A WORD OF CAUTION TO ARDENT OVER-ENTHUSIASTS

A WORD OF CAUTION TO ARDENT OVER-ENTHUSIASTS

Those who feel it would have been better had Netaji returned to India to take over the reins of administration, I remind them that they would have been rounded up, most of them, for their laziness, callousness of character and despicable desertion of national interest. They would have to endure the rigours of punishment for reneging on their duties towards the emerging nation. None, I say, none would have been spared. Netaji would not have tolerated common corruption among his ardent enthusiasts of the day who have nothing better to do than castigate the great leaders of our nation. All those who now revel in the name of Netaji, commoner or men of undue eminence, all these would have to pay the price of independence with their toil and labour and untold sacrifice which he would have exacted out of them, and if resisted, would have crushed the life of such opposition, for he would for sure not have allowed anything to stand in the way of his grand mission of national self-reliance.

So, next time before you utter utter nonsense against the seminal leaders of our nation in the hope that your adored Netaji will be very pleased with your deliberate irreverence, remember that you have much misread him. His thrust of discipline on your bearings would have been more terrible than you can contemplate. And rightly so. That is the one way of building a nation. Be responsible, therefore, with your adoration of the great one and do not indulge in casual foul play with the reverenced ones of our nation, prime among whom shines that lustrous figure about whom George Bernard Shaw has drawn parallels with the Himalayas.

Written by Sugata Bose

INJUSTICE INTOLERABLE?

INJUSTICE INTOLERABLE?

Most people who clamour that the history of our freedom movement has been written with over-emphasis on the non-violent Gandhian resistance have not cared to read the copious amount of literature available on the armed struggle for independence as well. It is sheer ignorance to thus clamour and is a sad pointer to what political propaganda can do to a polity.

Few care to read. Most are content to clamour. Now what can be done if people wish to dwell in their ignorance? Even Dr. Ramesh Chandra Majumdar has left an adequate account of the armed struggle. But men must shout that the venerable professor did write five times as much on the Gandhian resistance. Now who is to blame for that? Gandhiji? Pandit Nehru? The British? Dr.R.C.Majumdar? Netaji? History? Who?

Written by Sugata Bose

BROADEN THY VISION, UNTO THEE I EXHORT, MY COUNTRYMEN

BROADEN THY VISION, UNTO THEE I EXHORT, MY COUNTRYMEN

The universe of man is much bigger than individuals. Do not get bogged down in the study of single personalities alone of your specific choice to the exclusion of all else.

Although the heart of human social movements centres on the individual, often of exceptional merit and extraordinary power which the collective mass of humanity in following them lend unto them, it is principles that are to be understood which manifest through the prism of personality, and it is the corresponding world events of momentous significance that are to be comprehended which are the resolution of the labour of countless individuals lost to history.

The broadening of vision from the mere adulation of the individual leader to the apprehension of the historical process at work is the work cut out for the common mass of humanity who are apt to lose their way in life in such narrow hero-worship or narrower entertainment of hatred of leaders in the supposedly adversarial camp.

Unto a fuller understanding of history then is my exhortation unto my countrymen who have pitted Netaji against Gandhiji for God knows to what good effect.

Written by

Sugata Bose

THOUGHTS AS THEY COME BY

THOUGHTS AS THEY COME BY

1. We must be rooted to our heritage in a very enlightened way that allows us sufficient freedom to forge ahead. Hyper-conservatism is to be avoided and a fluid growth encouraged. Enlightenment must be the watchword.

2. The Bible says nothing about purgatory and, yet, the purgatory persists to this day in Church doctrine where Catholics are cleansed after death, a process that supposedly readies them for ascension to heaven. The Bible even does not mention indulgences whereby one can buy reduction of term in the purgatory or even a complete pardon for all sins committed on earth, the payment made to Church authorities right up to the Pope. Finally, the Bible does not even mention a Pope. All these are accretions with the passage of time, exigencies of organisational survival.

3. Holiness is a state of the mind but the mind's intimate connection with the body makes it imperative for one to maintain the strictest physical purity as well. Physical energy stored thus is transmuted into higher spiritual energy which helps ascend the peaks of realisation leading to ultimate freedom.

