Kanchan Gupta
As the nation, or what passes for it in this
wondrous land with an abysmally poor sense of history, observes the 116th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas
Chandra Bose, perhaps the time has come for one of India’s great leaders to be
freed from the confines of political myth-making that has reduced him to
calendar lithographs which adorn living rooms in provincial Bengal and the
dimly lit offices of the Forward Bloc in Kolkata.
In a sense, that would mark the posthumous
homecoming for a nationalist who believed that rashtrabhakti is a synthesis of religion and
nationalism, of the spiritual and the political. In the early decades of this
century, when others were looking up to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi for
inspiration, Bose was looking elsewhere for guidance: His search for a
religious philosophy that would spur political activism led him to explore the
teachings of Swami Vivekananda and the writings of Aurobindo Ghosh. The latter
made a lasting impression on his mind, providing his political activism with a
religious side.
The profound Impact that Aurobindo Ghosh had
on Subhas Chandra Bose is reflected in his autobiography: “In my undergraduate
days, Aurobindo Ghosh was easily the most popular leader in Bengal… a mixture
of spirituality and politics had given him a halo of mysticism and made his
personality more fascinating to those who were religiously inclined… We felt
convinced that spiritual enlightenment was necessary for effective national
service…”
It is, therefore, not surprising that he
should have also been influenced by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s construction of
nationalism. And like Aurobindo Ghosh, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Bal
Gangadhar Tilak, the Indian nation for him extended beyond the geographical to
the devotional plane. During his college days he discovered the wretchedness of
not India but “impoverished Mother India.”
Curiously, his view of the other India, the
one which appears so distant from the fashionable drawing rooms and glittering
malls of our cities, is not different from those who believe that a divide
separates ‘us’ and ‘them’. For, “the picture of real India”, which Subhas
Chandra Bose described as “the India of the villages where poverty stalks the
land, men die like flies, and illiteracy is the prevailing order”, is also the
India which many believe should receive priority over that India which revels
in rejecting anything that carries the label ‘Made in India’, including Hindu
spirituality and religious philosophy.
In his book, Brothers Against The Raj,
Leonard A Gordon writes about Bose’s quest for a religious philosophy to serve
as the core of nationalism and sustain his political activism: “Inner religious
explorations continued to be a part of his adult life. This set him apart from
the slowly growing number of atheistic socialists and communists who dotted the
Indian landscape.” And it was this “religious exploration” that set apart Subhas
Chandra Bose from Jawaharlal Nehru for whom “this was a vain quest”. Although
Bose scrupulously avoided publishing his faith or his quest, he remained firm
in his belief that “Hinduism was an essential part of his Indianness”, his
Bharatiyata. In other words, he subscribed to cultural nationalism or, call it
If you must by its other name, Hindutva.
This did not, however, make him a bigoted
Hindu, nor did it propel him towards Hindu orthodoxy. Commenting on the
“definite Hindu streak in Bose’s dislike for Gandhi”, Nirad C Chaudhuri records
in his memoirs, Thy Hand!
Great Anarch, “He was in no sense a bigoted or even orthodox Hindu. But he
had grown up in the first two decades of the twentieth century in Bengal,
where, owing to the influence of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Swami
Vivekananda, there was a fusion of religion and nationalism, so that the
nationalist feeling had a pronounced Hindu complexion and Hinduism a pronounced
political character.”
This “fusion of religion and nationalism” and
Hinduism with a “pronounced political character” came into play in 1925 when
during his incarceration at Mandalay prison, Subhas Chandra Bose, along with
the other Bengali prisoners, organised Durga Puja on the jail premises and
demanded that the expenses be borne by the authorities. When the latter
refused, Bose converted his spiritual quest into a political campaign by
launching a hunger strike. This practice of political Hinduism had an
electrifying impact on public opinion and soon the Swarajists lent their voice to
the popular demand for the release of all political prisoners who had not been
charged with specific crimes.
Those who deride nationalism, more so
cultural nationalism, as narrow, selfish and aggressive, a hindrance to the
promotion of internationalism, would do well to go through Bose’s speech at
Poona after being elected president of the Maharashtra Provincial Conference.
“Indian nationalism,” Subhas Chandra Bose asserted, “is inspired by the highest
ideals of the human race, Satyam, Shivam, Sundaram. Nationalism in
India has… roused the creative faculties which for centuries had been lying
dormant in our people…”
Sadly, nationalism has now been rendered
politically incorrect by our deracinated intelligentsia and abandoned by our
corrupt political elite.
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