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CHAPTER VII
RECOVERING NATIONAL SELF
FROM THE VERY beginning Devendranath was fortunate in having as his collaborators some of the best and most gifted men of his time. Indeed he had the capacity of choosing the right type of men to help him in his work for his country. Some of these are distinguished figures in the early history of the Indian renaissance. In fact, it is they who along with their leader initiated the movement for the recovery of the national self. When Devendranath started the Tattwabodhini Patrika he appointed Akshaykumar Datta (1820-1886) its Editor, and this he did because the latter, though a rationalist, was a man of exceptional intellectual honesty and rare literary gifts. His was a European mind, analytical and positivistic, not without a strain of agnosticism in it to which he leaned later, after having been a Brahmo in his earlier days. He was indeed a 'Representative Man' of that age of Reason combining in him the Positivism and Humanism of Auguste Comte, the Utilitarianism or Universalistic Hedonism of John Stuart Mill, and the Agnosticism of Herbert Spencer, all these finding expression in his fervent love for his motherland for which he lived and worked with all the intensity of his mind and heart. Akshaykumar was the first in those days to write from a scientific standpoint and on scientific subjects and the excellence of his writings attracted all classes of readers, so much so that despite his differences with Akshaykumar on many important points, Devendranath, a generous and kind soul, allowed him to continue as Editor of the paper. The main theme of his writings was man's relationship with external nature, which was the title of a book of his, based on George Coombe's Constitution of Man. A contemporary periodical said that Akshaykumar was Indianising European science' and that It is doubtful if any other writer has yet been able to mould the thoughts and tendencies of Bengali youths to the extent he has done'. The range of his writings included also school books. For all his rationalism, Akshaykumar was so much interested in the religious sects of India that he devoted years of strenuous labour to the completion of his monumental work entitled Bharatvarshiya Upasak Sampradaya (Denominations of Worshippers in India) containing an elaborate account of the Hindu religious sects and denominations. The work, remarkable for learning and exposition, was based on Horace Hayman Wilson's Religious Sects of the Hindus, but substantially amended and enlarged, more than half the work being the results of Akshaykumar's own investigations. It is believed that in course of writing or after finishing it, he developed his faith in Divine Providence.
Another literary stalwart of the time was Iswarchandra Vidyasagar (i 820-1891) born in the same year as Akshaykumar. Vidyasagar was his academic title, his brahmana surname being Bandyopadhyaya. He was Secretary of Devendranath's Tattwabodhini Sabha. While Akshaykumar drew upon the scientific and philosophical lore of the West and expressed and interpreted those ideas in a Bengali of surpassing clarity, vigour and force, Vidyasagar's source was Sanskrit, Hindi and English literatures and the style he evolved was more finished and refined. In his The Literature of Bengal R. C. Dutt says : 'Akshaykumar's style reflects the true patriot and the earnest, enthusiastic reformer... In Vidyasagar's style we admire the placid stillness and soft beauty of a quiet lake, reflecting on its bosom the gorgeous tints of the sky and the surrounding objects. In Akshaykumar's style we admire the vehemence and force of the mountain torrent in its wild rugged beauty... Modern Bengali prose as we understand it, has been shaped by these twin workers whose memory will be long preserved in Bengal.' Vidyasagar, said Poet Tagore, was the first true literary artist in Bengali. He is regarded as the father of Bengali prose.
There was on these two as also on later makers of Bengali literature an unmistakable influence of Western ideas, a study of which was part of their training in those days. By absorbing such influences from outside and giving them a new expression these writers proved their originality and creative power and because of this their works remained a sustaining force in the development of Bengali literature and in the recovery of the national self.
Vidyasagar, however, has his place in history also as a social reformer, a lover of humanity, and as a promoter of education and culture. Through the persistent agitation of Rammohun and others the practice of Sati had already been 'declared illegal and punishable by the Criminal Courts'. There was now the problem of widows whose helpless plight moved Vidyasagar so much that he took a vow to ameliorate their condition. He therefore revived the Widow Remarriage Movement in Bengal as Vishnu Sastri did in Bombay. The movement however had its origin in earlier times. Raja Rajballabh of Dacca was perhaps the first to have it approved by the learned Sanskrit scholars of both northern and southern India. This was in 1756. Rammohun's efforts in this direction have been already referred to. An Andhra brahmana published a pamphlet on it in 1837. Progressive periodicals had been bringing out articles advocating the remarriage of widows. But Vidyasagar's was the most vehement campaign undaunted by the opposition of Hindu orthodoxy. And it was in 1856 that his earnest efforts were crowned with success, the Government legalising the remarriage of widows by an Act. About the same year there was almost a crusade against polygamy in Bengal in which Vidyasagar took a prominent part. But this movement came to nothing.
Female education was another important matter that attracted the attention of the leaders of the Indian renaissance. Like English education the introduction of this also owed much to the efforts of the Christian missionaries, who were the first to start schools for the education of Indian girls. But these schools a number of which were opened in Calcutta and in a few important towns of Bengal, Madras and Bombay, were generally attended by girls of lower ranks of society. It was in 1849 that through the efforts of Iswarchandra Vidyasagar and J. E. Drinkwater Bethune, the then Legal Member of the Governor-General's Council and a promoter of Bengali language, there was established in Calcutta Hindu Balika Vidyalaya, 'the first separate school for instruction of girls of high class Hindus'. This was followed by the opening of a number of such schools in several towns of Bengal. In this venture also Vidyasagar had to encounter much opposition from the conservative Hindus. For the education not of girls alone, but of boys too, he started one school after another in Calcutta and other districts of Bengal, and himself wrote and published a large number of text-books for them. These Bengali text-books were the first of the kind, beginning with the very primer which is still in use along with his most popular series of Sanskrit grammar in Bengali. That a man of vast erudition should be the first to write the primer of his own language shows how he loved the language and wanted it to grow on. Many of Vidyasagar's schools were model ones.