4. Ideology is a force but often for evil when it resists change and stagnates. It is here that the scientific method of examination and reexamination of existing theories and assumptions becomes relevant. Religious dogma holds the human spirit to ransom and must be rejected just as much as political dogma is to be rejected. The soul, freed of arbitrary assumptions, archaic injunctions and devout beliefs thrust on it, flourishes to usher in higher learning, a brighter understanding of the workings of Nature and a clearer vision of truth, both material and spiritual.

5.Ultimately almost all of religion is social relations but once in a while a saintly figure comes along who lends the touch of the Spirit to what ordinarily without merit goes by the name of spirituality. It is such sages, who transcend the limitations of the physical senses and reach the realm of spiritual realisation, that give validity to all the sublime transcendent principles of religion that otherwise remain food for common acceptance by way of tradition and faith. Religion stands on the secure foundation of the realisations of these seminal figures of light and love that transcend all barriers, temporal and phenomenal.

6. What a terrible thing to be weighed own eternally by the idea of 'original sin' that simply has no basis in reason whatsoever to abide by ! Christianity is founded on such fragile concepts -- but with their rigid hold on superstitious man -- that perpetuate weakness in humans and retard civilisation unless men choose to reject such impossible doctrines.

7. This Christian idea of meeting one's Maker when one dies is utterly false. A single earthly life, incomplete and fractured by in experience, unfulfilled by the realisation of the oneness of all existence, cannot be the springboard for heaven or hell or even of redemption otherwise but is rooted in rank material superstition. Sooner or later the entire edifice of the three Semitic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, will crumble under the sledgehammer blows of reason and they will have to befriend Indian spiritual philosophy for sheer survival. The Vedas were the primal body of philosophical articulation and they will be the final body of the same as well.

8. There is but one religion in the world that can be called 'the science of the soul' and that is the Sanatan Dharma, in linguistic aberration popularly known as Hinduism. This is the eternal religion, the 'Perennial Philosophy', as Aldous Huxley put it, and this is the eventual destination of the spiritual man as he spirals unto his Self through the myriad experiences of evolving life.

9. Do not allow anybody to sell you religion however great he be in the eyes of society. He is merely duping you with pompous talk.

10. It is good to pay to learn engineering of the material world but beware if anybody sells you the secrets of 'inner engineering'.

11. Making commerce out of the Sanatan Dharma is not quite upholding its principles. This is no way to regenerate the nation.

12. To affirm the individual is not to negate God but to affirm God in humanity.

13. God is love. Love and spread love. That is all there is to life and that is all there is to living.

14. The Lord is with the simple folks, men of ignorance who trust Him in all their innocence.

15. Try to find God, free of organisation, free of allegiance to Church, in your own simple way.

16. Bow not to the tyranny of man or God but raise your head high in the sunshine of freedom.

17. 'Incorrigible' is the word reserved for the modern fanatical devotees of Netaji whose only business is Gandhi-baiting.

Written by Sugata Bose

Photo : Maharshi Yajnavalkya recording his realisations.

ARE WE PATRIOTS WHEN WE VILIFY THE MAHATMA? .. 1

ARE WE PATRIOTS WHEN WE VILIFY THE MAHATMA? .. 1

This calling Gandhiji 'a British agent' must stop. He was preeminently a patriot and one of the greatest human beings to have walked on the face of this earth.

I now quote Albert Einstein from his speech delivered on the occasion of Gandhiji's seventieth birthday in 1939 :

'A leader of his people, unsupported by any outward authority : a politician whose success rests not upon craft nor the mastery of technical devices, but simply on the convincing power of his personality ; a victorious fighter who has always scorned the use of force ; a man of wisdom and humility, armed with resolve and inflexible consistency, who has devoted all his strength to the uplifting of his people and the betterment of their lot ; a man who has confronted the brutality of Europe with the dignity of the simple human being, and thus at all times risen superior.

Generations to come, it may be, will scarce believe that such a one as this ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth.'

Surely, Einstein who could see through the mysteries of the universe and who had endured Nazi atrocity on his self, in a minor way, and on his brethren in annihilating terms, ought to know better than ill-informed people of the hour who, out of pettiness of personality that seeks the ulcer in an otherwise wholly healthy body, like the fly that feeds on it, keep hurling abuses on a soul supremely sublime. It is a shame that we, as free citizens of a nation that prides on its spiritual heritage, fail to pay our respects to our greatest leader at whose feet just the other day sat the most towering personalities of the age. Indeed, we have sunk as a people in having failed to read history right and so done the Mahatma such an enormous injustice that prompts us to make fun of him and cast all sorts of aspersions on him that only go to prove the hollowness of our own love for the motherland.

