Birendra Kumar Bhattach-aryya (1924-1997) occupiesa unique place in the histo-ry of post-IndependenceAssamese literature. AfterRajani Kanta Bordoloi (1877-1940),the father of the Assamese novel, noother writer in Assam has earned asmuch popularity as Birendra Kumardid. He is perhaps the only writer inAssam who sustained himself forquite some time solely on his writ-ings. His contribution towards Assa-mese literature is immense, as ex-emplified by his numerous novels,short-stories, poems, dramas and es-says. In the last four decades of hisliterary career, Birendra Kumar wasable to influence a whole generationof intellectuals of Assam.The contemporary events, whichcreated waves in Assam’s as well asthe country’s political life, were tak-en by Birendra Kumar as themes formost of his novels. Whatever he haswritten has come out mostly fromhis personal experience. For exam-ple, Rajpathe Ringiai (Call of theHighway, 1955), his first novel, de-scribes the events taking place on thefirst Independence Day of India in1947 as seen by his revolutionaryyoung protagonist, Mohan. Pratipad(First Moon, 1970) deals with thelabour agitation in the oil town of Dig-boi in 1939. Sataghnee (Hundred -edged, 1965) has its backdrop in theChinese aggression of 1962. KabarAru Phool (Graveyard and Flowers,1972) is based on the liberation warof Bangladesh. Iyaruingam (People’sGovernment, 1960), for which he gotthe Sahitya Akademi award, speaksabout the genuine feelings of the Nagapeople shattered by World War II.Birendra Kumar portrays the nakedpicture of the disintegrating struc-ture of Assamese rural society andits socio-economic dimensions in hisnovel Ai (Mother, 1960) and Munic-hunir Pohar (1976). Mrityunjay, hisJnanpith award winning novel, isbased on India’s freedom movementin Assam.India’s freedom movement is oneof the epoch-making chapters in herpolitical history. A number of novelsin various Indian languages werewritten against that background. In

this regard, Dinabandhu Mitra’s NeelDarpan (1860), written against thebackdrop of the Indigo Movement inBengal, and Bankim Chandra Chat-terjee’s Ananda Math (1872), withthe all-Bengal Sanyasi revolt as thecentral theme, constituted the firststep towards production of move-ment- centric literature in India. Thatwas only the beginning of a movewhich has brought about a significantthematic change in Indian literature.If we go through the history of worldliterature, we shall find its pages re-plete with countless works of greatwriters built on specific importantevents. Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace(1863), Earnest Hemingway’s AFarewell to Arms (1929), MaximGorky’s Mother (1907) to name a few,are examples of such works.Mrityunjay contains a real pictureof the last stages of India’s freedomstruggle, i.e., the Quit India Move-ment. Terrorist activities that tookplace throughout the country in thewake of the Quit India Movementalso occurred in Assam. The novelcontains a realistic account of suchactivities. Like in some other partsof the country, a section of the peoplein Assam, too, lost faith in Gandhiji’snon-violent method and indulged inviolent activities on the lines of Sub-has Chandra Bose’s guerrilla warfare.Many of the leaders of the armedstruggle were basically Gandhian anddevout Vaishnavites, who believed that God resides in every living be-ing, yet, they took to arms and sabo-

tage only for the sake of the coun-try’s freedom.Mrityunjay is a reflection of theyoung Birendra Kumar’s responseto and association with India’s histor-ic freedom movement. In his pref-ace to the novel he writes: “The gen-uine impressions have been givenhere from the memorable events ofthe last days of India’s freedom move-ment. This is not a historical account.The events took place in our lifetime.I have taken the theme from theevents... This novel is the story ofthat particular period when peoplesacrificed and struggled for the coun-try’s freedom. I am giving an insightinto the minds of those who reallyunderstood and got involved in it.”In 1942, World War II was at itsheight. Allied forces had gathered inAssam in preparation for their fightagainst the Japanese forces in Bur-ma. Now, the fury of the freedommovement was directed against thewar efforts of the British governmentand its allies. The freedom fighterstried to blow up bridges and railwaylines. A detailed picture of the horri-fying situation created in Assam byWorld War II is also depicted in Mri-tyunjay, Iyaruingam and Pratipad.His political or radical motive isvery clear in Rajpathe Ringiyai. Inthis novel, the workers are critical ofthe newly earned independence asthey found themselves in conditionsnot in any way better than what itwas before. They shouted in HindiYe azadi juthi hay, desh ki janta bhu-

