Subramania Bharati: Poet, Patriot, Seer
PROF. K. N. VASWANI
Vice-President,
Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari
Poets
learn in suffering, what they teach in song. The life of Subramania Bharati is a
saga of suffering, for throughout his life he was persecuted by poverty,
troubles by ill-health, and oppressed by authority, had to live for 10 years
(1908-1918) in exile in
The life of Subramania
Bharati is also an epic in heroism for he valiantly withstood all the odds
against him, and won through them, as a poet of patriotism, as a patriot, as a
seer, as a devotee, ever fighting, ever cheerful, optimistic, victorious,
unconquered and unconquerable, for, with faith in God, faith in himself and
faith in the future of India and the future of humanity, undimmed faith,
unshakable faith. He died early, on September 11, 1921, even before completing
39 years, having been born on December 11, 1882, but in the midst of economic
poverty, and poor health, what a rich life in beauty, love and in creativity!
And what acclamation, popularity and recognition since, as we now celebrate his
birth centenary!
Subramania Bharati, like
Sarojini Naidu, the “Nightingale of India,” was a poet of patriotism, a
champion of freedom. Freedom or Swatantra is a sacred word for Subrarnania
Bharati. He has sung:
“Although divorced from
the joys of the hearth
And consigned to
dungeons dark;
Although forced to
exchange
A time of cheer for days
of gloom;
Although ten million
troubles raged
To consume me entire;
Freedom! My Mother! I
shall not cease
To worship Thee.”
“A nation unlit by
freedom,
Can it be a nation
indeed?
Can it harbour a soul?
Can knowledge
prosper? Can industry
thrive?
What hope for poetry,
The learned arts, or
scripture?
Aren’t they verily
sinners all
That haven’t tasted Thy
milk, O Mother?”
And he wanted equal freedom
for all without distinction of caste or class, sex or creed, as in his poem
“Freedom”, translated by C. Rajagopalachari thus:
“Freedom! Freedom!
Freedom!
To the Pariahs, to the
Tiyas, to the Pulayas,
Freedom!
Come, let us labour,
all,
Sparing naught and
hurting none,
Walking in the way of
Truth and Light.
There shall be none of
low degree.
And none shall be
oppressed.
Born in India,
All are of noble birth.”
Subramania Bharati is a
poet singing of unity, universal and national. He is a poet of national
integration, the crying need of the nation today, in his birth centenary year.
He had beautifully sung:
“She has thirty crores
of faces
But her heart is one
She speaks eighteen
languages
But her mind is one.”
Thirty crores have risen
to seventy and may become a hundred, and eighteen languages may become
twenty-eight or more, but her heart will remain one, her mind will remain one.
She will remain the beneficent Mother of all, blessing all. This was Subramania
Bharati’s proud, prayerful song. Egypt is gone, Babylon is gone, but India
lives on.
Subramania Bharati! Thou
shouldst be living at this hour! India, your Motherland, hath need of thee!
You sang of Freedom, Equality
and Integration!
Today, these, more than
ever before, are the need of the Nation!
To Bharati, poetry was life and his life was poetry. For him all experiences of life–emotional, intellectual and spiritual–were desirable, enjoyable, enriching and rewarding. He has classified experiences into nine categories of Rasas all emerging from one Shakti or joy. And in one of his essays he has written:
“This world is sweet;
sweet is the sky and the wind.
The fire, the water and
the land are sweet.
Youth and senility are
sweet.
Saving is sweet; and so
is being saved.
Destruction is sweet;
and so is being destroyed.
Consumption is good; and
so is being consumed.
Rasa is well; Life is
well...well...well.”
“We sing because we
must, it has been said of true poets. Poetry is the call for fulfilment, the
call Divine, the call of compulsion by the spirit within, which makes the true
poets. Poetry to Bharati, was self-expression, self-fulfilment,
self-realisation and also the national need, the compelling call of the times,
to generate, to evoke and express the impulse, the urge for freedom, for
Bharat was in bondage and needed to be free for its growth, its fulfilment, its
mission, its destiny, its true role in history.
Today, when the nation
is confronted with dangers of external attack and division and disintegration
from within, due to foreign machinations and internal, selfish squabbles, and
the people are assailed by doubt and fear, we need a voice of courage and
faith, faith in ourselves, faith in our future, the future of our
Motherland. Subramania Bharati’s voice rings true and clear and courageous,
cheering and inspiring us. How beautifully he as sung:
“Fear not, heart!
Victory is sure!
Freedom is ours, here
and now!
The mighty Mother lodges in my heart,
And Bhakti shall bear nectarean fruit.
High are the shoulders, mountain-like,
And they carry the Mother’s golden feet;
Hers are all thoughts, passions and deeds,
And Dharma is here, and Shakti too.”
