Divine spark mends tiny hearts

Kids' heart surgeon, Hindu priest stays humble

By Gillian Woodford

The strangeness made him question all he'd been taught. Many of his friends, fellow Hindus from Trinidad, abandoned their beliefs and just tried to fit in. "But it drove me even more strongly toward my culture and religion," he says. Today, apart from his day job as chief of cardiovascular surgery at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, Dr Maharajh does double duty as a Hindu priest.

Hinduism's belief system is as different from Judeo-Christianity's as Trinidad is from Canada, he explains. "We start off as part of the master soul, being a divine spark from that master soul," explains Dr Maharajh in his calm, slightly accented, voice. "Then we take up existence on the earth, go through various lifetimes and experiences and sully our soul until eventually we will cleanse it and make it fit to return for union again with the master soul."

You might say spirituality was Dr Maharajh's destiny. He was born a Brahman, the priest caste in the Hindu faith; his father is also a priest and trained him. "You're not obligated to be a priest if you're born a Brahman," he says. "But if you accept that you're born into a particular caste because you're imbued with subtle tendencies, then fulfilling the duties of that station creates greater accord and harmony."

PART-TIME PUNDIT
There are two kinds of Hindu priest: a purohit, or lay priest, and a pundit, or scholarly priest. While Dr Maharajh does act as a purohit at times — "performing various religious ceremonies at people's homes to propitiate various gods and goddesses depending on what particular ailments or desires the person may have, as well as conducting ceremonies in temples" — his true calling is as a pundit. "Being a pundit really involves more discourse and dissemination of religious and spiritual philosophy found in our texts and scripture," explains Dr Maharajh. "A good pundit is infinitely patient, humble and compassionate."

He and his family — wife Chandar and two sons and a daughter — make time to get together and pray to Hanuman, the monkey god, every Tuesday night. "One of the particular aspects about Hanumanji is that he represents the paramount of humility and devotion and service," said Dr Maharajh in an episode of The Surgeons, a medical reality show he appeared in last year. It's an ethic he tries to emulate in his surgery.

GOTTA HAVE FAITH
Though Dr Maharajh's religious devotion may strike his Canadian-born colleagues as a little unusual, he insists a man of science can also be a man of the cloth — and be a better doctor for it.

"What I get out of my faith is what I call applied spirituality," he explains. "I use myself as a guinea pig, seeing how I apply these principles to my own life, and I try to get some further understanding of how things work."

He also applies spiritual principles to his work in cardiology. Operating on tiny little hearts is a stressful business, so you forgive a surgeon for the pride he or she takes in his or her successes. For Dr Maharajh that's a trap best avoided. "One of my underlying philosophies is that the source of all our troubles is the ego," he says, though he admits it's not always easy to keep one's ego in check. "Parents are very grateful, they thank you over and over and tell you you're a fantastic surgeon," he says. "Every time I hear that it's a key to remind myself 'It's not you.' As much as I can, I try to prevent that feeding my ego."

Most surgeons, he says, ignore unexplainable outcomes, disown the bad ones and take credit for the good. "We're very very greedy and like to take ownership when things do go well," he says. "And unfortunately that feeds the ego and that gets bigger and you get into more trouble and you end up with a God complex."

You'd think this attitude might make Dr Maharajh a little unpopular in the doctor's lounge, but he says he's no proselytizer. "It's more of an internal thing." Internal or external, he does think his philosophy helps him deal with his patients' outcomes — the good, the bad and the baffling — better than his colleagues.

"I'm not saying I don't do good things," he says. "It's more a matter of perspective. I'm actually privileged to be here — I'm just as privileged as the patient. I was brought here for a particular reason. That's my blessing."

STARCROSSED LOVERS
Dr Maharajh's traditional values extend even to the more romantic areas of his life. His marriage to his wife Chandar was arranged by their parents after they made sure their astrological charts matched. He already knew her brothers (he studied with her older brother and later became friends with her twin). "I met her much later, but even after that we'd just still say hello and goodbye," he recalls. "Then I met the parents and I guess they became interested in me as a prospect for her and they approached my parents." Both agreed the couple would make a good match. They had a three year engagement while he was in medical school "and then we got married."

It was far from your usual Canadian courtship, but neither partner has any regrets. "I remember her dad saying 'We realize we're in a more progressive society and we have to make allowances, so you can come down and visit her anytime,'" recalls Dr Maharajh. "So I came a few times and she would always disappear down to the basement and I'd spend the evening with her family. So we stopped doing that fairly quickly. We really got to know each other after we got married."

Additional research by Lisa Rutherford