[Assam] Bishnu Prasad Rabha : a neglected genius

[Manoj Das]

*Bishnu Prasad Rabha : a neglected genius
— Dr Sanjib Kr Borkakoti* *B*ishnu Prasad Rabha lived in a tumultous time,
when the country was in the height of freedom movement. He was an active
participant in that movement. He became so serious in this struggle for
freedom that he dedicated his entire life to it. He did not mean freedom to
be one-dimensional, that is freedom from the British rule only. By freedom,
he meant liberation from poverty and all types of hegemony as well. He
renounced a big estate of 1500 bigha land, bequeathed to him his father
Gopal Rabha in favour of the tenant farmers and went on wandering from one
place to another like a nomad. He was a true organiser of the people. His
service in mobilising the rural masses during the freedom movement was
really matchless. Only two other stalwarts, Sankar Barua and Jyoti Prasad
Agarwalla came a bit near him in this regard.

Bishnu Prasad had no dichotomy in his life. Whatever he professed, he did in
his own life. Even his colleagues were not so since in their avowed
principle. Some of them were actually casteist who interfered unashamedly in
Bishnu Prasad's personal life. But Bishnu Prasad took every thing in his
stride. The magnanimity showed by him to those so-called revolutionaries was
divine. The common people realised it and showered love on him plentifully.
There was even in instance when the public selected a bride for him and got
him married to her.

Bishnu Prasad was not confined to narrow party politics. He could have
acquired immense political clout in the corridors of power after the country
became independent, had be only wished it. But he preferred to continue with
the struggle, which for him had only started in 1947 in the real sense of
the term. He did not hesitate to declare that the independence acquired by
the country was a sham. The common masses remained in the dark abyss of
poverty like they had been before. His strong stand made him enemy of the
power that be. It was only at the instance of the Tezpur citizens towards
the fag end of his life that he decided to fight from within the system. By
then his health had deteriorated a lot. Otherwise the politics of Assam
would perhaps have taken a different turn.

Bishnu Prasad was a versatile genius. His dancing prowess mesmerised the
audience. He was bestowed the title Kalaguru by Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan at
Varanashi following a recital of the Tandava dance there. He was the
embodiment of Nataraja, the heritage of Assam. Incidentally, the concept of
Nataraja was a contribution of Assam to Indian civilisation. Till date there
has not been a better exponent than Bishnu Prasad of the Tandava dance. Even
Uday Shankar was fascinated by his recital and wanted to learn the same from
him. The concept of Tandava was as if ingrained in Bishnu Prasad. He wanted
to demolish everything bad in the society, which was the message of Tandava
dance.

Bishnu Prasad was simply marvellous as an actor. The Baan theatre of Tezpur
saw hisgenius aplenty. He ably assisted Jyoti Prasad in the making of the
first ever Assamese film Joymoti. There were innumerable plays where Bishnu
Prasad lent his acting prowess. He could havevery well established himself
as a commercial artiste outside Assam since he had access to the art world
in Kolkata and Mumbai. But he did not go for those green pastures as he
taken up this medium only as a tool for spreading this message. His acting
talent came very handy in moving incognito around the State for freedom
movement. Some times he sneaked out of a place cordoned by police force by
posing as a police official.

Bishnu Prasad could sing very nicely. He had learnt bargeet composed by
saint Srimanta Sankaradeva when he was staying at Barpeta with his sister.
Even thing pertaining to the saint attracted Bishnu Prasad greatly. He was
not an atheist like fellow communists. He was a believer in God, Whom he saw
in the multitude. Of course that was the very ideal of the saint too, who
had declared the enlightened devotees to be his God and who did not worship
any icon. It is significant that the highly demanded picture of the saint in
the market is that drawn by Bishnu Prasad. The latter could imagine a
picture because he could visualise the saint. A painter has to first
visualise his/her object before he/she can give shape to it. Unfortunately
the print of Bishnu Prasad's art which has been mass-produced lacks
graciousness of the saint in full measure and is also devoid of the
requisite atheleticism in the saint's agile body. The better pieces of his
art remain yet unavailable for the common people. These have been presented
by his family. There are four pictures of Srimanta Sankaradeva in water
colour which are simply marvellous. These pieces were pioneering attemps at
drawing imaginary pictures of the saint. It was not that Bishnu Prasad just
roamed around the State and indulged in performing art occasionally. He was
a serious academician too. In fact he was the first anthropolognist of
Assam. His book Bano-Kobang is a nice work of anthropological study based on
field work. The observations as well as materials compiled therein remain
invaluable source of information about the ethnic groups in this State. This
aspect of Bishnu Prasad has largely been ignored and the public get to know
him only as a performing artiste. This is because most of his writings were
published only posthumously and they were ignored by the mainstream critics
of Assam. There is ta endency in Assam to treat only poems, short stories
and novels as literary work. It is true that those creative works left by
Bishnu Prasad were a bit weak in form. But he was successful as a lyricist.
And he was richer in his anthropological works. But those were never counted
by our literary critics. The Asom Sahitya Sabha totally ignored Bishnu
Prasad when he was alive just as they ignored Jyoti Prasad. History however
never fails to do justice to a genius. Now the two 'Prasad's are remembered
as the symbol of Assamese culture. What an irony!

Bishnu Prasad was very emphatic about the rise of the downtrodden in his
writings as well as in his speeches. In this respect he was like Ambikagiri
Royachoudury, who also exhorted the people to get up from slumber. But
Bishnu Prasad was even more radical than Ambikagiri and never went near the
Congress party. Like Sri Aurobindo he could see the inherrent contradictions
in Congress, a party led by the upper class people. It was because of this
weakness in Congress leadership that the party always stopped short of any
radical design and was almost like the British in policy matters. Ambikagiri
and Jyoti Prasad failed to see that. However that does not rob the duo of
their due place in Assam history. We are only making a comparative study
here with Bishnu Prasad. No such study has been done till date.

Bishnu Prasad was very conscious of his tribal lineage. He participated in
several symposiums and conventions about tribal heritage. Each lecture
delivered by him was a masterpiece. He highlighted the fact that the
Assamese language and culture was predominantly tribal. This ran counter to
the prevailing conception that Assamese language and culture was basically
an Aryan one. Even Dr Banikanta Kakoti was mistaken in this regard. He
opined that the Assamese language and culture was basically Aryan. This view
was shared by Dr Birinchi Kr Barua, Dr Prafulla Dutta Goswami etc. But Dr
Kakoti and his supporters could never explain why the caste system or for
that matter many other evil traits of the Aryans were so subdued here.
Bishnu Prasad's view that Assamese culture was predominantly tribal seems to
be the correct one. Srimanta Sankaradeva culled material from different
tribal dances and music to evolve a new classical form of dance and music.
Unfortunately some orthodox people refuse to accept that.

It is because of the basic difference of approach to cultural study that
Bishnu Prasad was ignored by the so-called intelligentsia of Assam till the
other day. The revival of interest in him since the last three decades is
highly motivated. First, he was resurrected as a symbol of sub-nationalism
during the Assam movement and then of 'liberation' struggle in the early
nineties. But Bishnu Prasad was very much an Indian. He encouraged the
citizens of Tezpur to face the Chinese aggressors in 1962, whereupon he was
taken into custody by the then government! Bishnu Prasad rather talked of
suppressed humanity, wherever the latter were. Thus he had some similarity
with Dr Ernesto Che Guaverra. The lives of the two revolutionaries also were
similar to a great extent.
(*Published on the occasion of death anniversary of Bishnu Prasad*)

-- 
Manoj Kumar Das
C 172 GF, Sarvodaya Enclave
New Delhi 17 India
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