Indian Stories
by Sri Chinmoy
One day an examination was being held in a college classroom. The most brilliant student in the class was Bhudep Mukherjee. Bhudep Mukherjee was deeply engrossed in writing his exam when all of a sudden his fountain pen slipped from his hand and dropped to the floor. His English professor, who was standing nearby, picked up the pen and gave it back to the student. Bhudep Mukherjee took it from the teacher and, without saying anything, started writing again.
The professor was a little surprised. “Why didn’t you say ‘Thank you’ to me?” he asked. Bhudep Mukherjee remained silent.
“Why don’t you answer?” the professor said. “You Indians have no courtesy?” The student still remained silent.
“This is what I have taught you over the years?” the professor asked. “It seems that you are not feeling well, or perhaps you have a difficult question that is occupying all your attention. Otherwise, you are always respectful.”
The student said, “No, nothing is wrong with me, I am perfectly all right and the questions are not difficult at all. It is true that I was deeply absorbed in answering a question. But that is not the reason I did not answer you. Sir, you always taught us to do our duty. Whenever we get an opportunity to help someone or to serve someone, we should do it without being asked. Today, when my pen slipped from my hand and dropped, you got the opportunity to help me and serve me. So why do I have to thank you? If you expect my gratitude, then it is not real self-offering. So it is better to help the needy with no expectation. This is what you have taught us, and I am only obeying you. I have not done anything wrong. At the time of my need you helped me, and whenever you are in need I will definitely help you.”
The professor’s anger by this time had changed into joy and gratitude. He said to the student, “I am so proud of you. I am so proud of you. Indeed you are right. When you are in need, others should come and help and not ask any reward for it. If someone is in need, we should go immediately to help the person. And if we expect a ‘Thank you’ or gratitude, it is a mistake. It is our duty at every moment to help others and even to sacrifice our lives for others.”
Bhudep Mukherjee eventually became a very, very great scholar. He was a great son of Mother Bengal who did much for the intellectual and social development of his nation.
There was once a little boy who was very beautiful to look at and very smart, with many talents. He was talented even at a tender age. His father was very rich and well-respected; he owned vast plots of land and had many, many servants. The little boy used to spend most of his time with the servants. He was the youngest in the family and they all adored him.
One day, the boy was singing a song that he had composed himself. The song expressed the idea that, “The eye cannot see You, although You are inside the eye. The heart cannot know You, although You are inside the heart.” He was singing it most soulfully, and the tune was simply excellent.
The father heard him singing from another room and was deeply moved. He asked his servants to go and bring the little boy to him. Then the father said to his youngest son, “Can you sing the song for me again?”
The boy didn’t often get the opportunity to come to his father, because the father was so great and very busy. He could not approach his father any time he wanted to. So although it was a great honour that his father had called him, he was also afraid of his father and he felt shy. The father said, “I am your father. Please don’t feel shy. Just sing the song that you were singing before, my child.”
The boy sang a few times and the father was so deeply moved that he entered into trance. When his trance ended, the father entered his office and wrote the boy a cheque for 500 rupees. In those days, 500 rupees for a child was really something. When he gave it to the boy he said, “In the past, the Mogul Emperors used to honour talented people with great gifts. Now the Mogul Emperors are no more. But your talent is so remarkable that I know you rightfully deserve honour from the king. Unfortunately there is no king here to honour you. But I am your father, and I am giving you 500 rupees.”
The son was so excited and delighted. He ran with the cheque and showed it to his servants. The servants lifted him up into the air. They were so proud that their little hero had become such a great poet.
Indeed, this heroic soul became the poet of poets. He became India’s greatest poet ever and won the Nobel Prize. Many people have got the Nobel Prize and many poets have been honoured, but in India he remains matchless. He composed about 1800 songs, many of which are sung all over India, including India’s national anthem, Jana Gana. Truly, Rabindranath Tagore was a creative genius who excelled in every field of the arts. In the latter part of his life he even took up painting. As poet, singer and playwright, he won love and respect not only in India but all over the world. He remains in the vanguard of poets for his lyrics, songs, plays and stories. India’s Tagore will eternally remain unique. In 1961, on his birthday, the whole world observed his centenary.
