Subhoranjan Dasgupta 
My son, absent-mindedly, flashed a photograph on his mobile screen – a bearded Muslim was reciting Sanskrit chants.
He said, “Quite some heavens would break on the heads of quite some persons when they see this image.”
Perhaps, he was correct.
A few members of the myopic Hindu community would have observed, “How dare an infidel utter our pure verse written in our adi bhasha [literally, ancient language] Sanskrit?”
Similarly, some members of the Muslim community would have possibly observed, “How dare a true Muslim recite a prayer reserved for the ‘kafir’?” There is an alarming contiguity in these two sides, one inciting the other, and both summarily rejecting a relatively unknown enlightened tradition.
Yet, I was delighted to see this post.
Not only this bearded Muslim on the mobile screen, but many of his predecessors had indulged in the same redemptive crime. The most spectacular ‘criminal’ in this sphere is the unforgettable Kazi Nazrul Islam, whom Rabindranath Tagore loved immeasurably. Not only did he compose heartfelt Shymasangeet (songs devoted to the Hindu deity Shyama or Kali), which are extremely popular till this day, he also wrote the most impassioned songs of protest and was the first to translate the Communists’ Internationale anthem into Bengali. Nazrul was a phenomenal genius. Many would mischievously attempt to bracket him as an isolated figure amongst hordes of seemingly ‘implacable’ Muslims, but that would be wrong.
No fewer than five more Muslim Bengali poets of renown composed prayers to revere Kali. Then, the legendary Alauddin Khan of Maihar, also the father of the sarod maestro Ali Akbar Khan and the guru of Ravi Shankar was an ardent devotee of Kali.
A folk theatre practitioner portraying Hindu deity Kali. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/ Tapas Kumar Halder CC BY-SA 4.0.
The Muslim man in my son’s phone was not performing anything unique. Indeed, this entire tradition of devotion began from the days of Mughal emperor Akbar when he invited Brahmin pundits and Hindu sages to ‘enlighten’ him on the basic tenets of Hindu philosophy and religion. His trusted lieutenant, Abul Fazl, who wrote the Ain-i-Akbari was a dedicated Persian and Sanskrit scholar.
This tradition attained its desirable consummation when emperor Shah Jahan’s first son, Dara Shikoh, with the help of Sanskrit scholars, attempted to translate the Upanishads into Persian for the first time. Amartya Sen never tires of recalling the exemplary contribution of Dara Shikoh, who was the genuine forerunner of the Muslim man on the screen.
Even in Bengal, where I live, Valmiki’s Ramayan was translated from Sanskrit to masterly, readable Bengali by the eminent poet Krittibas under the royal patronage granted by the Muslim ruler Nawab Alauddin Hussain Shah who ruled from 1494 to 1519 AD.
Even modern Bengali Muslim poets like Jasimuddin and novelists like Kayes Ahmed (this frantic disciple of the Bengali novelist Manik Bandyopadhyay is said to have died by suicide, unable to accept the religious divide of Bengal), Selina Hossain and Hasan Azizul Haq have explored parts of Hindu philosophy and practice with admirable insight.
Indeed, the work of Jasimuddin is replete with references to Saraswati and other Hindu deities. We fail to find, however, a reciprocal utterance of the Islamic worldview in contemporary Bengali poetry written by ‘Hindus’ – though many poets like Subhas Mukhopadhyay and Sunil Gangopadhyay would object to the classification of being labelled ‘Hindu’. The only remarkable exception is perhaps the incomparable Jibanananda Das who has offered the most superb example of ‘confluence-poetry’ in Rupashi Bangla (beautiful Bengal), a poetry series which celebrates the serenity and beauty of rural Bengal. Muslim and Hindu freedom-fighters have carried Rupashi Bangla in their knapsacks while marching onto the battlefield to fight for liberation for Bangladesh. It was both, their inspirational mantra and ajan.
A still from ‘Shatranj Ke Khilari.’
But why do I defend the confluence of cultures?
