A Note on Utkala Samyabadi Karmee Sangha and Sarathi Kailash Chandra Dash
Nabakrushna Chaudhury had devoted fifty years of his active life to the political, social and economic progress of colonial and post-colonial Odisha. He came to the focus of politics at a crucial phase of Odisha-in – making. He was unforgettable for his socialistic ideas and experiments, participation in the peasant movement and the movement in the princely states of Odisha, his constructive activities in the Gandhian phase of nationalism. His revolutionary and constructive activities began with the formation of Utkala Samyabadi Karmee Sangha and the publication of Sarathi, a weekly Odia magazine in 1934. Unfortunately some scholars working on this aspect have followed blindly the autobiography of Surendranath Dwivedi and have presented a wrong picture of the context. Hence in this brief study an attempt has been made to review the contemporary periodicals for a revisit of the context.
Naba Bharata of 1936 first as in the 1970s onwards he might have not remembered the correct date. Besides Naba Bharat we have other reliable references for this context.
Samyabadi Sangha in February 1934 and by June it began to expand with some new but important members. Gangadhar Mishra, Gokulmohan Raichudamani, Gaurachandra Das, Malati Chaudhuri, Gobinda Chandra Mishra, Dibakar Pattnaik and Prananath Patnaik were some of the members in this association.
For the expansion of socialism in Odisha though the Samyabadi Karmee Sangha a weekly magazine called Sarathi also appeared from March 1934. According to Deshakatha of 13th March 1934 Nabakrushna
was its editor. Deshkatha stated that Sarathi was to focus on the peasants and wage earners. It stated that the nation would prosper only with the prosperity of the peasants and workers. Evaluating the new magazine Sarathi Deshkatha also stated that the peasants of Odisha were in a testing phase. They were almost dead though alive. The Congress and the colonial government enjoyed all opportunities in this helpless pitiable situation of the peasants. Some Odia nationalists were in the dreamland of making separate province of Odisha so that in the new province the peasants would be more helpless in the exploitative system of the landlords and babus. In this situation Sarathi of Bhai Nabakrushna should prepare some peasants to face the situation.(Deshkatha, 13th March, 1934) Sarathi
presented the programmes of the Samyabadi Sammilani in one of its issues of June 1934(First year, 14th Number, 18th June). In Sarathi
Bhagabati Charan Panigrahi, Prananath Patnaik, Manmohan Chaudhury and others had presented insightful issues. For example the article of Bhagabati Panigrahi entitled “Pruthibira Sankata O Sethiru Nistara Paibara Upaya”(The World Crisis and Ways for Escaping from it) appeared in Sarathi in 16th April, 1934(Sarathi, 1/6). It was serialized in Sarathi and was
completed in five issues. In that insightful focus Panigrahi explained the theory of socialism in simple language. Besides Panigrahi, Nabakrushna Chaudhury had several essays and editorial notes in this Sarathi. Manmohan Chaudhuri had a focus entitled “Itihasaku Bikruta Karibara Chesta”(The Effort to tarnish History) in Sarathi of 27th August,
1930s it was not properly appreciated by the scholars. Sarathi needs to be studied and used for a comprehensive study of Marxism in Odisha.
References
1. Dwibewdi, S. N., “Odishare Samyabadi Dala”, Naba Bharat, ed. Nilakantha Das, Vol.3, No.2, Kakada, Sala 1343, August, 1936.
2. Dwibedi, S.N., Mo Jibana Sangrama, Grantha Mandira, 1934. 3. Asha, 1934, June.
4. Deshkatha, 1934, March.
5. Satpathy, Bijay Kuymar, Odia Sahityare Prgatibadi Dhara, Odisha Book Store, Cuttack, 1995.
