विभूतिमूर्ति

Jayprakash Narayan was a great political figure across the major span of the 20th century in India. He was born in a village (Sitab Diara) near Chapra in Bihar (Oct 11, 1902), and went for his higher studies to the U.S. in the earlty twenties. He formed a powerful dissident group of socialists in the Congress which dominated the Indian freedom struggle under Gandhi. His daring escape from the Hazaribag gaol in 1942 made him a hero among the youth of his times. He always shunned power politics and, later in life, the course of his political activities turned away from revolutionary socialism. During the sixties he devoted himself to the problem of Chambal decoits in central India, most of whom voluntarily surrendered under his persuasion. He also involved himself with Vinoba Bhave’s Bhoodan Movement in which land was voluntarily surrendered to be distributed among the landless. During the 1970s he returned to active politics by leading a people’s movement against corruption and nepotism in government. He called the movement a Total Revolution (Sampurna Kranti) which led to the declaration of Emergency by Indira Gandhi in 1975. JP- as he was popularly called – was put into prison, and released only after the lifting of the Emergency in 1977. He died in Patna on Oct 8, 1979.
JP, like many other political activists of his time, also wrote a number of books, besides many articles. Why Socialism? (1936), From Socialism to Sarvodaya (1957), Prison Diary (1976) are three of his well-known books. But besides his political writings he also wrote an article, and two short stories in Hindi which are published here in English translation for the first time ever.

Our Ancient Heritage
Jayprakash Narayan

Ordinarily, an Indian Hindu is totally unaware of their ancient heritage; not to speak of the illiterate ones. At the most, they can get some acquaintance with it from the village priests, who would generally not go beyond the Bhagwadgeeta, Ramayan and some other Puranas. The educated Indians are, of course, conversant with the Western heritage. But it is our Indian education system which is to blame for this, as even those who could study the Vedas or the Indian philosophy are hampered by their lack of knowledge of Sanskrit. They could do so through English, but few of them have the requisite proficiency in that language. As a result, most of us consider our ancient heritage as something extraordinarily inscrutable and ungraspable, which interferes with our mental freedom and development. Our Vedic knowledge and philosophy become like a long sprawling Himalayan range of mountains, impossible for us ever to scale. But unless this mental and intellectual hesitancy is overcome, we can neither have the freedom of thought, nor the mental courage that we need. If we have to raise new edifices of civilization on our old foundations, then we must give importance and strength to these foundations.
It is true that this heritage is both accessible and graspable for those among us who are scholars of Sanskrit. But Sanskrit is not the language of the common people today. What is needed is that this rich ancient heritage should be made available to people by being translated in their language, which, of course, must include Urdu. The situation as it exists today is that our Vedas and philosophy are more easily available in English and German languages than in our own modern Indian languages. If we take the situation in Hindi, such translation of our heritage literature is not for small publishers. Only major institutions can take up such massive work in hand. It is not a cause for worry that an American university – Harvard, for instance - should start publishing a series of Oriental books, and our (Benares) Hindu university should teach even Kautilya’s Arthashastra in English? It should well be expected that this university will make our old heritage available in Hindi, but, on the contrary, there also we find English reigning supreme. This empire of English is so expansive that if someone tries to address the students there in Hindi, a loud clamour rises for English from all corners! At least that has been my personal experience twice in the past. The reason that is put forward is that students from all parts of the country come to this university, and students from south India, in particular, find it difficult to understand Hindi. But how strange it sounds! If these same students of the south go to Paris or Berlin, they would try to learn French or German so as to understand and speak them in the shortest possible time, but while they stay in Kashi, they are not inspired to learn Hindi even to that extent. And why blame them only, when Mahmana Pandit Madan Mohan Malviyaji himself preferred to make English the medium of instruction in his holy ‘Hindu university’? *. Who can say whether the million-rupee temple proposed to be built there will keep the old Indian heritage alive for the posterity, rather than the systematic publication of the old heritage literature by the university, which has been spoken of above? A rapid revival of that old cultural heritage through its easy and popular availability among the common masses, seems to be of lesser importance to Mahamana Panditji than embodying the soul of that Hindu culture in a magnificent stone and mortar edifice.
My ideas is that we must establish an institution with the sole purpose of publishing this old heritage material – Vedic, non-Vedic, Buddhist, Jain, social, political, historical and literary – by getting them translated into Hindi; not with any commercial motive, but only as a cultural mission. It must be taken up by duly qualified scholars, and should not be intended in any way to propagate any particular ideology. The scholars must be experts of English, German, Chinese, Arabic, etc – but they should preferably all be Indian. There could be an advisory committee of foreign scholars, of course, who can render expert advice. The language of translation - Hindi, for instance - should be easy, from which common and popular Urdu words should not be excluded. An exhaustive plan should be prepared which must be completed within a time-frame. We must also remember that all such planning should not merely be the mind games of our business magnates. Finance will be essential, but satisfactory execution of such a plan by people of the business class is simply beyond imagination. Such work can only be done by noble-minded, tolerant and selfless scholars. Scholars tainted by jealousy and narrowness must also be kept away from such an enterprise.
[ Lahore Fort: 20 August, 1944 ]