There was once a very great man who came from a very rich family. He was a great seeker, a seeker of the highest order, and to the whole of Bengal he was the very embodiment of truth. Countless people admired him, loved him and adored him, and felt he was a saint.
One day he took his youngest son with him on a train ride from Calcutta to Bombay. He bought a full-price ticket for himself and a half-price ticket for his son, who was eleven years old.
After the train had been going for some time, the ticket collector entered into their compartment and asked for their tickets. When he saw the half-price ticket for the boy, he was a little bit hesitant, for the boy was very tall for his age, and he looked much older than eleven years old. But the ticket collector didn’t say anything. He just marked the ticket and left.
After two hours another ticket collector came. He also hesitated because he too thought that the boy was over twelve years old, since he was so tall and smart looking. But he didn’t say anything either.
After some time, these two ticket collectors brought the station master to the man’s compartment, and the station master asked to see the tickets. The station master was so ignorant. He did not realise that this man was well known for his greatness and goodness.
By this time the man was very mad. So many times these ticket people were bothering him! “All right, see the tickets!” he said angrily.
The station master said, “This boy is a minor? How old is he?”
The man said, “Eleven.” The station master said, “No. You are telling me a lie.”
The man, whom all of Bengal worshipped as the embodiment of truth, said to himself, “What will you do with these ignorant people? It is useless to argue with them.” So he paid the difference in the fare to the station master, saying, “Take it!”
The station master gave him a full ticket for his son, and returned his change. When the station master gave the great man his few rupees of change, the man became so furious that he threw the money on the floor and it all scattered.
Then the station master felt very embarrassed. “What a scene I created for one ticket for a young boy and a haughty old man!” he said to himself.
Because of the commotion, many people came running to see what had happened. What they saw was the great sage and saint of Bengal, Devendranath Tagore, Tagore’s father. And the young boy was Tagore himself.
There was once a very great man who was knowledge incarnate. He was a professor of English at a college and was very, very brilliant. His eyes were full of light and in almost every way he was an ideal man. But unfortunately, on the physical plane he was not so handsome. He was very short, and his head was very big in comparison with the rest of his body
One day, an Englishman of higher authority wanted to see this Bengali scholar, so he sent for him. When the Bengali scholar came to the Englishman’s office, he was shocked. The Englishman had his feet on the table and was smoking profusely, and he began talking to the scholar with an air of contempt.
The Indian, who was a principal of a particular Sanskrit college, could not believe what he saw. He said to himself, “How can Englishmen behave so badly? They have no courtesy. They have no etiquette.”
When the meeting was over, he came back home mad and furious. “I shall one day pay that Englishman back in his own coin,” he said.
A few months later this same Englishman needed a favour from the Sanskrit professor. So he personally came to the professor’s office and knocked at the door. “Can I come in?” he said. But the professor did not answer. Only he asked his servant to bring his hookah.
The servant prepared the hookah and brought it to the professor. The professor placed his feet on the table, with his sandals on (he never wore shoes) and started smoking the Indian hookah. Then he asked the servant to let the Englishman in.
When the Englishman came in, he was so mad. He said, “I am an Englishman and I hold such a high post. Yet you are showing me such disrespect! What’s wrong with you?”
The professor said, “Nothing is wrong with me. Only I happen to be a good student. I always learn everything from my teacher. The other day you taught me to act like this and I have to show you that I have learned everything you taught me. If I don’t show you that I have learned what you have taught me, then you may not like me.”
The Englishman was shocked and, at the same time, illumined by the learned man’s remarks. This learned man became the ocean of compassion, the ocean of knowledge, whom all Bengal worshipped and adored. His name was Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar.
