Sunday, December 23, 2007

जयंती पर याद किये गये बेनीपुरी


मुजफ्फरपुर, एक संवाददाता : कलम के जादूगर रामवृक्ष बेनीपुरी की जयंती पर विभिन्न संगठनों ने उन्हें याद किया। आरबीबीएम कॉलेज में प्राचार्या डा. शांता सिन्हा की अध्यक्षता में एक समारोह आयोजित किया गया। समारोह की शुरुआत बेनीपुरी जी की प्रतिमा पर माल्यार्पण के साथ हुई। इस मौके पर प्राचार्या डा. सिन्हा ने कहा कि बेनीपुरी जी महान साहित्यकार थे। उन्होंने नारियों की दशा सुधारने के लिए कलम की लड़ाई लड़ी। वहीं प्रो. ऊषाकिरण ने कहा कि उन्होंने कुरीतियों एवं अंधविश्वासों के विरुद्ध सामाजिक चेतना लाने का प्रयास किया। इस मौके पर डा. वेणु राय, प्रो. रंजू सिंह, प्रो.कृष्णा सिंह, प्रो. श्यामा सिन्हा, प्रो. अवधेश कुमारी, डा. कुमार विरल आदि ने भी अपने विचार व्यक्त किये। उधर, भूमिहार -ब्राह्मण महासभा के चैतन्य परिषद् की ओर से जूरन छपरा में वीरेन्द्र प्रसाद सिंह उर्फ टुनटुन बाबू की अध्यक्षता में आयोजित समारोह में बेनीपुरी जी को याद किया गया। संस्था के संयोजक अरुण कुमार शर्मा ने कहा कि बेनीपुरी जी सांस्कृतिक चेतना के महा कवि थे। अशोक कुमार राय ने कहा कि बिहार ने देश को बेनीपुरी एवं दिनकर जैसी महान साहित्यिक विभूति दिया। डा. परमेश्वर ओझा ने कहा कि वे सामाजिक क्रांति के अग्रदूत थे। इस मौके पर अधिवक्ता सीपी शाही, अमल कुमार, जितेन्द्र प्रसाद सिंह, विद्या मिश्र, नरेन्द्र कुमार सिंह आदि ने भी अपने विचार रखे। उधर, पताही स्थित डा. श्यामजी सुमांती मिश्र पुस्तकालय परिसर में आयोजित समारोह में रमेश कुमार मिश्र प्रेमी, मनोज कुमार मिश्र, श्यामजी मिश्र, राकेश मिश्र, सुमांती मिश्र आदि उपस्थित थे !

