{"id":2864,"date":"2013-07-13T01:44:15","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:44:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2864"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:44:15","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:44:15","slug":"86-bande-mataram-28-5-07-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\/86-bande-mataram-28-5-07-vol-06-07-bande-mataram","title":{"rendered":"-86_Bande Mataram 28-5-07.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\tSri Aurobindo at the Surat
\n\tCongress, December 1907<\/p>\n

<\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\tIn the upper photograph, Sri Aurobindo is seated next to Bal Gangadhar Tilak. In
\nthe lower photograph, Sri Aurobindo (seated at the table) is presiding over a
\nNationalist Party meeting. Tilak (standing) is speaking.  
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t
\n\tPart Four <\/font><\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

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

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\tunder the Editorship of Sri Aurobindo <\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\t28 May \u00ad 22 December 1907<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n

On 2 June 1907
\nthe first issue of the weekly edition of Bande<\/i> Mataram
\n<\/i>was published. Issued every Sunday, the weekly edition was intended for
\ncirculation both in Bengal and in other provinces. It consisted mostly of
\neditorials, articles and news items that had appeared in the daily edition the
\nprevious week. Between June and December 1907<\/b>, Sri Aurobindo remained the
\nprincipal contributor to and chief editor of the daily as well as the weekly edition.
\n  
\n     
\n    <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

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

\n

\n\t
\n\t
\n\t{
\n\tCALCUTTA, May 28th, 1907 }
\n\t<\/b><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n
\nThe True Meaning of the Risley Circular
\n<\/b>
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nWe have seen that the effect of Lala Lajpat Rai’s deportation is solely to bring the struggle between the bureaucracy and the
\npeople to a head and the leaders as well as the rank and file into the range of fire. We have also come to the conclusion that the
\ndisturbances in Mymensingh create no new problem but rather compel us to face as urgencies certain primary necessities we
\nhave too much neglected,\u2014 the necessity of no longer relying blindly on the purely hypnotic and illusory protection of the Pax
\nBritannica which may at any moment fail us or be suspended; the necessity of an universal training in the practice of self-defence
\nand a better organisation for mutual assistance; the necessity of recognising and practically grappling with the Mahomedan
\ndifficulty. But neither of these occurrences has really made impossible, or even altered the conditions of, our programme of
\ndefensive resistance.
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nThe third fresh departure of the Government of India is
\nthe Risley Circular. This circular is only a more comprehensive and carefully studied edition of the Carlyle Circular. It brings
\ntherefore no unfamiliar element into the problem; but there is this very important difference, that while the Carlyle Circular
\nwas a local experiment hastily adopted to meet an urgent difficulty and dropped as soon as it was found difficult to work, the
\nRisley Circular is a deliberate policy adopted by the Supreme Government, with full knowledge of the circumstances and of
\nits possible effects, in the hope of striking at the very root of the Swadeshi movement. Everyone will remember the convulsion
\ncreated by the Carlyle Circular. Its natural effect would have been to bring about an universal students’ strike, and for a
\n   
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\n <\/p>\n

\n\t
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\n

\n\tfew days it seemed as if such a strike would actually take place.
\nUnfortunately the movement immediately affected certain vested interests and the representatives of those interests happened also
\nto be the political leaders to whom the country and the students especially were accustomed to look for guidance. The leading
\nspirits among the young men in Calcutta were still immature and wanting in grit and tenacity; the influence on their minds
\nof their old leaders was very powerful; the new men were comparatively unknown and influenced the course of events rather
\nby the concrete directness of their views, the ardour of their feelings and the fiery energy of their speech and activity than by
\nthe weight of their personalities. The older leaders were, therefore, able by a strenuous and united effort of their authority
\nto turn back the impetuous tide and dissipate the enormous motive-power which had been generated. They were too selfish
\nto sacrifice their immediate interests, too blind and wanting in foresight to understand that the immediate loss and difficulty
\nwould be repaid tenfold by the inevitable effects of the movement. An universal educational strike at that moment, before
\nthe Government had become accustomed to the situation, would infallibly have unnerved the hand of power and brought about
\nan almost immediate reconsideration of the Partition. Whatever the Government may say or do, it cannot afford to lose control
\nof the education of the country; it cannot afford to hand over this immense mass of material, the India of the future, into the
\nhands of the political leaders without the subtle control and check which membership of a Government University exercises,
\nwithout the opportunity of unstringing the nerves of character and soul which the present system of education provides. The
\nGovernment must keep its hold on the mind of the young or lose India. The magnitude of their blunder was dimly perceived
\nafterwards by some of the leaders and one or two admitted it in private. We only recall that disastrous episode in order to lay
\nstress on the fact that if again repeated the blunder will be worse than a blunder, it will be an offence against our posterity and a
\nbetrayal of the nation’s future. <\/span><\/p>\n

