Need Tagore now more than ever, say Bengal’s voices
As Bengal prepares to celebrate Rabindranath Tagore’s birthday — May 8 this year as per the Bengali calendar but May 7 according to the English calendar — those who know their Tagore say the poet is perhaps more relevant today, when one needs to respond to events “without fear”.
“While rejoicing in Tagore’s lyricism, romanticism and spirituality, we often tend to lose sight of the fact that he was an intensely political person; political in the best sense of the term — engaging with the important events of his time and responding to them with energy and without fear,” actor Dhritiman Chaterji told The Hindu.
“Our times are as turbulent as his were. The country is struggling to free itself from a yoke. One wonders how Tagore would have responded. Would his have been a voice of protest and of resistance? Perhaps it is that persona of Tagore that we should be celebrating today — of Tagore the activist,” he said.
Tagore was born in 1861 on the 25th day of the Bengali month of Baisakh. He died in 1941 on the 22nd day of Shravan, which fell on August 7 that year. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913.
“Nearly a century after he left this world, Tagore’s relevance in our everyday life is not only undiminished but growing. And here I am not only talking about his songs and poetry. As our world is being torn apart by toxic nationalistic passions, I think of his lectures on the evils of nationalism. I think of his profound engagement with nature as a climate catastrophe unfolds around us.
But in this election season, as the air is rife with lies and counter-lies, I think of his life spent in the pursuit of truth through art and literature,” writer Parimal Bhattacharya said.
Dyutiman Bhattacharya, Superintendent of Police at Cooch Behar, expressed similar thoughts. “In the current context of climate change and environmental degradation, Tagore’s emphasis on the interconnectedness of all life forms and the need for sustainable living resonates strongly,” the police ocer, who is also an artist, said.
According to writer Amar Mitra, winner of the prestigious O. Henry Award, one should turn to Tagore’s literature to “save the country”. “Tagore’s philosophy was unity in diversity. But India is going away from that. We should remember his poem, Bharat Tirtha, about how Aryans, non-Aryans, Dravidians, Chinese, Pathans, Mughals, all came here and became Indians. Tagore did not believe in chauvinism,” Mr. Mitra, whose story Gaonburo (translated into English as The Old Man of Kusumpur) got him the coveted award, said.