Written by Sugata Bose

CHURCHILL, STALIN AND MAO -- THREE CLASSIC CASES OF SAVAGERY IN PERPETRATING THE STARVATION OF MILLIONS

CHURCHILL, STALIN AND MAO -- THREE CLASSIC CASES OF SAVAGERY IN PERPETRATING THE STARVATION OF MILLIONS

Churchill, a British aristocrat, did exhibit the finer points of British aristocratic culture in his effecting the starvation of Bengal that cost the lives of 4.3 million Bengalis. Stalin, the exemplar of Bolshevik baboonery, to quote Churchill in ever so slightly altered linguistic terms, force-starved 7 million Ukranians to death, and Mao, through his misadventures in an attempted rapid industrialisation of his country, caused the death of 45 million Chinese through starvation. One wonders how Churchill's aristocratic culture was in any way superior to Stalin and Mao's rough peasant culture when it came to inflicting death on millions that simply mattered not. While Stalin and Mao, to use bad logic, may be excused on the count of their supposed lack of culture relative to Churchill of eminent intellectual and artistic attainments, Churchill cannot be so absolved. So, what would one be tempted to infer about the refinements of British imperial and aristocratic culture about which the British Prime Minister was so vainly conscious of?

Written by Sugata Bose

'MY ENEMY'S ENEMY IS MY FRIEND'

'MY ENEMY'S ENEMY IS MY FRIEND'

If Churchill and Stalin both used the principle 'my enemy's enemy is my friend' and are hailed for it, why then must Netaji be perennially blamed for doing the same? To save Britain, Churchill befriended communist Soviet Union and to drive Britain out of India, Netaji befriended Nazi Germany and imperial fascist Japan. Where lay the difference beyond judging things from the perspective of the victor?

USA also befriended communist Soviet Union and dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to emerge no better in terms of practising war ethics than Germany or Japan. Britain destroyed India to save herself. The Soviet Union, in driving Germany out, overran Eastern Europe and enslaved it for nearly half a century. Where was befriending Germany and Japan for India's freedom so wrong ethically then, at least in terms of the realpolitik that dictated events for the other great powers as well?

Did not America on the eve of her independence seek imperial France's help to drive out imperial Britain from her soil? Does not the Lafayette Square even today stand on American soil as testimony to it? Was not America fighting for democracy and was she not in the same vein taking the help of an imperial power to end imperialism in her own land? These are the exigencies of history and must be understood as such.

Netaji never stood for fascism or its extreme manifestation in the National Socialism of Germany. All that he had sought was a wartime alliance with the Axis powers to end British imperialism in India, for the World War provided India her best chance of doing so. Hence, Indians, feel proud to say that Netaji was not wrong in seeking Axis alliance for securing India's freedom and never feel apologetic about it.

We must debunk the theory that Netaji's alliance with imperial Japan would have compromised India's independence and would have in turn made India slaves to the Japanese. Such a turn of events would never be but that is the subject matter of a future lengthy series of articles. Suffice it to say that what Netaji did, he did after careful consideration of the political possibilities that could befall India, and I am dead certain that he came to the conclusion that Japan's help would ensure the exit of the Brits while not allowing the entry of the Japs with any measure of military might that would threaten India's freshly gained freedom.

Written by Sugata Bose

WE, THE PEOPLE ... 3

WE, THE PEOPLE ... 3

We have to free our society. Tall talks of spiritual freedom will not suffice. Even in our homes there is tyranny, a fall-out of our degenerate social state. Men tyrannising over women, women equally tyrannising over men, despite their tallest protestations to the contrary. All this must go and and an atmosphere of freedom prevail in both the domestic and the public sphere. It is only then that the Indian genius will freely flow, for constraints, imposed as they are right now, the legacy of past historical degeneration, will not allow the fullest flight of either imagination or execution of dreams that can effectively transform our society to be the fittest vehicle of expression of the grand ideals that are enshrined in our Vedic scriptures.