\n\tWhat is the position now? The Risley Circular is a desperate
\n   
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
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\n

\n\tattempt of the bureaucracy not only to recover and confirm its
\nhold on the student population and through them on the future, but to make that hold far more stringent, rigid, ineffugable than
\nit ever was in the past. They do not care very much if certain academical ideas of liberalism or nationalism are imparted to
\nthe young by their teachers, but they desire to stop the active habit of patriotism in the young; for they know well that a
\nmere intellectual habit untranslated into action is of no value in after life. The Japanese when they teach Bushido to their
\nboys do not rest content with lectures or a moral catechism; they make them practise Bushido and govern every thought and
\naction of their life by the Bushido ideal. This is the only way of inculcating a quality into a nation, by instilling it practically
\ninto the minds of its youth at school and College until it becomes an ingrained, inherent, inherited national quality. This is what
\nwe have to do with the modern ideal of patriotism in India. We have to fill the minds of our boys from childhood with the idea
\nof the country, and present them with that idea at every turn and make their whole young life a lesson in the practice of the
\nvirtues which afterwards go to make the patriot and the citizen. If we do not attempt this, we may as well give up our desire to
\ncreate an Indian nation altogether; for without such a discipline nationalism, patriotism, regeneration are mere words and ideas
\nwhich can never become a part of the very soul of the nation and never therefore a great realised fact. Mere academical teaching
\nof patriotism is of no avail. The professor may lecture every day on Mazzini and Garibaldi and Washington and the student
\nmay write themes about Japan and Italy and America without bringing us any nearer to our supreme need,\u2014 the entry of the
\nhabit of patriotism into our very bone and blood. The Roman Satirist tells us that in the worst times of imperial despotism in
\nRome the favourite theme of teachers and boys in the schools was liberty and tyrannicide;\u2014 but neither liberty nor tyrannicide was practised by the boys when they became men; rather they grew up into submissive slaves of the single world-despot. It
\nis for this reason that the men of the new party have welcomed the active association of our students with political meetings,
\n   
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\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
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\n

