Madhusudan_Das

APPENDIX : 1
NATIONAL AWAKENING IN ORISSA
AUROVINDO GHOSE
[In an editorial essay titled 'The Awakening in Gujerat' in the
17th December, 1907 issue of weekly paper 'Vande Mataram'
Aurovindo Ghose (later Sri Aurobindo) had discussed the emergence
of national consciousness in the politically backward regions of India
in general and Gujarat in particular. While discussing Pan-Indian
scenerio, he had commented on the awakening of national
consciousness in Orissa under the able leadership of Madhusudan Das,
without mentioning his name.
Most of the biographers of Madhusudan have quoted from this
article from secondary sources and sometimes misquoted it. To apprise
about the exact text and context of the article the relevant extract
is being reprinted here. It had been published in the 'Sri Aurobindo
Birth Ceremony Library Vol. I (Early Political Writing, P. 644-45)]
When the word of the Eternal has gone abroad, when the spirit
moves over the waters and the waters stir and life begins to form, then it
is a law that all energies are forced to direct themselves, consciously or
uncosciouslv, willingly or against their will, to the one supreme work of
the time, the formatinon of the new manifest and organised life which is
in process of creation. So now when the waters of a people's life are
stirred and the formation of a great organic Indian state and nation has
begun, the same law holds. All that the adversaries of the movement have
done whether they have tried to repress or tried to conciliate, has helped
what they sought to destroy and swelled the volume and strength or
purified as by fire the forces of Nationalism. So also the efforts of those
among ourselves who are afraid of the new movement or distrustful of it
to check the pace and bring back the nation's energies into the old
grooves, have only hoped to increase the vehemence of the National
desire to move forward... Nationalism depends for its success on the
awakening and organising of the whole strength of the nation; it is
therefore vitally important for Nationalism that the politically backward
classes should be awakened and brought into the current of political life;
the great mass of orthodox Hinduism which was hardly even touched by