Where the mind is without fear...’

By Somnath रोय

In the forties and early fifties of the last century the largest bookshop at Patna was the Kamala Book Store located near Patna College। Intellectuals of Patna gathered there regularly. Works of eminent writers in Bengali, Hindi and Urdu were systematically arranged on its shelves. The new publications in the UK and USA would be available there in a couple of months. In the mid-forties, as a schoolboy all kinds of fantastic ideas originated in my head. I started a juvenile library at my home. The membership fee was fixed at two annas a month. Books were loaned to members for a maximum period of one month. The defaulter had to pay a fine of one paisa a day for each volume. In collecting the fines I showed no leniency even to my closest friends. Some members returned the books in time, while a few were regular defaulters. I particularly liked the latter as their callousness helped raise the income of the library. I also kept a donation box in the library room. Occasionally some elders would visit the library out of curiosity. I would give them sufficient hints that their blessings or good wishes were of no use to me and my friends. Something substantial was needed. They willingly dropped a few coins into the donation box. Every second month I would go to KBS to purchase books for our library. The proprietor of the bookshop was Rabindranath Bose, a very handsome young man always attired in a dhoti and shirt. The buyers were taken away by his excellent manners and smiling face. An affectionate Rabi-da allowed me to go to the stacks and select my books. My first acquaintance with Satyajit Ray was there when I bought works of Sukumar Ray published by the Signet Press of Dilip Gupta. It was specifically mentioned in Abol Tabol, Ha-Ja Ba-Ra-La and Jhalapala that apart from the original sketches drawn by the late author, the additional pictures were drawn by his son (not yet known as a filmmaker). Often I saw a tall figure at Rabi-da’s shop, dressed in white khadi and wearing a Gandhi cap. He would himself select 15 or 20 books in English, make the payment to Rabi-da, and go out. Then his driver would appear and collect those books from Rabi-da’s table. I knew he was a VIP but there was no policeman or bodyguard with him. Once out of curiosity I looked at the books he had collected. His favourite authors seemed to be Tagore, Russell, Jadunath Sarkar, Aldous Huxley, Emerson and Sri Aurobindo. I often saw this gentleman in different situations. On 23 January, he would address a public meeting on the famous Gandhi Maidan paying tributes in his sonorous voice to Netaji. Three days later on the same Maidan he would accord a warm welcome to India’s first deputy Prime Minister who had come to inaugurate the Patna station of the All India Radio. A few months later, I saw him in the Sinha Library Hall attending the birthday celebrations of Tagore and hearing with rapt attention Rabindrasangeet by Dwijen Chaudhury and young Suchitra Mitra. Sometime later, I went to KBS with my autograph book in my pocket. As expected, he was there. I lost no time in placing my autograph book before him. He smiled, asked my name, the name of my school and a few such questions. Then he began to turn the pages of my autograph book. The first signatory was Sarojini Naidu followed by Rajendra Prasad, Arther E Morgan (former chairman of TVA), Sultan Ahmed, Radhakrishnan, Anugrah Narayan Sinha, Syed Mahmud, Abhilash Ghosh (who brought glory to Mohun Bagan in 1911), Jayaprakash Narayan and Phullan Prasad Varma (the first chairman of DVC and a close associate of JP). Varma was the only signatory who had given me a message: “Cast off all fear”. The gentleman whose autograph I now sought placed his forefinger on this page and asked: “Do you follow this advice?” “Yeah”, I replied. “That’s fine”, he said. Then Bihar’s first chief minister, Shrikrishna Sinha, put his signature on the next page. Postscript: I confess that all through my life I tried my best to follow Phullan Babu’s advice. As a consequence, I created more enemies than friends, more antagonists than well-wishers. I did not realise that sycophancy was the key to success in free and independent India. So I failed miserably in every sphere of my life. However, I have no regrets. Rather, I am proud of my failures.