This was Subramania
Bharati, the seer, sure of victory, for singer of Shakti, emerging from
Bhakti–total dedication to the freedom, unity and service of the Motherland,
and fearlessly singing the Mantra of fearlessness, rooted in Dharma, the true
searching of our Dharma!
Born on December 11,
1882, at Ettayapuram, in Tirunelveli District in Madras State, to mother
Lakshmi and father Chinnaswami Iyer, a Brahmin, well versed in Tamil, English,
Mathematics, Logic and Western Technology. Subramania Bharati recalls
Rabindranath Tagore to mind, for like him, he played truant from school, being
more interested in the book of Nature and life. He himself has written: “My
father ordered me to acquire “Foreign” knowledge. As if feeding a lion cub with
grass”, for he was even as a child of 8 years, given to composing, impromptu
verses in Tamil, rather than attending lessons at the Hindu College School,
consequently failing to get selected for the Matriculation Examination, to the
concern of his father. He had lost his mother when hardly 5 years and this made
him feel lonely, despite the affection of his aunt and his step-mother and
maternal grand father Ramaswami Iyer, who appreciated more than his father his
interest in Tamil.
1897 is an important
year for two reasons. Subia’s marriage at 15 years to Chellamal just 7 years,
and conferment on Subramania, of the new name “Bharati” for his intelligence
and brilliance, proved in the presence of the Raja of Ettayapuram. 1898 brought
a big blow by the death of Bharati’s father, and, with it also came the
conflict between love and duty–love for creation of poetry and duty of earning
for the family. He has sung: “I had twin masters: Love and Duty.” On his
father’s dying in poverty due to losses suffered by the closure of the Textile
Mill, pioneered by him, aunt Kuppammal invited Bharati to Benares for stay and
completion of his studies there and he agreed and joined the Central Hindu
College. Allahabad, and passed the Entrance Examination in First Division;
learnt two new languages–Sanskrit and Hindi; also cut his hair, grew moustaches
and wore a turban in the northern style, though somewhat to the displeasure of
Kuppammal’s husband Shivan, who looked after a mutt, with Nataraja installed
therein. But he pleased Shivan by singing Bhajans for Nataraj. Here he did a
job as a teacher on Rs. 20 a month, until he went back to his village for two
years, at the Raja’s call back there and then to Madura again as a teacher of
Tamil on Rs. 17½ per month, on 1st
August 1904, having tired of the stay at the Raja’s.
In November 1904,
Subramania Bharati joined Swadesamitron in Madras as Assistant Editor,
on a monthly salary of rupees twenty only. His main work was translation into
Tamil of news from English, which was a difficult job. But he enriched the
Tamil language through his translation; and also translated in English, the
speeches of Swami Vivekananda, Sri Aurobindo, apart from the Presidential
Addresses at various sessions of the Indian National Congress. Subramania
Bharati’s first poem “Hail Bengal” was published in Swadesamitran on 15
September 1905. He also joined some friends in publishing an English weekly “Radical
Social Reform.” He was for equality of women, against caste barriers
and for equal opportunities to the poor.
The Partition of Bengal
on 28th September 1905 brought Bharati, like many others, more actively in the
public and political life through movements of Boycott and Swadeshi. He
attended the Congress session at Benares in 1905, with Gokhale as President,
and also the next session at Calcutta, with Dadabhai as President.
Bharati, as we know,
became a champion of women’s freedom, equality and welfare as an essential part
of national renaissance and emancipation. He has written: “Nations are made of
homes. And so long you do not have justice and equality fully practised at
home, you cannot expect to see them practised in your public life. Because it
is the home life that is the basis of public life.”
The turning point in
Subramania Bharati’s life came in 1906 with his meeting Sister Nivedita,
disciple of Swami Vivekananda, the first nun of the Ramakrishna Mission, an
English woman, who had made India her home and taken up social work and social
service as her mission and specially work for and among women, including their
education. He bowed to her and recognised in her Mother Shakti. And she said to
him, “My son, remove all your mental reservations, forget uncivilized
differentiations such as caste, creed and birth. Enthrone love in your heart.
You will become a divine being enshrined in the pages of history.” These words
of Sister Nivedita have proved to be a prophecy as we see, while we celebrate
the birth centenary of Subramania Bharati. She made personal inquiries from him
and learning that he had a wife and a daughter, asked why he had not brought
them. On being told this was not their custom, she said: “How can one half of a
society win freedom, when it enslaves the other half? Let the past be
forgotten. Henceforth hold her as your left hand and praise her in your heart
as an angel.”
Sister Nivedita told Bharati
to think of Bharatmata as a sorrowing mother, in chains, which had to be
broken. He resolved to join those, devoted to this task and become an extremist
in politics, joining Bal, Pal and Lal–Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Bepin Chandra Pal
and Lala Lajapat Rai, the “Lion of Punjab,” in preference to the Moderates like
Gokhale and Dadabhai!