To Vidyasagar's original and independent mind it was quite evident that for a country to recover its self it must have an effective medium of self-expression and that it could be no other than its mother tongue. In accordance with this principle, he made Bengali the medium of instruction in the schools he started. This was in sharp contrast with the prevailing view of the so-called 'progressivists' that English was the only language worth learning. Vidyasagar was further convinced that, to use his own words, 'the creation of an enlightened Bengali literature would be possible if Sanskrit scholars well-versed in English language and literature tried to express their ideas in elegant and idiomatic Bengali, of which Bengalis having only English education were incapable'.
Vidyasagar was open to modern Western ideas then pouring in upon Bengal and his international outlook was as broad and sound as was his staunch nationalism in dress, manner and way of life.
Born of poor brahmana parents, Vidyasagar by his own efforts rose to a position of eminence equalled by none in his time. He began life as a Sanskrit teacher in the Fort William College. Later he became Principal of the Sanskrit College. The indomitable energy and ardour with which he threw himself into the cause of widow remarriage and the generosity with which he opened his purse strings for the relief of suffering humanity has made his name a household word in Bengal, nay, in India. Hundreds of poor widows lived on his charity and hundreds of helpless orphans owed him their education. One with so soft a heart had a mind hard and inflexible in matters of national honour. His sharp retorts to English critics of his simple national dress and unassuming manners bespoke his sense of national self-respect and dignity. His independence of spirit was as towering as his personality.
Like Akshaykumar, Vidyasagar also was an agnostic and a rationalist —almost typical of a section of prominent public men of the time who came obviously to fulfil a purpose of Nature in the historic evolution of India in the nineteenth century. When Sri Ramakrishna met Vidyasagar he said : 'I have been seeing so long canals, lakes and rivers, now I see the ocean', by which he meant, as the name signifies, the ocean of culture and kindness that was Vidyasagar. Michael Madhusudan Dutt sums him up in a memorable phrase : 'Vidyasagar has the heart of a Bengali mother, the genius and wisdom of an ancient sage, the energy of an Englishman'. Who but such a one could give Indians that light of knowledge and strength of character which they needed most in those days in order to be themselves again ? This 'intellectual dictator of Bengal', as Sri Aurobindo called Vidyasagar, dominated the mind of his race and gave to it the stamp of his puissant intellect that energised the mind of Bengal into those virile creative expressions which characterised her later cultural history.
Vidyasagar's namesake with a different surname was another remarkable figure in Devendranath's Tattwabodhini group. Iswarchandra Gupta (1812-1857), famed as a poet and writer of striking originality, voiced the soul of Bengal in all the sweetness and pathos of his poetic self at that critical hour of her history. Both in language and in idea his was pure Bengali poetry unsophisticated by any extraneous influence. Bankimchandra said that the famous poets who followed Iswar Gupta were all products of English education but he was an out-an-out Bengali with the heart of intuition which characterises the race. A man of inward perceptions, Iswar Gupta sang of the truth of Bengal both in her greatness and in her degradation under the impact of foreign ideas. It is possible that to his association with the Tattwabodhini Sabha he owed much of his national idealism that reflected itself in his writings in a Sambad Prabhakar. He founded the first Bengali daily and he edited it with such ability that it soon grew into a source of literary and cultural inspiration to the youths of the time including the great Bankimchandra himself. Iswar Gupta's love of country was not, however, confined to Bengal alone. In his paper he used always to give a proper place to matters relating to different regions of India. In one of his poems he addresses India as the Mother—and he was the first in modern times to call her Mother—asking her to say how long her children would remain in ignorance of their ancient heritage. In one of his lectures he said : 'When our country was free, when we were under our own rulers, how world-wide was the glory of the Hindus ! Ours is the most ancient country, ours the most ancient civilisation. It was from this country that originated various branches of learning including those of science, which widen the frontiers of knowledge. When great men of our country came to cultivate and develop them, the other parts of the globe were lost in primeval darkness.' Here is another voice given, in 1848, to the growing aspiration for national freedom.
Among the Tattwabodhini group was another remarkable figure Rajendralal Mitra (1822-1891), the pioneer Indian antiquarian of international fame, who inaugurated Indian historical scholarship and made invaluable contributions towards the recovery of India's past. He joined the Asiatic Society as Assistant Secretary, and was later elected its President, perhaps the greatest honour for an Indian scholar of the time. He knew a dozen languages and wrote about fifty books on subjects of history, culture and philosophy, the most important of these being Antiquities of Orissa, Bodh-Gaya and Indo-Aryans. His researches in Vedic and post-Vedic culture yet retain their many original points. Bengali language and culture received his particular attention. He started a Bengali literary society, called Saraswat Samaj, the first academy of Bengali literature, whose aim was to bring together the literary men of the country. He coined technical terms, drew up maps in Bengali, wrote text-books for children on history, geography and general knowledge.
In 1875 the University of Calcutta was given the power to confer the Degree of Doctor of Laws on distinguished citizens for their scholarship. Rajendralal was the first recipient of this honour next year. In the course of his Convocation Address Vice-Chancellor Arthur Hobehouse said : 'There is no European Society of Oriental scholars to whom Rajendralal is not honourably known, and there are many who have been glad to admit him as a member and a colleague. He has thrown light on many a dark comer of the history, antiquities and language of this country.' Max Mueller said of him : 'Our Sanskrit scholars in Europe will have to pull hard, if, with such men as Babu Rajendralal in the field, they are not to be distanced in the race of scholarship.'
Rajendralal was an active member of the British India Association almost from its start and helped forward its cause—the political advancement of the country. He was also associated with the Indian National Congress from its very beginning. As Chairman of the Reception Committee of its second session in Calcutta in 1886, Rajendralal delivered a fine speech in which explaining the main object of the Congress he said : 'It has been the dream of my life that the scattered units of my race may some day coalesce and come together; that instead of living merely as individuals we may some day so combine as to be able to five as a nation. In this meeting I behold the commencement of such coalescence... I behold in this Congress the dawn of a better and happier day for India.'
In his youth Rabindranath used often to meet 'this great personality of the nineteenth century'. Giving his impressions the Poet wrote : 'Rajendralal was a versatile genius. He was an academy in himself... I have met many Bengali men of letters in my time but none who left the impression of such brilliance. He was not only a profound scholar, but had likewise a striking personality which shone through his features... In his public life he was full of fire.'
