Shashibhushan Raychaudhuri
শশীভূষণ রায়চৌধুরী |
|---|
British India |
| Nationality | Indian |
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| Occupation | Revolutionary |
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Shashibhushan Raychaudhuri (Bengali: শশীভূষণ রায়চৌধুরী) (8 January 1863 – 1922), also known as Shashida, was a patriotic educationist connected with the radical revolutionary activities that had their origins in Bengal. He was the pioneer in what came to be known as the night-school movement, for building up a self-reliant society.
Early life
Shashida was born on 8 January 1863 at the village
.
Revolutionary organisation
In 1900, P. Mitter asked Shashida to send him some young men of character. It was the moment when Mitter was busy founding the Kolkata
Kakuzo Okakura at
Surendranath Tagore's house. Meanwhile, invited by Brahmabandhav, on 6 January 1902, Shashida joined the first batch of teachers at the new boarding school established by
Rabindranath Tagore at Santiniketan, along with
Jagadananda Ray,
Revachand Makhijani,
Shivadhan Vidyarnav,
Subodhchandra Majumdar and
Manoranjan Banerjee. In March 1902, Shashida had to return to Kolkata for the inauguration of the
Anushilan Samiti. Soon, with the coming of
Jatin Banerjee alias
Niralamba, Mitter was under the impression that the organisation was taking too much of a military turn, while Banerjee disagreed with
Barin Ghose's untimely terrorist enterprise. In the midst of this tension, Shashida and
Bagha Jatin served as mediators. Coming from Baroda, in 1903,
Sri Aurobindo at
Yogendra Vidyabhushan's place, tried to settle the disputes, and discussed with
Bagha Jatin and Banerjee his programme for Bengal. Very soon, Banerjee chose to set out for Upper India, where he continued his work as a revolutionary missionary.
The
.
Probably as the party's emissary, Shashida went to
.
Daulatpur College
With the
Rasbehari Bose was suspected by the police of involvement in the bomb making, Shashida arranged to send Bose to Dehra Dun for safety. He himself went to
Daulatpur College as the superintendent of its hostel. He shared his room with
Manindranath Seth, the vice-principal and member of the secret society, and
Bhupendra Kumar Datta, a brilliant student leader : all the three were to be arrested in 1917. Every morning and evening, after some physical culture, the students assembled for meditating, accompanied by select readings, and devotional and patriotic songs conducted by Shashida. Since 1911, drawn by Shashida and the promising students he had been training,
Bagha Jatin visited the campus, while touring these districts regularly. Advised by the latter, the students took to intensive riding, rowing and military drills. In 1913, Shashida formed a volunteers' corps to assist Jatin in the
Damodar flood relief. Shattered by the sudden martyrdom of
Bagha Jatin in 1915, in the teeth of massive arrests under the
Defence of India Act, Shashida with his students concentrated on social work, while helping the stray revolutionaries to reorganise the party. He was arrested in 1917. Judging from the state of this TB patient, the Government decided to home intern him with his wife Urmila Devi, his daughters Rani and Durga, and son Ashok, first in Daulatpur, then in Khulna. Released in 1919, Shashida returned to Tegharia to improve the status of his school and to campaign against malaria. In spite of his poor health, he maintained his social activities till his death in April 1922.
References
Biplabi Shashibhushan: jiban o sadhana, by Krishanu Bhattacharya, 2003;
agniyug o biplabi bhupendrakumar datta, by Samyukta Mitra, 1995;
biplaber padachinha, by Bhupendrakumar Datta, 2nd edition, 1973;
sadhak biplabi jatindranath, by Prithwindra Mukherjee, 1990;
biplabi jibaner smriti, by Jadupopal Mukherjee, 2nd edition, 1982.
First Spark of Revolution, by A.C. Guha, 1971.
