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Resource Name:
Resource Type:
External Resource
Metadata
Asset Name:
E008465 - Baratham, Gopal (1935 - 2002)
Title:
Baratham, Gopal (1935 - 2002)
Author:
Royal College of Surgeons of England
Identifier:
RCS: E008465
Publisher:
London : Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date:
2015-10-13
Description:
Obituary for Baratham, Gopal (1935 - 2002), Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
Language:
English
Source:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Full Name:
Baratham, Gopal
Date of Birth:
9 September 1935
Date of Death:
23 April 2002
Occupation:
Titles/Qualifications:
MRCS and FRCS 1966

MB BS Malaya 1960
Details:
Gopal Baratham was a consultant neurosurgeon in Singapore. He was born on 9 September 1935, into a Tamil Brahmin family, originally from southern India, who had moved to Malaya. His father was Dr Baratham Ramaswamy Sreenivasan, one of the founders of the Singapore Medical Association, and the first President of the College of General Practitioners of Singapore in 1974. He was also Vice-Chancellor of the University of Malaya in 1961. Gopal's mother was Elizabeth Haynes, a nurse and a Christian. During part of Baratham's childhood, Malaya was occupied by the Japanese. He attended St Andrews's School, but was also influenced by his father and uncle who introduced him to a wide variety of literature. On leaving school he was torn between a literary or medical career. His father persuaded him to try the latter, and he entered the medical college of the University of Malaysia. While at university his liberal views became apparent since he edited the magazine of the socialist club. His decision to make a career in neurosurgery caused some surprise among his friends. He passed the FRCS in 1966 and then obtained his neurosurgical training at the Brook Hospital, Woolwich, the London Hospital (where he worked in both the neurological and neurosurgical departments) and as senior registrar at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. He returned to Singapore in 1972, as a registrar at the Thomson Road Hospital, but later in the same year was appointed consultant at the Tan Tock Seng Hospital. He became senior neurosurgeon in 1976 and head of the department in 1987, when he left the hospital and confined himself to private practice in neurosurgery at the Mount Elizabeth Hospital, and devoted himself to writing. He retired from private practice in 1999, though he continued to do medico-legal work. Gopal Baratham was one of the earliest neurosurgeons in Singapore. At Tan Tock Seng Hospital he was active clinically and in training junior neurosurgeons. He was an important influence in establishing the high standards of the speciality in that country, making contacts with neurosurgeons in America and Australia, as well as maintaining his connections with the UK and inviting specialists to work for short periods in Singapore to help with the education of juniors. He was modest about his own achievements, claiming to have been an unusually clumsy child, however his interest in the surgery of arteriovenous malformations (common in Singapore) and the low mortality he achieved with these difficult lesions, shows otherwise. He wrote on this subject and on delayed traumatic intracerebral haematoma. He was Chairman of the Chapter of Surgeons of the Singapore Academy of Medicine in 1983, a member of the Council of the Academy from 1989 to 1991, and President of the Association of South East Asian Nations' Neurosurgical Society during the same period. He played an important role in organising the fifth congress of that society in 1992 in Singapore. Baratham pursued a literary career amidst his neurosurgical one, which brought him recognition in Singapore and beyond as one of the country's best writers. In the 1980's he published two sets of short stories and a novel about Singapore life, *A candle or the sun* (1991), which was short-listed for the Commonwealth book prize. In 1996 he published a detective novel, *Moonrise, sunset*. He was writing his autobiography at the time of his death. His fiction is not concerned with medicine, but with the way in which ordinary people live in Singapore, exploiting twists and allusions in the plot, as well as verbal jokes. He once said that 'the only subjects worth writing about are politics, sex and religion'. His antipathy to authoritarianism and his hatred of the debased language of pop and managerial culture was evident in the characterisation of his novels. He was married twice, first to Pauline Wong, a teacher, by whom he had four sons. This marriage was dissolved and he then married Low Wie Mien, his secretary. Baratham was a tall, rather gangling figure, quietly spoken, but with a highly developed sense of humour which appeared in his books. He had a great love of language and was entranced to find a new word or a hitherto unrecognised meaning for an old one. His interest in religions, especially Christianity and Hinduism, appeared in his fiction. He held that society should be based on personal freedom and honesty, and was deeply opposed to censorship of any sort. Though he was not politically active during his professional life, he was openly critical of the authoritarian government of his country, and in his book *The caning of Michael Fay* (1994) condemned the corporal punishment practised in Singapore. A gentle, kind, sociable man with a circle of friends, both literary and medical, he was an excellent and sympathetic doctor who gave patients his personal attention and care. In later years he did not enjoy good health. He underwent a coronary bypass operation in Sydney in 1989. After he retired from neurosurgical practice in 1999 he gave an address to the chapter of surgeons (entitled *The art of letting go*) in which he advocated compulsory retirement of surgeons on the basis of age - a suggestion that might be thought unexceptional, but which caused some dismay among his colleagues in Singapore. He died of pneumonia on 23 April 2002.
Sources:
*Asian Times* 4 September 1996

*Straits Times* 27 April 2002
Rights:
Copyright (c) The Royal College of Surgeons of England
Collection:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format:
Obituary
Format:
Asset
Asset Path:
Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008400-E008499
Media Type:
Unknown