First Light

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by Sunil Gangopadhyay


  After that Bharat, who had been taught to shun idol worship by his mentor Shashibhushan, went from temple to temple offering prayers and begging the gods for Mohilamoni’s life. ‘Hé Ma Kali!’ Hé Ma Chandi!’ he cried, ‘Save my wife. Return her to me. Take everything I have except her.’ On hearing that there was a tantrik somewhere near Udaigiri who had miraculours powers, he went rushing there. Three whole days he waited outside the tantrik’s cave, shivering and calling out, ‘Save Mohilamoni! Take my life but save hers. She’s my son’s mother. Have mercy! Oh God have mercy!’

  Chapter XV

  It was the end of April—a season of hot winds and blazing sunlight; of desperate longings and thwarted hopes when the eyes are turned involuntarily upwards, over and over again, in the hope of a speck of cloud; when the parched earth lies open and waiting for a shadow to pass over it; when even the blue of the sky is burned out to ashes …

  Fortunately for him, Rabindra did not feel the heat all that much. Or the cold. When other people smothered themselves in caps, coats and mufflers all he needed was a light shawl flung carelessly across his shoulders. And on summer afternoons, when his brothers and nephews lay sleeping in darkened rooms under undulating punkahs, he went about his work walking or riding down the burning streets with not even an umbrella to protect his head. He spent his mornings and evenings writing in the covered veranda on the second floor. It had no punkah and since Rabindra was not in the habit of using a palm leaf fan sweat poured down his limbs in streams. But it didn’t bother him one bit. He filled page after page with his flowing hand stopping only to brush away the drops that fell on the paper.

  Rabindra often wrote far into the night after everyone was asleep. Poetry seemed to come unbidden to him when the world was dark and silent. Of his five children Rathi and Madhuri were old enough to sleep in a separate room, apart from their parents. The three youngest still slept with their mother on her vast bridal bed. They were fast asleep by nine o’clock after which Mrinalini took up some sewing for an hour or two. Rabindra had told her several times that sewing by candlelight was bad for the eyes but Mrinalini ignored his advice. For one so quiet and placid she had a strong will and could be quite stubborn on occasions.

  Mrinalini had tried, in the past, to sit by her husband at this hour, when they were alone together, and engage him in conversation. But, though Rabindra never reproved her for disturbing him and answered her questions patiently, there was something missing in the exchange—something that she felt should have been there and wasn’t. Though neither analytical nor brooding by nature, she sensed a gap in their relationship. He was a good husband and father—kind, gentle and caring but he had nothing to say to her. It was true, of course, that he was a reticent man and didn’t open up easily. He treated everyone, including his wife, with the same formal courtesy. He changed only in the presence of Bibi—her second brother-in-law’s daughter. Mrinalini had seen them sitting together talking animatedly for hours together. The women of the household had told her that her husband wrote masses of letters to Bibi whenever he was out of Calcutta, touring his father’s estates or for any other purpose. But to Mrinalini, his own wife, he only sent a few lines and that too at long intervals. And all they contained were polite enquiries after her health and that of her children. Mrinalini had accepted the fact that she was no match for her brilliant, famous husband; that she could never share his thoughts. She knew she had no role in his life barring that of ministering to his physical needs and giving birth to and nurturing his progeny. But, still, the thought that he preferred another woman’s company to hers hurt her, sometimes so cruelly that the scalding tears oozed out of her eyes and burned their way down her cheeks.

  One night Robi sat writing a song. He had begun by humming a tune in Hambir and gradually it had fallen into rhythm with Teora Taal. And now he had found the words:

  How far?

  How far away lies that land of Joy?

  Blinded and weary I grope my way …

  Suddenly he felt a cool breeze at the back of his head. He turned around startled. Where had that come from? The night was stiflingly hot. Was a storm brewing at last? He rose from his chair and walked to the veranda. There wasn’t a breath of wind. Not a leaf stirred in the potted plants. He came back to his room and recommenced his work. Again! Again he felt the cool lifting of his hair as though touched by a gentle hand. ‘Natun Bouthan,’ he murmured involuntarily. She used to steal up behind him, on hot still afternoons, as he wrote industriously and ruffle his hair or fan him with a palm leaf fan. But she had been gone these twelve years!

