Shaheed Udham Singh: A Tribute

                Udham Singh also known as Ram Mohammad Sigh Azad is a symbol of the unification of the three major religions of India: Hinduism, Islam and Sikhism. Singh was a Marxist and militant nationalist. He is considered one of the best known revolutionaries of Indian freedom struggle. He had been referred as “Shaheed-i-Azam” by Pt. Nehru in 1962 in the daily Partap: “I salute Shaheed-i-Azam Udham Singh with reverence who kissed the noose so that we may live.”

Udham Singh alias Sher Singh was born on 26^th December 1899 in Sunam in the district of Punjab in a peasant family headed by Sardar Tehal Singh who belonged to Jummu clan of Kamboj lineage. Tehal Singh was a watchman on the railways crossings. Sher Singh’s mother Narayan Kaur died in 1901 and his father in 1907. He along with his elder brother Mukta Singh was admitted to Central Khalsa Orphange Putlighar, Amritsar. Both brothers were administered the Sikh initiatory rites at the orphanage and received new names. Sher Singh became Udham Singh and Mukta Singh became Sadhu Singh. Sadhu Singh died in 1917 which was also a great shock to young Udham Singh. While at orphanage, Udham Singh was trained in various arts and crafts. He passed his matriculation examination in 1918 and left the orphanage in 1919.

The brutality of Jallianwala Bagh Massacre left an indelible impression on the mind of Udham Singh. He mainly held Michael O’Dwyer responsible for the tragedy and this incident proved a turning point in his life. He turned to revolutionary politics and dedicated his whole life to the cause of people.

He moved from one country to another to achieve his secret objective that is to avenge Jalianwala Bagh Massacre, aiming ultimately to reach his prey in Landon. At various stages in his life, Singh went by various names: Sher Singh, Udham Singh, Udhan Singh, Udey Singh, Frank Brazil, and Ram Mohammad Singh Azad. In 1924, he reached America and there he actively involved with freedom fighters of the ‘Ghadar Party’. He spent three years in revolutionary politics and organized oversea Indians for the freedom struggle. He returned India in July 1927 on the orders from Bhagat Singh. He was accompanied by 25 associates from the U.S. and brought a consignment of revolvers and ammunition. 

On August 30, 1927 he was arrested at Amritsar for the possession of unlicensed arms and copies of prohibited paper of Ghadar Party called Gunj-i- Ghadar. He was prosecuted by the colonial masters and sentenced to five years rigorous imprisonment. He stayed in jail for four years and missed the peak of Indian revolutionary period and the actions of menlike Bhagat Singh and Chander Shekhar Azad.

Udham Singh was released from jail on Oct. 23, 1931. He returned to his native place Sunam but constantly harassment from police on account of his revolutionary activities led him back to Amritsar and then finally to England in 1934. In Landon he purchased a six-chamber revolver and always remembered his real objective that is to take revenge the massacre. Despite several opportunities to strike Michael O’Dwyer, he awaited perhaps he wanted to kill him when this could make more impact and to internationalize the event.

At last the opportunity came on March 13, 1940, almost twenty one years the massacre. A joint meeting of the East India Association and the Royal Central Asian Society was scheduled at Caxton Hall, Landon and among the speakers was O’Dwyer. Singh concealed a revolver in a book specially cut for the purpose and managed to enter in the hall. At the end of the meeting when O’Dwyer moved towards the platform to talk to Lord Zetland, Singh fired and O’Dwyer died immediately, Zetland was also struck because he was secretary for state in 1919 in India. Udham did not intend to escape. He was arrested and prosecuted.

During his prosecution facing the judge he exclaimed: “I say down with British Imperialism. You say India does not have peace. We have only slavery. Generations of so called civilization has brought us everything filthy and degenerating known to the human race. … All your British Imperialism will be smashed. … I am talking about the British government. I have nothing against the British people at all. I have great sympathy with the workers of England. I am against the imperialist government.”

Magistrate Atkinson sentenced him to death. On July 31, 1940, he was hanged till death at Pentonvile Prison. As with other executed prisoners, he was buried later that afternoon within the prison ground.  In July 1974, Udham Singh’s remains were exhumed and repatriated to India at the request of his cousin. He was later cremated at his birth place Sunam.

Udham Singh represented the best traditions of the people of Indian Subcontinent: courage and the spirit of self sacrifice in the fight against oppression, and unity in struggle irrespective of religious, communal or ethnic background. Today, when the forces of exploitation and fascism are becoming dominant in our society, the importance of heroes like Udham Singh has increased many folds.              