Right now our task is to remove these barriers that prevent the free flow of the Indian spirit and to this effect we have to be progressive in our outlook and not resort to regressive ways and means that are camouflaged as the renaissance of Indian spirituality. Indeed, that is what we have to achieve, this right renaissance but it cannot be achieved in the manner we are right now adopting, the reversal to regressive religious revivalism. It will rather have to be achieved by quickening the spirit of democracy in thinking and expression along scientific lines, the rational way of looking at things as was the Vedic way which had ushered in such a grand civilisation in ancient India. And even earlier in the Indus Valley civilisation we see this preeminence of the scientific outlook which seems to have been the historical hallmark of ancient and medieval India till we lost our track somewhere down the line. We must revert to that glorious path of progressive, creative thinking as we go about rebuilding our national fortunes from the ashes of the historical past.

Written by Sugata Bose

WHY CHURCHILL IS DEEMED A CRIMINAL HERE IN INDIA

WHY CHURCHILL IS DEEMED A CRIMINAL HERE IN INDIA

Churchill was a criminal who was raised by the evolutionary forces to counter other criminals, all of the barbaric sort of scant civilisation beyond technological attainments and proficiency of the intellect that is devoid of the heart that accounts for a modicum of humanity.

Who can ever forget the Bengal Famine caused by him that accounted for the loss of 4.3 million lives of innocent Bengalis who he termed rabbits breeding indiscriminately and, therefore, fit to die? He shipped food grains from Bengal to Europe to create buffer stocks for British forces in Greece and Yugoslavia by way of provision for a possible invasion in the future by the Germans. He prevented wheat-laden ships from Australia from docking at the Calcutta port lest they should deliver the grains to famine-stricken Bengal under arrangements with the British authorities of the province. Churchill's scorched-earth policy in Bengal in his bid to thwart the impending Japanese invasion of India through the province artificially created conditions of famine as well. Repeated cables to London by the British authorities in Bengal, apprising the Prime Minister of the desperate situation there, failed to quicken his concern for millions of starving Bengalis. He said that at any rate the emaciated Bengalis were used to remaining half-fed and that it was more worthwhile to feed sturdy Greeks instead with the stocks of rice sent to Europe from Bengal. That this person is hailed as the saviour of the western world against the barbarism of Nazism does not detract from the fact that to Indians he was a genocidal barbarian, a racist and an imperialist whose sole concern was the preservation of the British Empire at any cost, be it even the lives of millions of colonised peoples to help flourish the prospects of a handful of his own race.

An imperialist through and through, Churchill will remain much adored and much hated throughout history, a personality possessed of stark contradictions in light and shade, yet, a genius of a statesman who steered the western world to freedom from Nazi supremacy.

Written by Sugata Bose

Source of information : Shashi Tharoor

UNEASY SITS THE CROWN

UNEASY SITS THE CROWN

British trade with her colonises meant theft, the plundering of the wealth and resources of these subjugated nations. British fair play and justice, indeed, British civilisation at its height ! It was at the cost of Indian wealth that Britain was built. Stolen wealth yet adorns the British Queen's crown ! The Kohinoor is the 'shining' testament to Britain's plundering past.

Written by Sugata Bose

'বহুরূপে সম্মুখে তোমার' ... ১

'বহুরূপে সম্মুখে তোমার' ... ১
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যাঁরা জীবন্ত ঈশ্বরকে অবহেলা করেন, গৃহে, পরিবারে, আত্মীয় পরিজনে, সমাজে, তাঁরা অদৃশ্য ঈশ্বরের আরাধনা কেমন করে করবেন ? সমাজচেতনার মধ্যে আধ্যাত্মিক অগ্রগতি নিহিত, শুধুমাত্র অতিন্দ্রীয়ের পশ্চাদ্ধাবনে নয় ।

ঈশ্বর সর্বত্র বিরাজমান । তাঁর সেবা শুরু হোক একে অপরের প্রতি সহানুভূতিতে, বৈরীভাবপোশনে নয় ।

মানুষের সেবা ঈশ্বরপ্রেমের নিদর্শন কারণ ঈশ্বরই মানুষের মুখোশ পরে রয়েছেন । এ এক বিচিত্র খেলা ! এরই নাম ঈশ্বরের জগতলীলা ।

রচয়িতা : সুগত বসু (Sugata Bose)

A HIMALAYAN BLUNDER

A HIMALAYAN BLUNDER

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was the one who should have been the Prime Minister of independent India. Then India's fate would have been changed. He was the perfect foil for the perfidious Jinnah. But for Gandhiji's intervention, India would have had him as Prime Minister. Alas, that was not to be and we are in the sorry mess that we are !

