Jain Journal 1970 01

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 49

JANUARY, 1970
holidays and remain at our stations, ready to be able to leave Germany at the shortest notice before hostilities started. I continued my work with Schubring and communicated my anxieties to him, viz., that although I was not in the least interested in Anglo-German conflicts, yet I would be legally a Prisoner of War in Germany if war broke out because I held a British-Indian passport, and a war in modern times lasted no less than five years at least. He tried to soothe my anxieties -although I could see that he was in no less troubled mind himself though he did not show it-by saying that he would discuss the matter with the Dean. Next day he informed me that he and the Dean had decided that in case of war, the University would represent to the Government that although formally a prisoner of war, I might be permitted to carry on my usual work at the University instead of being in a POW's camp, because I could hardly be counted as a British agent. This reassured me somewhat but a few days later when the Crisis assumed serious proportions, he told me that he had another talk with the Dean who however now feared that although the University might make its recommendation on my behalf, there was no guarantee that the Government would accept it. I, therefore, along with many other British and American students and lecturers, kept ready to cross over to Belgium at a moment's notice, although there yet remained another serious risk, viz. that all frontiers would be closed twentyfour hours before the formal declaration of war. Although we attended to our normal routine of daily work, the time was spent in great stress and strain-barring the working hours, we spent the rest of the time listening to the radio and keeping in touch with the hourly progress of events. We breathed a sigh of relief when the Munich Conference ended but resolved not to face another chance of war as war clouds gathered. Winter came and went (when wars do not start!) and on the very first days of the spring vacation in March 1939 we all left for our respective lands almost in a body. To see me off at the station all my well-wishers came and as the train steamed off Schubring lifted his joined palms in namaskar in Indian manner and said Punardarśanaya, the Sanskrit rendering of "Auf Wiedersehen", the usual German mode of bidding farewell. I always hoped that I would meet him again some day in the future, but alas, it was not to be.
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During my last days with him he told me that he had written to the Calcutta University suggesting that if they so desired they might bring out an English translation of his Die Lehre der Jainas as they had done of Winternitz's History of Indian Literature, and I might take up the matter with Calcutta University on my return home. This I did do. I spoke to Dr Syama Prasad Mukerjea, to the Asiatic Society,