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<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center"><b>I</b></p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center">&nbsp;</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center">
<b>SUBHAS — OATEN </b> </p>
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<b>ULLAS — RUSSELL</b></p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center">&nbsp;</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="justify">
The Subhash-Oaten encounter has attained some notoriety, as a number of people 
have on several occasions given an account of how Subhash Chandra once gave a 
thrashing with his shoe to one of his British professors, Oaten. But it seems to 
have almost been forgotten by the general public that this incident was a mere 
replica or imitation of an earlier and identical performance. Subhash did not 
institute anything new; he was simply following in the footsteps of eminent and 
heroic predecessors. Today I propose to give an account of that original 
performance.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
It was in the year 1905. The Swadeshi movement was in full tide, flooding the 
land with its enthusiasm, particularly the student community. But how about the 
Calcutta Presidency College? That was an institution meant for the &quot;good&quot; boys 
and for the sons of the rich, that is, for those who, in the parlance of the 
time, &quot;had a stake in the country,&quot; those who, in other words, had something to 
lose. How far were they touched by that flood? Those that were touched might be 
described as something of a phenomenon.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
In 1905, I was in my Second Year class. Among my class-mates were Narendra Nath 
Law, a well-known name in later years, and perhaps also Bhupati Mohan Sen who 
subsequently came to be known as Principal B. M. Sen.<sup>1</sup>Sitapati 
Baneiji too was there; he won the Ishan Scholarship in his B.A. examination and 
was ultimately given the name Swami Raghavananda or Sitapati Maharaj at the 
Ramakrishna Mission. These more or less made up the list of the &quot;good&quot; boys. 
Among the &quot;bad&quot; ones was Indranath</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">&nbsp;</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
<font size="2">1 I cannot now exactly recall if Bhupati Mohan had been at the 
Presidency College right from the First Year class, or whether he joined the 
Third Year &#39;from the Scottish Churches College, known at the time as the General 
Assembly&#39;s Institution.</font></p>
		<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="center">
<font size="2">Page-1</font></p>
<hr>
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Nandi, a son of Colonel Nandi of the Indian Medical Service. Let me recount some 
of his exploits.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
He had been a colleague of Barin Ghose of Manicktolla Gardens fame, and also a 
member of the Atmopnati Samiti, an &quot;Association for Self-improvement&quot;. This 
Samiti was really a centre for the recruitment and training of revolutionaries. 
I too had been one of the junior members of the Samiti. Bepin Behari Ganguli was 
among its organisers. We had just given up football as being a non-Indian sport 
and had taken up lathi and dagger play. I had already attained such proficiency 
in these games that I was once asked to give a demonstration of <i>lathi</i> play 
before Mrs. Sarala Devi Chowdhurani on the occasion of one of her visits. But 
Indra Nandi was engaged in something much more serious; he was trying to make 
bombs. And he ended by blowing up his fingers in an explosion during a test. 