*In an editorial footnote, it was pointed out that Hindi had been introduced as the medium of instruction at the Banaras Hindu University from the same year (1946), by Malviyaji himself, as it was also introduced in some other Indian universities like Nagpur and Lucknow during the same year.
The article was published in Himalaya (July, 1946), a literary monthly edited by Shivpujan Sahay and Rambriksha Benipuri and published from Pustak Bhandar, Patna.
The English translation of the article and the note has been done by Dr Mangal Murty
© Dr Mangal Murty
The Second Moon
Jayprakash Narayan

The tale is of olden times. There was a small kingdom in the foothills of the Himalayas. The ruling family of the warrior caste claimed descent from the Sun-god, though the subjects were hill tribesmen. Marriages in the royal family took place either within the clan or in the caste families situated in the lower stretches of the central parts of the land.
In those days of this tale, a very talented, learned, art-loving and brave king ruled the kingdom. He loved music and philosophy, and though he was also a good hunter, that remained for him, his lesser love. He never wielded arms for the expansion of his kingdom nor did he ever cede even a yard of his realm to the mightiest of his rivals. None could ever defeat him till his last breath. His success depended on three things. First, he never cast a greedy eye on any of his neighbouring kingdoms - big or small. Second, his ruling and fighting capacity was unmatched. And, third, his kingdom had invincible natural boundaries.
He occupied the highest place in the Council of Kings which he well-deserved due to his gallantry, efficiency, wisdom, statecraft and love of justice. His wise counsel was heard with reverence and rapt attention. In his own realm, he had the stature of kings of the order of Janak.
Chandrashekhar – that was his name. He would engage himself for his own pleasure in playing the ‘veena’ and painting exquisite pictures. In painting, he invented a unique style in which the lines he sketched were characterized by an extraordinary sharpness, delicacy and acuteness. His paintings had the razor-edge quality of a fine sword. He would choose only such objects for his paintings which had the inherent quality of thinness, tenuousness and subtlety. His lines would have the flexibility of a cane and the exquisiteness of the ‘shiris’ flower. The objects of his painting would be - the second moon of the bright fortnight, the delicate hues of the sunset, the flickering tongue of the serpent, or the lotus or chameli flowers, or a thin nose and sharp eyes looking sideways, with bent brows and slender lips, or the cute spiky breasts of a fresh maiden. He would just take a few lines and set them in such an angular arrangement as to hit the very heart of the viewer instantly.
The people in his kingdom were all of small stature, with flat little noses, and did not possess any charm in their looks which could attract him. Perhaps, his love for sharp, acute lines was inversely inspired by the dull blunt looks of his subjects.
One of his favourite pastimes was looking at the second moon of every bright fortnight. It was as if the bright second moon was a symbol of his own art, which would kindle in him new artistic inspirations and experiences. He loved this gaze at the second moon so ardently that on every second evening of the bright fortnight, ere the moon would appear in the sky, he would sit at the highest rampart of his palace, or oftentimes, at some mountain-top itself, and would stare blissfully at the rising moon till it would vanish. Often the queen would be by his side, or his companions would be there – poets, artists, ministers and courtiers. Never did the king miss the second moon of the bright fortnight till his last breath. Gradually it became the usual practice not only among the nobility in the kingdom, but also among its common people, to view the second moon of the bright fortnight.
The king died at the age of seventy. A flood of grief extended right up to the Kurukshetra. On the occasion of his son, Chandraketu’s coronation, even the great emperor of the Bharat dynasty was present.
He was fondly remembered by his subjects as ‘Rajarshi Chandrashekhar’ or Chandrashekhar, the ‘Sage-King’. Even thousands of years after his death, a grand fair would be held in his kingdom on that day of the second moon, and it would be considered a highly auspicious occasion to view the moon and make offerings to the priests right on that mountain top from where the king used to view the moon for his sheer pleasure. Womenfolk would specially observe the pious day as it was considered particularly holy, to bring them a son-bearing boon.
[ Lahore Fort, 1944 ]

