Yes, I hate Shamik, Bilash and their associates. I hate myself. Of course, at times I feel pity for them. Sometimes I feel pity for them, sometimes I feel pity for myself.
Saying this, Aniket took a sip from his glass of wine, contorted his face, and swallowed some of it. Then he shook his head, left his chair, leaned on the table, and stood slightly tilted. With a slur in his voice, he said, – No, I have made a mistake. I have spoken wrongly. Yes, wrong. I don’t hate Shamik and Bilash. I do not hate them. They are right. What they are doing is right. I hate Principal Samanta. I hate Principal Samanta not because of his sincerity, but because of his, what should I say? Damn it, I can’t find the word in English. Anyway, I don’t hate Principal Samanta for his honesty. I hate him for his ignorance. Yes, ignorance. It was Principal Samanta who told Shamik, Bilash, and all of us that we would be the torchbearers of the coming days. He told that we will be the torch bearer of the impending days. We, the Engineers will have vital role to make our Country prosperous. He had said, “We have an important role to play in making our country prosperous. So we should study sincerely and try to be successful engineers. You should study well to become true engineers.”
After saying this much, Aniket remained silent for a while in a daze. Then he shouted, - But what happened later on. Then what happened? Shamik and Bilash passed with good grades. I was not far behind either. We qualified ourselves as Engineers. We passed engineering. Not by cheating. But we could not become the torchbearers as Mr. Samanta had said. We did not find any role to make our country prosperous. After getting the certificate of proficiency in technical education, we became outcasts to the owners. After getting education, Shamik, Bilash and we became footballs to the owners. Anantaram Cotton Mills, Baldeo Singh & Co., Bridge Mohan Construction, etc.’s Harsundar Kushalrams have only harassed us by showing us greed like tearing a piece of bread to a stray dog. Yes, they have treated us like dogs. And then, seeing the Alsatian dogs in front of their beautiful, polished mansions, our bodies burned with jealousy. Then one day, while wandering, I went to Principal Samanta. I told sir about Shamik, Bilash and myself. Sir then listened to me with sympathy and said emotionally - ‘Look Aniket, I feel sorry for you. But what can I do? We have to work in a set framework. We are paid to render service only under certain frameworks. We can not go beyond that. We cannot go beyond the prescribed framework.’
That day, after hearing sir’s affectionate words, I returned with a namaskar. But today? Today I feel like shouting and asking him why he said that we would be the torchbearers of the coming days? Why did he say that we will have a vital role to make our country prosperous? Why did he again, seeing our helpless state, say that he could not do anything beyond the prescribed framework? Can’t he understand why the Harsundar Kushalrams of Anantaram Cotton Mills, Baldeo Singh & Co., and Bridge Mohan Construction treat his favorite, smart students like stray dogs? Why are the Harsundar Kushalrams extinguishing his torchbearers of the coming days at their whim? If he doesn’t understand that, doesn’t know that, then I hate him. I hate him…
– Ah, Aniket, don’t drag the guru into this. I see you’re getting drunk and losing control.
-What, I have never been drunk and lost control. But yes, when I drink, all my suppressed anger, vindictiveness, and desires start to stir in my head. In a normal state, those whom I feel like calling sons of pigs but can’t, I shout and call them sons of pigs. Those whom I want to call Coward hypocrites, I call them. But I don’t say that to Mr. Samanta in that way. I feel that Mr. Samanta is not like those bastard scoundrels who, for the sake of serving the interests of the Harsundar Kushalrams, disguise themselves and secure their own future. Surrounded by their own pet sycophants, they put honey on their mouths and raise a hue and cry that today’s youth have become degenerated, they turn up their noses saying that they have become averse to work. When a helpless person comes asking for help, they guard the door and say, “Earn your living by working hard.” I say, you bastards, can you ever provide a system where people can earn their food by working hard? Can you do anything for the lakhs and lakhs of people who are wandering the streets in search of employment? You are only concerned with yourselves. Then why do you guard the door and say, “Eat by working hard?” You become a mound of knowledge and distribute knowledge! My Principal, Mr. Samanta, is not like that. Mr. Samanta does not do bad things with intent. That’s why I don’t abuse Mr. Samanta like those bastard scoundrels. But I do hate him. Because Mr. Samanta, knowing many things, does not know why his torchbearers of the coming days are all extinguishing and collapsing. Aniket poured more wine from the bottle into his glass.