References have already been made to Rajnarayan Basu's (1826-1899) eminent and whole-hearted collaboration with Devendranath as an authentic exponent of the aims and ideals of the Brahmo Samaj. A tract of his on this subject was characterised by Rev. Charles Voywey as 'magnificently true and wise'. A most important point in this exposition was what he said about the relation of the Samaj to Hinduism to which cause he rendered signal service in those days of open and blatant denunciation of this oldest religion of the world. The discourses of Rajnarayan and Devendranath on the truths of Vedanta and Hinduism did on the one hand give a setback to the proselytising campaign of the Christian missionaries, and on the other, raise the status of the Samaj in the estimation of the Hindus themselves. When due to Keshubchandra's objection the word 'Hindu' was deleted from the Marriage Act, Rajanarayan made a fervent speech on the superiority of Hinduism in which his principal arguments were: 'That Hinduism is superior to all other religions, because it owes its name to no man; because it acknowledges no mediator between God and man; because the Hindu worships God as the Soul of the soul and can worship in every act of life—in business, in pleasure and in social intercourse; because while other scriptures inculcate worship for the rewards it may bring or the punishment it may avert, the Hindu is taught to worship God and practise virtue for the love of God and of virtue alone; because, being unsectarian and believing in the good of all religions, Hindusim is non-proselytising and tolerant as it also is devotional to the entire abstraction of the mind from time and sense, and possesses an antiquity which carries it back to the fountainhead of all thought.'
This devoted champion of true Hinduism was in his youth a student of the Hindu College and developed, as was the wont with the products of that institution, those habits and views for which the new intoxication of the West was solely responsible. He says in his autobiography that his faith in Hinduism was shaken. He adopted Unitarian Christianity, and afterwards showed Islamic leanings. The study of Hume made him an agnostic. All this happened before he was nineteen, at which age he met Devendranath whose words on Brahmo Dharma converted him to it. And he remained a Brahmo all his life.
Rajanarayan's public life was indeed a chequered one. Besides taking an active part in the social, educational and other reform movements of the time he himself was the founder of several institutions whose ideologies, conceived by him, were not only original but significant for the future progress of Bengal and the whole of India. A master of English, he made no inconsiderable contribution to the development of Bengali. In a remarkable lecture on the cultivation of Bengali language he said : 'National progress depends much on national literature. And there can be no advancement of national literature without the development of national language. After fifty years of English training, should we yet depend on it for the acquisition of knowledge ?' Rajnarayan cited instances from history to show how the most glorious periods in many a people's history have been those that saw the rise and growth of their native tongues. The lecture was a vigorous plea for the cultivation of Bengali and other Indian languages by those who speak them.
Rajnarayan chose teaching as his profession. And he was a teacher in the highest sense of the word. Hundreds of youths profited by his ennobling influence, hundreds of them were inspired by his example of plain living and high thinking. From his own experience he knew what an evil drinking was. He started a society for the prevention of drinking. In order to counteract this evil and the denationalising trends and effects of English education he drew up a most wise and momentous plan of a society called Jatiya Gaurabechchha Sancharini Sabha (Society for the promotion of national feeling among the educated youths of Bengal) the prospectus of which was published in 1861. The scheme was a positive proof of how national feeling had taken such a conscious form in the mind of a son of Bengal just a hundred years ago. It was quite evident that our nationalism could be worthwhile, if based on a profounder sense of independence, of which Rajnarayan was then dreaming. T had a wonderful dream during sleep,' says he, 'it looked as if our country had become free and the English had left.' To quote him again, 'Of all services dear to God, the service of the country is the highest.' 'More glorious than heaven are mother and motherland'... 'India is our motherland. We will serve her even at the cost of our life. We will join hands with Muslims and other Indians as far as possible in politics and other matters. We will inspire the whole race to recover the same high state in body, mind, society, religion, customs, morals, arts, sciences as it had in ancient India; we will inspire it to rise even to a higher than the highest state in the past.'
Rajnarayan's plan suggested how this splendid vision could be realised. Here is the outline in his own words : 'The Nationality Promotion Society shall, first, revive the national gymnastic exercises, establish gymnasia in most important places of Bengal where Hindu gymnastics were taught, publish tracts on the importance of physical education citing historical evidence of the military prowess of the ancient Bengalees, improve the present weak and innutritious diet of the Bengalee; establish a Model School for imparting instruction in Hindu music and a school of Hindu Medicine where Hindu Materia Medica will be taught; publish in Bengalee the results of the researches of Sanskrit scholars of Europe in Indian antiquities giving special prominence to the prosperity and glory of ancient India, physical, intellectual, moral, social, political, literary and scientific; encourage the cultivation of Sanskrit; make it binding upon its members to ground the knowledge of their sons in their mother tongue before giving them an English education, and to correspond with each other in Bengalee, to conduct in that language all meetings which are attended by Bengalees only; publish tracts giving examples from ancient Indian history of female education, personal liberty of females, marriage by election of the bride, marriage at adult age, widow marriage, intermarriage, and voyage to distant countries; prevent drinking and other evil foreign habits; introduce such foreign customs as have a tendency to infuse national feeling into its members. In fine, the main object of the Nationality Promotion Society would be to promote and foster national feelings which would lead to the formation of a national character and thereby to the eventual promotion of the prosperity of the nation.'
