An Auspicious Birthday

Aju Mukhopadhyay

Aju Mukhopadhyay

Brief Bio: Aju Mukhopadhyay is a bilingual award winning Poet, Author, Essayist and Critic. He writes on varied subjects besides literature. He is a regular contributor to journals and books in India and abroad. Besides some awards and honours on poetry he received “Albert Camus Centenary Writer’s award” on Essays and Laureate award as Best Author. Besides main stream poetry he has been writing Japanese short verses published in many international magazines. He has authored 36 books including 12 books of poems and six books of short stories besides a novel. His poems and stories have been widely anthologised and translated. He has published more than 250 Scholarly essays in books and journals.

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I hail him as the greatest patriot of India
On his auspicious birthday with nostalgia
To our heart he is still very close
Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.

Highly intelligent; a gifted thinker, orator and leader
Liked by all communities; a true harmonizer and integrator
None among his contemporary Indian leaders,
Netaji announced in a public speech in Singapore,
Had so varied experiences like him; a military commander.
 “Give me blood, and I shall give you freedom”, his voice still resonates
In spite of all rivalries he kept the promise he made
Leading the country even in absentia to the door of victory;
It was elaborately recorded in umpteen pages of Indian history.

The valor of Indian National Army and its trial in Indian capital
Fired the Indian Nationalism
Inflamed Indian patriotism in history unparallel:
Clement Atlee the Premier in British Parliament in 1946 admitted
That all slogans shouted earlier in India had been discarded
The conception of nationalism had been growing stronger and stronger
That the temperature of 1946 was not the temperature
Of 1920 or of 1930, even of 1942 either. 

One who signed off on the decision to grant India freedom
The then British Prime Minister, Clement Richard Attlee
Admitted to the Bengal Governor in 1956 candidly
That the Bombay Naval Mutiny followed by rebellion
In Royal Air Force and British Indian Army
Took away the so long held loyalty
Of the combined forces to the crown
Shaking the very foundation of the British Empire
Compelling them to abdicate and quit anon
In accord with their National decision.
For this, Attlee admitted that Netaji’s activity
Was the most decisive factor:
Questioned, How influenced was the British decision really
By the ‘Quit India’ movement and by its acclaimed leader?
“M-i-n-i-m-a-l”, chewed out the British Prime Minister.
The law of Vishnu cannot prevail till the debt to Rudra is paid,
A modern Rishi said;
Smitten on one cheek turn the other is a funny apothegm
Never practiced but relayed.

Under the dire circumstances Netaji had to disappear
Plunging into the dark womb of the doomed Second Word War
To rejuvenate his force by availing in the international field
All the possibilities, struggling against all odds to rise again
Life was of little importance to him compared to his country’s gain.
In his absence for his activity the country gained freedom
.But back home he never came;
So far that remains the end game.
Do his countrymen not deserve to know how he escaped?
How he fared to the last of his days? How was he served?
How helped was he or what roles in his last life others had played?
When and how his last breath was exhaled?
Besides all sham and shallow efforts made
All true searches to find the truth failed
Due to meaningful apathy in powerful lobby
Powerful compatriots’ dogged rivalry.

Setu, March 2020