Gurusaday Dutt: Difference between revisions

| birth_place = Birasri, [[Karimganj district|Karimganj]], [[Assam Province]], [[British India]]

| death_date  = {{d-da|25 June 1941|10 May 1882}}

| occupation  = Civilian, folklorist

| spouse      = [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]] (nee Dé)<ref name="socialthoughtofrabindranathtagore:ahistoricalanalysis">[http://www.books.google.com/books?id=0HrBJJBFutsC&pg=PA138&lpg=PA138&dq=%22brajendranath+de%22&source=web&ots=6hzMYqYpVY&sig=j0LN8UVyO09xXv-DDGe4tWswGIo/ Tapati Das Gupta, Social Thought of Rabindranath Tagore: A Historical Analysis, (Calcutta, 1993), p. 138]</ref>

| children   = 1

'''Gurusaday Dutt''' (গুরুসদয় দত্ত) (1882–1941)<ref name="Dasgupta1993">{{cite book|author=Tapati Dasgupta|title=Social Thought of Rabindranath Tagore: A Historical Analysis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0HrBJJBFutsC&pg=PA138|access-date=11 July 2012|date=1 January 1993|publisher=Abhinav Publications|isbn=978-81-7017-302-1|pages=138–}}</ref> was a civil servant, folklorist, and writer. He was the founder of the [[Bratachari movement|''Bratachari'' Movement]] in the 1930s.

Dutt, born to Ramkrishna Dutta Chaudhuri and Anandamayee Debi, was a member of the ''zamindari'' family of Birasri village in Karimganj sub-division of [[Sylhet District|Sylhet]] district, in eastern Bengal (present day [[Bangladesh]]). Members of his family were followers of the Vaishnavite sect.

After completing his Entrance examination at Government College, Sylhet, in 1898, Dutt completed his F.A. examination from [[Presidency College, Calcutta]] in 1901. He obtained a scholarship raised by the Sylhet Union to study in [[Emmanuel College, Cambridge]]. He passed the  Open Competitive Service examination in 1905. Subsequently, he was called to the Bar by the Honourable Society of [[Gray's Inn]].

He was married to [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]], a daughter of [[Brajendranath Dé]], Esq., ICS.

==Career==

He served in various capacities in the districts, such as District Magistrateship of Mymensingh, Directorship of Industries and Secretaryship of Local Self Government and Public Health of the Government of Bengal, as Government Chief Whip in the Bengal Legislative Council and as a nominated Member of the Council of States and of the [[Central Legislative Assembly]] from 1930-1933.

==Contributions to social work==

From his youth, Gurusaday started to take active interest in social service and participated in helping fire-fighters and assisting in relief work during floods and other natural disasters. He was one of the social reformers of the first half of the nineteenth century who thought independently about various avenues of service to the rural poor. He realised that in order to establish any progressive idea on firm foundation it was necessary to educate women and make them self-reliant. [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]], who became an eminent Social Worker in her own right, was inspired by Gurusaday to start Mahila Samitis (Women's Institutes) as early as 1913, at Pabna district in British India, where he was then the District Magistrate.

In 1918, Gurusaday started the first Rural Reconstruction Movement in India in Birbhum. He then extended the movement to several districts where he was subsequently posted, like Bankura, Howrah and Mymensingh. This movement was bold and unique, as India was under British Rule at the time. In fact, he was advised by his senior officer that he should spend time in the Club socialising with other officers rather than pursuing activities to promote rural development and social welfare.

He was the first amongst civilian officers to set an example of the [[dignity of labour]], by manually working with a group of followers to eradicate the water hyacinth, a plant that covers ponds and makes water unusable. He would also re-excavate silted irrigation canals with a band of workers. In those days, it was unthinkable for a Magistrate to work manually with ''common'' people.

In 1922, he started a Society for co-operative irrigation in Bankura, which he later extended to Mymensingh and Birbhum.

He headed the Indian delegation as a representative of the British Indian Government at a meeting of the Agricultural Institute at Rome in 1924.

In 1925, he lost his wife at a very early age. He established the [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]] Memorial Association, in February 1925, as a Central Training Institute for training crafts and basic education to provide livelihood to women who had been deprived from receiving formal education in early life and lived at the mercy of relatives. He thought of ''non-formal education'' many years before it was officially started. His pioneering work was started when most women in India were still behind the ''purdah'' (veil), and would not dare to come out in the world to create a future for themselves. This organisation became the apex organisation for Mahila Samitis (Women's Institutes) in Eastern India, and was later affiliated to the [[Associated Country Women of the World]] (ACWW) and the [[International Alliance of Women]].

In October 1925, he started ''Bangalakshmi'', a monthly magazine that is still published.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

==Contributions to art and culture==

Gurusaday Dutt was mostly known for his interest and contributions to Bengal's folk art, folk dance and folk music. He spent a lifetime collecting and studying art objects and handiwork from the remotest corners of undivided rural Bengal collecting items of folk art such as Kalighat paintings, ''patuas''' scrolls, embroidered ''kanthas'', terracotta panels, stone sculptures, wooden carvings, dolls and toys, moulds used for making patterns on sweets or mango-paste etc. Gurusaday Dutt also wrote extensively on folk culture. Rabindranath Tagore and C.F. Andrews wrote in the foreword of the biography of his wife, [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]], which he wrote. Gurusaday Dutt also wrote a good deal about the Bratachari movement.

