Here is the tale of two statues, one of Chhatrapati Shivaji and the other of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. Pride and sentiments of people are often intrinsically woven around the statues of the country’s iconic personalities. They feel deeply hurt when statues are demolished or collapse. Correspondingly such harm done to statues acquires huge political overtones, pitting the ruling party at loggerheads with the opposition which blames those in power for negating the legacy of those icons.
Such intense political uproar erupted in Maharashtra when a 35-feet high statue of the revered Maratha icon Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 4 last year, collapsed merely 9 months later on August 26, this year. It is a calamity for people of the state for whom Shivaji is a much venerated figure and his hallowed name forms part of the oft recited slogan “Jai Bhabani and Jai Shivaji”. During the freedom struggle, Shivaji was invoked as a shining example of a fighter by several national leaders including Mahatma Gandhi.
Demolition Vidyasagar’s statue in 2019
It is a tragic coincidence that the Shivaji statue collapsed in Maharashtra slightly more than five years after the demolition of the bust of legendary social reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar in Vidyasagar College in Kolkata in 2019, when then Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah was leading a road show as part of a campaign during the 17th general elections.
Vidyasagar is an iconic personality in Bengal’s history and generations after generations acclaims his stellar role as a social reformer during the 19th-century, when he fought for widow remarriage and most importantly gave Bangla its alphabet. The demolition of Vidyasagar’s bust was devastating for Bengal where children grow up listening to stories from his exemplary life and work. It caused a huge political stir and a defensive Prime Minister Modi stated that he would build a grand statue of Vidyasagar made of “panch-dhatu.”
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee, in her sharp response, declared that Bengal would build it on its own and pointed fingers at the Modi government, accusing it of being unable to build even a small statue of Ram. A month later, in June 2019, Banerjee, accompanied by celebrities, poets and writers, rode to the Vidyasagar College in an open jeep with the new bust which was placed with due honour in the original spot. While unveiling it she charged that “”Bengal is being defamed” and “A plan is being hatched to turn Bengal into Gujarat. Bengal is not Gujarat.”
Five years later with the collapse of Shivaji’s statue, the BJP-led Mahayuti coalition government is facing the people’s wrath as well as that of opposition leaders who have alleged that massive corruption in building the statue led to its fall. They have characterised it as a huge affront to Shivaji, whose legacy and people’s adoration for him is part of the folklore of the state.
Gandhi on Vidyasagar and Shivaji
While in South Africa, Mahatma Gandhi wrote an illuminating article on Vidyasagar on September 16, 1905, in the Indian Opinion as part of his efforts to educate Indians living there about the icons of India. He wrote, “…. had Ishwar Chandra been born among a European people, an imposing column, like the one raised by the British for Nelson, would have been erected as a memorial to him. However, a column to honour Ishwar Chandra already stands in the hearts of the great and the small, the rich and the poor of Bengal”.
What Gandhi wrote about Vidyasagar is true of Shivaji who lives in the hearts of all Maharashtrians and whose legacy was recalled with respect when Indians were fighting for her independence.
Gandhi wrote in Young India on July 5, 1928 that “…he braved all perils and shared the simple life of his hardy men”. Four years later, on July 4, 1932, while reflecting on the necessity of preserving one’s health without the service of a doctor, Gandhi cited Shivaji’s example and wrote that he “…made his body very strong by his own efforts.” Even earlier on March 24, 1921, while addressing a public meeting in Odisha’s Cuttack, Gandhi stated that because there was some sort of swaraj under Mughal rule, a Pratap could take on Akbar and in Aurangzeb’s time a Shivaji could flourish. He then asked, “Has 150 years of British rule produced any Pratap and Shivaji?
It is indeed a tragedy that Shivaji, who braved all perils, made his body strong and reflected the spirit of Swaraj prevailing in the Mughal era to challenge its rulers, is not represented in 21st century India by a resilient and robust statue.
Modi’s unconvincing apology
Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde’s specious explanation, that there was a high-speed wind of 45 km/hr when the statue broke into pieces, invited sharp criticism from all quarters. Many flagged that the statue of Shivaji unveiled 67 years ago by former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in Maharashtra in 1953 still stands erect, weathering all challenges. Eventually, Modi tendered an apology to Shivaji and to all those who worship him. Modi’s apology does not wash away the egregious blunder associated with the installation of a weak statue of Shivaji. The fall of the statue will have adverse political implications for Maharashtra’s ruling coalition in the forthcoming elections.
The fall of the statue is an assault on his legacy which represented an inclusive vision marked by his equal respect of Hinduism and Islam and giving adequate space to Hindus and Muslims in his army.
While addressing a prayer meeting in Santiniketan on December 18, 1945, Gandhi thoughtfully stated, “True monuments to the great are not statues of marble, bronze or gold. The best monument is to adorn and enlarge their legacy.”
The spewing of venom against Muslims and the lynching of some of them in the name of their faith is a negation of Shivaji’s legacy. His statue’s collapse is symptomatic of a breakdown of inclusive vision because of the polarisation during the last 10 years by those in power and is bound to have a serious impact on the BJP-led government in Maharashtra.
SN Sahu served as an officer on special duty to former President KR Narayanan.
