South Kamrup region, boarded a train to Chennai with a relative diagnosed with cancer. He was not a doctor. He was not a nurse. He had no medical training. He was simply accompanying a family member who needed treatment.

More than four decades later, that one journey has turned into hundreds. Goswami has walked through nearly 150 hospitals across India, guided thousands of patients towards treatment, travelled across 17 states, and done it all without ever treating it as a profession.

Long before patients could search hospitals online or compare specialists with a few taps on a mobile phone, families from different parts of Assam and the Northeast relied on something far more personal—word of mouth.

Among the names that quietly travelled from one household to another was that of Ashok Deb Goswami. He became the person many turned to when illness forced them to leave home in search of specialised treatment.

Ironically, none of it was planned.

“It all began because a relative was diagnosed with cancer,” Goswami recalled.

A doctor in Guwahati arranged for the patient’s treatment at the Cancer Institute in Adyar, Chennai. The family, however, faced another challenge. Someone had to stay with the patient for months, manage hospital visits, cook meals and provide round-the-clock care. Goswami volunteered.

For three months, he remained by his relative’s side.

“I cooked, looked after him from morning till night and managed everything. Serving him gave me a different kind of joy,” he said.

When he returned to Assam, something unexpected happened. People who heard about his experience began approaching him for help. One patient became another, and then another. Before long, people from different corners of Assam started asking him where they should go for treatment.

At the time, there was no easy way to find such answers. Information did not arrive through search engines or social media. Patients depended on personal experience, doctors’ recommendations and trusted contacts. Goswami gradually became one of those trusted contacts.

Although he was running a business at the time, he found himself increasingly drawn to helping patients.

“Perhaps the urge to serve people was already within me,” he said. “I realised that people were suffering because they did not know where they should go for proper treatment.”

His journeys soon expanded beyond Chennai.

He discovered that no single hospital excelled in treating every disease. One institution was known for cancer care, another for cardiac treatment, and yet another for spine surgery or neurology. Instead of relying on hearsay, Goswami began visiting hospitals himself. He spoke to doctors, observed departments and learnt which institutions had developed reputations for treating specific illnesses.

From AIIMS and Sir Ganga Ram Hospital in Delhi to hospitals in Mumbai, Vellore, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Kolkata, Patna and elsewhere, he kept travelling, collecting knowledge that would later help countless patients.

“I couldn’t simply tell people to go to one hospital,” he said. “Different diseases require different hospitals.”

Over the years, his journeys took him to nearly 150 hospitals across India. He estimates that he travelled more than 500 times, often accompanying patients, sometimes guiding families from afar once he had established contacts with doctors and hospitals.

His work extended well beyond booking tickets or accompanying patients.

He discovered that many patients, overwhelmed by anxiety, forgot to tell doctors about important symptoms or previous illnesses during consultations. To avoid that, Goswami developed his own routine. Every evening before an appointment, he would sit with patients and their families, note down every complaint and prepare them for the consultation.

“Many patients cannot explain everything to the doctor. Sometimes they are too weak to speak. Sometimes their relatives are too worried and forget important details. So I write everything down first. It helps the doctor understand the case properly,” he said.

His commitment often demanded sacrifices that few people saw.

While families remained inside hospital wards with patients, Goswami usually stayed separately. Doctors advised him not to share meals with patients to reduce the risk of infection. He cooked his own food whenever possible and never expected families to bear his expenses beyond basic travel and accommodation.

What made his journey even more remarkable was his refusal to turn it into a business.

“I never demanded money from anyone,” he said. “If someone voluntarily gave me something, I accepted it. Otherwise, I never asked.”

His decision was made easier by the support he received from his family. His younger brother’s family looked after him whenever he returned home, allowing him to continue travelling without worrying about financial responsibilities.

“I was fortunate. My family never stopped me. Without their support, I couldn’t have continued this work for more than forty years.”

Not every journey ended happily.

Some patients recovered and returned home smiling. Some never made it back. Goswami still remembers carrying critically ill patients on trains and flights, comforting anxious families and, at times, witnessing death despite everyone’s efforts.

“We can treat disease, but no one can decide how long a person will live,” he said quietly.

Yet those painful experiences never persuaded him to stop.

Instead, they strengthened his resolve to ensure that every patient reached the right hospital as early as possible.

Contrary to popular perception, Goswami does not believe Assam’s doctors deserve the criticism they often receive.

“There is good treatment in Assam. Our doctors, nurses and hospitals are working sincerely. Sometimes specialised equipment or advanced technology may not be available, so patients have to travel elsewhere. But it is wrong to say that doctors here do not know how to treat patients,” he said firmly.

He believes the biggest challenge is accessibility.

“Thousands of patients still travel long distances to Guwahati before they can even begin treatment. Strengthening district hospitals with better equipment and more specialists would spare many families that hardship,” he said.

Looking back, Goswami never speaks about the thousands of kilometres he travelled or the countless railway journeys he undertook with any sense of achievement. Instead, he remembers the relief on a family’s face when a patient finally received the right treatment.

“I found a different kind of joy in helping people,” he said.

For over four decades, that joy became the purpose of his life.

Many people across the Northeast may never know his name. Yet long before medical information became available at the touch of a screen, Ashok Deb Goswami quietly built something no website could offer—a lifetime of experience, trust and human compassion, shared one patient at a time.

His final message remains as simple as the life he chose to live.

“Health is wealth. Love your body and take care of it. Everything else comes later.”

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