Mother's Chronicles - Book Five

58

Where is Aurobindo Babu

Calcutta.

Mid-February 1910.

Halley's Comet had begun to be visible in 'the Indian sky. Reports of sightings had come from different parts of the country, from Karachi and Dumka, from Bombay and Nasik____

It was 8 o'clock. Dusk had given way to night. Night had come swiftly, as it does in those climes. N°4 Shyampukur Lane, Shyambazar. A young man is seen—only there was no one to see!—trying to melt himself in the shadows, trying to avoid the bright patches of lamp lights. Furtively he enters the building, with many a backward glance, to make sure that he has not been followed. To his relief he does not see any C.I.D. men who are always hanging around watching the comings and goings at N°4. Once inside, he quickens his steps, and almost runs up the stairs. He stops at the door of a room from where mingled loud laughter was spreading outward in waves.

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Inside, seated on a sort of wooden cot —the only furniture in the room —was a man in his late thirties. Younger men, in their early twenties or adolescents, sat around him, one or two on the cot, the others on the floor. In this inner part of the building, the 'Chief'¹ as some called him, had a pencil in hand and a paper in front of him. Sri Aurobindo was doing automatic 'speech.' It was Bejoy's room. Bejoy was there, as were Nolini, Saurin, Hem Sen, Biren and Moni.² Saurin Bose was Mrinalini Devi's cousin; Biren was related to Sri Aurobindo.

The day had been quite normal for Sri Aurobindo. After his morning work he had taken as usual his midday meal, then worked on his articles for the two weeklies, the Karmayogin and Dharma. After that he had set out from N°6 College Square —never again to return as it turned out—to come to Shyampukur office and had done the office work. The day's work done, he had joined the boys as he habitually did.

Forgetting all cares the seven of them had become absorbed in the seance. The 'spirits' that came during the seances were a variegated lot. Some were serious, others were fiery. But that day it was a humorous spirit. The young men were responding with incessant merry laughter. The seance was in full swing when Ram babu suddenly appeared. He was big with news. He informed Sri Aurobindo that the Government

1.Moni says that Sri Aurobindo was known to young people under various names. 'Sejda' to Barin's friends; 'Katta' (Chief) to young workers; 'A.G.' in early Pondicherry days; Sri Aurobindo after his retirement.

2.In regard to Sri Aurobindo's sudden departure from Calcutta Moni's narrative in his Bengali book, Smriti Hatha,

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was decided to search the Karmayogin office and arrest him. He added in anguish that the arrest of Sri Aurobindo was imminent, quite possibly that very night or the next day. A warrant had been issued in his name. Ramchandra Majumdar's father had it all from a high-ranking police officer. Although the news was not quite unexpected, the atmosphere in the room underwent an electric change. The bubbling mirth gave way to a shocked silence ... for a moment. Then animated comments flew around from the young men on the approaching event; Ram babu was proposing to give a fight to the police! Many other ideas were flying about.

Sri Aurobindo listened silently for a few minutes. As he was considering what should be his attitude, he received a sudden Command from above, "in a Voice well known to me, in three words: 'Go to Chandernagore.'" He obeyed the Command at once. He did not stay to consult with anyone nor to pack a change of clothing. He said, "I shall go to Chandernagore."

"Just now?" asked Ram babu in astonishment.

"Now. This very moment."

Sri Aurobindo stood up and left the house. With him, and walking by his side and guiding, went Ram babu. Biren followed a little behind, keeping them in sight. Moni brought up the rear, keeping Biren in sight. That particular evening, there was "no trace of any policemen anywhere about the house," Moni noticed thankfully. In fact, when newspapers came to know of the 'mysterious disappearance of Arabindo Babu' they pointedly asked how was it possible for Arabindo Babu to escape Government's surveillance for which it was spending four hundred

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rupees every month? But all those questions began to be raised about a month after the night in question.

The silent procession, seemingly unconnected, went through a maze of lanes and by lanes and alleys. Ram babu, a resident of the locality, seemed to know every byway. Taking the shortcut thus shown, the four of them reached a Ganga-giar¹

A ghat in Calcutta in the 1900s

1. Ghat : harbour, quay, wharf, moorings.

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within ten or fifteen minutes. Next day when Ram babu went to inform Sukumar of Sri Aurobindo's sudden departure, he told him that they had gone straight to Ahiritola Ghat.

