& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

25TH BAISHAKH

A paean to heritage

Syed Badrlil Ahsan
Baishakh, the twenty-fifth day of it, is a celebration of Rabindranath Tagore. The Bard remains the foremost figure in Bangla literature. His place in history, in the overall Bengali scheme of things, then takes centre stage. But leap across all that and in your own individual way try feelingTagorein the soul.
As the day wanes in the steep decline of twilight, sing am ar je deen bheshe gachhe chokher-o jole; and a slight thump in your heart, a whisper in the soul, will speak to you once more of the eternal loneliness of man in a forbidding universe.
But there is too gogone gogone aponar-o mone ki khela, truly a paean to Creation. In Rabindranath, therefore, lived a man for all seasons, a being in whom was defined an entirety of life and thoughts of what lay beyond it. Listen to Himadri Shekhor recreate thatTagorean ambience with tumi robe nirobe, with aami kigaan gaabo je bhebe na pai. You get the sense once more of why Rabindranath continues to exercise such a powerful hold on the Bengali imagination.
And that imagination is but a seductively charming combination of the lyrical and the romantic, inter-spersed with the magical. Debabrata Biswas brought it all out in his renditions of Tagore's songs. Listen to his gaaye amar pulok laage or aji jo to tara tobo akashe. Hum, if you will, gopone dekhechhi tom ar byakul noyone bhaaber khela. The universe will come to be symbolised in you; or you will move away, even if momentarily, from the banalities that afflict the world you are part of.
If you have not heard diner sheshe ghoomer deshe, you have missed a whole lot. Rabindranath's is a poetic voice which brings deep pathos with its flow. When Mita Huq sings tumi kon bhangoner pothe ele shupto raate, it is the starry stillness of the night that pounds away in your soul. In an earlier time there was Papia Sarwar in our part of the world. And, yes, individuals of a calling beyond the ordinary --Waheedul Haque, Sanjida Kha tun and Kalim Sharafi -- responsible for a preservation and enrichment of the Tagore heritage, have always been
there.
On the other side of this large pasture, beyond geography but within heritage, there has been the overwhelming presence of Suchitra Mitra, of others. Chinmoy may not have appealed to the perfectionists, but his songs have generally been our initiation into the world of Tagore music Think of amar mon kemon kore. All these years after Sagar Sen passed into the great beyond, he remains our claim on Tagorean romanticism, or a large slice of it. His soul cuts through brilliantly in prokhoro topono taape akash trishaye kaanpe.
But, in a larger, deeper sense, you cannot recall Tagore without letting the light fall on Subinoy Roy. In tumi daak diyechho kon shokale, in hridoy amar prokash holo ononto akashe, you get a sense of the pristine world that once gave meaning to life for us. Romance in the softness of passion came alive when Hem onto sang tom aye gaan shonabo tai to amaye jagiye rakho. It is all
part of the Tagorean ethos, this ability to raise love to the heights of sublimity. You appreciate the beauty that defines womanhood, you sing paeans to the beloved and then you give it a push of Olympian proportions to make it come level with the heavens.
You move closer to God as you sing chiro bondhu chiro nirbhor chiro shanti tumi he probhu. Or there is that pure buzz of romance, as in amar praaner pore cholegalo ke boshonter batash tukur moto. Go through a rebirth of youth in that evergreen number amar-o poran-o jaha chayetumi tai go.
On 25 Baishakh, therefore, we celebrate the cultural traditions we have sprung from.
Let us make our way to the banks of the river, even as the sun descends in the distance, to hear the strains of a song brought along the waltzing waves.
Aaji shaanjher Jamunaye-go toruno chander kirono tori bheshe jaaye-go speaks to us of the passage of time, of