NEW DELHI, May 17:
President Pranab Mukherjee today said Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore was not only a par excellence writer but was an excellent ambassador of the country too who travelled immensely and gelled well with the people of the region to know them well in order to capture their lives in his paintings and writings.
The president was speaking at a ceremony organized to present him two books of Gurudev by Prof Lokesh Chandra,president of Indian Council for Cultural Relations at a simple ceremony here in Rashtrapati Bhawan.
The books ,’’ Tagore’s vision of the Contemporary World’’ and ‘’ Tagore and Russia’’ have been brought out to commemmorate 150th birth anniversary of Tagore. Complementing ICCR, the President urged the exercise of bringing Tagore’s work to the fore to continue. He said the government decided to celebrate Tagore’s birth anniversary from 2011 onwards.
‘’I was appointed executive chairman of the celebration committee and various projects were undertaken including the projection of Tagore’s paintings in India and abroad. I appreciate ICCR’s efforts’ especially Lokesh Chandra’s in bringing out Tagore’s works’’, he said.
The President said,’’ Tagore was an eternal traveller to all parts of the world. He not only stayed there but mixed with the people of the region.He tried to find unity in diversity through his works of paintings, art and literature.
Gurudev himself brought out a book on Russia as he was very impressed with the egalitarian society existing there. He became a Nobel laureate in 1911 and in 1917 civil revolution took place on Russia .
Three aspects which highly impressed him about Russia were education, agriculture and missionary”. He said ‘’The second book, ‘’Tagore’s vision of the Contemporary World’’ is an important contribution by Tagore. He captured the brutalities of war in this book. Capturing power by the facist forces in Spain and Germany had a profound impact in his poems and affected his mind.’’
‘’In the book, Rabindranath Tagore talks about ‘’oneness’’ of character of India.But his dream is of one order in the world and it ought to be made into one reality. Unity of universe and uniqueness of man and co-existence of many cultures has something to offer to the world. His poems, paintings depicted emancipation of women. He touched upon western culture also,’’ the President said.
‘’There is growing interest in Tagore throughout the world and many seminars, symposiums and debates are being organized the world over to celebrate the 150th birth anniversary year of Gurudev. These two books by Lokesh Chandra, President, ICCR and co-edited by Prof Indra Nath Choudhuri , Dr Reba Som and Prof Sergei Serebriany remind us today also Tagore’s works are as relevant as they were in the 40’s and that he was one of the greatest cultural icons of the country.’’ (UNI)
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