Recently, I was invited to speak at a symposium titled Confluence and Continuity of Culture and Creativity. I did not want to indulge in abstruse and postmodern theorising and complex debates on the modules of culture. So, I chose an elementary example and said, “I know nothing about the subject. But my wife and daughter, who are simply devoted to Kathak as artistes, have assured me again and again that Kathak, unlike Bharatnatyam and Kathakali, is the only Indian classical dance that has imbibed both Hindu and Muslim influences. It did not emerge from temples but from simple quotidian life (assemblies and marketplaces); it narrated stories or Kathakata and one of its greatest patrons was Nawab Wazid Azid Ali Shah of Lucknow, who himself played the role of Krishna in the enthralling performances held in the royal household.”
The audience seemed to accept my interpretation. But one tilakdhari – a man in a tilak – stood up. He said, “You know nothing. You are a paid agent of the godless communists. Kathak is a 100% Hindu, temple dance. And how dare the infernal infidel Wazid Ali impersonate our beloved Krishna! Our days are coming, we are going to sanitise Kathak and purge it of all its supposed Muslim influence.”
He was guided out of the hall by an audience who seemed less inclined to want to hear him – “not here, in the land of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar and Rabindranath,” they said. A person like the one I have described would have certainly spat on the Muslim man reciting Sanskrit shlokas.
Incidentally, we are celebrating the imperishable cultural legacy of Nawab Wazid Ali Shah in Kolkata at present. Shah was banished to this city after the British dethroned him in Lucknow. Do recall Premchand’s glorious story Satranj Ki Khilari and the equally glorious film bearing the same title created by Satyajit Ray. He was exiled from Lucknow 186 years ago and this Islamised version of Krishna, who revelled dancing with his gopinis, in the words of his great-great-grandson, Shyaheryaer Ali Mirza, pronounced only three days ago “championed humanity and inter-faith harmony. We want to revive that spirit and culture”.
We have wholeheartedly greeted the spirit and practice related to confluence of cultures. We have rejected outright Samuel Huntington’s poisonous thesis on the clash of civilisations. Similarly, we revere the unparalleled Johann Wolfgang von Goethe who consciously moved out of his predetermined Occidental parameters to learn Devanagari and welcome Kalidasa’s Abighanam Sakuntala as one of the greatest plays ever written where “the flower and fruit have merged into an indivisible whole”. Later, he accepted the great Persian poet Hafiz as his supreme guru, who inspired him to write the unique West-östlicher Diwan.
The Bengali audience member’s outrage at the symposium has not alarmed me because the present dispensation will encourage many more such elements.
I can suggest one, outstanding, corrective for him – Khitimohan Sen’s lucid and unique text Hindu-Muslimer Jukto Sadhana/The Joint Dedication of Hindus and Muslims. The author of this classic, which records the remarkable and harmonious contributions of both the communities to the spheres of music, poetry, art and architecture, from the 16th century onwards, was a formidable scholar of Persian and Sanskrit. He was one of the closest associates of Tagore, co-founder of Vishwabharati, excavated the priceless Dohas of Kabir and translated them into Bengali. He is the also the grandfather of the hounded apostle of secular humanism, Amartya Sen.
Above all, he wrote the first complete text on Hinduism which is not prescribed as a readable text by the present dispensation because his version of Hinduism, as well as that of another illustrious interpreter, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a close friend of Jawaharlal Nehru, do not echo the aggressive Hindutva of Veer Savarkar and Guru Golwalkar. Heavens would fall on the heads of the blind devotees of the latter if they see a Muslim man reciting Sanskrit texts, while I and many others like me would embrace him with open arms. Similarly, we shall be equally delighted, if not ecstatic, when the mobile screen of my son shows a tilakdhari Brahmin reciting the fervent poems of St. Francis of Assissi, or better still, quote from the metaphysical treatise of the illustrious philosopher Ibn-i-Rushd or Averroes.
Subhoranjan Dasgupta is a former professor of human sciences, author of several books in English and Bengali, and a columnist. He is based in Kolkata. His email is srdasgup19@gmail.com.