  Soon after Jyotirindra’s self-imposed banishment from Jorosanko, Rabindra had moved into his rooms, partly because they were the most beautiful in the house but even more so because, in them, he felt his Natun Bouthan’s presence. He often saw her shadow lurking behind a door or gliding past the gallery or washroom. And it didn’t frighten him. If anything, he welcomed these visitations and looked forward to them. He felt as though Kadambari’s wounded, tortured spirit was struggling to attain human form again; to come close to those she loved. But every time she attempted it, it shattered to splinters like a sheet of clear glass. He knew he was imagining it all but he clung to the idea out of a strange desperation and hope. What if her efforts bore fruit, after all, and she came back to him? The thought sent a tremor of happiness through him. He had been very young then; a young, unknown poet struggling to attain fame and recognition. The dead woman had been his only admirer and he had wanted to cling to her memory. But the situation had changed. He was, now, the brightest star on the horizon of letters in Bengal and had thousands of admirers. Besides, he wielded power as administrator of the Thakur estates, practically ran the Brahmo Samaj, was a husband and father to five children.

  Rabindra recalled an experience he had had exactly two years ago. It was another April night, not hot and still like this one but wild and stormy. Rabindra had been sitting at his table, writing, when the storm broke. A wild wind, moist with approaching rain, came lashing in making his papers fly about the room. He rose and shut all the windows, then came back and took up his pen. But one of the windows had a loose latch, perhaps, and rattled noisily every time the wind blew on it. Looking at that window Rabindra had the strangest feeling that Natun Bouthan stood outside it, and that she was rapping on it begging him to open it and let her in. He knew that was nonsense. The room stood on the second floor. No one could come in that way. Nevertheless, he rose and, walking over to the window, opened it wide. There was no one there. A gust of wind blew in and a flower fell on the floor. Rabindra picked it up. It was a juin—her favourite flower. He shut the window and went back to his table. A memory stirred deeply within him. Natun Bouthan used to attract his attention, when he was engrossed in his writing, by throwing flowers at him. It was her soul, he thought whimsically, that had come flying in on the wings of the wind and startled him out of his abstraction. Pushing aside the work he had been engaged in, he took up the pen and wrote:

  ‘You come too late

  Now, when the door is barred against you.

  Dark is the night and the street deserted,

  The lost wind howls its way along the path

  Begging sanctuary …’

  Suddenly, it seemed to him, the rapping grew louder and a voice sobbed piteously, it’s not the lost wind. It’s me! Me!’ A shudder passed over Rabindra’s frame. But he didn’t move from his place. He turned his eyes this way and that and looked around the room. This was Natun Bouthan’s apartment. Her plants were still here and her books. It was her hand that had hung those lace curtains and put up the pictures on the walls. He wrote:

  ‘Why do you wait forlorn and destitute

  Outside a door that was your own?

  For whom this thwarted love? For whom this pain? …

  Let sleepers sleep

  Why wake them from their slumbers?

  Seeing your anguished face this sudden night … .’

  The suckling infant, sleeping with
his mother in the next room, gave a startled cry shocking Rabindra out of his reverie and bringing him back, sharply, into the real world. Rabindra took hold of himself. What was he thinking of? He had actually believed Natun Bouthan … It was only a storm outside—a phenomenon quite usual during this season. And the rattling of the window was clearly owing to a loosened latch. He must get it fixed tomorrow. And then, suddenly, he remembered. Exactly twelve years ago, on this night, Natun Bouthan had taken her own life …

  Rising from his seat he walked to the veranda and, leaning on the balcony rail, yielded himself up to the elements. The driving rain soaked him to the skin. Thunder roared all around him accompanied by flashes of lightning. He stood there for a long time. But, for some reason, he didn’t think of Kadambari or feel her presence. He thought, instead, of the diseases that had broken out in the city. Cholera and chicken pox were usual at this time of the year but, to add to people’s woes, plague had come sweeping in from Maharashtra and was killing thousands of men, women and children. Rain was needed—a lot of it. Rain washed away the germs and cleared the atmosphere.