Satguru Mangat Ram ji

India is, and has been a land of seers since the beginning of history. Satguru Mahatma Mangat Ram stands in this great tradition connecting the past with our present, and with the future of mankind. He was the most profound exponent of “Samta” or oneness. His teachings are the quintessence of Samta. He taught nothing that he did not practice, and practice to perfection. It is only in the family of chosen once that a man of god is born. Blessed also is the land where such an event takes place. Shri Mangat Ram Ji incarnated in a pious family in village Gangothian Brahmana, Tehsil Kahoota in Rawalpindi district (Pakistan) on Tuesday 24 November, 1903. Even as a child of four/five years, Satguru Mangat Ram ji would get up in the middle of the night and start meditating for hours well past into midnight rather than to sleep. He was admitted to school at the age of five. By the age of eight years. Satguru started leaving home at midnight. He would go to a deep ravine near the village and sit in contemplation on a stone by the river. It was no ordinary feat for a child to leave the comfort of home for hard penance at a desolate place. He was good at studies and was personally offered a scholarship by the headmaster not only to complete his high school studies but right up to post graduation. He, however consciously renounced formal education at this point of his life. This seemed to him to be too self centered. As he said of himself later, “This one’s concern was with the knowledge of god that alone could benefit the ignorant of the world.” He spent most of his time in meditation in high altitude areas, dense forests and other lonely spots. Open sky remained his night companion for life. A wandering Fakir with no possessions but a love of God : his living was star tingly simple. For years at a stretch, he sustained himself on a single glass of milk-tea per day. He overcame sleep, hunger and thirst. He took up a job at the behest of his mother but gave it up when she died. He remained in service of his mother till her death in March, 1928 and felt released thereafter from his final domestic responsibilities. He remained a bachelor and a true ‘brahmchari’ throughout his life and led an ascetic life of intense unremitting contemplation. He was an embodiment of simplicity, humility & intellectual excellence with complete dedication to meditation.

CHALISA: As already mentioned, Satguru was dyed deep in God love right from childhood. When he was studying in class VII, he went into uninterrupted meditation for 40 days, such a penance was no easy task. He attained self-realization at the age of thirteen. All those living around were surprised. His body has become weak but his face shone with unique brightness.

MAHAMANTRA: Three days after this incident he was sitting near the banks of rivulet outside his village. Suddenly the first three words of the “MAHAMANTRA” appeared to him, thus: “Om, Brahma, Satyam”. The second day he emerged with “Nirankar, Ajanma, Advait Purukha ”. On third day he was blessed with words “Sarvabyapak, Kal Yan, moorat, Parameshwaraya, Namastang”. Each he would note them down on a piece of paper. How child-devotee Mangat Ram found God or came across the divine light of truth has been described in the sacred words of the “Mahamantra” for the edification of seekers of God. Later he fully expounded the significance of this “Mahamantra” in a section of his magnum opus “Shri Samata Prakash”. In that work, he has explained in some detail each words of this 13 word mantra.

Readers may find the mantra in its original form at the beginning of this book. It is enough to say here that this “Mahamantra” carries a significant effect. There is a special power inherent in it. Sincere and repeated recitation of this “Mahamantra” has been found to bring great benefit. It is also helpful if recited before starting any auspicious undertaking. He spent most of his time in meditation in high altitude areas, dense forests and other lonely spots. Open sky remained his night companion for life. A wandering Fakir with no possessions but a love of God; his living was startlingly simple. For fourteen years at a stretch, he sustained himself on a single glass of milk-tea per day. He overcame sleep, hunger and thirst. Sat Guru Mangat Ram sees similarity in the teachings of the founders of all religions the world over. The principle aim was to redeem man from the transient world he is born in and enable him to realize the bliss that is true and real. Sat Guru Mangat Ram had deep respect for all great souls. He accordingly advised study of their lives and teachings with reverence. However, cautioned against the futility of study if it was merely a mental preoccupation. He says: “The greatness of prophets and saints alone will not bring salvation unless their noble principles are actually adopted in life.” The revelatory verses of the “Vani” welled-up from the depth of his “Samadhi” and flowed for hours together.Bhagat Banarsi Dass who served at the master’s feet for over 16 years collected as many of these as he could and compiled them into Granth Shri Samta Prakash. The prose sayings on questions of applied Dharma and the way to right living are conserved in the Granth Shri Samta Vilas. Revelation and doctrine converged on a single focus: Samta - the point where difference and duality vanish, the state wherein the mind ascends the world of senses, and where phenomenon entities and experiences disappear and the individual being merges into the Supreme Being leaving behind the limit of time and space.

LIFES MISSION: With deep meditation, constant Self-remembrance and complete Brahmacharya (celibacy), Sat Guru Mangat Ram Ji had attained the supreme state of yoga. Vairagya (dispassion) within him had grown to boundless proportions. There was nothing more to be attained. The only mission before him now was to people who were burning in the fires of desires and snares of the senses. They were to be made aware of the real aim of life and introduced to true happiness and peace. Simple ways of spiritual progress were to be outlined for them. He preached what he practiced on himself. He was an embodiment of exquisite humility, undaunted fearlessness and an un-desiring state of mind: a true example of Selflessness. He left his mortal frame on 4 February, 1954 at the young age of 50 years at Amritsar in Punjab. He was the greatest exponent of Samta which he described copiously in the two “Granths” mentioned above. These scriptures are an ocean of spiritual knowledge for seekers of Truth or Ultimate Reality.

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad is one of those rare personalities through whom the distinctions of the 20th century can be recognized and possibilities of the 21st century determined. He stood for a learning society through liberal, modern and universal education combining the humanism of Indian arts and the rationalism of western sciences, a society where the strong are just and the weak secure, where the youth is disciplined and the women lead a life of dignity – a non-violent, non-exploiting social and economic order. He was free India’s first Education Minister and guided the destinies of the Nation for eleven years.