Within a year of the publication of this prospectus Navagopal Mitra, Editor, National Paper, brought into being the Jatiya Mela (National Gathering or Conference) with a view to giving effect to the aims set forth in the prospectus. The Working Committee of this Mela was called the National Society or National Council. Says Rajnarayan in his autobiography : 'Sri Navagopal Mitra has told me that it was on reading my prospectus of a Society for the promotion of national glory he formed the idea of the Jatiya Mela. After organising this Mela Sri Mitra set up a national council in order to supervise it. This council was formed on the model suggested in my scheme.' 1
Thus Rajnarayan was the first to see the basic truth of Indian nationalism and reveal it to his countrymen in all its varied aspects for each of which he gave in the prospectus his cogent arguments. No wonder that he should be called a Rishi, Seer. Behind this vision of his there was his inner perception of the spirit of Aryan culture, that gave to Rajnarayan's life and work their meaning and intention. None loved his country more, none knew it better. Indeed love of country was the very passion of his soul and this he wanted to inspire in others so that they might dedicate themselves to the cause of India's uplift, her decline being for Rajnarayan the deepest concern of his life. Therefore did he make a cult of his idea of nationalism and initiate others into it. With the help of Jyotirindra, an elder brother of Rabindranath, who was then and ever afterwards an active and enthusiastic supporter of all national movements, Rajnarayan started in 1878 a secret society called Sanjivani Sabha (Life-giving Society) in a deserted house in north Calcutta with himself as Chief and Jyotirindra as Organiser. On a table in a dark room of that house was placed a copy of the Rigveda wrapped in silk. On both sides of the table were two human skulls in the two eye-sockets of which were fixed two burning candles. The lifeless skull symbolised lifeless India. The burning candles signified the necessity of India's revival and the restoration of her ancient eye of knowledge. When a new aspirant sought initiation the Chief would appear in sacred red silk and administer to him the oath. Then he would have to sign his name in the blood drawn from his breast with the point of a sword.
The Sabha's work started with the singing in chorus of the Rigvedic hymn : 'Join together, speak one word, let your minds arrive at one knowledge even as the ancient gods arriving at one knowledge partake each of his own portion.' All works of national welfare, all activities for national progress formed principal part of the Sabha's programme. The promotion of indigenous industries was one of its special aims. Many were the rules of the Sabha, the most binding being mantra gupti, vow of silence or keeping counsel, that is to say, whatever was said or done or heard in the Sabha had to be kept a dead secret. Nobody had the right to disclose it to any non-member. Says Rabindranath in his autobiography : 'Even a callow youth like me was a member of the Sabha. In its tense atmosphere we felt as if we were all the time soaring about in frenzied enthusiasm. No inferiority complex, no fear, no shrinking, nothing of the sort. Our main business in this Sabha was to breath? in the flaming spirit of enthusiasm.' There is a view that one of its secret aims was the recovery of India's past greatness as a free country and that it was the first seed or incipient stage of the future secret revolutionary organisations that Rajnarayan's grandson (from his daughter's side) Sri Aurobindo set up in the country about two decades later. That he might have inherited a revolutionary element in his blood both from his father's and mother's side can be seen in the fact that Sri Aurobindo went to England at seven and returned to India at twenty-one, and that though out of touch with parents and relations during this long period, he was connected with a secret society 'Lotus and Dagger' in England and gave fiery speeches in the Indian Majlis at Cambridge in which he would often refer to his plan of armed rebellion in India for achieving her freedom.
Another important scheme of Rajnarayan was that of Maha Hindu Samiti which he outlined in his paper 'The Old Hindu's Hope', the last testament of, as he was rightly called, 'the Grandfather of Indian Nationalism'. Besides being an elaboration of some of the items of his prospectus of the Nationality Promotion Society, it laid special emphasis on religion as the basis of Indian life. 'Its objects,' says Rajnarayan, 'will be to maintain Hindu religious rights and possessions, to awaken Hindu national feeling and generally to improve the condition of the Hindu race... In India poverty is daily on the increase. Even a Government member (Sir W. W. Hunter) has himself admitted that out of her twenty-five crores, five crores remain half-fed. Our everyday necessaries, even the trifle of a matchbox, have to be imported from England. The fertility of India's soil is declining. Had we our own Government, this sorry state of things could be mended. As there is none, the combined effort of the people should remedy it... Any association for the improvement of the Hindus should have a religious basis, for the Hindus are a religious people. It is no exaggeration to say that the Hindu takes his walk, goes to sleep in accordance with the injunctions of his religion, starts a letter with the name of God, remembers Him when going out. What other race on earth is so religious as this ?... This is why the All-India Hindu Association has been based on religion. This is why the rule has been made that the Sabha will start work with a hymn to God and observe the rites of worship followed from Cape Comorin to Himalaya. We assemble here for the good of Mother India. What religious act is superior to this ?... Those who worship the Supreme Being or any god or goddess as the Supreme Being are Hindus... The creeds of Hinduism are different but Hinduism is one... By gradual development Hinduism has arrived at a form that can be called fully universal.'
Has there ever been a better definition of Hinduism as a religion of patriotism ? In his autobiography Rajnarayan says that as a result of the wider publicity given to the above scheme many scattered Hindu Sabhas in Bengal offered to unite themselves with those of northern India into an all-India organisation some form of which was the Bharat Dharma Mahamandal. Three years after the publication of this scheme, the Indian Mirror, in its issue of 8 August 1889, wrote : 'The scheme is exceedingly solemn in its character and catholic in its spirit... Patriotism of the highest type pervades every syllable of the old man's thoughts and utterances, and all who have the nation's good at heart would do well to consider the practicability of the proposal, which, if successfully carried out, is calculated to work a revolution in the temporal and spiritual economy of the Aryan nation.'
But of far deeper significance for the future of Indian nationalism was the form given by Navagopal Mitra to Rajnarayan's plan of the Nationality Promotion Society on the lines of which Navagopal organised the Jatiya Mela (National Gathering) and the National Society already referred to. In all these activities Navagopal had the fullest support of Maharshi Devendranath Tagore whose sons Dwijendranath, Satyendranath, Jyotirindranath, Rabindranath, and nephew Ganendranath, were among their chief patrons and promoters along with the well-known poet Monomohon Basu, the famous publicist Shishirkumar Ghosh, Raja Kamalkrishna and Raja Chandranath Roy. The story is indeed a wonderful one of how Navagopal with his indefatigable zeal translated the idea into an organisation for fostering the growth of national unity, national feeling and national literature, for inspiring in the Bengalis a patriotic fervour, and for preparing them for their part in the later efforts of India as a whole towards the social, political and cultural advancement of the whole country. The most glorious and effective of these nation-wide endeavours was the Swadeshi movement inspired among others by the teachings of Swami Vivekananda and the mantra of Bande Mataram of which Bankimchandra was the seer, and Sri Aurobindo the high-priest.