\n\twith the propagation and actual practice of Swadeshi, with the
\nvolunteer movement in its various forms,\u2014 not, as has been malevolently suggested, out of a turbulent desire to make use of
\nunripe young minds to create anarchy and disorder, but because they see in this political activity in the young the promise of a
\nnew generation of Indians who will take patriotism earnestly as a thing to live and die for, not as the pastime of leisure
\nhours. Nobody who believes that such patriotism is the first need of this country can consistently oppose the participation of
\nstudents in politics. When Indian nationality is a thing realised and the present unnatural conditions have been remedied, then
\nindeed this active participation may be brought under restriction and regulation; for then the inherited habit of patriotism, the
\natmosphere of a free country and the practice and teaching of the Bushido virtues within the limits of home and school life
\nwill be sufficient. But before then to submit to restrictions is to commit national suicide.
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\tIf our educated men do not understand this\u2014 as, indeed, with our want of direct political experience it is difficult for them
\nto understand it,\u2014 our English rulers at least have grasped the situation. Study their circular and you will see what it means.
\nSchool students are not even to attend political meetings nor school teachers to teach them patriotism. Why? Because at that
\nage the mind is soft and impressionable and what is seen and heard, sinks deep and tends to crystallise not merely into fixed
\nideas, but into character<\/i>. A teacher may by his personal influence and teachings so surround the minds of his students with the idea
\nof the country, of work for the country, of living and dying for the country, that this will become the dominant idea of their
\nminds and, if associated with any kind of patriotic discipline or teaching in action, the dominant note in their character. The
\nattendance of schoolboys as volunteers at political meetings, their work in the reception and service of men honoured by the
\ncountry for patriotic service, their active participation in semi-political, semi-religious
\nutsavas <\/i>are all part of such a patriotic
\ndiscipline. It is this against which the efforts of the bureaucracy are being directed, by the Risley Circular, by the prohibition of
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\tPage \u2013 456<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n\tthe Shivaji utsava <\/i>outside the Deccan, by the attack on our
\nmelas<\/i>
\nand other public occasions where such training is possible. For the same reason the
\nactive <\/i>participation of College students in
\npolitical meetings is forbidden. At the age of College students ideas may be modified, the intellect may be powerfully influenced
\nby what they hear and see, but character can only be influenced and modified by action. And it is of
\ncharacter <\/i>in action that the
\nbureaucracy is afraid, not so much of mere ideas, mere speeches, mere writings. Let the College students attend political meetings
\nand utsavas\u2014<\/i> that by itself will not hurt the bureaucracy; but let them not organise or take part in them, for that means the
\ncharacter affected, the habit of political action formed, the first elementary beginnings of service to the country commenced.
\nPicketing and active participation in Swadeshi work is of course still more objectionable from the bureaucratic standpoint. For
\nthe same reason, again, College professors are forbidden to influence their students or lead them to political meetings: for
\nthat brings in the powerful impetus of leading and example and threatens the bureaucracy with the beginnings of organisation.
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\tThe Risley Circular, with its sanctimonious professions of anxiety for the best interests of students and guardians, is in
\nreality a powerful attack on the growing spirit of Nationalism at its most vital point. As such we must understand it and as
\nsuch resist it.
\n\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t__________<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\tCool Courage and Not
\n<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\tBlood-and-Thunder Speeches <\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\tIt seems that our Local Columns Editor yesterday, seeing the
\nname of Srijut Bipin Chandra Pal at the head of the report of the Shaktipuja meeting in Sobhabazar, thought it unnecessary to
\nexamine the matter closely. The report can hardly be correct. So far as we are aware, Srijut Bipin Chandra has come to no final
\nconclusion on the question of holding or not holding public meetings in East Bengal at the present moment. The Nationalist
\nleaders in Bengal are in consultation at present on the best way   
\n\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\t
\n\tPage \u2013 457<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n of meeting the new situation and until the opinions of all are
\nknown, no definite pronouncement on the matter of the Ordinance is likely to be made. If the report is correct, it appears
\nthat a gentleman from Madras got up at the end and made the occasion ridiculous by a blood-and-thunder speech about bombs
\nand the Czar of Russia. We would advise all who have the cause at heart to refrain from such frantic flights of eloquence. The
\nsituation is serious enough in all conscience and we need all the statesmanship and courage there is among us to meet it. We must
\ndecide on a line of policy which will effectively and resolutely repel the determined onslaught the bureaucracy is making on the
\nmovement, while avoiding the mistake of playing into its hands. Cool courage is, as we have said before, the supreme need of the
\nmoment; exaggeration and unmeaning talk about bombs and human sacrifices can only weaken the seriousness of our action
\nand hamper the hands of those who are trying to grapple with the problem before us. We would request the public neither to be
\ndepressed nor to lose their heads,\u2014 of both which contingencies there seems to be some danger,\u2014 but to remember that by their
\nhandling of the present crisis the people of Bengal will either keep or lose their political lead in the Nationalist movement.
\n    <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n\t <\/p>\n

\n\tPage \u2013
\n\t458<\/font><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Sri Aurobindo at the Surat Congress, December 1907   In the upper photograph, Sri Aurobindo is seated next to Bal Gangadhar Tilak. In the…<\/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-2864","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\/2864","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=2864"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2864\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}