The Hindi short tale ‘Dooj ka Chand’ published in Himalaya, a celebrated Hindi monthly edited by Shivpujan Sahay and Rambriksha Benipuri, published from Pustak Bhandar, Patna, in its November, 1946, issue, and transcreated into English by Dr Mangal Murty.
© Dr Mangal Murty

Tommy Peer
Jayprakash Narayan

At the outskirts of the town, lies a famous mausoleum of a peer (or Muslim saint). An annual fair is held there to mark his death anniversary which is attended by all and sundry – Hindus or Muslims, men and women, the children and the old alike. They would throw flowers and coins, and touch their foreheads on the grave in prayer, and then join the crowd in the fair. Even on normal days at least five or ten people must visit this mausoleum.
On the road leading from the town to the mausoleum, there lay, next to it, another small grave. The square table-like platform of this small grave suggested that it could be a child’s grave. Those who went to offer prayers at the peer’s mausoleum, would also stop for a while at this small grave, put some flowers on it, and would make some sacred wishes there, too. It was said that this was also a minor mausoleum of a ‘Tommy peer’ who was supposedly the disciple of the great peer. But nobody was very sure. Quite often it was said that the present keeper of the peer’s mausoleum used to forbid people to offer prayers at the other grave. But he would not explain why. Be that as it may, except for some of the present keeper’s own disciples or people close to him, nobody would listen to his admonitions. Or, rather, would hardly care to know why not. Thus it was quite usual that people visiting the peer’s mausoleum would stop at the Tommy peer’s also, put some flowers on it, burn a lamp and offer prayers, there, too.
One day, I also went for a stroll towards the mausoleum. The small grave next to it was just there. On way back, I met a few Muslims who were returning after offering prayers at the main peer’s mausoleum. I struck up a chat with them. They spoke highly of the great peer and the power of his piety. A minor poet among them also sung a couple of verses in his reverence. By then we had arrived at the smaller grave of Tommy peer. I expressed my curiosity, and was told that it belonged to a lesser peer who was one of the minor disciples of the great peer.
The name ‘Tommy’ struck me as rather curious and I put my queries to them. All the others, except the poet, were illiterate rustics. They knew nothing, and, may be, the poet had some idea, but he, too, could’nt shed any light on the subject. But his way of speaking clearly suggested his irreverence towards this other ‘Tommy’ peer; in fact, he would never even care to visit it, although he would often be at the main mausoleum for his love meets!
The name ‘Tommy’, and the seeming irreverence of the poet, fanned my curiosity still more. My enquiries in the next 3-4 weeks led to the discovery of a reality which seemed to me as ludicrous, as it was dismal. I wondered what absurdities our superstitions could lead us to?
Just near that small grave was an old brick and mortar bungalow – though rather in a shambles. The rotting roof lurched low, and the bricks of the boundary walls were fallen helter-skelter. The bungalow was in such ruin, may be, also because the town itself seemed to be in a marked decline. The market had been slowly dwindling, and towns like these seemed to be slowly decaying. Also, it was widely rumoured, that the bungalow was haunted by ghosts. The issueless owner had been dead for many years, and none dare enter it even as a tenant. The remnants of the owner’s family had long shifted to some other town.
When I went close to the grave, I found it situated within the boundary of that bungalow itself. The slightly lower boundary wall drawn around the grave had been constructed with the same bricks as of the bungalow’s boundary walls. Although, apparently, the grave seemed totally unrelated to the bungalow.
When I found out this peculiar relationship between the grave and the bungalow, I became curious to discover who its last tenant had been. Eventually, I also met the distant relatives of the owner who had shifted to another town. There I could only gather that about 70-80 years back, a white European lived there as a tenant who was involved in the opium business. From documents I discovered his name to be Robinson. Further queries revealed that he used to pay the rent through his clerk on every seventh or eighth day of the month. Ultimately, the name of the clerk could be deciphered from the several slips signed by him as one ‘Naurangi Lal’.