There is evidence that by the expression 'countrymen' the organisers of the National Gathering meant Indians, not Bengalis alone, and their conception was of a pan-Indian nation, references to which are there in the autobiographies both of the Master-Poet Rabindranath and the Master-Artist Abanindranath.
Some effect to his scheme Rajnarayan himself had already given in Midnapur by establishing a Brahmo School, a debating club, a mutual improvement society, societies for the promotion of knowledge, for the realisation of national glory and many other kindred institutions. In these many of the local people would join and profit by their activities and by the illuminating prayers of deep import led by Rajnarayan. It seems there was an undercurrent of national feeling in the mind and heart of Bengal awaiting its propitious hour of outbreak for its truth to be uttered and a form given to it. Rajnarayan uttered the truth and gave the form. He discovered the line of India's evolution by following which she would recover herself and be reborn into her nationhood and fulfil her greater role on earth. One with that line originating from India's Ancient Vision, Rajnarayan lives in history for ever. A dreamer who dreamt golden dreams, a seer who saw wonderful visions—this was Rajnarayan, every one of whose dreams and visions pointed to the future of his country, of which he was as certain as he was of the ever-creative spirit of India's great past that spurs her evolution ever onward towards a greater Future.
In a sonnet on Rajnarayan's death, Sri Aurobindo calls him 'a strong and sentient spirit', taken back into 'the omnipresent Thought' :
'...Into that splendour caught Thou hast not lost thy special brightness. Power Remains with thee and the old genial force Unseen for blinding light, not darkly lurks : As when a sacred river in its course Dives into ocean, there its strength abides Not less because with vastness wed and works Unnoticed in the grandeur of the tides.'
Devendranath started The National Paper on 7 August 1865 with Navagopal as Editor and gave publicity in it to Rajnarayan's scheme of Nationality Promotion Society. Navagopal, already burning with the desire to organise a movement for the reconstruction of national life, felt inspired by the scheme when Devendranath drew his particular attention to it. The practical shape he gave to it was the Jatiya Mela (National Gathering or Conference) which had its first session in Calcutta in 1867. Rajnarayan who himself could not attend the first session sent a long poem on the ancient glory of Bengal written by his co-villagers and revised by him. He was however present at several of its subsequent sessions in one of which he spoke in glowing terms of the physical demonstration by the youths which was a special feature of the Jatiya Mela, Navagopal himself being most interested in the physical education of the youths, an item to which Rajnarayan gave the place of honour in his scheme. Because of the impetus he gave to physical culture and the pioneer work he did in reviving it, Navagopal was called 'the father of physical education in Bengal.'
Having for its principal aim the promotion of unity and self-help among Indians through the cultivation and growth of a common national consciousness, the Mela held its annual sessions for over twelve years in Calcutta and its suburbs in the Bengali month of Chaitra (March-April). Besides physical demonstration, there were exhibition of paintings and other works of art, arts and crafts including embroidery and handicrafts, agricultural and commercial products, music, lectures, popular expositions of the Puranas and the Epics, and literary gatherings where poems and papers on scientific and literary subjects of national importance were read. Scholars, artists, scientists, public and professional men used to make their whole-hearted contribution to the success of the Mela, the scope and utility of which increased with each session.
After the fourth session in 1870 there was started the Jatiya Sabha or National Society in whose monthly sittings lectures were delivered by competent persons on subjects of art, literature, philosophy, science, technology and industry suggesting how these aspects of national life could be developed for national welfare. In the fourth meeting of the National Council Rajnarayan read his famous paper Sekal ar Ekal ('Then and Now'). It was a close study and realistic picture of the conditions of Bengal before and after the introduction of English education and Western culture. In this paper, highly acclaimed by the whole country, he pointed out how the life of the nation had declined in every sphere of activity and yet how even in that state it could achieve great things, especially in religion and politics in both of which she gave a lead to the whole of India. After giving particular instances of the pioneer-work done by Bengalis in various parts of India, he said : Tf they can have done so much, how can one say that they will not do more ? Nothing is impossible for God. He can raise the low and lower the high. This Bengali race is now scorned by all; but, maybe, what this race will be able to do will be beyond any other race of India. Maybe, this weak Bengali race will one day be one of the greatest in the world. God hasten that day !' The Mela Committee announced in the fifth session that it would confer due honour on the authors of the best works in Bengali or Sanskrit provided they contained new and original ideas likely to promote the well-being of the country. The sessions of the Mela used to be attended by people from far and near including a good number of Englishmen.
The Mela soon became a powerful factor in the growth of a common national feeling which impelled the faculties of the race to burst into those noble creative endeavours whose fruits are part of modern India's glorious achievements. One such impulsion came from the national songs composed for and sung in the sessions of the Mela, the most notable of which was the one of Satyendranath Tagore, Rabindranath's elder brother. Its opening lines are :
'Let all children of Bharat tune their mind and heart to one note And sing the hymn of her glory ! Sing the victory of Bharat.'
The song gives a vivid picture of the glorious past of India. Bankimchandra was moved to give high praise to it. Another song of Ganendranath, Rabindranath's nephew and first Secretary of the Mela, begins with :
'How we blush to sing the glory of Bharat, Strangers, alas, are looting her mines of gems.'
Yet another song of Dwijendranath, Rabindranath's eldest brother and Secretary of the Mela after Ganendranath's death, opens with :
'Thy beautiful face, O Bharat, so sad ! Tears, tears, tears thou art shedding night and day. Beholding thy beauty surpassing the moon's, We would swim in seas of delight. How can we look today upon thy face so sad ! Alas, this sorrow of thine we cannot bear.'
Rabindranath, then fifteen, composed a poem called 'Bharat' and recited it in the ninth session of the Mela. He also sang a song of his own.