He was the first to raise the issue of the National System of Education which is today the bed-rock of the National Policy on Education (1986) updated in 1992. The concept implies that, upto a given level, all students, irrespective of caste, creed, location or sex have access to education of a comparable quality. All educational programmes, he said, must be carried out in strict conformity with secular values and constitutional framework. He stood for a common educational structure of 10+2+3 throughout India. If Maulana Azad were alive today he would have been the happiest to see the Right to Free Education Bill getting cabinet approval for the approval of Parliament. The Right to Education Bill seeks to make free and compulsory education a fundamental right. The wealth of the nation, according to Maulana Azad, was not in the country’s banks but in primary schools. The Maulana was also a great votary of the concept of Neighbourhood schools and the Common School System.

Born in Mecca on November 11, 1888, his father Maulana Khairuddin was a noted scholar, his mother Alia was an Arab, niece of Shaikh Mohammad Zahir Vatri of Madina. His father gave him the name of Feroze Bakht but he became Abul Kalam and the name stayed. At 10 he was well-versed in Quran. At 17 Abul Kalam was a trained theologian recognized in the Islamic world. His studies at Al Azhar University Cairo further deepened his knowledge. At Calcutta where his family had settled he started a magazine called ‘Lisan-ul-Sidq’. His early influences were Maulana Shibli Naomani and Altaf Hussain Haali, the two great Urdu critics.

Azad made a debut in politics when the British Government partitioned Bengal in 1905 on religious grounds. The Muslim middle classes supported the partition but Azad rejected it outright. He took active part in the agitation, joined the secret societies and revolutionary organization, came in contact with Sri Aurobindo Ghosh and Shyam Sundar Chakravarty. He stood for a unified India and never deviated from his stand. He writes in his famous book ‘India Wins Freedom’ : ‘It is one of the greatest frauds on the people to suggest that religious affinity can unite areas which are geographically, economically and culturally different’. It is a fact of history that while other Congress leaders accepted the partition in 1947, Maulana stood steadfast. His famous statement on Hindu-Muslim unity stands out as Magna Carta of his faith : “If an angel were to descend from the heavens and proclaim from the heights of Qutab Minar: Discard Hindu-Muslim unity and within 24 hours Swaraj is yours, I will refuse the preferred Swaraj but shall not budge an inch from my stand. The refusal of Swaraj will affect only India while the end of our unity will be the loss of our entire human world.”

At the age of 20 he went on a tour of Iraq, Syria and Egypt and met the young Turks and Arab nationalists including Christians. The tour proved very useful to Azad to crystallize his thoughts on the neo-colonialists who were exploiting those countries and how India could help them. On return he started a journal in Urdu named ‘Al Hilal’ in 1912. It was this journal where he aired his liberal views, ‘Rationalist in outlook and profoundly versed in Islamic lore and history’. Writes Nehru in his ‘Discovery of India’. The Maulana interpreted scriptures from the rationalist point of view. Soaked in Islamic tradition and with many personal contacts with prominent Muslim leaders of Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Iraq and Iran, he was profoundly affected by political and cultural developments in these countries. He was known in Islamic countries probably more than any other Indian Muslim.

The journal ‘Al-Hilal’ became extremely popular and in two years its circulation rose to 30,000. The inevitable happened when in 1914 the British Government confiscated the press and banned the journal under the Defence of India Act. Azad was arrested and sent to Ranchi jail where he suffered untold hardships.

Released from jail he resumed his educational writings. He spoke in a new language, writes Nehru. It was not only a new language in thought and approach, even its texture was different, for Azad’s style was tense and virile though sometimes a little difficult because of its Persian background. He used new phrases for new ideas and was a definite influence in giving shape to Urdu language as it is today. The older conservative Muslims did not react favourably to all this and criticized Azad’s opinion and approach. Yet not even the most learned of them could meet Azad in debate and argument, even on the basis of scriptures and tradition, for Azad’s knowledge of these happened to be greater than theirs. He was a strange mixture of medieval scholasticism, eighteenth century rationalism and modern outlook. There were a few among the older generation who approved of Azad’s writings, among them being Shibli and Sir Sayyaid of Aligarh University.

After the confiscation of ‘Al-Hilal’ Azad brought out a new weekly called ‘Al Balagh’ but this too came to an end when Azad was interned in 1916. He remained in jail for four years. When he came out he was an acknowledged leader and took his seat with the great might of the Indian National Congress. In 1920 he met Tilak and Gandhi which was the turning point of his life. Gandhi had launched the ‘Khilafat Movement’ under the Deoband School and Firanghi Mahal where Gandhi and Azad were frequent visitors. But when Muslim League denounced Gandhiji’s Satyagraha, Azad who had enrolled himself in the League when a boy, left the Muslim League forever. His popularity was so high that at 35 he became the President of the Indian National Congress, the youngest ever to hold that office. In 1942 during the Quit India Movement he was elected as the Chief spokesman of the Congress. This distinction he also had during the negotiations with the Cabinet Mission in 1946 at Simla.

As Education Minister (15.08.47 to 22.02.1958)

In 1947 when the Interim Government was formed Maulana Azad was included as Member for Education and Arts. On August 15, 1947 when India attained Independence he became Free India’s first Education Minister with a cabinet rank where he achieved a number of distinctions and established institutions of excellence to promote education and culture.

