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a place perhaps only next to God. And as matters stand to day he may possibly dethrone God on the strength of any referendum. Thousands of rhetorical tributes stand recorded in the mass of journalistic and other literature and one is amused and even amazed by the variety of attitude taken by each of the admirers of Shivaji. Shivaji had, of course, had his more than liberal share of enemies and their courses are equally profusely recorded in the historical material now available about the great hero. I can quote copious instances of his having been called anything between a divine 'Avatar' and a confirmed villain. But the time when history was a mere collection of impressions of either the contemporaries or the modern historians, is long since gone. We now speak of facts and interprete them in the light of a number of social sciences which are highly enriched by annual additions of what may be called comparative history of all countrics. The days of Shivaji's being called an 'avatar' are also gone. His claims upon our respect are now firmly founded on certain well-established facts emerging out of careful research of a quarter of a century. I am greatly pleased that our “Shiva Charitra Karyalaya" contributed its mite to a systematic collection of all such material as a result of a careful study of which some old and fantastical ideas about the early life of Shivaji are dissipated. If Shivaji, the mythical hero, melts away in the furnace of Scientific research, Shivaji the political leader of Maharashtra stands forth as an embodiment of whatever was best in man. I have come accross no other personality either in historical or modern times who has not in the least suffered in the searchlight of disinterested and fearless research. Historians need not be afraid to go any depth into the private or public life of Shivaji. This cannot be said of any other man in the world placed in his position, and with equally ample opportunities and temptations. And that is the greatest tribute one can pay to the individual who had already volumes after volumes to his credit to delineate the history af his achievement. We hear too much of the changing standards of morality, however true this may be of the standards of private morality the public or political standards of morality have scarcely undergone any Whange so far as relations between beligerents are concerned and Shivaji would in no way suffer in comparison with any of the participants in the last world war. Attempts at
Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