In the course of his stirring speech on the significance of the Mela in its second session the famous poet and playwright of the time, Manmohan Basu, visualised in the gathering a source of great rejoicing in that it had brought together children of the country, inspired by a sense of sincerity and good will, to achieve national unity which, properly nourished, would not only bring prosperity to the whole of India but culminate in her independence.1
This is the first occasion that the far-reaching significance of the National Gathering is revealed—the first occasion when from a corner of India rises the first ringing note of independence.
In his address to the sixth session after expressing his gratification at the response given by the educated middle class and the student community, Monomohon made an impassioned appeal to the aristocrats, the magnates and millionaires of the country to make love of country the light of their life. Concluding he said : 'Sleep no more the sleep of apathy and unconcern, hasten to relieve your Mother's distress. Wake up, open your eyes, arise, take the sacred vow, resolve to stand on your own legs, put on the helmet of unity, cherish hope in your breast, move out of the prison-house of self-oblivion into the vast field of action. Behold, it is Dawn ! The birds of paradise are singing songs of glory, the songs of duty, earnestness and enthusiasm, the joyous notes of victory. The blossom of the national effort of new Bengal is filling the air with its fragrance. Students, pure-hearted young hopefuls, are flocking in, group upon group. Again, look behind the trees ! The Sun of Fortune is slowly rising in his youthful apparel. Call all your brothers and show them his splendour. Thrilled by that marvellous light, let all India shout 'Victory, victory, victory !' Let the holy caves of the Himalayas send forth the echo : 'Victory, victory, victory !'
'Victory to the National Gathering ! Victory to the National Gathering ! Victory to the National Gathering !'
The poet is visualising the Mother to be.
Within five years of its inception the influence of the Mela over the national life began to be felt. The National Paper wrote in its issue of 7 August 1872 : 'A great change has taken place in the mind of the educated youths of Bengal. The tide of denationalisation has sustained an ebb. A happy reaction has taken place in native feelings. People have begun to disbelieve in the theory that for a nation's progress they have simply to learn the art of borrowing. They have firmly begun to believe in the doctrine that to secure everlasting good to themselves, they should have a basis of their own... A great movement of the National Gathering has found its footing and has roused the sleeping energies of the people and stimulated their physical activity, which has afforded an impetus to the advancement of our national art and industry and which, should God grant it a long life, will doubtless bring an incalculable amount of good to our countrymen.'
Thus did Rajnarayan's idea take root in the mind of Bengal, and nurtured by the zeal and care of Navagopal Mitra and his collaborators,
1 This and a few other facts about the Jatiya Mela are from Yogeschandra Bagal's Bengali book Jatiyatar Navamantra and Bipinchandra Pal's Bengali book Navayuger Bangla. particularly the Tagores of Jorasanko, began to materialise in what may be called the movement of the national being the signs of which were evident during the year between the ninth and tenth session of the Mela (1875-76) when Shishirkumar Ghosh, the first notable Indian publicist, and Anandamohon Basu, the first Indian Senior Wrangler of Cambridge University, started the India League as a political association, open to all, pursuing the aims and objectives of the Jatiya Mela. The other significant events of this period were the inspiring lectures on New Italy, Mazzini and the rise of the Sikhs, delivered by that fiery orator-patriot Surendranath Banerjea before the Students' Association of Anandamohon Basu. These lectures electrified the youths of Calcutta. But what added to Surendranath's glory as the first acknowledged leader of India's national movement was his foundation in 1876 of the Indian Association of Calcutta. His dismissal from the Indian Civil Service on inadequate grounds was a god-send to the country in that he who was debarred from serving the British Government in India plunged himself into the service of his country with his dynamic leadership. The Indian Association, in the words of its founder, 'was to be the centre of an all-India movement based on the conception of a united India, derived from the inspiration of Mazzini'. The inherent aim of united India of the Jatiya Mela here takes an explicit form.
Surrendranath's hour came when in 1877 the British Government reduced the age-limit of the Civil Service Examination from twenty one to nineteen. 'This was a deliberate attempt to blast the prospects of Indian candidates for the Indian Civil Service.' The Indian Association organised protest meetings in Calcutta and Surendranath led a whirlwind campaign holding similar meetings at Agra, Lahore, Amritsar, Meerut, Allahabad, Delhi, Kanpur, Lucknow, Aligarh, and Varanasi. The immediate objective of these meetings was the raising of the age-limit but 'the underlying conception,' wrote Surendranath, 'was the awakening of a spirit of unity and solidarity among the people of India'. Writing about the success of this campaign Sir Henry Cotton in his book New India said : 'The idea of any Bengali influence in the Punjab has been an incredible conception... Yet it is the case that during the past year the tour of a Bengalee lecturer lecturing in English in Upper India assumed the character of a triumphal progress; and at the present moment the name of Surendranath Banerjee excites as much enthusiasm among the rising generation of Multan as in Dacca.'
This agitation brought home to Indians belonging to various sects and communities the value of unity for the attainment of common political ends. And it was this object that was behind the creation of the Indian National Congress. When under the pressure of the Anglo-Indian protest the British Government withdrew the Ilbert Bill which proposed that the European British subjects were no longer to be tried by an Indian Judge, there arose 'a rankling sense of humiliation in the mind of educated India'. Surendranath took the lead and within a year an all-India National Fund was created and the Indian National Conference, with representatives from all parts of India, met in Calcutta in 1883.
Meanwhile, Allan Octavian Hume, a retired English civilian, conceived of 'an all-India organisation for the mental, moral, social and political regeneration of the people of India'. During his thirty years of service in India Hume had voluminous reports of 'seething revolt incubating in various parts of the country'1 the seeds of which were sown by spiritual teachers belonging to different sects. In order to keep off educated Indian youths from the influence of these 'Gurus' and also from the 'extreme' national feeling growing in the country, as noticed before, Hume hit upon the idea of setting up a 'safety valve' for such feelings of discontent, where they could discuss the problems of their country and seek solutions through constitutional means. This 'safety valve' took the form of the Indian National Congress.
