Why I will miss Aaj Tak's 'stings man' Akshay Singh

"Get married, you are getting older. You won't find a girl later". These were the words I would tell the dimpled livewire Akshay Singh frequently. A storyteller and a charmer, Akshay, like me, was a Cancerian, something that made me believe he was one of my kind.

Unfortunately, innumerable plans of going for beer and chai would remain unaccomplished. As he departed forever, while on his professional mission, I feel a loss and nostalgia. The moments spent with him are rushing back - all those moments from a seven-year-old association.

I met him for the first time in 2009 when I joined Zee Business. I found him to be a highly self-respecting man. He had an air of silent pragmatism and the caution of an eagle. He knew how to stay unblemished, just like every good reporter.

I remember many a conversation with him, mostly as we walked past each other in office. He was a man who could get work done by hook or crook. No wonder he was the "stings" man at Aaj Tak.

I remember him giving me a ride in his car while he was still at Zee Business. After a long wait for him to depart, I would call and lash out at him. "It's been so long. Can you please stop playing hide and seek? Phone bhi nahi uthana. Hadd ho gayi".

And he would drop me far ahead of my destination to compensate for the time lost. He would also enquire about my elder sister in Bollywood and tell me what an idiot I was for coming back from the UK after my postgraduation.

"If you had left why did you come back? Can't you see your own good? And then you came back to the same profession, media? Back to square one! How stupid!" He had his own ways of being your well-wisher.

We crossed paths again at the India Today Group after a gap of two years. He was with Aaj Tak and I, with India Today TV. He was a special investigation team reporter.

"What do you do here?"

"I do stings."

"Aren't you scared? Somebody will catch you someday."

"No. Nothing happens."

And he would brush aside my concerns as if a juvenile was asking naive questions to a master.

Of late, he had been kinder to me. Age had made him mature, wiser. Not that he wasn't his flamboyant self but he wasn't as critical of me as he had been earlier. Rather he would criticise me mildly, with little more affection.

Just two days before his 38th birthday on July 1, I was sitting on his desk and cribbing about shift change, and the sunlight falling on my desk was not letting me work. He heard me out patiently and again lectured me that I was an idiot for coming back from London.

"Why did you come back? If I were you I would have done the most menial job but wouldn't have come back."

"I didn't have money for visa and I didn't want to ask (my) parents. Plus it was cold."

"Bullshit. I haven't seen anyone more foolish than you." And in a five-minute conversation he made me feel like a fool for coming back from the UK. Like a convincing reporter that he was, he proved his point.

It was last Monday that our seven-year-old friendship was revived. I left his desk telling him that if I felt dazed in the sunlight on my desk again I would come back to him. Consoling me like a child, he agreed. I walked back to him within a minute. Like an affectionate old friend he said that we would go out for chai after he finished his script.

"Such a long script!" I exclaimed looking at his screen. "I can't wait. Let me know when you are done." Sulking, I came back and resumed work.

Hardly did I know that the friend I had just reclaimed was about to leave so abruptly. It seemed predestined that I would meet him just before his departure. Just when I felt that I had found someone genuinely wishing me well, he is no more. I am sad for not waiting for him last Monday!