Mr. Himmatmal Mardia hailing from Jodhpur, Rajasthan was born on 4th November 1931. Educated and brought up in Jodhpur and after completing B.Sc there, he came to Chennai and joined B.L. in Madras Law College. He started practicing law in 1955 and from that day onwards he took up social service also as his motto in life.
Right from the day he started practicing law, he took it upon himself to give honorary services and legal advice to all religious institutions, be it Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh or Jain, educational institutions, any poor or less fortunate people and in these 50 years he has served innumerable such institutions and people and continues to do so even today.
He has contributed to society on social, educational, religious and family front through publications of his articles in various national and religious newspapers, magazines and periodicals.
Being in the forefront of the society, and serving the society for last many decades, a few years ago he has started a unique and commendable service by way of “Family Counseling” especially for uniting the families where husband wife or father- son or mother in law- daughter in law have differences and are living separately. Till date he has united about 125 families through counseling who had differences between them.
For the last 8 years he has devoted himself fully to free social, educational, religious and family advice and devotes about 10-12 hours a day only for this apart from being a successful lawyer.
The Rotary Consumer Guidance Cell, of which he is the President since 1994, is place where a common man is given free advice on how to get his defective item either repaired or replaced by the seller even if the seller is a small shop, mega store or the Government itself.
800 out of more than 1000 cases of deficiency in services / products have been solved by the Cell to customer’s fullest satisfaction just by writing a letter to seller. Through this work, Consumers are more aware of Consumer Rights than ever before and the consumer movement is spreading fast in the society.
In Hindi, “Himmat” means courage & Mr. Himmatmal Mardia, true to his name, showed exemplary courage and valor in saving the lives and properties of about 350 people. During 1990, when on a pilgrimage along with his wife and about 350 other people, their convoy was attacked by a group of armed dacoits. In a bid to save the lives and propertised of his co-passengers, he, at the age of 59, fought with dacoits all alone and in the process was shot by the dacoits with the intention to kill. But God was on his side and though seriously injured, he battled all odds and survived and in the process saved all his co-passengers. This act of valor was reported in all national and regional dailies at that time.
Mr. Himmatmal Mardia, even now at age when most of the people retire and are at home, works about 10-12 hours a day and continues to inspire other people to join him and to give back to society what they have got and being getting all through their life.