THE MAN I KNEW: K. B. SAHAY - RAGHUVEER PRASAD

FROM THE BLOGGER’S LIBRARY: REMEMBERING K.B.SAHAY:19

Sri Raghuveer Prasad, retired journalist and teacher, marks out the characteristics of the man that Sri K. B. Sahay was. (Editor)

RAGHUVIR PRASAD

There is a streak in human nature that cannot be denied, one that forever urges to explore to the limit and beyond. His history is the history of man’s search to know the world, that is, he. More so in context to the socio-economic order of which he himself is a product. With complete disregard to family circumstances, graduating a summa-cum-laude in English language and literature as an alumnus of the oldest college in Chhotanagpur Saint Columba’s College, Hazaribagh he would have risen to any limit in the administrative services. But that was not to be. Instead, he threw himself into the vortex of the freedom movement to become an insider par excellence in the filthy game of politics.

Few can visualize a moderately tall, sturdy young person with cat-grey eyes and roughened determination writ large on his face, moving with a knapsack, full of Gandhi caps and a sheaf of Khadi clothes from village to village. That was 1935-1936. And in 1937 he won the elections hands down to become the Parliamentary Secretary in the Ministry of Bihar. His administrative skill, his deep understanding of men, matters, and things, his organization capabilities, and more so, his knack to find out a way out of every impasse, made him an imperative. He would often say “we are not free to complete the task or to desist from it. That’s the human imperative. The Promethean imperative, if you like.”

It was this that drove the man who knew “every advance in knowledge has its self-correcting consequence” to free the peasantry from the shackles that Lord Cornwallis had bound them with. “The Zamindari Abolition” was his brainchild. His ruthless determination to implement the same seemed to spring forth from the motto, as George Bernard Shaw has put it in one of his plays:

“The serpent says to Eve in the Garden of Eden:

“When you and Adam talk I hear you say ‘why’? But I dream things that never were, and I say ‘why not’? I think that’s a better question: ‘why not’?”

That “why not?” made him the most misunderstood man. Yes, he was brazenly misunderstood. But he cared not. To him, it meant a kind of reciprocal relationship between the humans’ try and what they need and what they think they need and so on, which is not a simple linear movement along the path of biological or spiritual needs. The immediate would have to be heeded to. Not that he didn’t know what he didn’t know, but that he wouldn’t leave the challenge un-replied and that made him rough and arrogant. But then, most efforts to civilize humans have been based on arrogance. Reforms grow on the boundary between something and something else. When an effort is made to reduce this ‘else-ness’ to ‘sameness’, resistance to reform increases. This happened when he, as a Minister in the Bihar cabinet, enforced the reforms relating to the “Preservation of Forests”. He knew where the ruts were and where the highway was. He stood in the ruts to propel the hitherto exploited on to the highway. He had to bear the consequence. He did bear them with a wry smile.

This was the man that was an indulgent big brother to some that mattered and to some that matter now in the politics of Bihar. He showed the way. Provided the wherewithal and left for them to strike their own path.

This was the man whom I saw one fine morning standing motionless by the lake and gazing into the void. I kept a distance. He wouldn’t like his reverie to be broken. Decisions came in such moments. He was on the way to take that long walk before sunrise. On his way back to his very modest home he talked. He talked and talked and I heard. Nothing of politics. Not a sort of any problems. Not of friends and foes in the party but of comrades-in-arms during the freedom struggle. He seemed to keep a track of everyone. That was the real man. Those who knew did know that it was the right time to seek his guidance and his blessings.

This was the man who was most unmindful of his dress and attire, simple in tastes and exquisite in homeliness, broad in views and rough of tongue, for to him, Benjamin Franklin’s twelve dictum made sense.

As the Chief Minister of Bihar, he must need to be remembered for his capabilities to keep the administration in leash and even the most audacious ones would meekly submit to his directions.

It was a fascinating sight to watch him mixing with his ‘sepoys’ (Policemen) on every Holi festival afternoon for them, out of sheer regard for him, assembled in a festive mood at his residence ‘in power’ or ‘out of power’ notwithstanding.

To move from reason to consequence is the normal way but those who begin with the consequence to arrive at reasons have the guts to face odds and oppositions. He was of the latter type. I once put to him “You, Sri Kamakhya Narayan Singh and Sri Jaipal Singh if you all come together, I visualize a radical- radiant change.”

Prompt came the reply “I haven’t the least hesitation. You see, they have their own axe to grind. You can’t expect the moon to kiss the sun. But both need to be there.”

This was the man I knew. Need I tell you that the person was Sri Krishna Ballabh Sahay?

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber. -PLATO.