ki hay. In these words, we find theecho of Jayprakash Narayan’s follow-ing speech (incidentally, JP was Bi-rendra’s political guru): “But free-dom of Swaraj had come by then tomean much more to me than merenational independence. Free India tome meant Socialist India and Swaraj,the rule of the poor and downtrod-den.” At the same time, one of Bi-rendra Kumar’s protagonists, ob-sessed with the dictum, “Liberty isnot a thing that you are given as apresent,” muses over its implications(Rajpathe Ringiai p77). The follow-ing lines reveal the true incident thatmotivated Birendra Kumar to cre-ate his first novel Rajpathe Ringiai:“One of the most important days ofmy life was 15th August, 1947. Thatday was a day for self searching forthe hero of my first novel RajpatheRingiai. He cannot reconcile himselfto the partition of the country, andfinds the day wanting in the fulfill-ment of promises and hopes the In-dependence movement gave. He in-duces workers and tribals, to take topeaceful struggles again to realise thedreams of the unfinished revolution.”In portraying the characters of hisnovels, which are moulded fromearthly dust and are symbolic of reallife, Bhattacharyya’s extensive expe-rience and deep insight come to light.He has efficiently sketched charac-ters varying from farmers and labour-ers to high ranking white sahibs. Bi-rendra Kumar’s characters’ broadoutlook has made them colourful andimpartial. Rejecting the assumptionthat foreigners and the well-to-dowere devoid of human sympathies,he has presented the appealing char-acters — the Flaming couple andHiggins Sahib in Pratipad, Dr Brucein Iyaruingam, Choudhury, the pol-itician in Ranga Megh and so on.All his characters are lively andearthly – men and women of fleshand blood. This is so because theyare born out of real experience. Theauthor’s idealism has found expres-sion in characters like Mahada Gos-wami, Dhanpur and Rup Narayan inMrityunjay, Rishang and Jeevan inIyaruingam, Chatterjee in Pratipad,and Rajat in Ai. Such characters aredescribed by English author and crit-

ic Marjorie Boulton as “a mouthpiecefor the author’s own view.”The predicament of the charactersadds beauty to the novels. Circum-stances, environment and often, asense of duty are instrumental in cre-ating inner conflicts in human beings.Pictures of such mental strife in Mr-ityunjay are comparable to the oneswhich Valmiki portrayed in theRamayana, of Rama’s inner conflictprior to Sita’s banishment to the jun-gles in order to uphold the honour ofthe family and the throne, or the “tobe or not to be” situation projectedby Shakespeare in Hamlet. The mes-sage of the novel is that he who laysdown his life for the freedom of hismotherland attains peace. Motivat-ed by this profound ideology, the char-acters get involved in guerilla war-fare. Yet, the feeling of guilt prickedtheir conscience and created mentaldistress.Being compelled to involve him-self in the violent movement, Mad-hu Bhakat, a Vaishnavaite, sufferedpangs of inner conflict. Madhu’s feel-ing of remorse has been treated byBhattacharyya in a unique language –a soul stirring description of one’smental agony: “If a train is toppled, itis not just the engine that will bewrecked, many lives will be lost. TheMahapurusha (Sankardeva) saidRama resides even in the souls ofdogs, foxes and donkeys.” This hes-itation and struggle is also apparentin the main protagonist of the novel Mahada Gosain (Goswami), the chiefof the guerilla group, and Rup Naray-an, an educated youth. Although theyrealised that death was imminent, theweakness of these duty-bound death-defying heroes for their homes andfamilies often surfaced in their hearts.Gosain could not escape from his in-ner conflict until his last breath. The“neither here, nor there” feeling hasbeen highlighted by Rup Narayan,who is torn between violence andnon-violent struggle. Although thiseducated young man paged throughworld history and decided upon gue-rilla warfare as a viable means to at-tain liberation, the sight of the nu-merous corpses caused in him a men-tal conflict as to which was superior –the path of violence, which he had