Among the new institutions he established were the three National Academies viz the Sangeet Natak Academy (1953), Sahitya Academy (1954) and Lalit Kala Academy (1954), the Indian Council for Cultural Relations having been established by him earlier in 1950. The Maulana felt that the cultural content in Indian Education was very low during the British rule and needs to be strengthened through curriculum. As Chairman of the Central Advisory Board of Education, an apex body to recommend to the Government educational reform both at the center and the states including universities, he advocated, in particular, universal primary education, free and compulsory for all children upto the age of 14, girls education, vocational training, agricultural education and technical education. He established University Grants Commission (UGC) in 1956 by an Act of Parliament for disbursement of grants and maintainence of standards in Indian universities. He firmly believed with Nehru that if the universities discharged their functions well, all will be well with the Nation. According to him the universities have not only academic functions, they have social responsibilities as well. He was pioneer in the field of adult education. His greatest contribution, however, is that in spite of being an eminent scholar of Urdu, Persian and Arabic he stood for the retention of English language for educational advantages and national and international needs. However primary education should be imparted in the mother-tongue. On the technical education side he strengthened All Indian Council for Technical Education. The Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur was established in 1951 followed by a chain of IIT’s at Bombay, Madras and Kanpur and Delhi. School of Planning and Architecture came into existence at Delhi in 1955.

Student Unrest

Secular to the marrow of his bones Maulana’s advice to students was: ‘Bury communalism once for all.’ Student indiscipline, however, continued to worry him. Presiding over the meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) on February 7, 1954 he said: “What worries me most is that the extent and magnitude of the student’s unrest is very often without any relation whatsoever to the supposed cause. Such unrest among the students strikes at the root of our national culture. The student of today is the potential leader of tomorrow. He will have to sustain the social, political and economic activities. If he is not properly trained and does not develop the necessary resources of character and knowledge he cannot supply the leadership which the national will need”.

As an Author

Maulana Azad was a prolific writer with books in Urdu, Persian and Arabic notably amongst which is ‘India Wins Freedom’, his political biography, translated from Urdu to English. Maulana’s translation of Quran from Arabic into Urdu in six volumes published by Sahitya Akademy in 1977 is indeed his ‘Magnum Opus”. Since then several editions of ‘Tarjaman-e-Quran’ have come out. His other books include ‘Gubar-e-Khatir’, ‘Hijr-o-Vasal’, ‘Khatbat-I-Azad’, ‘Hamari Azadi’, ‘Tazkara’. He gave a new life to Anjamane-Tarrqui-e-Urdu-e-Hind’. During the partition riots when the ‘Anjamane-Tarrqui-Urdu suffered, its Secretary Maulvi Abdul Haqq decided to leave for Pakistan alongwith the books of the Anjaman. Abdul Haqq had packed the books but Maulana Azad got them retrieved and thus saved a national treasure being lost to Pakistan. He also helped the Anjaman to revive by sanctioning a grant of Rs. 48,000 per month from the Ministry of Education. Likewise he increased the grants of Jamia Millia Islamia, Aligarh Muslim University in their days of financial crisis. He paid particular attention to the Archaeological Survey of India’s efforts to repair and maintain the protected monuments.

Throughout his life he stood for the chords of cordiality between Hindus and Muslims and the composite culture of India. He stood for modern India with secular credentials, a cosmopolitan character and international outlook.

As an orator Azad had no equal among his contemporaries. When he spoke the audience listened to him spell-bound. Recalling the memories of the Roman and the Greek orators, there was magic in his words, his language was chaste, civilized, his speech was dramatic. In October 1947 when the Delhi Muslims were leaving for Pakistan tens of thousands of them, he spoke from the ramparts of Jama Masjid, like an ancient oracle: “Behold, the high towers of Jama Masjid are asking you: where have you lost the pages of your history. Only yesterday your caravans had performed ‘Wazu; (Ablutions) on the banks of Jamuna. And today you are afraid to live here. Remember that you have nourished Delhi with your blood. You are afraid of tremors, time was when you yourself were an earthquake. You fear darkness when you yourself symbolized light only recently. The clouds have only poured dirty water and you have raised your trousers for fear of being drenched. They were your forefathers who had dived deep into the seas, cut across the mighty mountains, laughed away the lightnings, answered the thunder of the skies with the velocity of your laughter, changed the direction of the winds and turned the typhoons that they have been misled to a wrong destination. It is an irony of faith that those who played with the destinies of the kings are victims of their own destiny today. And in doing so they have become so forgetful of their God as if it never existed. Go back it is your home, your country….”

The effect of his speech was dramatic. Those who packed up their baggages to migrate to Pakistan returned home filled with a new sense of freedom and patriotism. There was no mass migration thereafter. In the history of international oratory Maulana Azad’s Jama Masjid speech can only be compared with the Gettysburg address of Abraham Lincoln, Birla House speech of Nehru on Gandhi’s assassination and recently of Martin Luther’s speech: ‘I have a dream’.

As a man Maulana was even greater, he led an austere life. He had the madness of a Spinoza, the courage of Prometheus Unbound, the humility of a Dervesh. At the time of his death he had neither any property nor any bank account. In his personal almirah were found some cotton ‘Achkans’. A dozen ‘Khadi Kurtas’ and ‘pyjama’, two pairs of sandals, an old dressing gown and a used brush. But there were lots of rare books which are now a property of the Nation.

