A marriage is arranged continues...


Like many other ‘managers’, father got a Sanad (a certificate) for his good work there. I enjoyed the sight seeing and the show. I had a look at the King. I remember one incident. All the princes bowed before the King, offered him homage and Nazars, and returned to their seats without turning their backs on him. The only exception was the Gaekwar of Baroda. He neither bent before the King, nor walked backwards! Serious notice was taken of this ‘discourteous' conduct, and the Gaekwar lost favour with the Government.

4.
NEW CONTACTS


DURING this impressionable age of 15 years to 19 years when I was in school and college a good deal of change came into my life. thoughts and religious and political ideas. I was considerably affected by the speeches of political leaders like Lala Lajpat Rai, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Srinivas Sastri, Surendranath Bannerji, Mrs. Basant, Bipen Chandra Pal and Lokmanya Tilak.

I have yet to come across a more fluent and powerful speaker in Urdu than Lala Lajpat Rai. He could command an audience of fifteen to twenty thousand persons easily and carry them with him. He could convert them to his views, powerfully expressed in language unsurpassed in diction and oratory. I first heard him on the Arya Samaj platform and was converted to his views. He was a great political leader, a spirited public speaker, never afraid. prepared to sacrifice his all, and ready to face all perils for the causes he sponsored. He commanded the allegiance of the Punjab as long as he lived.

Gokhale and Sastri I heard with rapt attention. They spoke beautiful English. full of the sonorous periods and rich diction of those days. Their obvious sincerity and enthusiasm for the political uplift of the country were infectious! They fearlessly criticised the Government but in language that would not give offence. India has not produced another orator like Surendranath Bannerji. His oratory was a stream of well chosen words unmatched in their logic, sentiments and emotion. I also heard Sarojini Naidu, the Nightingale of India.


to be continued...

(This account is handled by Har-Anand publication)