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was the Prime Minister elect, 11 votes out of 13, of the Congress Working Committee and India was set on her course to adequate recovery before Jawaharlal Nehru decided to stand apart in such a case from the scenario and the Mahatma relented. This was the single biggest blunder that Gandhiji made and the result inevitably followed.

Pandit Nehru was a moderate, a liberal, a politician too gentle to deal with the harsh realities of communal politics that prevailed then, and the blunders he made in his enlightened liberalism, an ideal too far-fetched and lofty for the turbulent times, caused irreparable damage to the emerging nation.

History had given us twice the opportunity to have a strong leader at the helm of affairs and twice the Mahatma's intervention thwarted us of that good fortune. He foiled Netaji and he foiled the Sardar.

The country stands now where it stands and we have to take it forward. Come, let us contribute mightily to this sublime endeavour of rebuilding the motherland and bring to fruition the aspirations of the martyrs to her freedom.

Written by Sugata Bose

FROM THE ADMINISTRATOR'S DESK ... 6

FROM THE ADMINISTRATOR'S DESK ... 6

Spewing venom in the name of devotion to Netaji against other seminal leaders of the nation is hardly like being truly devoted to him, to his ideology or to his manner and means in life. It were better if devotees and followers of Netaji, not all but quite a substantial section online, were to refrain from such indulgence in spreading hatred against Gandhiji, Pandit Nehru and the like and rather engage themselves in educating themselves better in the life and activities of Netaji which were so sharply in contrast to what these so-called devotees of the leader exhibit in their vicious attacks on the great one's colleagues and compatriots in the Congress. This sort of vilification of the nation's greats is an exhibition of the utter hollowness of these offenders and is a sad reflection on the regressive culture of the polity. I sincerely wish that the members of this group will abstain from such lowliness as has been evident thus far in the name of so-called patriotism and devotion to Netaji.

Written by Sugata Bose [Administrator]

CHILD-CARE

CHILD-CARE

Allow children to question. Do not indoctrinate them with anything, most certainly not principles of religion. Let them think. Let them reject what they think contradicts reason and let them accept what conduces to it.

Let the creativity of children be not stifled. Let them flower into fine specimens of the human species instead of turning out into machines programmed to thinking along the line of ancient or medieval scriptural injunctions or modern-day political ideologies that are totalitarian in approach and crush the freedom of the individual person.

Let democracy of the political system truly extend to democracy in human thinking such that the best of human resource be available to solving life's problems. That is called proper child-care. The abilities that Nature has endowed a child, let them flourish in an atmosphere free of indoctrination, in a field of free play of the faculties. Teach the child only how to concentrate his mind best without in any way imposing on his or her mind any of the theological principles that come traditionally in its wake. Let freedom be for freedom to arrive at.

Written by Sugata Bose

SINGAPORE AND ITS LEADERS, A MODEL FOR MANY A NATION

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK094NJH5lE

SINGAPORE AND ITS LEADERS, A MODEL FOR MANY A NATION

See what a leader should be like -- highly educated, strong, forthright, decisive, nationalistic, pragmatic and, yet, a visionary. PM Lee Hsien Loong, the present and the third Prime Minister of Singapore, is the illustrious son of an even more illustrious father, the first Prime Minister of Singapore and its founding father and architect, the great Lee Kuan Yew who remains to this day one of the great statesmen of the world and one who has an incisive understanding of China.

I exhort all to follow the history and development of Singapore so as to be fired up with hope and aspiration for the building up of our motherland, along our own lines, though. The sheer drive that these Singaporean leaders have and the way they have, despite Singapore being such a tiny country that is smaller than most major cities of the world and has hardly any natural resource to rely on, mobilised their people towards developing their country into a top first world one, has drawn the admiration of the whole world, but Singapore, despite such attainments, does not rest on its laurels and pushes on towards higher achievements. For, as Lee Kuan Yew has said, there is always the possibility of Singapore sliding down the ladder of development and ruining its past attainments through future inadvertence. Therefore, the motto of Singapore is to move on ever onward, maintaining a strict vigil on its present abiding state and possible future states.

Singapore is driven like a corporate house and is a capitalist state through and through that relies on profit generation for its survival in an unapologetic way and with a clear developmental conscience for its people. Singapore is a modern state that is completely non-racial and non-communal in attitudes, aspirations and executive action which has helped it to forge the bond of national unity across the cultural and community spectrum. In foreign affairs Singapore's policy is to maintain perfect amity with all its Malayan neighbours so as to keep its own domestic peace and communal harmony. All these things are worth pondering for us who also aim to build a strong nation but along our own civilisational line.

