NRG pines for Gujarat school his mom built

Unfinished business with Gujarat troubles NRG Neville J Roach — who currently chairs a large number of high-profile organizations such as the Australia India Business Council. He has a poignant agenda on his list. He desires to return to his roots and re-connect with a small school, St Mary’s in Rajkot, which his mother set up in 1955. Roach is the only Australian member of the Indian Prime Minister’s Global Advisory Council, which comprises 20 eminent overseas Indians from around the world. He is also New South Wales government’s Honorary Sydney Ambassador to India. Roach holds the title ‘Officer of Order’, conferred in Australia; it is a kind of knighthood. Roach was born in Bharuch to a Mangalorean mother, Teresa Roach, who was a teacher; and a Goan father, Frank Roach, who had been an intelligence officer.“I feel great to re-connect with the state where I spent my youthful years,” said Roach. In 2008, he became the first Australian to receive the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award from the President of India, the highest honour bestowed on overseas Indians.Recently, Roach came to Gujarat after 53 years. Though he was in Ahmedabad to receive an award, his mind and heart were preoccupied with something else. Roach, a well-known ICT industry leader who chairs the ANZ Advisory Board for Tata Consultancy Services, said: “My mom set up this small school to support the cause of girls’ education in Rajkot when my father was posted there as an intelligence officer.”After the death of his parents, he desired to do something that would please their souls. “And I feel that giving a push to the small school they had begun during years of their togetherness in Rajkot was an apt way of paying them a tribute,” Roach said.“I left my parents in Gujarat in 1957, and after graduating from Bombay University I migrated to Australia in 1961 on deputation from a reputable insurance business company,” said Roach. “I left with the intention to return soon. However, I was given Australian permanent residency in 1966 with a group of 44 non-whites —which was a first. I then came to terms with the fact that I had actually migrated.”Roach’s parents lived in Rajkot till 1968, leaving for Mumbai after retirement. “That was a point of disconnection with Gujarat – a state where I was born, spent my youthful years and where I have memories of meeting my wife Gladys,” Roach said. Due to hectic schedule, he could not visit the school.