This time he did not gulp it down with a contorted face. Just as devotees take charan amrit from the sacred-thread-wearing priest of the Thakur bari and sip it, Aniket sipped the wine in a similar manner. Then he said, “Shamik and Bilash have done well. They have done well by going to the States. So what if they couldn’t become chief engineers there? What’s the harm in that? So what if they became second-class citizens there? What’s the harm in that either? By working hard, they have got the opportunity to save a good amount of dollars. They are eating well, living well, and becoming plump, and they are sending a good amount of money in exchange for dollars to their old fathers who are floating like straw in the ocean of family life here. When Shamik was getting tossed around by the Harsundar Kushalrams here, his old father’s face, like a dried mango, was always pale. Now, of course, most of the time, after receiving Shamik’s dollars, a smile lingers on the old man’s dried-mango-like face. Shamik, Bilash, they have done well. But after Shamik and Bilash went to the States, Principal Samanta once told me, ‘Aniket, I see that many of you have been bitten by the bug of going abroad. Shamik and Bikash have gone to the States. What will happen if everyone goes abroad like this? Hey, one should have love for one’s own country.’
Oh, my love for the country! Love for the country. You, Mr. Principal, are very much engrossed in love. For a long time, you have been serving your educational institution with love from morning to evening, obeying the orders of your superiors, and you are swelling with pride thinking that you are producing engineers every day - even if you don’t beat the drum to express your pride, you are thrilled thinking about it yourself. Have you ever gone out of your limited environment and thought about what attraction will bind the engineers trained by you to the love of the country? After attaining a certain level of completeness, as soon as they cross your door, the colorful paper lanterns of their minds get punctured and mix with the dust. Their very existence is then endangered. Mr. Principal Samanta, can you give something so that those who have crossed your threshold in the past with a certain level of completeness can keep the colorful paper lanterns flying in the sky of their minds and maintain their existence in a proper way? You may feel pain for them, you may feel sorry. But you don’t come forward to remedy it. You don’t revolt. That’s why I hate you. I hate… hate and…
-Ah, Aniket, you have been going on about hate, hate, and hate from the very beginning. Don’t you have anything else?
– Who says I don’t have anything else? I have Love. I have respect. I love, I respect. Yes, I love Nayan. I love Nayan. But now I don’t know where Nayan is. Nayan used to say - “You know, Ani, today our biggest enemy is imperialism. Imperialism is the greatest enemy of the present era. Imperialism must be swept away. Imperialism is increasing the wailing and sorrow of countless people. Why is the number of helpless people in our country increasing day by day? Why is my middle-class family, instead of having a normal life, gradually falling into misfortune and becoming immobile? Why is there a procession of beggars on the streets today? Why do my country’s twelve or thirteen-year-old boys, suffering from malnutrition, with ugly, emaciated bodies, wait eagerly on the streets and at stations to see if some benevolent person will ever throw away some food? Why is there only a tide of hungry and starving people, like skeletal adjutant storks? Why are they losing their vitality and just wilting? But it’s strange! They are the descendants of those who crossed the turbulent waves of the Padma, Meghna, and Dhaleshwari in stormy weather with their merchandise. They are the descendants of those who stood in neck-deep water, ignoring the fear of wild animals, and cut jute to load the ships of Macleod, David Company. They are the descendants of those who dived into the deep waters of the Titas river and caught fish with their bare hands. But today? Today they can’t run. They stare blankly for leftover food. But why?”