But the fact is there that the ground for this Congress from the Indian side had been prepared by various public men and institutions of the time, prominent among these being Surendranath Banerjea and his Indian Association. Before the Indian National Conference, followed two years after by the first session of the Indian National Congress, the stirrings of national consciousness had been brought about in various parts of the country by such regional institutions as the British Indian Association in Bengal, Bombay Association and Poona Sarvajanik Sabha in the Western Presidency, the Native Association and the subsequent Mahajan Sabha in the Madras Presidency. The activities of these associations had helped in isolated ways in rousing national feelings, but none of them had any all-India sweep. The efforts of Devendranath Tagore to coordinate their work for united action on matters of common interest remained in the air only as a practicable idea. It was the Indian Association under the distinguished leadership of Surendranath Banerjea that envisaged national unity, and an all-India movement to promote it. As a matter of fact, the idea of national unity as an indispensable basis of national progress began to take shape when Surendranath started a country-wide propaganda for the purpose. There is therefore truth in the view that, more than any other institution of the time, it was the Indian Association that was 'the true precursor of the Indian National Congress'.
There is evidence that almost from the beginning of Muslim invasion a number of high-souled spiritual teachers of India were deeply intent on doing away with her subjection. Following their line were Swami Ram-das, the guru of Sivaji, one of the humblest and greatest of spiritual masters, and the leaders of the Sannyasi Rebellion in Bengal about a
1 Indian National Evolution by P. Rajeswara Rao in The Modern Review, November, 1957- hundred years before Hume. They are historic examples of .active moral and physical resistance to foreign rule. Sitaram Bawa's connection with the Sepoy Revolt is yet another. The Marathas and the Sikhs owe their rise, as two powerful races, to the creative force of spirituality. Guru Nanak's contribution to national regeneration, like Ramdas's, is a matter of history. Other instances of direct and indirect part of spiritual figures in the national struggle for freedom will be found in the course of later history.
In his move Hume had the support of the then Governor-General Lord Dufferin who told him that the Government would welcome such an organisation from which to ascertain the wishes of the people. Hume's idea was forthwith accepted by the progressive Indians of the time and as a result of their joint efforts there came into being the Indian National Congress, the first session of which was held in Bombay in 1885 presided over by W.C. Bormerjea. Mahadev Govind Ranade, that great Maharashtrian reformer, was one of the most prominent of the senventy-two Indians who worked with Hume and laid the foundation of the Congress. For the wise counsel he received from Ranade Hume called him his 'political guru'.
In the course of the next year the Indian National Conference having identical aims silently merged itself in the Indian National Congress— a striking testimony to the growth of a feeling of national unity in which Surendranath and before him, the Jatiya Mela or National Gathering, had the pioneering role to play.
However constitutional was their method of agitation and moderate their tone, and in the beginning it could not be otherwise, the early leaders of the Congress did have a vision of the glorious future of India which grew clearer in their consciousness with every renewal of their efforts towards the political advancement of their motherland. Presiding over the Madras session of the Congress in 1898 Anandamohan Basu, connected with the Congress from its very start, said : 'After centuries of darkness, the dawn of a better day has now opened for her, and the golden light has already begun to stream over her fair face. It depends on us, brothers and sisters, fellow-citizens of this ancient land, it depends on us, on our own sense of duty, on our spirit of loving sacrifice and earnest effort, whether the streak of that light shall broaden and grow into the lovely day. The land where, after ages, the sundered streams of Aryan life unite once again in the present day, that land, brother-delegates, deserves all our love. Love her more, cling to her the closer, for her misfortunes of the past, for the shadows and the clouds that have hung over her in the times that have gone.'
It is said that the Jatiya Mela was the first to give currency to the word 'Jatiya', national, in Bengal. And Navagopal, the founder of the Mela, was its author. All honour to this great soul of whom Monomohon, quoted before, said : ' 'National', 'national', 'national'—the word is constantly on his lips. All his actions are national. The paper he publishes is 'national'. His council, his school, his gymnasium are all 'national'. The Mela, organised by him is 'national'. All his waking hours he is occupied with matters 'national'. He is an embodiment of all that is national.'
Reference to Navagopal will remain incomplete without a reference to his Jatiya Vidyalaya or National School, started in 1872 'for the cultivation of Arts and Music, and for physical training', which was open morning and evening, and attended by a large number of students many of whom attained remarkable proficiency in the subjects taught. Surendranath Banerjea's younger brother Jitendranath, the famous physical culturist, Bipinchandra Pal, Dr Sundarimohon Das had their physical training in this school. Horse-riding is said to have been one of the items of the training.
It is possible that behind these endeavours to recover the national self in the sixties of the nineteenth century there was that historic event, the revolt of the Indian army against the British Government whose policy disturbed the political, economic, social and religious life of the people so much so that disaffection against the foreign rule began to grow 'generating fumes of discontent in different parts of the country', which in 1857 burst into a devouring flame characterised by different historians by different names,—'mutiny', 'revolt', 'rebellion', 'war of independence'. Whatever it may be, there can be no doubt that this armed uprising against the powers that be and its suppression which meant wanton slaughter of thousands of innocents, and the consequent dire distress and humiliation, could not fail to have had their psychological reaction on the mind and heart of the people. And as the reaction deepened, educated and leading Indians felt urged to unite and exert themselves towards the recovery of their life and feeling as a self-respecting nation. Generally speaking, the event of 1857 may be said to have accentuated the strivings and aspirations of the people of India which took definite form in the subsequent movements that sought to advance the cause of national reconstruction culminating in what India is today. It must however be admitted that the seed of these movements had been sown earlier and some significant sprouting also had been there.
The immense and invaluable contribution of the Tagores to these movements of the time must be acknowledged as almost a unique feature in that most of the young members of one family with Devendranath as leader took active part in them and did their share with such enthusiasm and originality as entitle them to a prominent place in the history of modern Indian renaissance. The greatest poet of modern times is not their only gift to Bengal, India and the world. Indeed Indian renaissance would not have its richness and manysidedness did not the Tagores take the initiative and do the pioneering work in almost every field of nationale activity. Many cultural, educational and public institutions of Calcutta owe their origin to the munificence and initial efforts of the Tagores. And Dwarkanath, Rabindranath's grandfather, was himself a founder of a number of them.
