We are searching for the city's Greatest Glaswegian. Take a look at two of our contenders.

Dr Anne Gilmore

IT WAS one woman’s dream to bring a modern hospice to the city of Glasgow.

Dr Anne Gilmore, a former Evening Times’ Scotswoman of the Year, set the wheels in motion for the creation of the Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice.

The charity has played a role in thousands of lives and last year saw it mark a new milestone when it moved to a purpose built site at Bellahouston Park, a campaign supported by the Evening Times and its readers.

The hospice was initially four townhouses on the banks of the River Clyde at Carlton Place providing specialist palliative care for people with life-limiting illnesses, but also a place where life is celebrated.

It was born from an idea of Dr Gilmore OBE, the late Glasgow GP.

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Dr Gilmore, from Knightswood, studied medicine at Glasgow University and pursued a career in geriatrics. She became a consultant to the World Health Organisation, president of the British Society of Gerontology and president of the British Society of Thanatology.

She saw caring methods used in other countries to look after the terminally ill and wanted to introduce a modern hospice for the people of Glasgow.

In 1980, after hearing Dr Gilmore’s thoughts on terminal care through a neighbour, staff at Black and White Whisky presented her with a sum of £4000 and a charitable trust was set up.

Morag Cunningham, former director of fundraising and communications, described her as having the vision that Glasgow needed somewhere for people to come when they were dying, to have dignity and to be pain free.

The hospice was given as a wedding present to Charles and Diana from the people of Glasgow in 1981 and in 1982 Billy Connolly cycled from London to Glasgow to publicise it as part of the ongoing fundraising efforts.

The buildings were acquired in 1984 and a year later, a volunteer-manned telephone support line was set up. Day services were added in 1986, as were out-patient and home care services in 1987. The in-patient unit was created in 2002. Now, it is a world-class centre for palliative care.

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Talking to the Evening times in 1987, Dr Gilmore, who died in 1998, aged 63 from cancer, said: “The aim at all times is to enhance the quality of life. It is separate from mainstream medicine.

“The building itself is part of the therapy. We wanted to avoid a white, clinical, institutional place and create instead a friendly informal environment where people could feel relaxed and comfortable in order to promote a certain ambience and joy.”

Charan Gill

CHARAN Gill, the man dubbed Scotland’s Curry King, went from waiting tables to running a multi-million restaurant empire.

Born in India’s Punjab region, Charan arrived in Glasgow in 1963 when he was nine.

The bus conductor’s son went against his teacher’s advice, he left school in 1969 at the age of 16 and took a job at Yarrow’s Shipyard on the Clyde as a turner and fitter. While he enjoyed the work, but in 1974 a chance encounter with an old friend, Gurmail Dhillon, who ran the Ashoka Indian restaurant on Glasgow’s Argyle Street, changed his life.

He later took a controlling share in the restaurant and from there, his entrepreneurial spark was lit.

He grew what became Harlequin Leisure Group into the largest Indian restaurant chain in the country. Four years after selling up, he launched the Slumdog chain, but shortly afterwards handed over the operations to another company.

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In 2018, he announced the sale of his final restaurant property, bringing the curtain down on a colourful career which saw him build up the Ashoka restaurant chain before selling it for £8m in 2005 and embarking on a host of smaller ventures.

Speaking to our sister paper The Herald last year, when asked if the sale marked his official retirement from the business world, Charan said he had “almost” been retired since the sale of his Harlequin Restaurant Group to his friend Sanjay Majhu. Of that sale, he said the timing was “lucky” given it came two years before the financial crash.

He said his drive to make more money was diminished.

“My obsession [with business] ended many years ago. I realised when I sold Ashoka that I would not do anything significant after that. I’d maybe potter about in business, but over the last five or six years I’ve seen a major shift in my personal way of life and the way I want to live my life.”

In 2015, Mr Gill began to unwind his interests and sell his property portfolio. Now 64 Mr Gill, who has sung in a Bhangra band for man years, said life was about the simple pleasures. “It’s all about family, the grandkids, a bit of travelling, friends and music and dance,” he said.

This philosophy came after a trip to India which became something of a spiritual awakening for Mr Gill. Having studied the Brahma Kumaris movement, Mr Gill meditates daily, and has given up alcohol and meat.

“You start to discover yourself, the real beauty of life when you get the chance to get away from the buzz,” he says. “We start to live this life that people expect us to live and then you realise you’re not actually doing it for yourself, and it’s about trying to unfold that image.”

While Mr Gill acknowledges he is one of just a few people who can afford to not work, he says: “We’re stuck in a system. This is the society we live in, we have very little choice but to work and pay our way because the system that has been created and the one in which we’re bringing up the next generation is to say you need to earn, that’s the only way to live. It didn’t have to be that way, there are plenty of societies living without a monetary system, but we have one so we must live within it.”

Of his five children, three own their business, one works with children from difficult backgrounds, and his only son is a former engineer who now teaches yoga.

And he said he was not encouraging his grandchildren to follow in the entrepreneurial footsteps, instead he is looking forward to seeing what path they choose to follow themselves.

“I’m glad to say that things are okay. I’ve earned enough, I’ve worked hard enough that I can retire now and do the things I want to do. I don’t need a lot to live.”