Tributes to Nivedita
Bharati has acknowledged
Sister Nivedita as his Guru and his inspiration and woven his worship of her in
beautiful words thus:
“Nivedita ! Mother!
Thou, Temple consecrated
to Love!
Thou, Sun dispelling my
soul’s darkness!
Thou, Rain to the
parched land of our Lives!
Thou, Helper of the
helpless and lost!
Thou, Divine spark of
Truth!
My salutations to Thee!
What a welcome and
richly deserved tribute this to Nivedita, whom Swami Vivekananda himself, on
her birthday, in his poem, “Benediction” blessed in these prophetic words:
“Be thou, to India’s
future son,
The mistress, servant,
friend in one.”
And Bharati has
dedicated two of his poetical works to Sister Nivedita. The dedication to Suvadesa
Gitangal reads: “I place this slim volume at the Teacher’s feet who showed
me the vision of Mother Bharat and instilled in me patriotism, even as Sri
Krishna revealed to Arjuna His Viswarupa and taught him the true nature of the
Self.” A year later, in 1909, he dedicated Janmabhoomi also to Sister
Nivedita: “I dedicate this book to Srimati Nivedita Devi, the Dharmaputri of
Bhagavan Vivekananda, who without words, in a split second, taught me the
nature of true service to the Mother, and the greatness of sacrifice.”
Birth of the Journal’ India’ and Tributes to
Bal, Pal and Lal
Inspired by Nivedita,
Bharati returned from Calcutta to Madras, a transformed being to use his
powerful pen as a liberating sword, to break asunder the fetters of Bharatmata.
Swadesamitran would not afford him the freedom required. A fearless rich
Brahmin, Mandayam Tirumalachariar, who was editing an English monthly Brahmavadin,
became an instrument for the Tamil paper, India, being
inaugurated in April 1906, with Bharati in charge of editorials, political
articles, poems, skits and even ideas for cartoons. Bharati also became editor
of an English weekly “Bal Bharata.” With some friends he also started a Bharat
Bhandar, to sell Swadeshi goods. During Bepin Chandra Pal’s tour, Bharati took
him round from Bezwada to Madras and got definitely identified with the
Extremist trio–Bal, Pal, Lal–and Sri Aurobindo. And then came, at the Surat
Congress in 1907, a show-down and the Schism between Moderates and the
Extremists, Bharati among the latter. He paid poetic tributes to them hailing
Tilak as a leader and seer and on Lala Lajapat Rai, referring to his exile, he
wrote:
“In a foreign dungeon,
You are neat our heart
Lajapati, how can they
prevent
You, growing in us?”
During the time of
repression by the British, while Lala Lajapat Rai got transportation to
Mandalay, in Burma, Bharati, de facto Editor of India, voice
of the Extremists in the South, exiled himself on the persuasion of friends to
Pondicherry in 1908 to voice vigorous protest from there, through his journals
which were shifted and issued from there to escape the ire and interference of
the angry authorities and their suppression. “India” reappeared weekly, from
Pondicherry on 20 October 1908, having discontinued at Madras in the last week
of September. It carried the motto “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.” Bharati
also issued from September 7, 1909 the daily “Vijaya” from Pondicherry, earlier
issued from Madras. In 1910, the British Government imposed a law on journals,
as a consequence of which Bharati’s journals came to a stop.
In 1910, Bharati met Sri
Aurobindo, another fateful meeting. During his Pondicherry stay, it is said
Bharati turned from a fiery patriot into a Vedantin, a seer, due to his
friendship with Sri Aurobindo who had experienced this transformation, and also
due to his devotion to Gita and Upanishads, his devoted reading
of Swami Vivekananda, and according to some his poverty and its difficulties,
which also turned him more and more inwards, to the self within. His songs
became hymns.
Fearlessness and love
became his panacea for the ills of life. He has sung:
“No fear, no death by
water;
No shame, no body’s
trembling;
No sin, no hiding;
We shall nothing fear.
Let the earth quake, yet
fear not!
Let the sea boil and
rise, be not afraid!
We shall fear none and
nothing,
Fear nor place nor
time.”
And of love, he has sung:
“High above the worlds
of our seeing
You have reared the
Temple of Bliss;
And you have taught us
too the way to scale it
Learning on Love
Divine.”
“There is no penance
More potent than Love;
Those who love are by
nature
Filled with joy
eternal.”
Bharati became the devotee of Shakti and sang:
“In the flood of Shakti
the Sun is a bubble
In the lake of Shakti,
the Sun is a blossom
Shakti is all-pervading,
limitless, endless
It brings movement to
immobility.”
And again, speaking of her, he has sung:
She said: “Serve me and
thrive
And mind not the fruits
of action
She has chased away all
sorrows
And wedded me to joy.”
