Poet and Nation Builder

…………..he that laboureth right for love of Me
Shall finally attain! But, if in this
Thy faint heart fails, bring Me thy failure!

THE SONG CELESTIAL

POET AND NATION-BUILDER

 

IT was but the other day that free India celebrated with great rejoicing the seventieth birthday of Sarojini Devi, poet, patriot and statesman, and definitely a leading architect of the edifice of our freedom. She was not well for some time, and, despite her keen desire to be in Allallabad to participate in a touching function at the Kamala Nehru Hospital, the doctors decided she ought not to move out of Lucknow. Now the nation is plunged in sorrow at the distressing news of her passing away. “Full of years and honours” is a conventional phrase. But this gifted daughter of India not merely covered herself with honour by her achievements in literature and public life, but brought glory to the motherland and raised her in the estimation of the world. She was one of a group of just half-a-dozen Indians of the modern age whose fame was international. Whenever she travelled abroad and spoke of the spirit behind the culture of India, great audiences thrilled to her eloquence and felt uplifted and ennobled by her presence. To them, she was the authentic, living voice of India,–the India of seers and sages, of heroes who battled for the right and sustained the values that are of eternal significance.

Brought up in an atmosphere of liberal culture, it was her endeavour, right through her eventful life, to win freedom for the individual from the bonds of convention. She was a born rebel who cut out a path in life for herself. She loved and married the man of her heart’s choice albeit coming from a different caste and speaking a different language. She was a shining example of catholicity, a queen among women, esteemed by all and treated as ‘one apart’ by reason of her intellectual eminence and her personal charm. This sensitive artist, this lover of literature and the arts could indeed have dwelt apart, but the Mahatma won her to the cause of political freedom, even as he won Motilal Nehru and Chittaranjan Das. From that day till the dawn of independence, she was in the forefront of the fight, braving imprisonment at one moment and wearing the Congress crown at another. It was all in the scheme of things which the high gods planned for India, and she took the rough with the smooth. There must have been moments of regret, however, that she had abandoned the Muse who sought her out in early girlhood and awakened her young soul. But the disciple of the Mahatma never swerved from the path; the good fight was fought to a finish and India broke her bonds. Hardly had this been achieved when the Master was snatched away and the disciples had to become ‘lamps unto themselves.’ It is a story charged with pathos and reminiscent of the ages of Jesus and Siddhartha.

Sarojini of The Bird of Time and The Broken Wing was, after Rabindranath, the head of the All-India Centre of the International P. E. N. Club; and with her were Radhakrishnan and Jawaharlal as Vice-Presidents. The session at Jaipur, where she presided, was a landmark in the cultural history of India and forged a fresh link between the intellectuals of the East and the West.

Her last days were spent as the Governor of the United Provinces. It was a call from her colleagues in the freedom fight which she could not ignore. She filled that high office with dignity and grace; there never was a person to whom the appellation of “Excellency” was more appropriate. From Golden Threshold in Hyderabad to Government House in Lucknow! That is the end of the journey. But, is it the end? The star-studded firmament alone can answer.

MADRAS, March 3.