Mumbai: In the mid-eighties, I was assigned to shoot R.K. Laxman. I called him at his office and asked for his appointment. He said, “come tomorrow morning at 8.30.” Since I was staying in the suburbs, I said I can make it by about 9 am. He replied. “in that case don’t come.” I said I would be there in time.

The next morning I went to his office, which was on the third floor. The door to his cabin was half open and he was sitting with his legs stretched on the table, like Amitabh Bachchan in Deewar. I knocked and he answered, “Come Pradeep.”

Unlike how he sounded over the phone, he was quite happy to be photographed. He took me to the Editor’s cabin and asked, “Would you like to shoot here? Or any other place?”

He asked me if I could give him a few prints of the pictures after the story appeared. I went with the pictures and the cover of the magazine on which his photograph had appeared. “Good job,” he said.