{"id":2813,"date":"2013-07-13T01:43:58","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:43:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2813"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:43:58","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:43:58","slug":"127-bande-mataram-6-8-07-vol-06-07-bande-mataram","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/06-07-bande-mataram\/127-bande-mataram-6-8-07-vol-06-07-bande-mataram","title":{"rendered":"-127_Bande Mataram 6-8-07.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n\t<\/p>\n

\n\tBande Mataram<\/font><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t
\n\t{
\n\tCALCUTTA, August 6th, 1907 }
\n\t<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n
\nThe 7th of August
\n<\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nThe approaching celebration of the 7th of August has a double importance this year, for it has not only its general and permanent importance as the commemoration of our declaration of independence, but an occasional though none the less urgent
\nimportance as an opportunity of reaffirming our separate national existence against the arbitrary and futile attempt of the
\nbureaucracy to reaffirm and perpetuate a vanishing despotism. The 7th of August will be recognised in the future as a far more
\nimportant date to the building up of the nation than the 16th October. On the 16th October the threatened unity of Bengal
\nwas asserted against the disingenuous and dangerous attack engineered by Lord Curzon; and since it is on the solidarity
\nof its regional and race units that the greater Pan-Indian unity can alone be firmly founded, the 16th October must always be
\na holy day in the Indian calendar. But on the 7th of August Bengal discovered for India the idea of Indian independence as
\na living reality and not a distant Utopia, on the 7th of August she consecrated herself to the realisation of that supreme ideal
\nby the declaration of the Boycott. The time has not come yet when the full meaning of that declaration can be understood;
\neven the whole of Bengal has not yet understood, much less the whole of India. But the light is coming; partly by the efforts
\nof the preachers of the light, still more by the efforts of the enemies of the light, it is coming: and in the dim wide glimmer
\nof the mighty dawn we can see the vast slow surge of Indian life quickening under the breath of a stupendous wind, we can
\ndiscern the angry fringes of the tide casting themselves far beyond the old low level, we can almost hear the roar of the surf
\n   
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\n <\/p>\n

\n\t
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\n

\nhurling itself on the flimsy barriers it had once accepted as an
\niron and eternal boundary. The waters are at last alive with the breath of God, the flood which is to overwhelm the world has
\nbegun.
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nThe 7th of August was India’s Independence Day. A big
\nword, it may be said, far too grandiose for the little that was accomplished. To those who judge only by the gross material
\nevent it may seem so, but to those who look beneath and watch the course of events as they shape themselves in the soul of a
\nnation, the phrase will not seem one whit too excessive. It is the soul within us that decides, that makes our history, that
\ndetermines Fate, and the material nature, material events only shape themselves under the limitations of Space and Time to
\ngive an outward body and realisation to the decisions of the soul. The day of a nation’s independence is not the day when the
\nadministrative changes are made which complete the outward realisation of its independence but the day when it realises in its
\nsoul that it is free and must be free. For it is the self-sufficing separateness of a nation that is its independence, and when that
\nseparateness is realised and recorded as a determined thing in ourselves, the outward realisation is only a question of time.
\nThe seventh of August was the birthday of Indian Nationalism, and Indian Nationalism, as we pointed out the other day, means
\ntwo things, the self-consecration to the gospel of national freedom and the practice of independence. Boycott is the practice
\nof independence. When therefore we declared the Boycott on the seventh of August, it was no mere economical revolt we
\nwere instituting, but the practice of national independence; for the attempt to be separate and self-sufficient economically must
\nbring with it the attempt to be free in every other function of a nation’s life; for these functions are all mutually interdependent.
\nAugust 7th is therefore the day when Indian Nationalism was born, when India discovered to her soul her own freedom, when
\nwe set our feet irrevocably on the only path to unity, the only path to self-realisation. On that day the foundation-stone of the
\nnew Indian nationality was laid.
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nLet us then celebrate the day in a spirit and after a fashion
\n   
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\tsuitable to its great and glorious meaning. Let it be a reconsecration of the whole of Bengal to the new spirit and the new life, a purification of heart and mind to make it the undivided
\npossession and the consecrated temple and habitation of the Mother. And secondly let it be a calm, brave and masculine
\nreaffirmation of our independent existence. The bureaucracy has flung itself with savage fury on the new activities of our national
\nlife; it has attempted to trample on and break to pieces under its armed heel our economical boycott; it has made the service of
\nthe motherland penal in her young men; it has visited with the prison and deportation the preaching of Nationalism by the elder men. The 7th of August must be an emphatic answer to these persecutions and prohibitions. The Boycott must be reaffirmed
\nand this time in its purity and simplicity as the national policy to which all are committed. The Risley Circular must be definitely
\nand unmistakably challenged and negatived in action. Let there be a procession of students led by those venerable leaders of
\nBengal who are also professors of the Government University. And let us see afterwards what the bureaucracy can do and what
\nit dare do to the men who refuse to give up their lifelong and sacred occupation at an alien bidding and to the youths who
\nrefuse to abstain from initiation in the same sacred service out of sordid hopes and fears.
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\tBut most of all the day should be a day of rejoicing and a day of consecration. The whole Indian part of the town should
\nbe illumined in honour of the divine birth which saw the light two years ago. And along with the outer illumination it should
\nbe a day of the illumination of hearts. It is the sacrament of our religion that can alone give the perfect and effective blessing to
\nour movement, and the celebration of this great day will not be complete until every Indian makes it a sacred observance,
\nworshipping God in his own way, the Hindu in his temple, the Brahmo in his mandir, the Mahomedan in his mosque, to
\nconsecrate himself anew on that day to the service of that single and omnipresent Deity through the task He has set to the whole
\nnation, the upbuilding of Indian nationality by self-sacrifice for the motherland.
\n    <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
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\n

\n\t
\n\tThe Indian Patriot <\/i>on Ourselves
\n<\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\tWe gave in full yesterday the article of the Indian Patriot <\/i>in which our contemporary criticised the action of the Bengal Government in searching the Bande Mataram <\/i>office as a preliminary, it is presumed, to a prosecution under the sedition clause. We
\nthank our contemporary for his sympathy, but we are bound to say that he does not seem to have entirely grasped the political gospel preached by
\n\tBande Mataram. <\/i>The Patriot <\/i>seems to be under the impression that it is a gospel of violent despair.
\nBecause England has refused to hear our prayers and melt at our tears, therefore we advocate an appeal to force. But this is
\nnot and has never been our attitude. Those who are at present responsible for the policy of this paper were never believers
\nin the old gospel of mendicancy and at no time in their lives were associated with Congress politics; they publicly opposed
\nthe Congress propaganda as futile and doomed to failure at a time when the country at large was full of a touching but
\nignorant faith in prayers and resolutions and British justice. Despair and disappointment therefore could not possibly be the
\nroot of their policy. It is rather a settled, reasoned and calm conviction we have always held, but for which the country was
\nnot ripe until it had gone through a wholesome experience of disillusionment. Neither is our teaching a mere gospel of brute
\nforce. We preach on the contrary a great idea in the strength of which we are confident of victory. All that we contend is
\nthat we must reach the realisation of that idea in the same way as other nations by utter self-devotion, by self-immolation, by
\nbitter struggle and terrible sacrifices, and that we cannot hope and ought not to wish to have liberty given us at less than its
\neternal and inevitable price.   
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\tPage \u2013 625<\/font><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bande Mataram { CALCUTTA, August 6th, 1907 }   The 7th of August   The approaching celebration of the 7th of August has a double…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-06-07-bande-mataram","wpcat-54-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2813\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}