Written by Sugata Bose

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK094NJH5lE

Photo : Lee Kuan Yew

BOND OF BLOOD AND THE BOND OF THE HEART

BOND OF BLOOD AND THE BOND OF THE HEART

There is a bond that runs deeper than that of blood. It is the bond of the heart. And out of this the bonds of blood are freshly forged. Often, though, the bond of the heart is not consummated and hangs in air as sublimity of the soul, as pulsating beats in delightful resonance, requited or unrequited, it matters not. What matters is the intensity of feeling that lends truth to the relation that transcends the structural limitations of society. Such a love is, verily, freedom on this very earth that otherwise binds with its myriad fetters.

Written by Sugata Bose

THE ABSOLUTE AND THE RELATIVE ... 1

THE ABSOLUTE AND THE RELATIVE ... 1

Endless are the mercies of the Mother. Her inscrutable ways, who knows? But She exists despite the protestations of erudite atheists, anti-theists and nihilists of all order. Mother is, so, we all are.

The Vedantic idea of Maya is mostly misapprehended by by lay aspirants to scriptural understanding. Even monastics are misled by Shankara's non-dual philosophy for few, alas, few are intellectually or spiritually equipped to comprehend the subtle truth. 'The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna', though, is an adequate guide to the eventual truth if one follows the directions of the Master strictly. The removal of ego is the one thing needful and submission to the will of the Mother. Else, it will be like moving about in circles at the basement of the spiritual tower, to spell it out as Sri Aurobindo had put it in somewhat altered terms.

Maya is not false as men make it out to be, having failed to apprehend the meaning of what Shankara had said when he formulated his epic principle of the absolute and the phenomenal reality thus : "In half a couplet shall I enunciate what has been thus far elaborated in tens of millions of books, and it is this -- Brahman is Truth, the world [phenomenal universe] is false and the sentient beings are none other than Brahman."

This single verse has been most misapprehended by the followers of Shankara and all that followed in the wake of this grand pronouncement, so much so that it took a series of future Acharyas, sages and divine incarnations thereafter to rescue the Indian people from its erroneous interpretations that negated the world as falsely false. Ramanujacharya, Vallabhacharya, Madhvacharya, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Kabir, Nanak, Meera Bai and a host of other spiritual luminaries have consciously or unconsciously made so many attempts to reconcile the inharmonious interpretations of the Advaita philosophy with the rest of the grand system of spiritual thinking in India but it was left to Ramakrishna-Vivekananda to eventually set the scales straight and bring home to one and all the core content of the text on Maya.

End of Part 1
To be serialised

Written by Sugata Bose

THE MASTER AND THE MINNOW IN MUSIC

THE MASTER AND THE MINNOW IN MUSIC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBasSgRpr-c&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR1rQkzkNbST6GxLCprfe2a-KE6PiMKduSlS5pSHC82bRNLoIpvsNMl5xQg

The best rendition till date unlike the more popular singer of the Order who has made a mockery of music. The latter one ought to learn the ABC of music from renditions such as these, but, alas, in a country where mediocrity must inevitably rule the roost, the good is ever substituted by the desperate decadence that goes by the name of music. Would it were that these latter aberrations in the name of artistes were to train their ears first for lifetimes before attempting to please the audience in some future incarnation with their unwholesome presentation that is made to go by popular decadent consent by the name of music ! However, that is not to be in a country that has lost its ancient moorings in the art of discernment of that which is delectable from that which is decadent and one must endure the inharmonious strains of what is being passed off as music to the horror of the ears that must endure the pathetic rendition of the otherwise sublime composition of the Swami Vivekananda.

In a like manner at the Mayer Bari {Mother's House], Baghbazar, a sublime rendition used to be and, perhaps, still is, of the song, 'Prakriting paramaang abhayaang varadaang', at the vesper hour, which has been horrendously distorted in tune at Belur Math and is sung so during the vesper service, an alteration which has made of a skylark flight of inspiration through limpid spaces into a morose nocturnal gravitating mass that is materially earth-bound and can only dampen the spirit instead of uplifting it.

These then are the musical tendencies of the times, the handiwork of the legatees of the Swami Vivekananda whose music used to send God into trance. Indeed, men like me are condemned to listen to these routinised rough renditions of what had originally promised to be the sublime savouries of the soul.

Written by Sugata Bose