My curiosity aroused further, I tried now to find out where did this ‘Naurangi Lal’ belong to and whether any of his existing relatives could still be traced. However, nothing more could be discovered there, and I returned to my own town, where after persistent efforts, I met an old opium-seller, whose father had been in business partnership with that Robinson. With the cessation of opium farming, the opium trade had declined, but that old man still had a small licenced shop selling opium. He did not know Naurangi Lal, of course, but he knew of a big shot of the town – Hira Lal, whose ancestors had made a fortune in the opium trade.
I went straight to Hira Lal’s shop, and it was there that I learnt from the manager that Hira Lal was none other than Naurangi Lal’s own grandson. The manager’s age must have been around seventy. I thought, who better than this fellow would know the inside story of Naurangi Lal’s business affairs. In course of our rambling conversation I tried to learn something more about Robinson. The manager soon opened up – “Nauragi Lal was only the manager of Robinson sahib. And, to tell you the truth, the old Lalaji had always taken the sahib for an easy ride, and swindled him so thoroughly that the sahib couldn’t even have the wildest guess about the whole bluff. Lalaji piled up all the wealth in his house, while the sahib kept adoring him for his honesty till his last days.
When I enquired about the ruined bungalow, the manager smiled and said – “Spooks there? It’s all bullshit. The sahib’s own relatives had spread these stories, so that the property is ultimately reduced to ruins. As God willed, not only the sahib perished, but his relatives, too, turned into beggars. One who digs a ditch for others, himself falls into it, Babuji!”
Shadows of such suckers suddenly floated before my eyes, but I just kept mum, and only nodded my head in sombre agreement with his views. After a while I asked about ‘Tommy peer’ which made the manager burst into laughter. “ Don’t you know the real story which half the town surely knows?” Puzzled, I blurted out – “ For weeks I have been trying hard to find out the truth, but till now I haven’t found anyone except you who knows anything about it at all.”
The old man stared at me in wonder, and uttered with a sigh – “Yes, that’s true. The older folk are all gone. And the town itself is now in decay. But let me now soothe your itching heart a little. This ‘Tommy peer’ was, in fact, the name of the sahib’s pet dog; he had till then not been consecrated into a ‘peer’, but was just a cute little fearless dog of sound pedigree. Both the sahib and the memsahib loved him dearer than their lives – because being issueless, they used to pour all their love on him alone. Unfortunately, the dog fell ill and just passed away one day. You can well imagine the unfathomable grief of the couple. They buried him in one corner of their compound, and raised a small square table-like structure there to enshrine his memory. Every morning they would pick flowers from their garden to place on the grave.”
“O I see! So even today we and our Muslim brethren are offering prayers at a dog’s grave? I would sooner let the cat out of the bag, indeed!”
The old manager kept mum for a while, and then slowly said – “Forget about it, Babuji. How’d it matter? All those who put flowers on that grave and pray for divine boons, do they ever know that it is a dog’s grave? They must be thinking that it is some pious saint’s small mausoleum – which would only wash away their sins by their virtuous prayers.”
I had no answer to the old man’s plea. For a while I sat still, and then, thanking the old man profusely, and totally lost in my thoughts, I rose listlessly to go.
The Hindi short story “Tommy Peer” published in Himalaya, a celebrated literary Hindi monthly edited by Shivpujan Sahay and Rambriksha Benipuri, published from Pustak Bhandar, Patna, in its December, 1946, issue, and transcreated into English by Dr Mangal Murty.
© Dr Mangal Murty