On arriving at the ghat, Ram babu hailed one of the boatmen and asked him if he would take a fare ; and the two talked in a low voice for a few minutes. Sri Aurobindo then got into the boat. Biren and Moni followed. Ram babu took his leave. The boat sailed off. "It was a common Ganges boat rowed by two boatmen," Sri Aurobindo said, setting all doubts at rest. "As we sailed up the river and reached midstream," Moni reminisced, "it was apparent that it happened to be a night of waxing moon. The waves danced and sparkled all round in the bright moonlight. I don't know what the exact phase was, but perhaps:

"Today is the eleventh day of the bright phase. See the sleepless moon Sailing alone on her dream-boat."

(Rabindranath Tagore)

No, it was not the 'eleventh' day: that would have occurred on the 20^th. For Saraswati Puja, which is always held on the 5^th day of the waxing moon, was performed on the 14^th. But analyzing newspaper reports we find that Sri Aurobindo was no longer in Calcutta on the 19 ^th, for he did not attend a meeting held in honour of his uncle's release. On the other hand, press reports make it evident that he was still in Calcutta on the 15 ^th when he went to Chandpal Ghat to welcome back Shyam sundar Chakrabarty, released after fourteen months' exile in Burma. We have therefore the choice between 16-17-18 February 1910

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—the 7^th - 8^th - 9^th day of the moon's bright half—for the day Sri Aurobindo left Calcutta on the spur of the moment.

Chandernagore is some thirty kilometres upriver from Calcutta. They reached it before dawn, about four in the morning. It had taken the boat almost seven hours to reach Rani Ghat where it moored. The sailing-rowing had gone smoothly, except for a slight delay of ten to fifteen minutes when the boat got stuck on a sandbank. Eight pairs of hands pushed and shoved, and lo! the boat was free, and the sailing was smooth.

Sri Aurobindo sent Biren to a fellow-revolutionary, who had been arrested in the Alipore Bomb Case along with him and others: Charu Chandra Roy of Chandernagore. Could C.C. lodge him ? Charu Roy expressed his inability to give shelter to Sri Aurobindo. But he did give a piece of advice: Tell Aurobindo to go to France.... No, Sri Aurobindo did not follow that advice, but waited quietly in the boat. Not in vain. For Motilal Roy

—who had not previously met Sri Aurobindo, but had seen him at Uttarpara on 30

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and on to his house.¹ Assured that their presence was no longer needed, the two young men sailed back for Calcutta. They, however, stopped at Uttarpara Ghat, not only to give rest to the boatmen, but because they suddenly realised how very hungry they were! Not a morsel of food had passed their throats since the midday meal of the previous day! It was around eight, when night had fallen, that they reached Shyampukur. At Namasi's house, the ladies waited and waited to serve dinner or breakfast to Auro-dada.

Sri Aurobindo had sent a confidential message through a young man from the office to Sister Nivedita asking her to take up the editing of the Karmayogin in his absence. That is how Nivedita came to know about his departure for Chandernagore the next day. "She consented" said Sri Aurobindo, "and in fact from this time onward until the suspension of the paper she had the whole conduct of it.... The editorials during that period were hers ... I was absorbed in my Sadhana and sent no contributions nor were there any articles over my signature. There was never my signature to any articles in the Karmayogin except twice only, the last being the occasion for the prosecution which failed." The Karmayogin ceased with its last issue dated 2 April 1910. On January 20, just a month before taking charge of the paper, Nivedita had written to S. K. Ratcliffe, the editor of The Statesman, who was then in England: "How I wish you could get the Karmayogin every week! In my opinion, it is a triumph

1. From clarifications given on 13.3.1990 by Renuka Ghose of Prabartak Sangha to my brother Nirmal.

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of style and thought. Aravindo is magnificent."

As for his Bengali weekly, "the articles published in Dharma during February and March 1910 were not written by me ," Sri Aurobindo clarified, adding that they were by a "young man on the sub-editorial staff of the paper." That was Nolini Kanta Gupta. The Dharma breathed its last on 28 March 1910. Because Nolini and his comrades had also to go into hiding fearing arrest. Nolini left for "an obscure little village in distant Barisal. " The other three dispersed in Calcutta itself.

Moni went from one hiding place to another ... till one day, in late March, at N°6 Crouch Lane, a hostel where he had taken lodgings, he received "a tin y note , about two inches square" with three or four lines in Sri Aurobindo's handwriting. He was asked to go to Pondicherry to arrange a house for Sri Aurobindo ; attached was an introductory letter to a Revolutionary of Pondicherry. Moni's friend , the bearer of the note, told him that Sukumar and Saurin would make all the necessary arrangements for his travels. Thus Moni left Calcutta on 28 March and reached Pondicherry in the early hours of 31 March. That was also the day when Sri Aurobindo left Chandernagore.

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