Uttarpara Speech - Sri Aurobindo

When I was asked to speak to you at the annual meeting of your Sabha, it was my intention to say a few words about the subject chosen for today–the subject of the Hindu religion. I do not know now whether I shall fulfill that intention; for as I sat here, there came into my mind a word that I have to speak to you, a word that I have to speak to the whole of the Indian Nation. It was spoken first to myself in jail and I have come out of jail to speak it to my people. It was more than a year ago that I came here last. When I came I was not alone; one of the mightiest prophets of Nationalism sat by my side. It was he who then came out of the seclusion to which God had sent him, so that in the silence and solitude of his cell he might hear the word that He had to say. It was he that you came in your hundreds to welcome. Now he is far away, separated from us by thousands of miles. Others whom I was accustomed to find working beside me are absent. The storm that swept over the country has scattered them far and wide. It is I this time who have spent one year in seclusion, and now that I come out I find all changed1. One who always sat by my side and was associated in my work is a prisoner in Burma; another is in the north rotting in detention2.  I looked round when I came out, I looked round for those to whom I had been accustomed to look for counsel and inspiration. I did not find them. There was more than that.

This speech was delivered in Uttarpara, near Calcutta, Bengal, on May 30, 1909 at invitation of the town’s Dharma Rakshini Sabha.

© Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, Pondicherry. Reprinted with permission.

1.Sri Aurobindo was arrested on May 2, 1908 and released on May 6, 1909.

2 Shyamsundar Chakravarti was imprisoned in Burma and Subodh Chandra Malik in Bareilly and Almora. They were among the nine political leaders of Bengal arrested and deported without trial in December 1908.

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