When calm and composed PK fell in love

It was love at first sight for Pradip Kumar Banerjee, who met his wife Aarti under one of the most peculiar circumstances.

The Melbourne Olympics-returned Banerjee was at his prime in 1958, and was made a chief guest for a function at Madhyamgram, on the outskirts of Kolkata.

High in demand, the Indian football star failed to mark his attendance, but made up for that by personally visiting the hosts, who happened to be from the renowned Mazumdar's House of Cornwallis Street.

Floored by his humbleness, the patriarch of the house made a direct proposal: "Will you marry my daughter?".

"My heart skipped a beat as a young girl wearing a frilly frock with a badminton racquet barged into the room. She was a bundle of energy, bubbling in her own joy as her father introduced her to me," Banerjee writes in his memoir 'Beyond 90 Minutes', co-authored by Anirban Chatterjee.

"I knew she was the girl I was waiting for all this time. I somehow lost my suave in front of her, and the only sound in the room was the loud creaking of the aged ceiling fan."
"Life for me had become meaningless. Life was never the same again. The tragedy had shattered me in many ways. Everything I achieved or won in my life was pale in front of this loss."