A man like Maulana Azad is born rarely. Throughout his life he stood for the unity of India and its composite culture. His opposition to partition of India has created a niche in the hearts of all patriotic Indians.There he stands with Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, his senior an Ashfaqullah his junior. In the words of Iqbal : Hazaron sall Nargis apni benoori par roti hai, Bari Mushkil sey hota hai chaman mein deeda var paida. ( For a thousand years the Narcissus weeps for her blindness, With great difficulty is born in the garden a man with vision). Maulana Abul Kalam Azad’s Birthday 11th November has been declared as National Education Da y.

The Refugee

Say this city has ten million souls, Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes: Yet there's no place for us, my dear, yet there's no place for us. Once we had a country and we thought it fair, Look in the atlas and you'll find it there: We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now. In the village churchyard there grows an old yew, Every spring it blossoms anew: Old passports can't do that, my dear, old passports can't do that. The consul banged the table and said, "If you've got no passport you're officially dead": But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive. Went to a committee; they offered me a chair; Asked me politely to return next year: But where shall we go to-day, my dear, but where shall we go to-day? Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said; "If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread": He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me. Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky; It was Hitler over Europe, saying, "They must die": O we were in his mind, my dear, O we were in his mind. Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin, Saw a door opened and a cat let in: But they weren't German Jews, my dear, but they weren't German Jews. Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay, Saw the fish swimming as if they were free: Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away. Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees; They had no politicians and sang at their ease: They weren't the human race, my dear, they weren't the human race. Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors, A thousand windows and a thousand doors: Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours. Stood on a great plain in the falling snow; Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro: Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.

                                                                             W.H.Auden

R. K. Narayan: A Tribute to Malgudi Man

                                                        

The first Indian novelist in English of international repute was neither Salman Rushdie nor the Noble laureate V. S. Naipaul  but Rasipuram Krishanaswamy Aiyer Narayanaswamy who is better known to his readers by his shortened name R. K. Narayan. His career as a writer spanned more than five decades, dating from the first published novel Swamy and Friends (1935) to a collection of shorts stories Salt and Sawdust (1993).

Narayan is a conspicuous star in the galaxy of fiction writers by the virtue of his achievement. It is certified by the fact that his novels have been translated into all major languages of the world, which also indicates his wide popularity the world over.

Narayan is the first member of the “unique trio” who has in fact defined and shaped the nature and stature of Indian fiction in English. Mulk Raj Anand and Raja Rao are other members of this group. Anand’s fiction is tragic-comic, whereas the fiction of Raja Rao is religio-comic, Narayan’s is serio-comic. It is Narayan who gave comedy a new shape and semblance with his bifocal vision which comprises the absurd and the grand. The absurd he dramatizes pleasingly, exposing the ideal suggestively. Almost all his novels are comedies of sad manners and they are invested with his harmless humour, by jovial power of his language. The language of his novels is like a kind of clownish language exposing the splendour of laughter: ‘Man laughing at his own weakness is divine.’

“Why take life too seriously?” asks Narayan and then adds: “Mine is an unserious attitude towards life.” That is perhaps why his character-portrayal is neither ironic nor satirical but cartoonic, like his brother Laxman’s cartoons. His is pure fiction, great fiction. He does not ridicule or condemn anybody, but with his impersonal sympathy he analyzes human weakness or selfish undue aspiration in terms of laughter, and his humour is a purifying medium. Finding one’s own weakness or deficiency in the weakness of Narayan’s protagonists, one laughs at oneself and that is the myth and essence of his novels.

Narayan depicts the general in the particular. Although his characters appear to be individuals but they are types – personifications of the various shades of human aspirations at different stages of life. Malgudi is itself imaginary and universal, spiritual fantasy which is timeless. It has been Narayan’s obsession through some fifty years ever since Malgudi with its little station swam into his view all readymade. The river Sarayu flows endlessly through the heart of Malgudi representing the eternal flow of life. Mempi (caves) Hills are the peaks of natural beauty and knowledge or spiritual refinements for the seekers like the Master or Marco. The imaginary Malgudi has given Narayan immense freedom to portray life from the mythical times to ultramodern time.

Narayan is a master of realism and angst. His characters and situations, incidents and episodes, are real and true to daily life. Man appears, passes through self-made travails of life, and vanishes into life. That is the central theme of his fiction. He portrays life as a mighty force to which man has to bow, willingly or unwillingly.

It is the achievement of Narayan that his reader feels as an initiated insider whereas he feels as uninitiated outsider with other novelists. The end of one trouble is but the beginning of another. Life is but a series of tribulations and failures, and every failure leads to a fresh beginning. This truth about life Narayan illustrates by the closing and opening of his novels.  He achieves this through dramatizing the aspirations of the simple middle-class individuals of our society. Implying the philosophical behind the physical, the spiritual behind the secular, the ideal behind the absurd, the infinite behind the finite, in the medium of harmless humour and laughter, Narayan’s art is unique achievement unprecedented which he attains by the power of his written word and wisdom.                

Tribute to Mulk Raj Anand: Novelist and Fighter

                       Tribute to Mulk Raj Anand: Novelist and Fighter

                                (His death anniversary falls on 28^th Sept.)