  Next morning Rabindra instructed the servants to bring his writing table and chair down to a room on the first floor. The inmates of the household were puzzled and asked him, repeatedly, why he was exchanging his beautiful room on the highest floor of the mansion for one so ordinary. Rabindra smiled shyly. The children disturbed him as he wrote, he explained, and Mrinalini had a hard time keeping them away. He needed quiet and seclusion for, without them, he couldn’t concentrate …

  Clinging to the past was useless. Rabindra realized that he had to let go. He had to turn his face to the future and go on with his life. Besides, he was growing busier by the day and the demands on him were endless. Over the last few years the Congress had been gaining popularity with the masses, evoking the interest and curiosity of the common man. More and more meetings were being organized all over the country. That winter a session was to be held in Calcutta and several members of the Thakur family were caught up in the preparations. Rabindra, who was to be a delegate, had been given the responsibility of composing the invocation song.

  One morning, Bipin Pal came to Jorasanko with a strange request for Rabindra. He had heard that Ganesh Puja was being celebrated with great success in Maharashtra every year with vast numbers of people participating in it. Something like that, in his opinion, was needed here in Calcutta. The most prominent deity of the Bengalis was Durga. The thing to do was to bring the festival out of the mansions of rajas and zamindars and hold it in the streets where the masses could congregate. With a different focus, of course. The public needed a symbol for their country; one with which they could identify. What could he better than worshipping Ma Durga as Desh Mata? That would arouse patriotic feelings among all sections of people. Could Robi Babu write a lyric in praise of the Mother Goddess which could be sung as the invocation song at the meeting of the Congress?

  Rabindra heard him out quietly but was shocked at the proposal. An invocation in praise of Durga! Was the Congress a Hindu party? Had it not been formed to bring all the people of India—Hindus, Muslims, Parsees, Buddhists and Christians together? Noting the expression on Rabindra’s face Bipin Pal added quickly, ‘I’m not asking you to write a religious poem. All I want you to do is compose a paean in praise of our country in the Mother image. Just looking at a map tells us nothing. Visualizing the country as Mother will have a powerful effect on ordinary people. Don’t be so finicky Robi Babu. After all we are not asking Muslims and Christians to perform puja. We’re only asking them to look upon the country as their Mother.’

  ‘Bankim Babu’s Bande Mataram should serve your purpose,’ Rabindra said quietly, it expresses both devotion and patriotic fervour. We could sing that.’

  ‘The language is too high flown, beyond the comprehension of the common man. If you could give us a simplified version perhaps—’

  ‘Forgive me,’ Rabindra said, shaking his head. ‘I can’t do that.’

  Bipin Pal’s face fell. He hadn’t anticipated such a reaction. Making his displeasure obvious he rose and left the house. Rabindra sat, frowning, for a while pondering on the subject. He was a Brahmo; a member of a sect that rejected the worship of images. How could he compromise his deepest sentiments by composing a paean of praise to Durga? And sing it at the Congress meeting, of all places? Impossible! He could write a different kind of lyric though; one that could be understood by the entire gathering. People were coming in from all parts of the country. He had to find a common language and sentiments that were universal. Taking up his pen he wrote:

  ‘Oi bhuvan man mohini Oi nirmal surya karajjwal dhwani

  Janak janani janani …

  Neel sindhujal dhauta charan tal

  Anil vikampit shyamal anchal

  Ambar chumbit bhaal himachal

  Shubhra tushar Kiritini …’

  He frowned and put down his pen. There were too many Sanskrit words in the poem. But Sanskrit was the only Indian language common to the diverse people of the country! All the languages of India were derived from Sanskrit barring Tamil and Telugu. But all educated Indians knew Sanskrit—even Muslims. Rabindra completed the lyric oblivious of the fact that it, too, evoked an image—a woman’s image. The invocation song, the elders decreed, was to be Bande Mataram after all. As Robi Babu had said, a song in Sanskrit would be more acceptable to the entire gathering. But when Rabindra took up the task of training the singers he found that it was too difficult a composition to be sung by a group. After some deliberation he picked out a song written and set to music by his brother Jyotirindranath:

  Chal re chal sab é bharat santan

  Matribhumi kare ahwan

  A huge pandal was put up on Beadon Square for the twelfth session of the Indian National Congress. Chaired by the famous lawyer Janaab Rahim-u-tulla M. Sayani, it was represented by the eminent elite from all parts of the country. After the invocation was sung the crowd cheered lustily and called out, ‘Robi Babu! We want to hear Robi Babu!’

