How Aabid Surti quietly mastered art, literature, and storytelling across a remarkable six-decade career.
Inside the extraordinary journey of a nonagenarian creator turning his focus to grassroots activism.
Environment Pulse desk
In today’s day and age there are many who claim being multitaskers. There will be the others who would talk of being multifaceted. But some folks hone multiple skills very silently and make no noise about it. A bestselling novelist, a beloved comic-strip creator, an award-winning short story writer, and a door-to-door plumber’s assistant — all rolled in one. That’s Aabid Surti for you.
Born on 5 May 1935 in Vavera, a small village near Rajula in Gujarat, Surti nonagenarian is still going strong, working out of his home in Mumbai’s Mira Road. Over a span of six decades, he’s built a career that refuses to sit still — cartoonist, novelist, painter, playwright, screenwriter, journalist, and, in his later years, an environmental activist known simply as the “Water Warrior.”
A Childhood Shaped by Hardship
Born to a Gujarati Muslim family, Surti is son of Gulam Hussain and Sakina Begum. He nearly drowned at age five during a flood on the Tapti River — an early brush with water that, decades later, would take on an almost poetic significance.
Settled in Mumbai, where Surti grew up in Dongri, a neighborhood better known at the time for its underworld connections than for producing artists.
Tightfisted with money, Surti spoke about the daily struggle of queuing at community taps just to get enough water for the household — a memory that would quietly shape the second half of his life.
An alumnus of the prestigious Sir J.J. School of Art, earning a diploma, and found early inspiration in the writing of Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay. In 1965, he married Masooma Begum, and the couple went on to have two sons.
His entry into cartooning came almost by accident — a stray page of a Mickey Mouse comic, tossed aside by a World War II soldier, caught his attention as a child and stuck with him. His writing career meanwhile was born out of heartbreak: a failed first love pushed him to write his debut story, published in Gujarati as Tootela Farishta (Fallen Angels) in 1965.
A Career That Wouldn’t Be Boxed In
As a cartoonist, Surti created Dabbuji (also known as Dhabbuji), a gentle, bumbling everyman character who ran in Dharmyug magazine for more than 30 years — one of the longest-running comic strips in India, with fans that reportedly included Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Asha Bhosle, and Osho.
He also co-created Bahadur, widely considered India’s first comic-book superhero, published through Indrajal Comics starting in the late 1970s, along with a roster of other characters including Inspector Azad and Inspector Vikram. His contribution to the medium earned him a Lifetime Achievement Award at Comic Con India in 2015, and many consider him one of the founding figures of Indian comics.
But comics were only part of the picture. Surti has written more than 80 books — roughly 45 novels, 10 short-story collections, seven plays, along with children’s books, travelogues, and satirical writing across Gujarati, Hindi, and occasionally English.
His 1975 novel The Black Book, a fictional reimagining of the Devil’s Bible, stirred enough controversy to earn him comparisons to Salman Rushdie; it was later translated into multiple languages and named Book of the Year in Kannada.
His autobiographical work Musalman revisits his Dongri childhood, while Sufi traces the diverging paths of his own life and a childhood friend who ended up in the criminal underworld. Teesri Aankh, a short-story collection, won him a National Award.
He’s also painted — holding somewhere between 15 and 16 solo exhibitions in India and abroad — and pioneered a technique called “mirror collage” that drew acclaim in Japan. His creative process was even the subject of a government-commissioned short film, Abid, directed by Pramod Pati in 1971. Along the way, he’s worked in journalism, written for filmmakers like Raj Khosla and Raj Kapoor, and penned plays including the comedy He is Radha.
Turning Memory Into Mission
It was in 2007, during the International Year of Water, that Surti’s early memories of water scarcity resurfaced in a new form. Watching a tap drip at home, he found himself thinking back to his childhood in Dongri — and decided to do something about it. He founded the Drop Dead Foundation, built around a simple, blunt slogan: “Save every drop or drop dead.”
What followed wasn’t a large organization with staff and funding rounds — it was essentially one man and a plumber. Every Sunday, after spending the week arranging permissions with local residents, Surti heads out into Mumbai’s suburbs, particularly around Mira Road, going door to door to fix leaking taps free of charge, replacing worn washers and O-rings himself. He’s visited thousands of homes over the years, largely funding the work out of his own pocket through prize money and donations — including support tied to his appearance on Kaun Banega Crorepati, backed by Amitabh Bachchan. Estimates of the water saved through his efforts run past 20 million liters, with some accounts placing the cumulative figure even higher.
Remarkably, he’s kept this up well into his 90s — and he’s said more than once that this quiet, unglamorous work ranks among the achievements he’s proudest of.
A Life of Recognition
Surti’s contributions haven’t gone unnoticed. He won a National Award in 1993 for Teesri Aankh, along with the Hindi Sahitya Sanstha Award, the Gujarat Gaurav honor, the Dharamvir Bharati Award, and recognition for his children’s literature. His environmental work has been honored too, including the Rotary Club of Bombay’s Taru Lalvani Award, alongside lifetime achievement recognition for his contributions to comics and animation. He’s also made television appearances and given talks, including a TEDx address.
Taken together, Aabid Surti’s life reads less like a single career and more like several — a childhood of poverty in Dongri that gave way to literary acclaim, iconic contributions to Indian pop culture, and a form of quiet, hands-on activism that continues, tap by tap, into his tenth decade.
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