 

 

His stay in Mymensingh was also cut short when he failed to give orders as required by him by the British Indian Government to deal with protesters against The Salt Act imposed by the Government. [[Mahatma Gandhi|M.K.Gandhi]] had called for a [[satyagraha]] against this Act. He was transferred to Birbhum by telegram (then the fastest means of communication), which was an unprecedented way of dealing with an ICS officer in those days.

*Pallisampad Raksha Samiti (1931)

*Bratachari Lokanritya Samiti (1932)

*Sarbabharatiya Bratachari Society etc.

*In 1941 he also set up the Bratachari village(Bratacharigram) near Calcutta, and the Bratachari Janashiksha Pratishthan. The [[Bratachari movement]] founded by Gurusaday Dutt (from ''vrata'', vow) was a movement for spiritual and social improvement. The movement aimed at creating a sense of world citizenship as well as national awareness among people, irrespective of caste, religion, sex and age. The movement aimed to nurture the mind and the body and to encourage people to work for national and individual improvement through encouraging traditional and folk culture, especially folk dance and folk song. The ''bratacharis'', or followers of the movement, pledged themselves to build their moral fibre and serve the country on the five principles of ''knowledge'', ''labour'', ''truth'', ''unity'' and ''joy''. They aimed at developing the mind and body through dance as well as by undertaking to perform good deeds. The Bratachari movement did not catch on all over India and slowly died away after the death of its founder. In 2011, the Mamata Banerjee Government again made Bratachari education compulsory in Primary schools in West Bengal, after the Marxist Communist Government withdrew it from the School curriculum in 1984.

Gurusaday Dutt wrote many books and articles, which are listed below. The latest book to be published is "Banglar Lokashilpa o Lokanritya" (in Bengali), which is a collection of his essays and articles on Folk Art and Folk Dances of Bengal in various magazines between 1928 and 1941(his death), that were painstakingly obtained from the old magazines at Bangiya Sahitya Parishad's library by his grandson Devsaday Dutt and granddaughter-in-law Priyadarshini Dutt. The book has been published by Subhromani De and Subhadra De of Chhatim Books in 2008.

 

*''Bhajar Banshi'' (1922) (in Bengali) (A book of rhymes for children)

*''Palli Sangskar'' (in Bengali) (1925)

*''Ganer Saji'' (in Bengali) (1932)

*''Indian Folk Dance and Folklore Movement'' (in Bengali) (1933)

*''Patuya Sangit'' (in Bengali) (1939)

*''Bratacharir Marmakatha'' (in Bengali) (1940)

*''A Woman of India]'' (1941)

*''Shrihatter Lokasangit'' (in Bengali) (1966)

*''Banglar Lokashilpa o Lokanritya'' (in Bengali) (Calcutta: Chatim Books, 2008)

*''Goraey Golod'' (in Bengali)

*''Gramer Kaajer ka kha Ga'' (in Bengali)

*''Palli Sanskar O Sangathan'' (in Bengali)

*''Paaglamir Puthi'' (in Bengali)

*''Purir Mahathwa'' (in Bengali)

*''Gaaner Saaji'' (in Bengali)

*''Banglar Samrik Krira'' (in Bengali)

*''Chaander Buri''(in Bengali)

*''Bratachari Shakhaa'' (in Bengali)

*''Patua Sangeet'' (in Bengali)

*''Bratachari Parichoy'' (in Bengali)

*''Srihotter Lokageeti'' (in Bengali)

*''Banglar Bir Jodha Raebeshe'' (in Bengali)

 

 

Biographies have been written on his life and works in Bangladesh by Shankar Prasad De, Amitabha Chowdhury, Shaikat Azgar and Naresh Banerjee.

 

A Medal in his honour, known as "The Gurusaday Dutt Medal" along with a Cash prize, was endowed by his grandson, Devsaday Dutt, at the University of Calcutta, which is given to the student who stands First in the Post-Graduate Examination in Geography, from 2008 onwards.

 

Gurusaday Dutt Scholarships are also being awarded by the Sylhet Union(Srihatta Sammilani), Kolkata for brilliant students pursuing post-graduate studies.

 

His articles initially published in the 1930s in journals such as ''Prabashi'', ''Banglar Shakti'', ''Bangalakshmi'' and ''Aloka'' (in Bengali), have been republished in a book entitled ''Banglar Lokashipla o Lokanritya'' in August 2008.

 

His daughter-in-law, [[Aroti Dutt]], was an eminent social worker, and was the World President of the Associated Countrywomen of the World for two terms and President of the Saroj Nalini Dutt Memorial Association, Calcutta.

*[http://rajsaday.com/?p=86/ Profile of Gurusaday Dutt at Lives Less Forgotten]