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

ALL SPIRIT AND GRACE : A tribute to Tarkeshwari Sinha


In snooty circles, Bihar continues to be at the receiving end of derisive comments. The phenomenon of Lalu Prasad is naturally referred to as illustrative of what awaits the nation if Bihar’s caste fixation and rustic ways are allowed their head. But be fair, Bihar is only part of the whole; political culture has declined precipitously all over the country, period.To forget Bihar’s role in the freedom struggle will be an essay in ingratitude. Jayaprakash Narayan will always stand out for his high moral principles and as an innovator of ideas; his civilization too was in a class by itself. Sahajanand Saraswati is now a forgotten figure; but it is his legacy which the communist party came to enjoy while it was entrenching itself in the Bihar countryside in the middle decades of the last century. Or consider, among the state’s chief ministers, the case of Karpoori Thakur, a person of extraordinary integrity. And whatever one’s views on Rajendra Prasad, the country’s first president, the Dalit, Jagjivan Ram, was surely one of the shrewdest and ablest cabinet ministers at the national level. Should we pass over either the impact, in the sphere of culture and literature, of the eminent savant from Bihar, Rahul Sankrityayan?If on a different plane, it is equally relevant to remember the euphoric times between the end of World War II and the nation’s independence in 1947. The country was in ferment; students were on the march everywhere, either protesting against the trial of the Indian National Army heroes or extolling the romantic mutiny of the naval ratings at Ballard Pier in Bombay. Two college girls from Bihar, still in their teens, burst onto the national scene during that phase. One of them, Ramdulari Sinha, did not stay the stretch. The other one, Tarakeshwari Sinha, went on though to win laurels after laurels.Graduating from the Students’ Congress to the faction-ridden precincts of Bihar politics, she demonstrated, in the process, both stamina and grit. Scion of landed aristocracy extracting surplus with merciless efficiency from Bihar’s countryside, she as a child had been groomed in a convent and, on entering college, tasted the excitement of the turmoil of 1942 and the following years. Self-assured to a fault, she was fluent in both English and Hindi, possessed ambition, and plenty of glamour to go with it. She fitted snugly into the turbulence of politics. Her beauty apart, she loved to dress well, and had a weakness for make-up. It would however be silly to assume that these were her only capital assets. Her major attribute was raw courage, which some people chose to describe as brashness. Women’s lib was during those days an unencountered concept; the epidemic of women’s studies was yet to spread out from across American campuses for global conquest. Tarakeshwari did not know of such tides-in-waiting. She constituted a one-woman army, fighting the battle for women’s emancipation on her own. While she fought it within the ambit of the superstructure, her heroism can scarcely be underrated. After all, most of the subsequent mobilization, too, is confined within the contours of the middle class; the women who really need massive protection at the base of the society against the ravages wrought by both mass poverty and gender inequity continue to be left out.Tarakeshwari must therefore be judged in the context of her era and milieu. Defying the manoeuvres of machine politicians, she got herself elected to the first Lok Sabha. She was young, brave and uninhibited. She would harry ministers with piles of questions, interpellations and endless supplimentaries, and would also chip in with points of order on the slightest of protest. Presiding officers as stern as Mavlankar and Ananthasayanam Aayangar found it difficult to control her ebullience. A bemused Jawaharlal Nehru thought he had a solution. He made her a deputy minister and, with a sense of puckish humour, attached her to Morarji Desai in the ministry of finance. That did no good. Opposites attract each other; Morarji, the arch reactionary and conservative, enjoyed the cheekiness of the brash young damsel; she in her turn found in him an indulgent sugar daddy, of course of the puritan genre.Ordinarily, a deputy ministerial slot is assumed to be sinecure. Tarakeshwari would not put up with the idea. Inveigling Morarji into giving her a specific area of responsibility, she was determined to prove her competence. She would, without standing on ceremony, barge into the rooms of officers irrespective of their positions. She would demand to know the difference between balance of trade and balance of payments, she had to be taught the mystique of the relationship between growth, investment and incremental capital-output ratio, she had to be helped to understand what Keynes meant by disguised unemployment.She was the only deputy minister at the time to break out of the dark chamber of anonymity. Not that the calumny-mongers decided to take a rest, they sneeringly referred to her hair-do and the heavy French perfume she wore. The same crowd however had not a word to say about the attar exuding from the frame of Satya Narayan Sinha, also from Bihar, Union minister for parliamentary affairs for a long time.The Sixties turned the scales against Tarakeshwari. Indira Gandhi believed in keeping at arm’s length women politicians; in this matter she made no distinction between her own aunt and the sassy upstart of a woman from the Bihar plains. It was thus inevitable that when the Congress party split, she kept the company of Morarji Desai in the camp of the old fogies, who began to experience a lean time. The post-Emergency triumph of the Janata Party revived Tarakeshwari’s spirit for a while. But the party soon split, and fissures have a way of multiplying themselves in the North Indian climate. Even though she maintained her links with one faction of what emerged as the Janata Dal, it was not quite the same again. At a certain juncture, she disappeared from the political rostrum.Glamour is an ephemeral happenstance; it is also skin-deep. So forget about it. In addition to her courage, Tarakeshwari’s real treasure was her natural friendliness and a measure of dignity accompanying it. A particular recollection haunts the mind. In July 1984, Farooq Abdullah had invited all opposition parties to a conference to chalk out a detailed programme of action for realigning the Centre-state relations in the country. EMS Namboodiripad, then general secretary of the party, led the Communist Party of India (Marxist) delegation. Though it was summer time, Srinagar could be quite chilly in the mornings and the evenings. All EMS had as protection against the cold was a faded knitted sweater already coming apart at the neck and along the sleeves. Tarakeshwari persuaded EMS to take off the sweater; she wrapped her own shawl round him, commissioned a pair of knitting needles and some matching wool, mended the sweater and handed it back to EMS with a charming smile. It was a performance which expressed, at one go, respect for a great leader, affection and womanly grace.That was the point of the matter. Tarakeshwari fought and won the gender battle much ahead of the Jennys who now choke the boulevard. She also proved something else; an emancipated woman need not discard either feminine grace or domesticity.Tarakeshwari Sinha made the point and withdrew from the scene. She died last week. Till they themselves drop off, those of her friends who are still around will keep remembering her as an ethereally lovely human being.

