205. Chittaranjan Guhathakurta

Chittaranjan Guhathakurata was born in Barisal. His father was the famous revolutionary of Barisal named Manoranjan Guhathakurta.

 A paper named Nava-shakti was already there, owned and conducted by Sri Manoranjan Guhathakurta. It had a house rented in Grey Street (North Calcutta). An understanding was reached between the parties so that the spirit and letter of Yugantar could continue in and through Navashakti. The house was built more or less on the pattern of the one we had later at Shyamapukur. There were two flats. The one in front was used as the Navashakti office; Sri Aurobindo occupied the other with his wife, Mrinalini.

A word about Manoranjan Guhathakurta will not be out of place here. In that epoch Aswinikumar Dutt and Manoranjan Guhathakurta of Barisal were two of the mighty pillars of nationalism. But whatever their achievements as political leaders and selfless patriots, as writers and orators, it was their greatness of character that mattered more. By a great character I mean one in whom there has awakened in a certain measure and manifested to some extent the inner being and the indwelling spirit; this is what Vivekananda used to call the awakening of the Brahman in the individual.

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I had come to know Sri Manoranjan Guhathakurta personally and I had been to his house in Giridih and stayed with him more than once. Giridih being not very far from Deo-ghar, he was aware that we dabbled in the bomb. He was not only aware of it, he also gave us all his help and sympathy. It had even been suggested that a factory for the making of bombs might be tried somewhere around the mica pits he owned in that region. His eldest son Satyendra had been a schoolmate and friend of Barin and the two were practically co-workers. This family had helped Barin a good deal by their offers of money and advice. But what I had in mind was not these external things but an inner life. Manoranjan Guhathakurta had an inner life, a life of sādhana. His wife in particular was known for her sādhana. In his eyes the service of the country was an occasion and a means for the service of God. But his saintliness or sādhana did not stand in the way of his strength of character. In him there was a fine blend of strength and sweetness.

Manoranjan's son Chittaranjan became for a time a centre of great excitement and violent agitation in those days. There was a session of the Bengal Provincial Conference at Barisal which was attended by all the leaders like Sri Aurobindo and Bepin Pal. But there came a clash with the Government, the police raided the pavilion and attacked the procession with lathis. The boy Chittaranjan went on shouting "Bandemataram" as the police beat him mercilessly. He fell down wounded and covered with blood but he did not cease his "Bandemataram". This raised a furious storm of protest throughout the country, which gave an opening to the terrorists too.

This shining example of non-violent resistance occurred long before the Gandhian era. To us who were in favour of armed resistance this kind of forbearance seemed intolerable. When, after this incident, the journalists and the poets began to sing in chorus, of "Barisal of glorious virtue", we could not help adding with a little sting, "thanks to those beatings.
Chittaranjan became seriously wounded by the beating with lathis by the police when he was conducting  a procession to carry out  the orders of his father..