VIVEKANANDA KENDRA PATRIKA 1 SHIVAJI IN STORIES EDITORIAL he Tercentenary of Chhatrapati symbol of the sublimest sense of patriotism Shivaji ‘s Coronation is being and nationalism, and representative of the Tcelebrated all over the country ideal of political emancipation. Directing during the year that commenced on June the people, to adopt like Shivaji, every 2, 1974, and the present volume conceived means including the use of arms, methods as part of the celebrations is now brought of warfare and military strategy in the fight out as signifying their concluding phase. against alien oppression. Tilak pointed out It may be recalled that the idea of the to them, on the occasion of Shivaji’s coronation day celebration was first mooted coronation day celebration : “If thieves by Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak in 1886 enter our house and we have no strength as a symbolic expression of the aspiration to drive them out, we should, without of the people for sustained freedom and in hesitation, shut them and burn them alive. order to mark the beginning of New India’s God has not conferred upon the foreigners struggle for independence from what has the grant of the kingdom of Hindusthan.” been described as the rule of “the Mughals of the modern era.” The celebration, as It was an image revealed in the archives then suggested, came off in April 1896 at of history and re-shaped out of legend and Rajgarh, and sought to stress the truly tradition, and it served to bring Shivaji back nationalist, revolutionary and anti- to the modern peasant and worker as well imperialist direction regarded as necessary as to convince the intelligentsia of the need for the struggle and to provide the new for an organised fight for freedom. There movement for Swaraj with the dynamic is nothing incongruous in an image of inspiration of a popular, national hero. Shivaji, himself a ruler, the “:Chhatrapati”, Lokmanya Tilak, who used to visit Sinhagad serving as a source of revolutionary and every year and stay there for sometime to anti-imperialist inspiration for a fight against imbibe the spirit of Shivaji, firmly believed alien oppression. Shivaji had, in his own and declared that “The only consciousness days, risen above narrow affiliations of which we as a nation can proudly retain caste and community, broken the shackles and foster ought to have its springs in of class-consciousness and defended Hindutva.” Hence he rightly saw and shared masses against all forms of exploitation. with his compatriots, the appropriateness We have it on record that he had even to of projecting the image of Shivaji as a fight his own kith and kin and the Jagirdars, VIVEKANANDA KENDRA PATRIKA 2 SHIVAJI IN STORIES Patels and Deshmukhs who were thriving conquest and domination. It was Shivaji on the inams granted by Badshahs. It who made the people, the sons of the soil, would not, therefore, be surprising to know re-awaken to a sense of unity forged that a revolutionary like Vasudeo Balwant spontaneously by bonds of a time- Phadke, acclaimed as among the first to honoured concept of nationalism. The call raise the banner of armed struggle in 1878 for unity was in the name of “Hindvi against British Imperialism in India, issued Swaraj” , which implied free and un- a manifesto in his name signing it as “Shivaji hampered self-determination of a people the Second.” with a heritage dating back to the ancient seers of the land and a culture moulded in the light of their vision and by the power of their penance. Moghul conquest was the chief political feature about the time of the birth of Shivaji. The trail of destruction, through fire and plunder, that the Moghul armies left behind, as they advanced in conquest, the religious discrimination by the Muslim rulers and the harassment to which the natives of the land, the Hindus, were subjected, all resulted in great discontent, social and religious. Contemporary conditions grew so desperate and everyone was in such a state of helpless expectancy that all thoughts turned towards the advent of a deliverer. The man of destiny was Shivaji, born in February 1630 in the hill- fort of Shivneri, where his mother Jija Bai had to be left for safety. That is the setting into which we see Shivaji the Grat ushered as an infant. The tree of Hinduism is not really dead, The Tercentenary is thus a tribute of a that it can rise from beneath the seemingly nation to one of its most outstanding crushing load of centuries of political heroes for having roused it from a state of bondage ; that it can put forth new leaves semi-slumber and infused into it the and branches. It can lift up its head to courage and dynamism needed to stand the skies,” writes Jadunath Sarkar, in Shivaji up and arrest the advancing tide of Moghul and His Times. He further points out that, VIVEKANANDA KENDRA PATRIKA 3 SHIVAJI IN STORIES “Intensely religious from his very boyhood and legends. The legend as it appeals to by instinct and training alike, he remained the modern mind is happily not divorced all through his life abstemious, free from from history. vice, respectful to holy men, passionately fond of hearing scripture readings and “Study the life of Shivaji and you will find sacred stories and songs.” According to him a nation-maker, instead of a marauder, Vincent Smith, “Indeed, it is safe to affirm as the Europeans represent him,” says that his religious zeal was the most potent Swami Vivekananda, the patriot-monk of factor in arousing the sentiment of India. We have here endeavoured to nationality which inspired his lowly present in the form of a narrative, marked countrymen to defy the Moghul Legions.” by a certain sequence of incidents (as it However, as Sarkar has rightly stressed, moves from chapter to chapter), the whole “Religion remained with him an ever-fresh course of Shivaji’s illustrious career in a fountain of right conduct and generosity, brief campass. The trend would be seen it did not obsess his mind nor harden him to be almost unbroken, even if some of into a bigot.” By all accounts, Shivaji’s the chapters are selected, culled out and personal life was marked by a superior strung together, as for instance those that standard of morality and deep spiritual appear under the titles, “Refrain”,. fervour. Here indeed was not only a warrior “Crescendo”, and “Closing strains”, included and administrator, but one who was devoted in the opening, middle and concluding as a son, attentive as a husband, and a sections of the volume with a view to unique exemplar of duty as a father. providing a compre-hensive picture of the Historians, poets, novelists, bards and play- entire ground. What we have offered here writes have painted the picture of this is neither just history nor just legend. It is medieval India’s outstanding hero in a blend of both, so that the legends that resplendent hues. And the image of Shivaji are narrated are rooted in facts of history. is regarded today as a blend of history VIVEKANANDA KENDRA PATRIKA 4 SHIVAJI IN STORIES SHIVAJI - SYMBOL OF NATIONAL RENAISSANCE IN STORY Prof. K.N.VASWANI hatever the faults of the Shivaji Stories Indian people, they have one W great quality , they know how True of this great, glorious tradition of our to honour their heroes, heroes of their people, the great, impressive, dynamic and History, who have brought honour to their heroic figure of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Nation, glory to the Motherland, lived and too has attracted and inspired our people, died honourably and heroically, exemplifying our poets and our writers, in the interest the ideals and values of which the of our people, to fire them with idealism, Motherland is the sacred symbol, the energy and fervour, with zeal for national cultural values which are the heritage and service and the spirit of nation-building, the legacy of the Motherland, which it is to weave many stories around some or the the mission of the Motherland to contribute other of the many exploits and adventures to the cultural whole of humanity. Yes, the of Shivaji Maharaj, a hero among men, an simple, gentle, mild and sincere people of ideal son of an ideal mother, Jija Bai, an our great Motherland, Bharat Varsh, it has exemplary pupil, a devoted disciple of his been conceded by all, including many Guru Samarth Ramdas, a fit friend and true, foreign writers, thinkers and historians, a soldier and a commander of ability, skill, have an extraordinary, exceptional, unique and judgement, quick in his judgements, capacity, nay a genius for myth-making, quick in his movements, a master of guerilla for creation of stories and legends, round warfare, which is now being made so much their national heroes, which have the of, even by that successful master of beneficial effect of sustaining the people warfare, Mao of China, and which had won in the period of their national adversity for Shivaji the strange appellation and and peril, when they are down-cast and description of ‘the mountain rat’, which depressed due to tyranny or oppression or epithet can be interpreted as it has already apathy or inertia, and also the effect of been interpreted by different historians, exhilarating, enthusing and even inspiring differently, both as a compliment as also them to action through a re-awakening of as a slight or a caricature. pride in their past and faith in their future, which incline them, then, to break the Yes, Shivaji has fired the imagination of bones of depression and apathy, and plunge our people, as of our poets and writers, as into heroic and harmonious action, once a national hero, held high in esteem, as a again to add a new glorious chapter to the nation builder, a dreamer of the dream of heroic history of their Motherland.