As seen before, the national spirit had its first votary in Devendranath whose love of his mother-tongue once made him return a letter to its writer, a new relative, for the simple reason that it was written in English. His second son Satyendranath, the first Indian member of the Indian Civil Service, is the writer of the first known national song, and also of a number of charming hymns 'containing such expressions of rapturous joy and devout hope as made their singing in the Brahmo Samaj services a most inspiring factor in its growth' during the fifties when Devendranath was the leader and Keshubchandra had just joined him. Satyendranath was the first in modern times to affirm that it was the duty of a nation to honour its women and to give them freedom and every opportunity of education. He is said to have imbibed these ideas from what he saw in England most of whose greatness, he believed, was due to her respect for women. He introduced female education in his family and his wife was the first to learn horse-riding and popularise the new style of sari wearing which has since been in vogue among progressive women all over India. He broke the purdah of women by removing the screens from the women's chambers in his own house.
One of the best products of Satyendranath's educational efforts is his own younger sister Swarnakumari Devi, a woman of exceptional literary gifts, the first woman novelist in India, who edited with remarkable ability the famous Bengali monthly Bharati, later edited with equal ability by her daughter Sarala Devi whose notable literary, social and political work entitles her along with her mother to an honoured place in the history of Indian renaissance. In fact, periodical journalism owed much of its development to the Tagores who themselves conducted in different periods three papers of wide popularity, all of which used to have the largest number of contributions on a variety of subjects from Rabindranath himself. The Tagores were the first to introduce the Indian style in household furniture whose Indian 'feel' was easily noticeable.
Their very home, a home of culture and refinement, became something like the eighteenth-century French salon. Besides his own gifted sons, daughters and nephews who, even when young, began making contributions in the world of literature and music, Devendranath himself was a generous patron of arts and letters. He would often invite to his house distinguished scholars, poets, thinkers, artists and musicians to participate in discussions on subjects of their study and research. Many of them were his personal friends, already mentioned, who were leaders of the intellectual life of the city. The musical soirees would always attract bigger gatherings. In his Reminiscences Rabindranath refers to the influence on him, then a child, of 'the literary and artistic atmosphere which pervaded our house',—mainly the creation of 'the newly-awakened national feeling' in which Devendranath had a large hand. 'From an outside point of view,' writes the Poet, 'many a foreign custom would appear to have gained entry into our family, but at its heart flames a national pride which has never flickered.' Speaking about Ganendra, an elder nephew of his and the first Secretary of the famous Jatiya Mela, the Poet continues : 'His enthusiasm for literature and fine arts knew no bounds. He was the centre of a group who seem to have been almost consciously striving to bring about from every side the renascence which we see today. A pronounced nationalism in dress, literature, music, art and drama had awakened in and around him.'
The Tagores did not rest content with transfusing this national feeling into the culture and social life of the country but gave it a more practical turn in extending it to the industrial field. Jyotirindranath, an elder brother of Rabindranath and an initiator or supporter of a number of literary and national movements of the time, was the first to start a match factory and an Indian navigation company for which he became almost an insolvent. To whip up the timid Bengali of his time he taught hunting to young men. He made an attempt to introduce a common national costume. In the 1840's two younger brothers of Devendranath had already made a beginning in giving shape to the histrionic art in their house at Jorasanko. In the sixties along with a cousin Jyotirindranath set up a stage in his house where after the production of a few original Bengali plays the need was felt for new ones and prizes were announced in the papers to be awarded to the writers of the two best Bengali dramatic productions, one on 'The Hindu Females' and the other on 'The Village Zamindars'. Devendranath gave his appreciative support to this move. The production of these and afterwards a number of other plays promoted the cultivation of literature, art and music in all of which the Tagores were the pioneers. Later, all these were enriched and elevated to a high pitch of excellence by the master-poet of the age.
Dwijendranath, the eldest son of Devendranath was a poet, a writer, one of the greatest original thinkers of the age, the first to write essays on comparative philosophy in Bengali, and one of the first to understand, appreciate and be stirred by the supramental writings of Sri Aurobindo in the Arya. His device of Bengali shorthand was another proof of his creative mind. It is said his earlier attempts at poetry-writing were an inspiration to his younger brother who became one of the greatest poets of the world.
Sri Aurobindo spoke1 of 'Dwijendranath's spiritual experience', and of
1 From Nirodbaran, Sri Aurobindo's personal secretary. "the tradition of religious tendency in the family of the Tagores'. This naturally expressed itself in the poetry of Rabindranath as well as in the literary, cultural and national activities of the family.
Abanindranath, a nephew of Rabindranath, is the founder of the neo-Bengal School of Painting and the greatest Indian painter of the modern age, who won world-wide fame for reviving the ancient Indian artistic culture with its eternal appeal. Indeed in the characteristically unique work of his there shines the light of heavenly beauty wooing the earth. A master of the brush, he was also a master of the pen: the incomparable excellence of his style and theme and of the angle of vision from which he looked at things constitutes his greatest contribution to Bengali art and literature, acknowledged even by the Poet himself. Gaganendranath, Abanindra's elder brother, is the first competent original exponent of Cubist art in India, and Dinendranath, a grandson of Dwijendranath, was a master-musician, the custodian of the Poet's songs, as the Poet himself once said. Dinendranath's wonderful gift of dramatic acting and training brought him the best of praises from competent critics. The Santiniketan School of Dramatics owes him not a little of its success and popularity.
Most of these personalities, when young, were actively connected with the Jatiya Mela and the Sanjibani Sabha both of which aimed at the recovery of India's self on the basis of national unity. Of deeper significance than their individual achievements was the vision that these young Tagores saw of India's resurgence as a nation. The beautiful expression they gave to this vision in poetry and literature, drama and painting remains an inspiring psychological factor in the progressive realisation by the country of its own self. In every sphere of national reconstruction, especially of art and literature, a large part of what Bengal and India if today in her cultural life is the creation of the brilliant and gifted family of the Tagores of Jorasanko. |