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ROBI AND RABI

- Two singers One Tune

By Vidyut_Chakraborty

Scottish writers have had the choice of three languages: Scottish Gaelic; Lallans, or; and English. The most notable Scottish poets who wrote in Lallans (Lowland Scots )and English were Robert Fergusson (1750-74) and Robert Burns (1759-96). Rabi Burns was born at Alloway, Ayrshire, Scotland on 25 January 1759 and died in Dumfries on 21 July 1796. In less than 37 years of life he accomplished more than most people do in a normal lifetime. Scottish people love to call him Rabi when a general trend was to shorten Roberts into Rob. There were Sir Walter Scott and James Joyce and many others to be par with Burns but people had opt Burns by their heart. Rabis songs are still popular. Amongst them AULD LANG SYNE is most familiar and best loved ones. Then there are FLOW GENTLY,SWEET AFTON,MY HEARTS IN THE HIGHLANDS etc Burns had a fantastic sense of humour which was reflected in his satirical, descriptive, and naughty verse. To a Haggis,Man is born to mourn- a dirge, Tam o Shanter and The Jolly Beggars, are among his masterpieces. His great popularity with the Scots lies in his ability to depict with loving accuracy the life of his fellow rural Scots, as he did in The Cotters Saturday Night. His use of dialect brought a stimulating, much-needed freshness and raciness into British poetry but Burnss greatness extends beyond the limits of dialect. His poems are written about Scots, but, in tune with the rising humanitarianism of his day, they apply to a multitude of universal problems. Socialists, communists, atheists and anarchists all claim that Robert Burns was one of their founding fathers. Burns Night on 25th January is a festivity starts with Address to a Haggies with the dishes of Tatties and & Neeps and is drummed with the waves of Scotch whisky.This was originally a fest of poor farmers and hunters oppressed by the burgesses of the Castles.Burns was always with the general people. He painted some wanderers as sages, in sufi cult of Islam they are called as Darbesh,Fakir or Mastan,and in Bengal these wanderers are called Aul and Baul. Their indigenous songs are based on human lifestyle and the tune is very much earthly and natural. Bengal too have the likes to adapt the lower Bengals language, mainly Calcuttan Bengali, an admixture of colonial legacy, after 1800AD when to start a college, William Carrey of Serampore church.started to write Bengali language. Raja Ram Mohan Roy,Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay upgraded the language to literature. Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay brushed with a popular humane touch. Two eminent poets of different classes, Kazi Nazrul Islam and Rabindra Nath Thakur (Tagore) , in unison,attributed a rich cultural tone and flooded the Bay of Bengal with songs ,verses and music of different tastes. Bengal has had a Lalan too but he is a roaming bard and a wretched sage worshipping sect less classless religion less and boundary less

humanism. Bengal contributed its mainstream nation, India, many a laureates and a sizable number of Nobel laureates of different cast class and community and even two foreigners, Ronald Ross in 1902 and Mother Teresa in 1997, who made Bengal their abode. Rabindra Nath Thakur(Tagore) was the first Bengalee- Indian Nobel Prize winner in1913.The two other Bengalees are Amartya Sen (Santiniketan West Bengal)and Mohammad Yunus( Dacca,Bangladesh). Rabindra Nath thakur as popularly known as Gurudev( the Chief Teacher) called by Mahatma Gandhi who in compliment got the title Mahatma from his Gurudev. But Bengalees from all parts of undivided India(pre-independence),adoringly called him Robi Thakur which was also his call-name in his family.The great Indian Painter Abanindra Nath Thakur called him Robi kaka( Robi Uncle).Robi Thakur was born in 25th Baisakh (.7th. May1861) and his grandfather Prince Dwaraka Nath Thakur started the westernization of Bengals nobility. Although Tagore wrote successfully in all literary genres, he was first of all a poet and his volumes of poetry are Manasi (1890) [The Ideal One], Sonar Tari (1894) [The Golden Boat], Gitanjali (1910) [Song Offerings], Gitimalya (1914) [Wreath of Songs], and Balaka (1916) [The Flight of Cranes]. The English renderings of his poetry, which include The Gardener (1913), Fruit-Gathering (1916), and The Fugitive (1921), do not generally correspond to particular volumes in the original Bengali; and in spite of its title, Gitanjali:(Offerings of Songs) in 1912, contains poems from other works His major plays are Raja (1910) [The King of the Dark Chamber], Dakghar(1912) [The Post Office], Achalayatan (1912) [The Immovable],Muktadhara (1922) [The Waterfall], and Raktakaravi (1926) [Red Oleanders]. He is the author of several volumes of short stories and a number of novels, among them Gora (1910), Ghare-Baire (1916) [The Home and the World], and Yogayog (1929) [Crosscurrents]. Besides these, he wrote musical dramas, dance dramas, essays of all types, travel diaries, and two auto -biographies, one in his middle years and the other shortly before his death in 1941. Tagore also left numerous drawings and paintings, and songs for which he noted the tune either from within his self or remixing folk tunes of all over the world, even from Scotland and especially from Robert Burns music.Sakalee furalo swapan prai,Fule Fule Doole Doole bohe kiba mridu bai, Purano se diner katha vulbi kire hai etc. The English Year 2011 is celebrated as 150th.Birth Centenary of Robi Thakur with much fanfare all over Asia and of course in some part of Europe & America. From the age of 17 he started his tour from England and visited many countries of Europe & America.The main attribution of Robi Thakur is the two national anthem, Janagana mana adhinayak jai hey (India), Amar sonar Bangla Ami tomai Valobasi(Bangladesh)are his creation apart from the tune he did for Sri Lankas national anthem. It is the only exception excepting the Communist International which is sung in Communist countries only. He believes in humanism, So like Rabi Burns he was also believed to be a torch bearer of Indian socialism, He was not a politician, so he denounced all sorts of cruelty towards children , women, downtrodden, different religion, caste ,colour and creed. He started

with Hindu Upanishads and mixed so many tone, tune, and tint, collected from all over the world, in his works and philosophy and Bengali Literature elated , enriched and upgraded to the global standard .

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