Mulk Raj Anand passed away at the grand old age of 98 on Sept. 28, 2004 and left behind him remarkably large number of novels and collections of short stories. He deserves the credit of entertaining and enlightening generations of readers during his life time and his works will continue to do so in times to come. It may not be an exaggeration to say that he was, he is, and he shall be socially very relevant as an author – a novelist with purpose, cause, and concerns. It is also quite relevant to assert that Anand tried to do with his pen what Mahatma Gandhi did through his political actions.

Anand will be remembered as a novelist of lowly, the lost, and the underdog. Not that he was the first to voice in his novels the voice of the poor and the down-trodden. Bankim Chandra, Tagore, Sharat Chandra, and Premchand had also done it effectively in their novels. It was Anand who took the romanticism of Bankim, humanizing breath of Tagore, Premchand’s sympathy for the suffering people and Sharat Chandra’s understanding of human hearts to synthesize the texture of his novels. That is why he has been called as a writer who wrote of the people, for the people and as a man of the people.

An important aspect of Anand’s fiction is its concern with the reality of organized evil. In all most all his novels he appears as a social critic. The society he has seen and observed is the field of his work. His writings probe deeply into the social process. For him literature is an expression of society and the large numbers of questions raised by him in literature are social questions: questions of tradition and convention, norms and genres, and symbols and myth.

Before Untouchable (1935) Indian English novels were mainly based history or romance and they are primarily written for merely enjoyment or escapist light reading. Anand’s temperament and social concern have not been suited to such ventures. His missionary zeal for the welfare of the masses had added purpose and brought a new direction to Indian novels in English. His purpose in writing fiction has been to focus attention on the suffering, misery, and wretchedness of the poor and the underdog of society caused by the exploitation of capitalists or feudal lords or by the impact of industry on the traditional or agrarian way of life. Through his art Anand has been trying to awaken our sympathy for the subalterns of society which in turn can urge us to be an active agent of social reform.

Anand is a humanist, a proletarian who does not believe in ‘art for art’s sake’, but writes to awaken the social conscience. He is audacious enough to admit that he is using literature as a means to some other end, and that this end is the alleviation of the suffering of the fellow human beings. He has made his position very clear in his Apology for Heroism: “Any writer who said that he is not interesting in ‘la condition humaine’ was either posing or yielding to a fanatical love of isolationism.” In the same book he asserts; “just as I desire a total and truly humane view of experience, a view of the whole man, in order that is completely new kind of revolutionary human may arise, so I have been inclined to stress the need for truly humanist art commensurate with the needs of our time.”

Anand has written novels and short stories with a view of teaching man to recognize the fundamental principles of human living and exercise vigilance in record to the real enemies of freedom and socialism. The truth Anand the artist interpreted from the realities of life focuses on man’s inhumanity to man. It tells:  (1) Casteism is a crime against humanity and anyone who believes in human dignity should actively strive to eliminate it. (2) Inequality in society and the ill-treatment by “haves” and “have more” of “have not” is a national tragedy. The nation can be saved from this tragedy only by following the path of dramatic socialism i.e. way of life in which the moral and material urges of the people can have the fullest play. (3) Belief in fate or ‘karma’, religious fundamentalism and fanaticism are enemies of healthy social life, progressive thinking and individual and national prosperity. They should be totally removed from the minds of the people by inculcating national thinking. (4) Social, Economic, and Political freedom is the birth right of all the citizens of a nation. To ensure this to common man, society must be free from its arch-enemies i.e. capitalism and imperialism.  (5) War is the greatest plague that can afflict humanity. It destroys not only states and families but also international harmony and peace. As war is mainly due to the failure of human wisdom so the disputes should be settled by apply wisdom.  (6) Anand believes that machine is important for rapid growth and modernization of any nation. But it should be introduced keeping in mind the welfare of the society as a whole not for turning poor, poorer and rich, richer.  (7) According to Anand feudalism is a terrible evil crushing the peasant folk. If land, the principal means of production in the agrarian economy, is under monopoly of few people- landlords, then the poor peasant will remain in the state of perpetual beggary and slavery. Only by abolishing the landlordism and giving the right to ownership of land to all can the diabolical exploitation of peasants can be stopped. (8) He is of the view that the ill-treatment of woman is a barbaric act. Woman should be given equal right with man both in theory and practice.  (9) He notices that modern education is futile and produces only frustration as it gives merely degrees not imparts skills. So he believes that the time has come when this education is to be overhauled.

Anand’s works were inspired and influenced by the lives of real people in unglamorous situations, warts and all. In addition his writings demonstrate a keen desire for a political change and social transformation. The best tribute that we could pay to this great novelist would be to read his novels and be inspired by the dedication and commitment that he had.                  

                                                                                                                   

                                                                                                                                          

Rao Tula Ram,

Rao Tula Ram, whose martyrdom day is commemorated in Haryana as ‘Haryana Heroes and Martyrdom Day’, was one of the key leaders of the First War for Independence (1857), in Haryana  where he is considered a state hero.

