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A LOVER OF LIGHT AMONG LUMINARIES : Dilip Kumar Roy
few turbaned Olympians who condescended to smile at me deeply conscious that it was so good of them to find music "interesting".
"There was Surendramohan Ghosh with an aerial smile round his lips and a grim determinaiton in his heart to go where there is no laughter nor marriage: the jail. There was a tall Pathan, a fire-eater, whose every word was instinct with Croce's battle-cry: "It's just opposition that rejuvenates." In one shy corner murmured T. C. Goswami, a born aristocrat with a velvet heart and Oxford accent who was going soon to prove an alltoo-willing victim for every vulture round the corner. There were also the lesser fry, giants with puggrees and topees, dwarfs with bald heads and top-knots, non-co-operators nodding assent in Gandhi caps and co-operators tossing defiance in Turkish Fezes. It was, indeed, an awe-inspiring and withal the most incongruous company that ever assembled to save an ancient country with a modern motto: "We shall all hang together or.
assuredly, we shall all hang separately."100
When one compares Roy's portrait of Subhas Chandra with his other portraits of Sri Aurobindo and Krishnaprem, one can easily notice a point of difference. Dilip Roy here finds himself on equal footing with his subject. So, he becomes a bit critical, at times, of Subhas Chandra's imperfections. At times, he gives his own reasons for Subhas Chandra's failures and also defends his mighty actions.
Unlike in his other books, in the two books on Subhas Chandra, Roy has taken care of proper documentation. The footnotes in these books are detailed and informative.
It is one of the features of Roy's style that he includes opinions held by others about his subject to support his own understanding of his greatness. In 'Appendices' to Netaji — the Man: Reminiscences Roy presents the views of such prominent persons as Rabindranath Tagore, Romain Rolland and Bhulabhai Desai about Subhas Chandra. 4. Indira Devi
Each life that Dilip Kumar Roy presents in a book reveals also a relationship and a facet of the authorial personality too. What we see in his relationship with Sri Aurobindo, is a sincere seeker after spirituality approaching his guru for enlightenment and harassing him perpetually with questions that trouble his own soul. Here we see a true disciple, almost an ideal disciple of the definition of the Bhagavat Gita, seeking knowledge by puriprahsna or questions and answers, by pranipat or worship and by service to be rendered to guru. 107 This is Dilip Roy in relation to Sri Aurobindo.
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