Madhusudan_Das

78 Madhusudan Das :
. . .This urbanization can do little good to the Harijans, much
less to the villages. It is a process of double drain from the villages.
Urbanization in India is slow but sure death for her villages and
villagers. Urbanization can never support ninety per cent of India's
population, which is living in her 7, 00, 000 villages. To remove from
these villages tanning and such other industries is to remove what
little opportunity there still is for making skilled use of the hand and
the head. And when the village handicrafts disappear, the villagers
working only with their cattle on the field, with idleness for six or
four months in the year, must, in the words of Madhusudan Das, be
reduced to the level of the beast and be without proper nourishment,
either of the mind or the body, and, therefore, without joy without
hope.
Here is work for the cent-per-cent swadeshi-lover and scope for
the harnessing of technical skill to the soultion of a great problem.
The work fells three apples with one throw. It serves the Harijans,
it serves the villagers and it means honourable employment for the
middle-class intelligentsia who are in search of employment. Add to
this the fact that the intelligentsia have a proper opportunity of coming
in direct touch with the villagers.
XIV : AN APPRECIATION
I had the privilege of meeting the late Madhusudan Das. He
was a great patriot. He held most liberal views about religion. Though
he professed Christianity, he had the same regard for Hinduism that
he entertained for his own faith. He wore himself out in teaching
the youth of his country, 'Dignity of Labour' and gave political proof
of his teaching by establishing at great sacrifice a tannery in Cuttack.
XV : SPEECH AT THE EXHIBITION OF KHADI AND
VILLAGE INDUSTRIES
.. .Man differs from the beasts in several ways. As Madhusudan
Das said one of the distinctions is differing anatomy of both. Man
has feet and hands with fingers that he can use intelligently and
artistically. If man depended wholly and solely on agriculture, he would
not be using fingers that God has specially endowed him with.