Eternal India Encyclopedia
"Bharatamayuram" and " Swetantragath" which expressed his nationalistic feelings and was awarded the title " Maha Kavi". Died in a boat accident. Muhammad Iqbal (1873-1938) He was born at Sialkot in Punjab. His parents, devout and pious Muslims, inculcated in him the teachings of Islam. Was sent to the Government College, Lahore where he graduated in 1899 and was appointed lecturer in philosophy. Went to study philosophy in Cambridge and also qualified as a barrister. Started practising law at Lahore but gave it up and began writing. It was not long before he was recognised as a thinker of importance and the greatest Urdu poet of his time. He is considered next only to Ghalib (1796- 1869). He was knighted in 1922 in recognition of his greatness as a poet. Temperamentally he was unsuited to politics and his only real contribution in this field was made as president of the All India Muslim League session in 1930 when he said: "I would like to see the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sind and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single state. Self-government within the British Empire or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North- West India". This was the first time that the idea of a separate state for the Muslims had been put forward on the platform of a political party. Pakistan recognises him as its national poet. He wass born in a middle class peasant family at Nadi ad. He was not very good in studies, took to law and was successful as a criminal lawyer. Went to England for his Bar- at-law. On his return to India in 1913 he set up practice in Ahmedabad, defending those who had fallen foul of British officialdom. So impressed he was by Mahatma Gandhi that he joined politics. He came very close to Gandhiji during the "Kheda satyagraha" in 1918, which was started to get exemption from land revenue since the crops failed that year. In 1928, the government decided to increase the land tax by 50% to 60%. Vallabhbhai Patel, along with Gandhiji, Nehru and many others started the successful Bardoli satyagraha. From that time he was known as "Sardar". He went to jail many times and took part in the boycott of the Simon Commission, Salt Satyagraha and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (1875-1950)
give his children an English education. They were sent to the Loreto convent school in Darjeeling and in 1879 Aurobindo was along with his two elder brothers, Benoy Bhushan Ghose and Manmohan Ghose and younger sister, Sarojini, taken to England by their parents for education. Aurobindo who was then seven was entrusted to the care of a Protestant clergyman and his wife. In 1884 he was entered at the St Paul's School in London where he impressed his teachers by mastering English, Latin and Greek. In 1889, at the age of 17 he secured a scholarship for entry to King's College, Cambridge. He passed with a first class distinction the First Part of the Tripos and then passed the open competition for the Indian Civil Service. But he deliberately did not take the compulsory riding test and thus disqualified himself for an IC S career on which his father was keen. Paradoxically his father's letters from India in which he complained about the injustices and heartlessness of British rule may have played a part in Aurobindo's decision not to take up a career in the IC S. For though Dr. Krishna Dhan was an admirer of the English way of life he was not an admirer of the British Raj. Aurobindo became a member of the "Lotus and Dagger", a secret group that met in London and whose members took a pledge to adopt some measure that would help in ending foreign rule in India. After completing his University studies Aurobindo arrived in Bombay in February 1893. His father had passed away a few weeks earlier as he had been informed by mistake by his London bankers that the ship by which Aurobindo had left London had sunk off Lisbon. While in England he met Sayaji Rao Gaekwad of Baroda who invited him to join the Baroda State Service. He joined the Secretariat but soon gravitated towards educational work. He became a Lecturer in French but was soon appointed Professor of English and then Vice- President of Baroda College. In Baroda he began learning Indian languages - Sanskrit, Gujarati, Marathi and Bengali, his mother- tongue with which he was only slightly acquainted. He began contributing articles to the "Indu Prakash" of Bombay in which he attacked the moderate leadership then obtaining in the Indian National Congress. While in Baroda he married Mrinalini Devi in 1901. The agitation that followed the partition of Bengal saw Aurobindo leave Baroda for Calcutta where he joined the Bengal National College as Professor of English on a salary of Rs 150 p.m. one-fifth of whathe had been getting in Baroda. He began writing articles without
however using his name in "Yugantar" a revolutionary Bengali weekly started by his younger brother Barindra, and Bipin Chandra Pal's English weekly "Bande Matharam". He was prosecuted for the Bande Matharam articles because even though his name did not appear the government suspected that he was the author. However he was acquitted by magistrate Mr. Kingsford declaring that the general tone of the articles was not seditious. In May 1908 he was arrested in connection with a bomb throwing incident in Muzzaffaipur in Bihar. Two Bengal boys threw a bomb at what they thought was the carriage of Kingsford who was then the District Judge of Muzzaffarpur. The victims were Mrs Pringle- Kennedy and her daughter who had nothing to do with politics. The police arrested Barindra, Aurobindo's brother, who was thought to be the brain behind the plot. Aurobindo was released in April 1909 after being declared not guilty. In jail he had a mystic experience in which he had a vision of Krishna. In July 1909 he received information that he would again be arrested and this time deported. Following an inner voice in February 1910 he left for Chandranagore in French territory. Not finding the place convenient he went to Pondicherry arriving there on the 4th of April 1910. He remained there for the next 40 years. He completely withdrew from all political activities. Devoting himself to literature and philosophy, Aurobindo gave a new interpretation of the Vedas and the Vedanta. In his commentary on the Gita he expounded what he called "the integral way of life". He wrote his prose poem "Savitri" based on the ancient Hindu legend. He expounded his philosophy in" The Life Divine". Inhiswork he received the co-operation of a French couple Paul Richard and his wife (later to become famous as the Mother) who came to Pondicherry on the eve of the First World War. An ashram named after Aurobindo grew up in Pondicherry. Kumaran Asan (1873-1924) Poet, scholar and a social reformer, he was born in a small village, Keyikeara, in Trivandrum District. In school he studied both Sanskrit and Malayalam. At the age of fourteen he became a teacher and taught Sanskrit to the local people and came to be known as "Asan" or preceptor. He started his campaign against the caste system. Because of the discrimination he had experienced as a member of the Ezhava community, he got many temples opened in Kerala. He wrote many powerful poems like- " Duravastha". He wrote poems like
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