Rabindranath Tagore: A Visionary Educator and Social Reformer

BOOK EXCERPTS

Book Title: Rabindranath Tagore

Author: Hiranmay Banerjee

Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore Birth Anniversary May 07

In his "Poems on Life", Nobel laurette Rabindranath Tagore says "Life is given to us, we earn it by giving it." These lines written by him also echo about 'him' and 'his life', capturing the essence of him. Tagore's multifaceted persona as a thinker, writer, reformer, musician and painter has been indelibly woven into the fabric of Indian history and culture. Revered as an ideal by many, his birth anniversary on May 07 is celebrated annually. Fondly known as Gurudev, Tagore's works are admired for their timeless relevance, profound wisdom. Winning the coveted Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 for his collection of poetry 'Gitanjali', he was the first non-European to receive it for literature and the second non-European to receive the prize after Theodore Roosevelt.

Here are a few excerpts from 'Rabindranath Tagore' by Hiranmay Banerjee, a part of the Publications Division's Builders of Modern India series.

Educationist and Social Worker

Here were two factors that impelled Tagore to turn an educationist. Firstly, his son having attained the stage when regular education in school became a necessity and his own bitter experience of school life urged him to provide a new type of school for his son. Secondly, he had felt an inner urge to occupy himself in some disinterested service as a necessary phase through which he should spiritually realise himself. The two urges thus combined together establishing a school at Santiniketan.

As the primary function of the proposed University was to present to the outside world the representative learning of India, it should provide for facilities for a comprehensive study of the same. He thought that Indian learning had developed through different phases on basis of distinct cultures. These in his enumeration are the Vedic, the Puranic, the Buddhist, the Jain, the Islamic, the Sikh and the Zoroastrian culture. Evidently, he wanted the list to be as comprehensive as possible so that even the youngest cultural group should not be omitted. He desired that knowledge of all these component elements of Indian culture should be made available from the proposed institution.

Tagore's main objective is clearly indicated in the name he proposed for the new University, namely, 'Visva-Bharati'. His idea was that the new institution should be so developed that people from different parts of the world would be attracted to it for exchange of the spiritual wealth. The following quotation from his observations will clearly bear this out:

"Universities should never be made into mechanical organisations for collecting and distributing knowledge. Through them, the people should offer their intellectual hospitality, their wealth of mind to others and claim their proud right in return to receive gifts from the rest of the world."

The next subject that engaged Tagore's attention was what should be the contents of education. The objective of education he thought should be to make the whole nature of man articulate. Secondly, it should enable the student to express himself fully. This he thought could only be achieved by a system of education which would develop not only his intellectual faculty, but also his emotional faculty. 

Thirdly, he deplored the fact that educational institutions not often tend to become mere centres for distribution of knowledge. To his mind that was however, only a minor function for them and rather the major function should be the creation of knowledge.

Lastly, he felt that an educational institution should not live in isolation separated from its geographical and social surroundings.

Tagore’s Creative Feats

As regards fine arts, particular attention was paid to painting and music. For looking after painting, he got two of the most promising painters of those days who had received their training from Abanindranath Tagore, the founder of Bengal School of Painting. They were Nandalal Bose and Surendranath Kar. For teaching music, he brought Bhim Sastri and Nakuleswar Banerjee of the Bishnupur School of Music both of whom were well grounded in classical music.

By this time, Tagore's own songs had established a reputation of their own not only for their distinctive character but for their aesthetic quality as well. It had consequently, gained immense popularity in Bengal. To meet popular demand, therefore, provision had to be made for teaching Tagore songs also at Santiniketan. In this matter Tagore was very lucky to get a man with a finely developed sense of music who was none other than his own grand-nephew Dinendranath Tagore who had a prodigious memory for tunes. Once he heard somebody sing, a song he was able to reproduce it to a degree of perfection and could also put it to notation from memory.

With the groundwork thus prepared, Tagore decided to declare the University open through a formal ceremony. For this, December 22, 1921, corresponding to the Bengali Pous 8, 1328, was selected, this being the anniversary day when his father embraced the Brahmo faith. Dr. Brajendranath Seal, the distinguished philosopher presided over the function.

Community Development

Consistent with his idea that an educational institution should become a part of the local life by involving itself in welfare activities in surroun-ding areas, Tagore also decided to open a rural welfare section of this University. With this end in view, he acquired some properties in a village called Surul located only 3 km away from Santiniketan and opened a rural welfare depart-ment in the same year he formally opened his university and named it Sriniketan which means the abode of wealth. The idea was that this complementary institution should look after the material well being of the surrounding villages.

In developing this institution, Tagore was ably assisted by an idealist young Englishman named Leonard Elmhirst. Elmhirst had visited India in 1915 and had also read Tagore's Gitanjali. Tagore met him in New York in course of his visit in 1920 where the latter was undergoing training in Agronomy. Tagore at once developed a liking for him and on impulse asked him to accompany him to India, straight away to develop his rural institution. Elmhirst, however, was keen to finish his training first and so promised to visit Sriniketan after that. True to his word he sent by wire to Tagore after the completion of his training in 1921 this message: "Study is finished. Can I come?" Now, Tagore was just then facing financial difficulties and finding it impossible to undertake the consequent financial responsibility, wired back to say, "Do not come; no funds available."

The limitation of funds did not allow Tagore to operate on a big field which he least regretted, for he knew that it was the quality of work that counted and not the quantity. He, therefore, decided that the scheme should function like a pilot project to initiate experiments and study results to find out solutions for problems of rural areas. "A lighted lamp, "he said, "is for us the end, not a lamp of gold."

With these general points as guiding principles, Elmhirst carried on very interesting experiments in rural reconstruction in the group of villages surrounding Sriniketan. In the process, he evolved an effective programme for rural development and also deve-loped a method which in many ways anticipated the Community Development Programme introduced in our country several years after as a part of the First Five Year Plan under the direct supervision of the Planning Commission. A brief reference to the points of similarity will repay our efforts by bringing into relief the special points of excellence in Tagore's programme.

The Programme adopted by the Planning Commission has three broad features: (1) It is a multipurpose programme pro-viding for simultaneous activities in different sectors of rural life; (2) It is meant to be purely a self help programme where the rural people are expected to be encouraged to solve their problems ex-clusively through their own efforts with the minimum of technical and other assistance from outside; (3) The special method adopted for rural improvement by persuading the people to adopt improved practices after being satisfied about their effectiveness, better known by its technical name as the Extension Service.

Elmhirst's experiments yielded results which anticipated all these features. The general principles adopted by Tagore referred to earlier will show that the first two features had been anticipated through them. Thus, Tagore wanted that rural development programme should be executed through the people's own efforts both individually and collectively and no help should be made available from outside. Secondly, the multipurpose character that Tagore wanted to impart to his programme was wider in scope than that adopted by the Planning Commission. Tagore's scheme recognised the fact that to get the best return for voluntary action, it was necessary to link it up with our emotional faculty.

In this manner grew up a programme which provided for improvement in agricultural practices, resuscitation of cottage industries, adult literacy, co-operative banking and medical service through co-operatives as a part of the educational programme of his University.

(These excerpts have been curated from the book 'Rabindranath Tagore' by Hiranmay Banerjee.

The book can be purchased @ INR 95 from the Publications Division website.)