“You are joy, O Kali,
You have entered me
Then without you, O
Kali,
How can I be?
So the poet has become a
seer. It is reported that Rajaji said that on his return from Pondicherry
Bharati looked like a Vedantin. Outwardly he may have looked ill,
poverty-stricken, not properly dressed. But he was wearing the seer’s vision
and wisdom and had gained the glimpse of the Beyond and could think of Krishna
as a friend. Of the hood verses planned by him only 66 came and they ended
thus:
“It is the blanket of
ignorance
That says you are not
this earth’s God.
You are God; Remove that
Ignorant veil,
And say ‘I am Siva’ ever
and always.”
Among the important
works of Bharati is “Kannanpattu” which consists of twenty-three lyrics of
great beauty. Subramania Bharati sings of Krishna as a friend, mother, father,
servant, king, student, teacher, child, boy, lover, lady love and deity. A fine
sample is:
“Thou to me the flowing
Light,
And I to thee,
discerning sight;
Honied blossom thou to
me,
Bee enchanted I to thee:
O Heavenly Lamp with
shining ray,
O Krishna, Love, O
nectar-spray,
With falt’ring tongue
and words that pant
Thy glories, here, I
strive to chant.”
Another of Subramania
Bharati’s remarkable work is “Panchali Sapatham” which deals with some episodes
from the Mahabharata, chiefly “the insult to Droupadi” in a new,
original, epic way. A moving sample is Droupadi’s appeal to Krishna thus:
“Thou sky within sky,
thou element
Of the elements, earth,
air, water, fire;
Thou who lightest the
hearts
Of sages in deep
meditation;
Thou the first of all
beginnings,
Share and centre of all
knowledge,
Thou light of all
lights,
Krishna, thou flame of
truth,
Thou rich immaculate
grace,
Hear me, save me!
And Droupadi’ is saved.
Bharati: The Last Phase (1918-’21)
In November 1918, on his
return from Pondicherry with his wife, Bharati was arrested near Cuddalore, but
later released by the efforts of Mrs. Annie Besant, C. P. Ramaswami Aiyar and
others and recuperated at Kadayam, his wife’s place. On one of his visits to
Madras he met Gandhiji for the first and last time in March 1919 at Rajaji’s
house.
Rajaji has said of
Bharati: “The body of thought that he wove into song was that which preceded
Gandhiji. It was Vivekananda’s and Dadabhai Naoroji’s and Tilak’s.” This is
true he passed away in 1921 on 11 September and Gandhiji’s main
Satyagraha Movements were still to come.
Bharati on the Gandhi Way
Bharati nevertheless,
with a poet’s intuition, had hailed Gandhi and welcomed his way:
“Today
Bharat shows the other
countries
A new way.
The world-famous
Rabindra,
King of poets,
Says ringingly:
‘In this wide world
The leader of all men
Is Mahatma Gandhi
The image of Dharma.”
“With Gandhi as our
leader
We to prove are prepared
That Dharma alone
succeeds
In politics, as in all things.”
Or again:
“You shunned the path of
war and murder,
Realising the true worth
Of the Dharmic way to
freedom
Preached by great men
and humble devotees.”
Among these great men
and humble devotees, we can count also our Subramania Bharati whose worship of
Bharatmata was his own, not a gift from Gandhi or inspired by contact with
Gandhi.
A great man is he, who
greets the glory of the Motherland in such soulful songs! And yet how very
humble was he, while presenting the gems of his poems to the Mother! Regarding
‘Swadesa Gitangal’ (1908), his collection of songs, Subramania Bharati wrote:
“I offer these flowers
at the feet of Mother Bharat who is a symbol of unity and youthfulness. I will
know that my flowers have no scent. Did not Lord Siva accept the stones thrown
by a low-born person? Even so, may Mother Bharat accept my flowers with
kindness!”
The great humble are
often not recognised by their contemporaries. Bharati’s plans for publication
of his works found little response from those who could provide funds. In
November 1920, he returned to “Swadesamitran” in Madras as an Assistant Editor,
on a meagre salary of Rs. 75. In August 1921, he delivered a lecture on “Man
has no Death” and on 11 September 1921, he departed to his Heavenly Abode,
having sometime back been hit by the temple elephant, close to his house, in
Triplicane, Madras. Though he recovered from the accident, he was too frail in
body to last long. He had lived and laboured for the love of the Muse of Poetry
and the Worship of the Motherland.
Subramania Bharati lives
in his poems, his songs, his patriotic fervour, his Vedantic vision, and will
continue to live as long as we value sincerity, poetry, patriotism, creativity
and nobility, the sense of mission and the devotion to divinity. Poets are born
to confer immortality on the life-experience of their nationality and of
humanity. Such a one was Subramania Bharati.