Tarkeshwari, a mix of wit and beauty

AJ. PHILIP’s article “A beautiful politician” (Aug 22) was interesting. Tarkeshwari Sinha rendered the Sansad Bhawan cosy not only with her doe eyes daintily dressed with kajol, an elegantly made up coiffure and rouge tinted fluffy cheeks and fragrance of an exotic perfume wafting from her torso but also with her sparkling recitation of poetry.
Her famous verbal duel with Dr Ram Manohar Lohia is still etched in the memory of those who were present in the House at the galleries on that day. Lohia, in his inimitable style, was pleading that Svetlania, Joseph Stalin’s daughter, who fled to India from behind the iron curtain, wanted political asylum. He argued that as Svetlania was married to an Indian, Brijesh Singh, a close relative of the then External Affairs Minister Dinesh Singh, she was entitled to asylum.

When Lohia pleaded that the government must appreciate a widow’s feelings, Tarkeshwari said, “Lohia Sahib, how can you talk of marital sentiments when you yourself are not married?” He quipped, “Madam, when did you give me an opportunity to marry?” There was great laughter all around. Tarkeshwari interrupted Lohia’s speech and said, “You are very much concerned about women from abroad while you do not care for the Indian ladies”.
He seized the opportunity and replied, “Madam, rest assured, I do care for you. I am always full of thought about you”. “Maybe, but let it be known to you, I care not a whit for you”, she calmly replied. Indeed, because of her wit and beauty, Tarkeshwari was a unique MP.