  Robi stood on the stage facing the audience. It numbered more than two thousand. He took a quick decision. He would sing Bande Mataram. Beckoning to Sarala to accompany him on the organ he commenced singing in his rich baritone. There was pin drop silence as the impassioned voice, throbbing with powerful feeling, rang around the auditorium. This was the first time that people from all over India heard Bande Mataram and it left every man, irrespective of region, religion, caste and creed, moved beyond his wildest imaginings. Tears stood in every eye and a hush fell on the assembly to be broken, at last, by a storm of applause that went on and on.

  Any song after this one was bound to come as an anti-climax, so Oi bhuvan man mohini, which Rabindra had taught to the group who sang the invocation, had to be dropped, to the great disappointment of one of the boys. ‘Robi Babu,’ he asked wistfully ‘Are we not to sing your new song?’ The young man was a barrister newly returned from England. His name was Atul Prasad Sen.

  Atul Prasad got his chance a few days later, when the delegates were invited to dinner at the house in Jorasanko. As soon as the guests were seated a group of boys and girls, dressed in spotless white, stood in a half circle in front of them and sang Oi bhuvan man mohini. Rabindra stood in the centre and sang with them. The response was overwhelming. Many of the delegates said they had never heard a composition more beautiful and stirring. Others expressed their satisfaction at having understood every word.

  Rabindra’s involvement with the Congress session had kept him so busy that he hadn’t written for nearly a month. And now a restlessness seized him. He felt as though his spirit would sicken and die if he kept himself away from pen and paper any longer. Late that night he came up to his room on the first floor and took up his pen. While waiting for an idea to come he began doodling on the paper in front of him. Suddenly, a face took form rising, trembling, to the surface—a long, pale face with anguished eyes. ‘You’re here again!’ Rabindra muttered, hardening his heart against her. ‘
It’s over between us. Whatever there was is over. I’ve forgotten you. You’re false; false …’ Suddenly his head slipped down to the table and he burst into a storm of tears. ‘No! No!’ he cried aloud, oblivious of who may or may not be hearing him. ‘I haven’t forgotten you. No, not for a day. Praise is meaningless; adulation worthless since you’re not here to see it. I’m your creation! You put the crown of love on my head with your own hands.’ Rabindra sobbed like a broken-hearted child for some more time then, lifting his head, took up the pen. And, now, words flowed out of him on to the paper. The pen raced on, ahead of his thoughts, as though it had a life and will of its own. He wrote—

  Render me oblivious

  Of all things true and false.

  Set me afloat on a sea of happiness.

  Madness and reason; freedom and captivity

  Are one and the same to me.

  May only thy desire.

  Enveloping the universe,

  Rise and engulf my soul.

  Chapter XVI

  Jadugopal sat on an upstairs balcony of his house in Janbazar sipping tea from an elegant porcelain cup. He had just returned from court and this was his hour with the family which consisted of his wife, two children, a widowed sister, an old aunt and her son. They all sat together drinking tea and talking of this and that when the orderly entered with a card on a silver salver. Jadugopal frowned at the old retainer. ‘Not now,’ he said waving his hand in dismissal, ‘I won’t see anyone now.’ Even as he said this his eyes fell on the name. It was that of his old friend Dwarika. ‘I’ll see him,’ he amended hastily then, turning to his wife Sunetra, he asked ‘Shall I send for him up here? You know Dwarika.’ Sunetra nodded. She came from a Brahmo family and was used to conversing freely with men.

  Looking at Dwarika’s shaved head, as he was being ushered in, Jadugopal felt a pang of guilt. Dwarika had lost his mother three months ago and Jadugopal had neglected to meet him and condole with him. He hadn’t even attended the shraddha. He had been very busy at the time with a case in Nator. But Dwarika was a good friend. He hadn’t held that against him.

 

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