RAFI SAHAB -- LET MUSICIANS OF MERIT LEARN LESSONS IN HUMILITY AND HUMANITY FROM HIM
The classical artistes of the day, especially the Pandits and the Ustads, ought to learn genuine humility from Rafi Sahab who never had any pretensions to it. His was a rare gift of God and he bore it with becoming gratitude and utter self-effacement. Tagore had said that humility is an attribute in absence. Rafi Sahab epitomised it.
I wish this piece is read or somehow communicated to the falsely humble practitioners of classical music who have made of even humility a trade. Holding the ears in mock reverential memory of the great masters, when these vain ones pretend humility, even as they then proceed to vaunt about their life and career, their talent and achievements, one wonders what stuff the Lord made Rafi Sahab with. It seems the Lord had breathed life into him and sent him to the world not only to enthral audiences but to lead such an exemplary life of utter self-abnegation that posterity would reflect and weep with the words, "Ah ! What a soul did descend into human clay, what a soul !
Written by Sugata Bose
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