The Mahatma and the Poet – Letters and debates between Gandhi and Tagore 1915-1941

-compiled and edited by Sabyasachi Bhattacharya

Introduction

This book puts together letters exchanged by Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore along with some essays which they wrote debating major national issues. These letters preserved in the archives of Vishva-Bharati, the University founded by Tagore, are of great historical interest. Of more than historical interest is the debate between Gandhi and Tagore over certain issues and questions which continue to be relevant to this day and age. This intellectual exchange began in 1914-15 when Mahatma Gandhi along with his students of Phoenix school in South Africa visited Shantiniketan. Gandhi recalled later. “It is here that the members of my South African family found warm hospitality in 1914, pending my arrival from England, and I too found shelter here for nearly a month”.

At that time, Tagore’s school at Shantiniketan was not yet 15 years old. Tagore was 53 years of age and he had received the Nobel Prize just a year earlier. Gandhi was younger by eight years and yet to attain a national stature in India, though his great work in South Africa was widely known. There were many striking contrasts between these two personalities. Yet, they found some common chord and there began a friendship which lasted till Tagore’s death in 1941. as early as February 1915 we find Tagore referring to Gandhi as ‘Mahatma’ and Gandhi readily adopted the form of addressing Tagore as ‘Gurudev’.

But theirs was not a friendship pased on just mutual admiration. They had differences on fundamenta philosophical questions, which led to disputation about many political, social and economical matters. Both were unsparing in their debate and, indeed, it cannot be said that either were successful in perusading the other towards a path of convergence of views. Each accepted cordially the other’s right to differ. These differences on public