A beautiful politician


TARKESHWARI SINHA stepped out of college to step into the portals of Parliament House where for 19 years she spread radiance of a kind the august institution had seldom been accustomed to. Hardly 26 when she was sworn in as a member of the first Lok Sabha in 1952, the two sobriquets she earned instantaneously and which stuck to her indelibly were “Baby of the House” and “Glamour Girl of Indian Politics”.
Her face might not have “launched a thousand ships” like Helen of Troy but it certainly turned fellow members’ heads every time she strode into the House or stood up to make an intervention. When girls of her age were reading Mills and Boons by the dozen, she plunged into the 1942 movement as a student of Bankipore Girls College, renamed Magadh Mahila College in Patna.
Her family thought her honeymoon with politics was over when she tied the nuptial knot with the scion of an aristocratic zamindar family of Chapra, whose tenant was once the first President, Dr Rajendra Prasad. Married life in Kolkata did not keep her off from politics for long.
The INA trial in Delhi rekindled her passion for politics and soon she found herself elected President of the Bihar Students Congress, which broke away from the All India Students Federation. She was among those who received Mahatma Gandhi when he arrived at Nagar Nausa in Nalanda district to quell the anti-Muslim riots in the aftermath of Partition. The Mahatma also had a taste of the people’s fury when he was “manhandled” there.
Within a few months, Tarkeshwari was at the London School of Economics doing her M.Sc in economics. “Harold Laski had just left LSE when I joined there”, she had told me in an interview. However, she had to cut short her research on Indian taxation and return to India when her father died.
By then India had become a Republic and the first general elections had been ordered. She won from Barh defeating veteran freedom fighter Sheel Bhadra Yajee. The “Beauty Queen” took such an active part in the debates in the Lok Sabha that Jawaharlal Nehru immediately noticed her debating skills.
However, it was only in 1958 that Nehru chose her for a ministerial assignment. She became deputy to Finance Minister Morarji Desai. They became so close that tongues began to wag. And, when the Congress split in 1969, she sided with Morarji Desai and it marked the end of her political career.
Indira Gandhi disliked her so much that when greenhorn Dharambir Sinha defeated her in 1971, she rewarded him with information and broadcasting portfolio. Tarkeshwari returned to the Congress and contested on its ticket in 1977 when every Congress candidate in Bihar was routed.
Eventually, she quit politics and took up social work. It was in that capacity that she once came to invite me to Tulsigarh, her native village in Nalanda district.
Tarkeshwari wanted to show me a hospital she had set up in memory of her brother Capt Girish Nandan Singh, an Air India pilot who died in an air crash in New Delhi. During the journey to Tulsigarh, she told me how she had raised nearly Rs 25 lakh, a big sum those days, to construct the two-storeyed hospital where treatment was almost free.
She also prided herself in taking the initiative to construct a road to link the village with Chandi and Harnaut in Nalanda. During the return journey, I summoned up courage to ask her about her insinuated closeness to Morarji Desai.
“We became Central ministers on the same day. He trusted me and I trusted him. When Lal Bahadur Shastri died, I felt that he should have been elected Prime Minister. There was nothing more to our relationship”, she replied in a matter of fact manner.
Caste also cemented their relationship. Bhumihars of Bihar, of whom she was one, trace their ancestry to Lord Parasuram. They believe that Morarji Desai, too, was a Bhumihar.
It is a pity that when this stormy petrel of Indian politics died after a prolonged illness in New Delhi last week, few newspapers cared even to report her death.

Beauty & brains

Her charm and oratory excelled that of today’s women politicians. Tarkeshwari Sinha was a freedom fighter, a firebrand student leader and a member of Jawaharlal Nehru’s council of ministers. A four-time MP representing the Barh constituency of Bihar, she was the only woman politician other than Indira Gandhi who was considered newsworthy in her time.
Tarkeshwari was also the only woman politician from Bihar who was much ahead of her time. Well-read and articulate, she had charisma. She remembered thousands of Urdu couplets and these were delivered with extraordinary finesse and ease. In an era when film actresses were not introduced into politics, Sinha epitomised beauty and brains and charmed Parliament for 19 years.
Poet-lyricist-director Gulzar, once discussing his film Aandhi, said the movie was supposed to be based on the life of Indira Gandhi, but that was only partially true. It was the first film on the modern Indian politician and, according to Gulzar, Indira Gandhi and, to a lesser extent, Tarkeshwari Sinha fitted the picture.
I had seen her from a close distance at a public meeting during the turbulent years of 1969-71 Congress divide, when she was touring India and came to Ludhiana. Accompanied by S. Nijligappa and Rajya Sabha MP Mahedra Kaur (mother of Captain Amarinder Singh), she addressed a sizable crowd at the famous Daresi Grounds. After the Congress split, Sinha sided with the Syndicate. It is an irony of fate that such a vibrant and progressive politician like her chose the company of old and obscurantist cronies like K. Kamraj and Morarji Desai and gradually faded into oblivion. Perhaps she chose this path because of Indira Gandhi’s deep-rooted dislike for her.
Katherine Frank, in her book Indira, had written that once upon a time Feroze Gandhi openly flaunted his affair with Sinha. She passed away recently at a ripe old age unsung and literally unreported. With her death, a link to the Nehruvian era and pre-Independence India has been snapped.