He is credited with having obliterated every vestige of the British rule from the region that today is southwest Haryana during the Rebellion, and also helping rebel forces fighting in the historic city of Delhi with men, money and material. Noted as a good administrator and military commander, after the 1857 uprising ended, he left India, met rulers of Iran and Afghanistan and also established contacts with the Tsar of Russia, to seek their help to fight a war to free India from the British. His plans were cut short by his death from dysentery in Kabul on September 23, 1863, at the age of 38.

Why GOD Gave Us Friends

GOD knew that everyone needs
Companionship and cheer,
He knew that people need someone
Whose thoughts are always near.

He knew they need someone kind
To lend a helping hand.
Someone to gladly take the time
To care and understand.

GOD knew that we all need someone
To share each happy day,
To be a source of courage
When troubles come our way.

Someone to be true to us,
Whether near or far apart.
Someone whose love we'll always
Hold and treasure in our hearts.

That's Why GOD Gave Us Friends

I wrote your name in the sky,
but the wind blew it away.
I wrote your name in the sand,
but the waves washed it away.
I wrote you name in my heart,
and forever it will stay.

                                                Jeremy Weida

                               The Relevance of Munshi Premchand

                                      (Birth Anniversary is on 31^st July)

                                                                                     Sanjeev Gandhi

                                                                                     Dept. of English

                                                                                     Govt. College

                                                                                     Chhachhrauli (Yamuna Nagar)

                    Munshi Premchand (July31, 1880 – Oct. 8, 1936) was not only a versatile writer, but a social philosopher, a born rebel, a patriot, a freedom fighter, and the harbinger of the progressive movement in Indian Literature. It was he who brought a new wave of realism in Urdu and Hindi fiction in the first decade of 20^th century and thus gave a new dimension to fiction writing in these languages.

                   From the very onset, his writings were charged with such patriotic feelings and love for freedom that his very first story ‘Duniya Ka Sabse Anmol Ratan’ (The Most Priceless Jewel of the World) is based on patriotism. A lover Dilfigar by name is asked by his beloved, Queen Dilfareb to bring to her the most valuable thing in the world if he wants to be accepted as her lover. The first thing he brings is the tear drop of a murderer who was about to be hanged and saw his young child before him. The queen declines it. He then brings to her a handful of ashes of a beautiful woman who had sacrificed her life on the funeral pyre of her dead husband. This too is not considered as the most priceless thing by the beloved.  At last the lover meets a dying patriot who has shed his blood for his motherland, and takes a blood drop of the martyr’s blood to the queen and is gladly accepted as her lover. 

                   Premchand’s first collection of stories Soz-e-Watan was banned and burnt in his presence by colonial masters in 1908. He was ordered not to publish even a single line without the prior permission of the British Government. It was the sequence of this incident that he adopted the pseudonym of ‘Premchand’ so that he could write freely, undetected by the colonial regime. Before this he used to write under the pseudonym Nawab Rai . His actual name was Dhanpat Rai. Referring to this episode, he once said that he was convinced beyond doubt that political leaders alone could not change the destiny of people, writers and artists had to play their roles to show the right path to society. If it were not so, the colonial regime would never have burnt and banned his books.

                 He was of the firm belief that every writer could and should play a significant role in changing and remodelling the emotions, values and ways of life of the people of his society. Premchand did not write merely to entertain, he wrote only when he had something to say or to convey; or when he was convinced that this experience deserved to be shared by his readers. All his life he kept this high ideal before him.

                             During his literary career of about thirty years, he wrote about ten novels, 350 short-stories, three plays, and scores of essays and literary articles. Studied in their chronological order, Premchand’s writings present a crystal-clear picture of traumatic social and political events that took place on the national and international scene between 1905 and 1936 and the impact they made on his mind and heart.

                             Premchand was not an idle spectator of events but deeply involved in them. During the Non-Cooperative Movement against British rule in India, he resigned his government job as inspectors of schools and joined the freedom struggle as a true disciple of Mahatma Gandhi. He was also very much acquainted with Dr. Ambedkar and his movements since beginning. On the cover page of his magazine Hans he had published a photograph of Dr. Ambedkar in 1933 and under it he had marked gracefully: “With incessant, painstaking efforts you have under gone many a trail, and attained scholarship, proving that the so called untouchables are not created with ordinary resources by God. You have been enlisted among world famous personalities.”

                               Actually Dr. Ambedkar started his movement, breaking the law of Manusmriti, and drinking the water of ‘Chowdar tank’ which was denied to untouchables. This problem is reflected in Premchand’s short story ‘Thakur ka Kuwan’. Except Dr. Ambebkar nobody had touched upon this problem on political level at that time and except Premchand anybody on the literary level. Same is the story of ‘Temple Entry Movement’. Dr. Ambedkar started this in 1930 and Premchand picked it up in Karmabhumi published in 1932. Thus his writings about the political and social movements of the time are autobiographical, and clearly reveal his anguish over terrible happenings in the country, as also his deep love of his people who are suffering and struggling to throw off the yoke of exploitation and foreign rule.

                              Premchand’s writings reveal that a writer is not a prisoner of the four walls of his study but the whole world is his workshop. Premchand broke the barriers between the writer and the mass reader, the peasant and the worker. In his novels and short-stories he advocates humanism, equality and justice. He upholds truth, beauty and goodness and opposes hatred, ugliness and repression. 