There was a great leader who was very, very simple. From his appearance nobody could tell that he was a great leader. Only people who were around him and knew him well, or those who were in the political world, could recognise who he was. Otherwise, from his outer appearance he could fool anyone, since he was not tall and there was nothing about him that showed that he was bright or commanded respect and admiration from people. He always wore very simple clothes, and he was all simplicity and all sincerity.
One day he was working in his garden, digging and planting and doing everything all by himself. He was wearing very, very simple gardening clothes. A few middle-aged men came up to him and said, “Can you tell us where the chief is?”
He said, “Yes, I can. Just wait. I will call him.” Then he went into the house, washed his hands, put on a panjabi and dhoti and came out and stood in front of them.
They said, “You! You have come again. You didn’t tell the chief that we are here? We wanted to see the chief and not you.”
This time the gardener was a little serious. He said, “Well, the chief is here. I am the chief.”
“You are the Prime Minister of India?”
“Yes, I am!” Some of them bowed down, some were shocked. Some felt miserable. “Oh, we thought you were just the gardener,” they said.
The Prime Minister said, “I am so glad that you didn’t recognise me as the Prime Minister of India because I don’t want the world to know me by my appearance, but by my actions. I want to remain always simple, always humble.”
He was the second Prime Minister of India, after Nehru. Lal Bahadur Shastri: simplicity incarnate and heart’s magnanimity incarnate. Lal Bahadur Shastri was without a single enemy. His own people admired him and the opposition party also admired him equally for his heart’s nobility and his life’s simplicity and purity.
There was a very, very great scientist who was also a great patriot. Everyone adored him. He lived a very simple, austere and spiritual life and remained unmarried. He had a very long beard and moustache, and was very lean and thin. He believed that well-educated young men should not just accept the work of clerks and other unimportant work. He felt they should not act like slaves but should do something with their lives if they were well-educated. He came to realise that money gave one the opportunity to do quite a few things in life.
“Money properly used is a blessing, but money badly used is a curse,” he used to always say. “If one has money and uses it properly, then one will have a decent life. And from this decent life one can try to aspire. But if one is pinched with hunger all the time and suffers from poverty, then how can one do anything great and good?”
He always used to advise everyone, especially the Bengalis, to enter into business and to make money, and then to use the money to try to do something great and good for mankind.
Just because he was great, after getting their degree young people used to come to him to get a recommendation from him for jobs as clerks. But instead of a recommendation, with all love and concern he would give them a smart slap. “Go away from here,” he would say. “I will recommend you to become somebody’s clerk and assistant? I don’t want that! I want you people to enter into business and use the money you make to lead a decent life. Then only will you get the opportunity to do the right thing. But if you misuse the money you make, you will destroy your life.”
One day, when the great scientist was an elderly man, a young man approached him and asked him to say a few words in favour of him so he would get a clerical appointment. As he usually did, with all love, affection and concern the great scientist gave the young man a smart slap. Then he said, “You deserve it! I always tell you people to enter into business.”
The young man said, “Yes, I want to enter into business, but I have no money.”
Then the scientist said, “You want to enter into business? How much do you need? I will give it to you.”
He said, “I need ten thousand rupees.”
The scientist said, “Ten thousand rupees you need for a business? Absurd! You don’t need that much. I am giving you three thousand rupees. You people are under the impression that if you have a large amount of money to invest, then only will you be able to make money. It is not true! It is not the money you invest, but your will power.
“I am giving you three thousand rupees. You don’t have to return this money to me, only promise me that you will enter into business. If you enter into business, I will be very happy. With this money you will start and, I tell you, you will be successful. With all my blessings I am giving you this money.”
The young man bowed to him and said, “This money I am taking as your blessing.”
The old man said, “Yes, it is my blessing. But you have to try to be successful. And even if you are not successful, I will be very happy and proud of you just because you have tried.”
This man was India’s most famous scientist-pioneer, P.C. Ray. He received his Ph.D. from Edinburgh University and, as a teacher of chemical science, had many pupils who later became great world chemists. When once asked if he had any children, he responded with a list of seventy-three of his dearest and brightest students. Such was his love and dedication for those who took him as their teacher-father.