Aniket drank more wine. Then he said; - Nayan had said that to get the answer to this ‘why’, what comes at the end is the imperialists and their running dogs. I want Shamik and Bilash to become proficient in technical skills while staying in their own country. I want the stream of starving, hungry people who stare blankly to be filled with vitality. I want the pot in the house of the village farmer’s wife to be on the stove every day. I want the worker not to lose his life prematurely to tuberculosis by constantly turning the wheels of the factory. But what I want is not happening. The reactionaries are united to purify progress. And yet I can do nothing. In this situation, Principal Samanta, sitting in his protected coop, gives knowledge, saying, ‘Aniket, keep working’. That fellow judges the harsh reality in a holistic way. Not only that. What I cannot do, he can. What Principal Samanta cannot do, he can. He knows that it is just to revolt against reaction. He knows that to revolt against reactionaries is justified – so he has revolted. He is not a coward like me. He is not a coward like me. That is why the Harsundar Kushalrams are afraid of him. They want to eliminate the existence of the Nayans.
But Nayan knows that. Nayan has set out on the path knowing it. He is rather trying to eliminate the existence of the supporters of imperialism, the protectors of the existence of the Harsundar Kushalrams. Nayan has said, ‘The working people are creating wealth through their collective efforts by taming nature. The farmer brothers, ignoring the fear of ferocious wild animals, have produced golden jute by trampling on the things given by nature, and have loaded the ships of the imperialist stooges Macleod, David, Company by subduing the adversity of the terrible currents of the Meghna and Padma. The farmers have created wealth by showing their thumbs to the sun and rain in the morning and evening and have filled the granaries of the Rai Bahadur Shri Bel Mashais. The workers have constantly turned the wheels of the mills and increased the prosperity of the Maclean Company. The working people of my golden country have produced gold. The David, Macleod, Rai Bahadur Bel Mashais have kept all the gold of the country to themselves. The working people, who are the owners of the priceless wealth of my country created by the collective efforts of the workers, farmers, and other working people, could not become so. Gradually, the descendants of the farmers, workers, and other working people, who have become the playthings of the successors of David, Macleod, and the Rai Bahadur Bel Mashais, the Harsundar Kushalrams, are creating a procession of the starving and hungry throughout the country, and the self-aware, intelligent people of the middle and lower-middle class society are stuck in the middle of the cracked bamboo created by the Harsundar Kushalrams. Nayan was saying that this trend has to be changed. The vast masses of my country, who create endless wealth, will not serve the imperialists and their allies to make the country prosperous. Those who, in the service of imperialism, wearing the guise of helmsmen, smuggle the priceless wealth created by the workers, farmers, and working people out of the country behind the backs of the people, and then gain satisfaction by scattering the leftover food among the starving people of my country, must be swept away. Nayan was saying all this. Not only that, Nayan has revolted, that’s why the Harsundar Kushalrams are calling him an anti-social.
But what should I say? No, Nayan is not an anti-social to me! Nayan wants the society to be beautiful. My country to be self-sufficient. The tide of starving people in my country to end and everyone to be filled with vitality. He wants it and is working for it. In the gap between Aniket’s drinking and thinking, the night clock has advanced a lot. The sound of the gong coming from the distant police station, breaking the silence of the night, brought him back to his senses. Aniket thought, “Damn it, I’m spending the whole night drinking. Shamik, Bilash, they are dazzling themselves in the dazzling, glamorous city of New York, Mr. Samanta is sleeping as is his habit. In every railway station of India, people are writhing, naked and half-naked, many probably don’t even have the strength to writhe. And Nayan? What is Nayan doing? Nayan is probably sitting in a farmer’s house in a remote village of Bilasganj, preparing how to cross the village and deliver the news to the “Agrogotir Mail” before the darkness of the night disappears.
– Ganomukh Sharad Sankalan: ‘73