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Santiniketan as Remember it

by Zillur Rahman Siddiqui
I spent the winter of 1984-
85 at Santiniketan as a visiting professor. It was not my first visit, as 1 and my wife had been there on a days visit — half day and a night, to be precise — a few years before. On that occasion. Professor Amlan Datta, the Vice-Chancellor. had left instruction to the effect that, an informal meeting with some senior faculty members should be arranged. This took place in the lounge of the Guest House and Professor Sibnarayan Ray, who was the Director of Rablndra Himban at that time, played the host on behalf of the Vice-Chancellor who had been away.
That was my first taste of Santiniketan hospitality. I cold perceive, even during that short visit, that the kind of hospitality which was extended to me, a restrained and refined thing, had a long history behind it. Tagore himself had set the example of academic and artistic hospitality during his forty years of stewardship of Santiniketan.
The Santiniketan that I found in that memorable winter was still a place where one could feel the spiritual presence of the poet. I was attached — visiting professors were expected to be attached to one or other of the Bhabans — to Rablndra Bhaban. Professor Sibnarayan Ray had left after serving his term as Director, and Professor Naresh Guha had succeeded him. We had known each other for many years. This time, when I landed in Santiniketan, the whole place was under a sense of stupor. Prime Minister Srlmati Indira Gandhi had been assassinated only three — was it four? — days ago. I was in Calcutta, on that fateful day. and I was at Annada Sankar Roys place when she was felled in her won official residence by gunshots fired by her own guards. The taxi had just dropped me close to Bangladesh High Commission,when I first heard some hushed voice talking about it. Though she had died almost immediately, the news was held back for some hours. There was sporadic rioting In Calcutta, and in New Delhi, it had taken a vicious turn. Throughout India, al) traffic came to a halt, and I had to wait for a couple of days for my ohward journey to Santiniketan
Santiniketan held Indtra Gandhi in special affection and esteem as she had been a slu dent here while Rabindranath was still altve She loo. in I kt turn, reciprocated this feeling. A moving memorial service was held in the mango groves, a brief and neat affair. devoid
It took a few days for me to settle down to my work. After a week's stay at the Ratanpalli Guest House. I moved into my quarters am Panchabeti, a complex of five small houses I had a Russian and an Italian neighbour, and neither had a family. When I joined them, we were al of us men without son**, and social contact did not thrive
When Vice-Chancellor Amlan Datta first wrote to ns his fetter of invitation hr IukI expressed his desire that I come and join at the beginning of the session, fe.. in July I could not oblige as the prospect of a Birbhum summer was far from alluring. So I had deliberately delayed my going there and I had chosen what seemed to me the best season for a short stay. As winter ad vanced with the progress of November, I was convinced of the rightness of my choice J never missed my morning walks and Santiniketan was unfolding Its mysteries as f was trying new paths every morn-
For n9 reading I had chosen a comer in the Library of the Rablndra Bhaban Dr Guha has offered — according io him the first such offer ever made — the use of a room of Uttarayan. 1 had thanked him and declined the offer. I should be too much cut off . from the Library. The place had a sharp smell of Chemicals for the preservation of books, but was other wise perfectly to . my taste. I could browse among the books to my heart's content and whenever 1 wanted a change from reading. I could just walk downstairs, peep into the room of Naresh and I was sure of a ready smile of welcome.
1 have never met a man more relaxed than Dr. Naresh Guha. I always wondered when he did his office work. There were always a few people in his room and he was never In a hurry to dismiss them. It looked as if a business was meant to be non-ending. Naresh, many years agp, had announced his entry as a poet with a volume of verses entitled Duranta Dupur, and had produced very little poetry since then. He was a close friend of Budhdhadcb Basu and had helped him steadily for many years in bringing out Basu's Kavtta, a journal devoted t# paefry.1 f 'thing Ms own poetry was smothered under the
weight of scholarship and academic responsibilities. After Budhdhadcb. he took over the headship of the Department of Comparative Literature at Jadavpur University and had edited a scholarly journal with great credit.
We met every day and sometimes look our morrting walks together. Naresh's house, in Purva Palll, close to l’anchabatl where I lived, stood on extensive grounds, and, in order to keep fit. he had taken to gardening with an exemplary dogged ness. Naresh initiated me into going to the Mandir, where a weekly prayer meeting was held each Wednesday morning. The congregation consisted mostly of school children and women, with a few adult males whose piety. I suspect, centred on the devotional songs of Tagore sung by someone chosen for a particular Wednesday. Santiniketan had no dearth of musical talents.
Incidentally. Wednesday is the Sabbath day at Santiniketan. and has been so since the founding of the Ashram by the poet’s father, the saintly Debendranath. That Lakes us back to the early sixties of the nineteenth century.
The English Department had in the early weeks of my slay, invited me and had in dtx-ed me to teach Chaucer for the M A class. I had accepted the invitation, and this meant I was with the teachers of that Department twice every week It took some of my time but I valued the companionship of some very friendly people who had treated me as one of them
Curiously enough, so did the teachers of the Bengali Department. They arranged a special session of lecture and responded warmly to my talk
Special occasions were ereated for me by others outside these two Departments to talk or to read a paper. Sibnarayan Ray, who occasionally descended upon Santiniketan from Calcutta, had a special talent in organising informal meetings. In his eagerness to see that I meet his Calcutta friends, he invited me to Calcutta, and I had some formal lecturing to do. One was in the Jtgnyasa office, and one at Bangiya Sahitya Parisat . The most satisfying of these special occasions was the one sponsored by Vice-Chancellor Mimai Sadhan Bose. A one-hours session of poetry-reading from my own meagre crop of poetry was perhaps the highest tribute I have ever received as a poet. 1 forgot to mention that Dr. Bose had succeeded Prof Amlan Datta as Vice-Chancellor.
Bangladeshi girls studying at Sangeet Bhaban would sometimes visit me with their Indian friends. They would enliven an evening with their chatter and with their songs, and enjoying whatever snacks I could get for them. A partlcu -lar girl from West Bengal, in Idbur-^WHIV a boy1' From Bmfj'ia&sM, "hoping to get'
married some day, took me as a friend and when ultimately their courtship came to nothing, the girl wrote me a letter, confiding in me her pain and sorrow. But the boy who was a frequent visitor at my place, maintained a studied silence over the matter. I still remember the girl, for she made me share her pain.
Santinikatan hospitality reaches a climax with the famed Paush Mela. The whole place, it seemed to me, woke up from a slumber. There were visitors and guests In every house, Bauls appeared with Thai Ektara, stalls were set up over a vast area. There were fireworks, Jatras were staged, and mairas were doing their business of a life time with Bengali Babus consuming hot jilipis with so much excitement that was to be seen to be believed. I still remember a limping Prativa Basu, alighting from a ricksha, and joining the company of jilipi eaters in their idle talks, otherwise known as adda, my plans for an early return to my work was totally set at nought. Prativa Bose is a great conversationalist. and this I would not have known but for the good offices
speechless Sibnarayan Ray in her company, as she went of weaving her Males. Prativa Basu's reminiscence of Dhaka of the twenties and of Nazrul Islam the enchanter of youth I still remember with gratitude, so liberal she was with her time as we visited her tn her Santiniketan house, Swagata Bidaya.
With my wife's arrival during the Paush Mela, my Iffe-• style changed considerably. Some of the neighbouring families came still closer to us, and she could see for herself that 1 was not doing too badly without her at Santinikatan where all the doors I had knocked had opened for me and where I had spent a sen-son rich with the meeting ol minds. Amlan had said I hat was exactly the idea behind the invitation.