Sudip Sarkar
When we talk of Tagore in the light of contemporary times, a question may peep into the mind: what is contemporary times? Really it seems to be difficult to have an exact definition of contemporary times. If contemporary times comes to be looked upon as a definite timeframe, it may mean 100 years or more, 50 years or more or just the twenty years of the twenty first century we are placed in. Indeed, contemporary times is very difficult to answer.
Anyway, let us remind ourselves that Rabindranath is just not a creative artist. He is an extraordinary thinker with keen and penetrating intellect whose outlook embraces many layers of human thinking and activities in deep synergy. He was an imaginative educationist or a practical or political worker. During Tagore's birth centenary celebrations Aldous Huxley said in a radio broadcast: "Tagore realised very clearly that education as it stands now is primarily an education on the verbal level, on the level of concepts, and that the non-verbal side of man, the whole physiological, emotional, imaginative, non-rational side of human beings was left almost completely uneducated. At Santiniketan he set out to make the best of both the worlds."
On issues of war and peace, international competition between nations, national chauvinism, democracy, the quest for a scientific outlook, national unity, the Hindu-Muslim question, curse of casteism and untouchability, religious bigotry, obscurantism, planned development, experiments at Visva-bharati and Sreeniketan–Tagore's many writings and speeches many, many decades back are still relevant and valid.
The technology-driven character of the twenty first century has destroyed the essence of the human mind. We never feel the need for being in harmony with Nature. For Tagore, the tall mountains, the deep forests, the endless expanse of the seas, the clear blue sky studded with millions of stars, the gurgling mountain-springs, the meandering rivers–now placid, now turbulent, now calm, now terrible, the seasons of the spring and the rains are all expressions of life's joys rejoicing in the bountifulness of magnificent nature. To discover the peace of the bruised mind of a stressed soul, one must remember Tagore and revert to the enchanting beauty of Nature. Truly, if we can imbibe the spirit of Nature as a near and dear one and not as an alien, as we see now-a-days, many of our domestic ills and the smallness of the mind will depart and here Tagore's relevance comes out vividly like the beautiful colours of the rainbow in the sky.
We always look to the West for succour, it is reflective of our mental slavery. We tend to get oblivious of the fact that we are inheritors of a 5000-year old civilization. Against this obstinate mental slavery, Tagore posits his idea of healthy nationalism which is far removed from blind and egotistical nationalism breeding chauvinism and aggrandizement- a scenario witnessed in many countries across the globe including ours.
Above all, Rabindranath Tagore should be evaluated as a quintessential humanist. We have to accede that the fall of humanism is the root of many ills in families, in societies, in countries. If we can imbibe Tagore's humanism with all its sublime features, the present-day world, afflicted with so many ills, would be a better and safer place to live in. Rabindranath Tagore's permanent commitment has always been to Life, to Man, to Nature and to Peace in the world. Should we not emulate Tagore in our contemporary times?
About Writer
Sudip Sarkar is a member of Rabindramela Berhampore
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