             

              Prior to his emergence, Hindi and Urdu fiction was devoted to the portrayal of urban aristocracy and upper middle classes. This fiction was, obliviously, devoid of the panoramic view of our villages and the cultural diversity of our peasantry and working masses. Premchand’s novels and short-stories for the first time depicted the real life of our peasants and workers. So, the Hindi and Urdu literature became a faithful mirror of the life of Indian masses. By depicting the deplorable conditions of the Indian peasantry and working classes, he realised the sad lot of millions of workers all over the world, especially in the colonial countries. Thus, he acquired an international outlook which is reflected in many of his works of the later period.

      When he began his career as a literary artist reformist movements were gaining great momentum all over India. These movements certainly influenced him but he refused to be swept away by them. He always avoided the revivalist trends in these movements, and tried to highlight their patriotic and liberal content only. His only preoccupation was with the liberation of the country and the emancipation of millions of his fellow citizens from exploitation.

       His early novels like Sevasadan, and Nirmala show his keen social conscience. Sevasadan, his first novel, relates the suffering of Suman, who is married to a cold, narrow-minded and jealous husband. He turns her out on a flimsy pretext of coming late one night. The Hindu society has no place for a forsaken girl. Poor Suman has no option but to join the sisterhood of prostitutes. The novel deals with the problem of prostitution in the society. All the characters and incidents are centred round this social evil. The social purpose of the novel is quite transparent. The age old institution has been ruthlessly assaulted from a moral and sentimental standpoint. Premchand believes that the causes leading to this evil are not deeply rooted in human nature, but are the offspring of immediate environment; and by giving understanding and sympathy women can be saved from a life of sin and shame. In Nirmala, Premchand exposes the merciless orthodox system of dowry. It is the story of that unfortunate girl, Nirmala, whose widow mother cannot afford to give a handsome amount in her dowry and she is forced to marry an old wealthy man. The result is disaster. Dying Nirmala says: “My daughter should be married to a suitable person.” The author suggests that dowry is not an individual problem but a social disease which demands a desperate remedy.   

        When he wrote his famous novel Premashram in 1921 the Great October Revolution had already taken place in Russia. In this novel, he deals with the struggle of the peasants of northern India against the tyranny of landlords and the British government. One of the young characters of the novel Balraj is made to speak to his father: “You behave as if the cultivator is nobody and that he has been created only to provide forced labour to the landlord. I have read in the newspapers that the cultivators constituted the ruling class in Russia. They do what they like.”

      Soon after ‘The October Revolution’ Premchand started communicating its message through his writings to the Indian people. In this way he came to identify the classes which deserved support in their struggle for freedom and social justice. There were other classes which feigned involvement in the freedom struggle, but in fact which had their own vested interests. Premchand exposed and opposed these vested interests.

       The fundamental theme of his novel Rangbhumi embodies the conflict between two civilisations – the one represented by the new forces of industrialisation based on profit and competition and the other by the tradition way of life based on co-operation. This novel depicts the ruin of rural life. It is an epic story of moral degradation of village brought about by the western civilisation which is the other name for capitalist civilisation. John Sevak represents the new forces of production: the old beggar Surdas stands for old village economy. Surdas resists with all his force the erection of a cigarette factory on that piece of land which he has inherited. But the land was forcibly taken. A terrible picture of evils of industrialisation is painted. A complete crash of old foundations without a better substitute attracted Premchand’s attention and deepened his interest in all that was happening around him. He attacked with passion and powers the new social order which depends on the enslavement of masses, on their poverty and exploitation, on violence and profit, on greed and selfishness.  Education promotes it, law-courts defend it and police guard it.

          Godan is the life story of Hori who has experienced the suffering and hardships of life. He faces crisis after crisis, till he dies in exhaustion. He represents the Indian peasant who has been robbed of his honour, his spirit, and his life. He has been plunder and profaned, disinherited and disposed by those who exploit him. The novel does not end in the triumph of the peasant but ends in an atmosphere of pessimism and despair. The heroic struggle against heavy odds is perhaps the only redeeming feature of Hori’s character. Premchand seems to have realised the futility of all those solutions which had been suggested for improving the lot of peasants. He believed that the extension of democracy would be proved a rule by the big bankers, traders and money-lenders and their hold on the peasants would be firmer and more ruthless.

        Premchand throughout his life had fought on the side of the poor. In his final testament ‘Mahajani Sabhyata’ (The Capitalist Society) he writes: “In this capitalist society the one motivation for all the actions is money....From this point of view, it is the capitalists who rule the world today. Human society has been divided into two sections. The bigger section comprises the tiller and toiler, while far smaller section comprises those who through their might and influence hold the larger section and take no pity on it whatever. This section exists merely so that it may sweat for its masters and one day quietly departs the world.”

     In the January issue of Hans in 1931, Premchand wrote on mental slavery: “While we want to be free of physical slavery we continue to embrace mental slavery of our own free will.... Culture is a comprehensive term. Our religious beliefs, our social customs, our political principles, our language and literature, our manners and our conduct, are all parts of our culture but today we are hitting ruthlessly at the roots of this very culture.” How true these words are in the second decade of 21th century.

     Today, when the forces of reaction, exploitation, fascism and obscurantism are becoming dominant in our society, the relevance and importance of Premchand’s writings and of the ideas he expounded have increased many folds.