Retired Indian Information Service Officer reminisces IIS years 

Mumbai, 20 December 2020

Shri Madhav Krishna Pardhi, a retired Indian Information Service officer celebrated his 100th birthday on 18 December, 2020. Poet, journalist, storyteller, actor and critic, he served in the Indian Information Service from 1950 to 1978. Shri M. K. Pardhi was born in a humble family at Savner in Maharashtra. He started his career as a journalist at a Marathi newspaper Navshakti. He proudly remembers his days when he reported on the “Quit India” movement led by Mahatma Gandhi. In 1945, when Navshakti Prabhakar Padhye was the editor of Navshakti, Shri Pardhi worked as the deputy editor for five years. Shri Pradhi recounts his association with the All India Radio “I spent large part of my career in the All India Radio. I joined the News Services Division of All India Radio in New Delhi in 1950. I worked in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry till my retirement. But my association with radio goes even beyond. I was associated with radio broadcast work since Mahatma Gandhi’s 1942 Quit India movement in AIR Mumbai, where I also worked as casual reporter and occasionally as a poet.” Apart from All India Radio, Shri Pradhi worked for the Publications Division and Field Publicity departments of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. In year 1978, he retired from Field Publicity office, Pune. A renowned theatre actor, Shri Pardhi has also earned recognition as a critic in the field of drama, music, dance and literature.