The Importance of Not Being Earnest

A memoir is a narrative of an individual with reference to the socio-cultural and economic milieu in which he or she was born and raised. The expression, memoirs, is not necessarily a recollection of the past by an individual but a commentary on the context, which is key to the unfolding of a personality. In this sense, a memoir is also an articulation of experiences an individual acquires while being chronologically older as days pass. Everybody is a child of his time, argued Plato while codifying many of his pathbreaking ideational priorities. The assumption entails not just the physical growth of an individual but his or her social growth since he or she evolves in a context of uncertainties as well, out of which individuals enrich themselves with unique experiences that are critical to their journey since birth as those who were gradually involved in many activities seeking to carve out a distinct path for themselves. So, a memoir is a specific articulation of how an individual grows by being dialectically interactive with the environment in which he or she is raised. This is true of all, for everyone’s trajectory of growth is qualitatively different from another. Explained here is why a particular socio-political event may not have a uniform impact on those witnessing or confronting circumstances stemming from certain events. The impact varies from one individual to another. For instance, the Naxalite Movement in West Bengal in the 1960s and early 1970s caused devastation to education and students immeasurably suffered as most of the educational institutions came to a standstill. Many lost their near and dear ones as a section of Naxalite leaders felt that the typical Chinese line of class annihilation was perfect to bring about a socialist revolution following the rise of a draconian state ready to deploy coercive forces to crash those championing such politico-ideological preferences. Being a student at Calcutta (now renamed as Kolkata) Presidency College when the movement nearly lost its momentum, I became a victim because I lost two years due to the administrative disruptions caused by the Naxalite agitation. But the outbreak of this campaign radically altered our perception of humanity in general, and we were also alerted to the impact of poverty on those hapless people who were subject to various kinds of exploitation, especially in rural West Bengal. Many of the creative authors rewrote India’s socio-political history, which added new perspectives to our thinking.

A memoir is thus not an elaboration of events; it is also an explanatory design that an author puts forward based on his or her unique experiences. Illustrative here is the discovery of electricity by Benjamin Franklin, who, instead of being mesmerized by thunder, tried to find out the reason behind this. His curiosity led to the discovery of electricity, and humanity reaped the benefit. Similarly, a memoir represents an interpretation of processes and events from the point of view of the writer, which may appear differently to another. Added to this is another significant aspect of a memoir, which is also a mirror of individual sensibilities to events shaping socio-political history and the economic development of a particular juncture of human history. One may refer to Rabindranath Tagore’s assessment of the Upanishads. As they were articulated in different phases of the civilizational growth of India, they codified various socio-cultural codes for human beings with reference to the experiences of those who codified their views in these texts. Upanishads were not memoirs per se, but the fact that 107 of them presented many aspects of how humanism developed amidst crises confirms that these were historical documentaries of phases of human history. Furthermore, Tagore’s memoir, Jibansmriti in Bangla, is another example of a persuasive text. As one goes through Jibansmriti, one comes across how he evolved his ideational vision by being sensitive to the eventful changes around him during his upbringing and later. His memoirs are, at one level, a detailed description of his growing-up years; at another, they are probably one of the finest codifications of how nationalist campaigns were designed differently as history progressed. It was, as if, an attempt to capture the macrohistory of humanity at a particular phase of the unfolding of human civilization from the microexperiences of an author.

A memoir carries with it certain difficulties in contemporary India since the idea of being ‘politically correct’ in one’s articulation is clearly an impediment to the author’s ability to express his or her views on processes of human development as candidly as is expected. Being politically correct is thus a device to muzzle the human voice, which is neither desirable nor helpful in comprehending human history as appropriately as is expected of an author being true to professional ethics. I tried in my text to avoid my exclusive views on many events, barring those where I needed to be honest in my interpretation of processes and events that were critical to making a submission to the readers. For instance, my five-year stint as Visva-Bharati’s Vice Chancellor was a watershed in my life, for it was an eye-opener for many reasons; prominent among them were three: first, not only did it allow me to understand the system of education that evolved in West Bengal since I left the province in 1980, but it also provided me with inputs to unearth the principal reasons. One of the reasons was certainly politicization of education in West Bengal, although the trend was not peculiar to this constituent province of Bharat as it was more or less a feature cutting across many states of the country. Second, it is also unfortunate that many bright Bengali students preferred to leave the state to pursue education, especially higher education outside the state. This is a great loss since there is perhaps a great dearth of talents in the province; nonetheless, there are many globally reputed centres of higher learning that still keep bright students despite the temptation. This achievement is admirable. Third, it is my personal view that the universal distaste for reading books in English is a serious limitation for our students’ ability to compete at the national level. Bengalis were appreciated given their capacity to persuasively argue their point both in Bangla and English equally comfortably and with competence. In other words, the presence of bilingual intellectuals inculcated a desire to follow the trend until the 1970s. Now, it is reversed. I am not opposed to the introduction of Bangla as a medium of instruction; we have at our disposal quality books in vernacular. Perhaps it will happen in the near future. Nonetheless, one cannot remain totally ignorant of English since it is also a language of communication, particularly in the English-speaking world.

Visva-Bharati is a place to initiate the process of training in a bilingual mode because its founder, Rabindranath Tagore, was equally adept in both languages; not only was Tagore confident in expressing his ideas in Bangla, but he also wrote persuasive texts in English. His linguistic competence in both languages inspired those who were associated with Visva-Bharati at its dawn to become bilingual authors. There are some with such capabilities on campus even now, but the number does not seem to be encouraging. And, if it is allowed to continue, there is no doubt that the possibility of West Bengal becoming an intellectual hub as in the past cannot ever be realized, unfortunately. And, also, the authority should take special care in training the learners to make them employable. Barring a handful of departments, Visva-Bharati’s students do not seem to be as marketable as is the case in most of the central universities in the country. The reasons need to be located and meaningfully addressed, and the authority should not restrain itself even if it has no alternative but to take unpleasant decisions. So long as the state-supported forces are allowed to act decisively in the governance of educational institutions, the future appears to be bleak. This is a bitter truth that is not easy to digest. I am saying this on the basis of my five-year experience as the head of Visva-Bharati, which was anything but pleasant on occasion when I was not treated respectfully since my effort at setting out a path for making this great institution a leader in education was always violently opposed, presumably because it was likely to diminish the role of those forcing the university authority to be dictated by resorting to means that were not always humane.

I am now nearly at the end of my active academic life. During this long journey, I came across many good souls who remained an important source of my inspiration. I owe a great deal to my detractors because it was they who, by drawing my attention to the ugliest side of humanity, contributed to my being equipped with the capacity to hit them back as strongly as was needed. Without their presence, Bidyut Chakrabarty would not have seen the already degenerated section of humanity that flourished in various parts of India, perhaps due to the dearth of individuals capable of being fierce combatants of these satanic and disgruntled souls. Visva-Bharati also showed me how fearful many of the Bengalis were, apprehending that they would face the wrath of these Bahubalis if they stood against debilitating forces. This seems to have gripped many. As history demonstrates, the reign of terror is unleashed by authoritarian political forces to completely remove opposition, although it is also a historical truth that the devilish politico-ideological designs do not survive beyond a point when human beings rise to the occasion to decimate those striving to dwarf humanity.