Madhusudan_Das

I
REMINISCENCE OF
GREAT POLITICAL LEADERS
(i)
A TRIBUTE OF LOVE AND RESPECT
RAJENDRA PRASAD
I first met Mr. M. S. Das when he came to preside over
the Bihar Students' Conference which was held at Motihari in
the year 1912. We travelled together on our way to Champaran
and the conversation I had with him in the train and on the steamer
left an indelible impression on my mind about his personality,
intellectual depth, fearlessness and love and devotion to country.
In a long life full of varied activity he was ever striving to serve
the people and as he told me, although he ruined himself financially
he never sent his hat round for public help. It was a matter
of deep regret that the Utkal Tannery on which he spent so much
and to which he was so much attached as a child of his creation
could not prosper on account of lack of financial support. His
public career commenced long before men like me were born
and he always struck an original line of his own. I remember
how when as a minister he was on a visit to Chhapra and learning
that I was ill he came to see me and how by the mere touch
of his soft fingers I felt a sort of relief. Just towards the end
of his all too brief ministerial career he told me that he had done
his best to give a liberal Local Self-Government Act to the province
but he was afraid there were forces acting against it and we
should be on our guard to see that no tampering with the popular
rights contained in it was allowed or tolerated by the public. He
was not afraid to speak and do the right regardless of
consequences and every one knows what hard times awaited him
towards the evening of his days when he had to carry on practice
at the Bar at an age which is rarely reached by men in this country
and which hardly ever turns out to be an active period in the
life of any man. But he faced it, and faced it boldly and well
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