One day a high-class Brahmin went to the Ganges for a dip. On that particular day he was supposed to go to court, and he was late. So he could not spend as much time as usual bathing in the Ganges.
After hurriedly taking a dip, he was on his way back home when all of a sudden he heard someone say, “Hello, hello, can you spare a moment?” It was an elderly woman.
The Brahmin said, “Yes.”
The woman said, “Today my house priest could not come and there is nobody to conduct our house puja today. Without a Brahmin, how can my daily house puja be performed? You are a Brahmin, so will you do me a favour? Will you come and do the puja? Our house deity will be displeased if he is not worshipped today. And I never eat without worshipping our presiding deity. So please come.”
So the Brahmin said to the old lady, “Yes, I am coming.” And he followed her to her house.
The Brahmin was well-educated. He was a great scholar who knew Sanskrit and even the scriptures well — far better than the Brahmin who usually conducted her pujas. He did everything. It took him an hour or so.
After he was finished, the lady said to him, “Now I wish to reward you. I would like to give you something from the puja. I will give you a fee, and also I wish you to take some coconuts and bananas. Please take.”
The Brahmin said, “No, no. I cannot take this.”
“No, you have to take this,” the old lady said. “You have done me a favour, so you have to take money from me. You have to take fruits from the puja.”
But the man said, “No, I cannot do it. I am very grateful that I was able to help you, but I cannot accept any fee.” Then the Brahmin ran away.
The Brahmin happened to be the judge of the Calcutta High Court. He was a great scholar, a great pandit and a very great judge of the High Court. His name was Sri Gurudas Banerjee. The lady didn’t know who he was, but he himself knew who he was and what he was. Even though he held such a high post, he still regarded his duty as duty.
There was once a great leader whose heart was larger than the largest. In law he was extremely successful and as a national leader he was also quite successful. His real name was kindness, affection and compassion. He was always for the poor and the miserable and he used to help people far beyond their need. The tips he gave to the police, for example, were ten times the amount that they usually got from others.
“These policemen work so hard,” he said. “Just because they wear Indian dhotis and garments, we don’t value them. But if the same work were done by Englishmen with trousers on, we would have to give them much more.”
One day a man in the Congress who worked for the great leader came up to him crying. The great man said, “Why are you crying?”
He said, “I stay at your house, but just because I come from the lowest class, everyone goes away from me. I am given my food at the place where the dogs and the chickens stay. It is so dirty and filthy there. One of your servants brings my food and I eat there as if I were another dog or another chicken. Please do something for me.”
Because of his low class, society did not permit him to sit with the members of the family. But still the great man felt very sad. He said to his wife, “All right, granted he cannot sit and eat with us, but can you not at least give him a nice place to eat? Why does he have to eat with the dogs and chickens? Can he not be given a better place?”
His wife said, “Yes, he should be given a better place. I shall see to it.”
Although the wife told the servant to take his food to a nice place, a few days later the servant was careless and took the food to the same place. So once more the Congress worker came to the great man, crying and crying: “They have given me the food there again, just because I come of a low class. I am staying with you because of your affection and love for me. Otherwise, I would not stay. This kind of treatment I hate. Whenever your Brahmin cooks see me, they run away. They show tremendous contempt for me and literally hate me. Am I not a human being?”
The great leader felt miserable, and he burst into tears. He called his wife and said, “From now on this young man will eat not only inside the house, but actually in my room where I eat. He has to eat in my room whenever I am eating. If I happen to be elsewhere and it is time for him to eat, he has to eat in my room. I make it a law.”
This great man was Chitta Ranjan Das. He was known as the most beloved friend of Mother Bengal. It was he who saved Sri Aurobindo from jail. When he died, Tagore said, “You came into the world with an immortal heart and you left it here on your way back.”
Published in Great Indian Meals: Divinely Delicious and Supremely Nourishing, part 3