opted for, or that of non-violence.The inner conflict of Mrityunjay’sfemale character Subhadra, a victimof inhuman torture at the hands of thepolice and military personnel duringthe Second World War, is equally evi-dent. This symbol of neglected wom-anhood was driven to suicide by herfeelings of guilt, which stemmed fromher being raped and the subsequentloss of social status. Similarly in thenovel Sataghnee, a female characterBimla finds herself in a dilemma when,one day, she realises that the Chineseyouth she loves is guilty of treason.Perplexed by the choice between herown interest and that of her mother-land, she finally opts for a solitary ex-istence without her husband. Themental agony of Sataghnee’s heroineAmala also adds to the beauty of thenarrative. A pall of gloom descendson her life as a result of having lovedtwo brothers from the same family.Having married the younger Prashant,Amala finds herself in a quandary atthe unexpected appearance of hererstwhile lover Rajat. The author hasexpressed the soul searching strug-gle through Amala’s father-in-law,Bandhuram Majumdar when he says:“A fervent appeal was visible in hervacant look. I sense her plight instant-ly. She has lost herself in a deep innerconflict.” Such natural mental conflictsof the characters enhance the overallappeal of Birendra’s literary style.Birendra Kumar’s female charac-ters have their own distinct identity.According to him, “A capable womandoes the work of a hundred men”(Mrityunjyay p134). Mrityunjay’smain women character, Dimi, and theefficient weaver, Kali baideo, who isa real Gandhian, Lachmi and Nayan-mani of Pratipad, Sarengla of Iyaru-ingam, Aaimani in Munichunir Po-har and other such characters haveachieved greatness through their in-dividual thinking and ideals. Basa’s mother, the central character of Ai,is the picture of an accomplished andaffectionate universal mother.Bhattacharyya had great sympathyfor women, who were at that time,supposed to be the weaker sex insociety. The picturisation of torturedwomen has taken a concrete shapein his literary style. The description

of the suicide of Mrityunjay’s Sub-hadra, the unfortunate life of Iyaru-ingam’s Sarengla, a victim of inhu-man torture by the Japanese army;the distress of Pratipad’s Jebunnis-sa, a victim of the white sahib’s lust,the tragic consequences of a wom-an’s love in society; the authentic pic-ture of the life of women doomed bythe evil of child marriage in pre-In-dependent Assamese Brahmin soci-ety and parental negligence in edu-cating the female child- all thesewomen’s issues have been project-ed powerfully in his novels.The October revolution of 1917and Marxist philosophy had someinfluence on Bhattacharyya as muchas these had on other intellectualsand writers of the country like Jawa-harlal Nehru, Rabindranath Tagore,Hindi writers Bairab Prasad Gupta(Masal), Amrit Roy (Beej), Punjabiwriter Narula (Lok Dushman) andothers. Such influences on BirendraKumar and his deep conviction insocialism find expression in all hisnovels in some measures, especiallyin Pratipad, Rajpathe Ringiai, Ran-ga Megh, Sataghnee and Mrityunjay.His unflinching faith in the basic hu-man values, which permeatesthrough all his creations, puts himalmost at par with humanist writerslike Sarat Chandra Chatterjee andPremchand.According to noted critic Prab-hakar Machwe, Birendra Kumar’screations do not conform to the twogeneral patterns followed by the ear-lier schools of Indian writers, onewriting sentimentally about social illsand the other realistically document-ing poverty and deprivation. In Assa-mese literature, the two best novelswere Jivanar Batot (Birinchi KumarBarua) and Dawar Aru Nai (JogeshDas) that represented these twoschools. “What Birendra did”, saysMachwe, “was to discard the oldmoulds and evolve a new pattern.”Birendra Kumar played a crucialrole in the growth of the literature ofcommitment in Assamese. He him-self was committed to social respon-sibility as a writer. This is evident inthe following comments of one of thecharacters in his novel RajpathatRingiyai: “Writings will have to be

the sword, poetry will have to be theglow of a new society, songs will haveto be the reverberating war-songsof a hundred throats.” Like all uni-versal literature, the central themeof Birendra Kumar’s literary crea-tions is to serve human liberty.Finally, one memorable contribu-tion of Birendra Kumar to the healthygrowth of Assamese literature de-serves commendation. Right fromthe days of Orunodai (1846), liter-ary magazines have been responsi-ble for the birth of new eras in thehistory of Assamese literature. Ram-dhenu (Rainbow), the widely appre-ciated magazine of very high stand-ard under Birendra Kumar’s able ed-itorship, was responsible for theemergence of a new, distinct groupof writers during the period fromthe early 1950s till the late 1960s thatgave a new vigour and added coloursto the rainbow of Assamese languageand literature. And for that, genera-tions to come will hold him and hisRamdhenu in high esteem.

(Published on the occasion of his13th death anniversary)

By-Dr. Malaya Khaund