Caught in this maimed condition, he was sent up for trial in the Alipore Bomb 
case, although he could not be convicted. Our counsel managed to prove that the 
state of his hands was due to their being crushed under an iron chest.<sup>1</sup></p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
Let me in this connection announce one of the feats of my college life. It was 
in that same year, 1905. Loud protests had arisen on account of the Bengal 
Partition and there was going to be observed a Day of Fasting or Rakhi-day or 
something like that. In what manner did I register my protest? I went to college 
dressed as if there had been a death in my family, that is to say, without shoes 
or shirt and with only a <i>chuddar</i> on. As I entered the class, everybody seemed a 
little stunned. The professor cast an occasional furtive glance at me but said 
not a word. My action must have appeared as rather unconventional, perhaps even 
incorrect to many, but I felt at the same time there were quite a few who gave 
me an admiring look.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">
At that time, in the class just above mine was Charu</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify">&nbsp;</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25px" align="justify"><sup>
<font size="2">1</font></sup><font size="2"> But there was a rumour that Colonel 
Nandi had compounded with the Government on condition that his son would thence 
forward behave like a thoroughly good boy.</font></p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center">
<font size="2">Page-2</font></p>
<hr>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="justify">
Biswas. Next above him was Rajendraprasad, and a year senior to Rajendraprasad 
there were Benoy Sarkar and Atul Gupta. Ramesh Majumdar was perhaps a year 
junior to me.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="justify">
Now let me come back to what I was going to say— <i>revenons 
<font face="Times New Roman">à</font> nos</i> <i>moutons</i>, as they 
say in French.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="justify">At 
a time like this, when the sky was getting red and the air was hot, with so much 
agitation in the minds of men and the young hearts, one of the Englishmen in our 
college, Russell, our professor of Logic and Philosophy, got it into his head to 
come out with something tactless against the Bengalis. It was like a spark in a 
powder dump. There was much excitement and agitation among the students. Could 
this not be avenged? Should the white man be allowed to escape scot-free, just 
like that? The day of reckoning came at last, like a bolt from the blue. How did 
it all happen? One of our classes had just been over and we were going to the 
next class along the corridor, when all on a sudden there rang out all over the 
place from a hundred lusty throats shouts of &quot;Bande Mataram&quot; that tore the air 
with its mighty cry. Everybody ran helter skelter. &quot;What is the matter? What 
happened?&quot; &quot;Russell has been thrashed with shoe!&quot; &quot;Who thrashed him? Who?&quot;</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="justify">
The Principal came—it was Dr. P. K. Roy, the first Bengali to have become 
Principal of the Presidency College, though in a temporary capacity. We all got 
into our classes. He entered our class first as it was nearest to the scene of 
the incident. Russell was with him, his face red with shame and indignation. He 
glanced around at those present in the class and said that he could spot no one. 
After the class was over, we went into the Physics Theatre for the Physics 
class. There too the Principal came in and broke out in a deep thundering tone, 
&quot;I see, &#39;Bande Mataram&#39; has become a war-cry.&quot; But the whole class was utterly 
quiet, there was not a sign of movement. All that high excitement and agitation 
of an hour ago was now hushed in dumb motionless silence. We were all a bunch of 
innocent lambs!</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0" align="center">
<font size="2">Page - 3</font></p>
<hr>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
But who was the culprit? It was Ullaskar Datta, one of our class-fellows. He was 
a boarder at the Eden Hindu Hostel. He had come to college with a slipper 
wrapped up in a newspaper sheet and had made good use of it as goon as he got a 
chance....</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
The life-story of this Ullaskar is a real drama, although its last stage is 
rather tragic. Soon after this incident he joined the Manicktolla Gardens with 
Barin Ghose and gave all his thought and energy to the making of a bomb. He did 
not know even the a b c of bombs. He read up by himself books on Chemistry, 
pieced out information from all kinds of books and finally mastered all alone 
the principles of explosives—nobody ever taught him. His father, Dwijadas Datta, 
was a professor at the Sibpur Engineering College. He had something like a small 
laboratory at his residence. It was here that Ullaskar took his training in 
secret. To what extent he had finally succeeded in his efforts was proved one 
day when to the first of his bombs one of our own men had to fall a martyr— 
Prafulla Chakravarti.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
I too had been an associate of his in this enterprise.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
Ullaskar—&quot;one who abounds in energy&quot;—fully lived up to his name: he was indeed 
an inexhaustible fount of energy and enthusiasm. When they used to escort us in 
a prison van from the jail to the court room (during the trial of the Alipore 
Bomb case), we rent the air all the way with our shouts and songs as we drove 
along. It was Ullaskar&#39;s idea; he led the chorus and the rest of us followed. 
Some of the old refrains still ring in my ears, I can still recall the words—of 
songs like &quot;Deep From the Heart of Bengal Today&quot;, &quot;The Soil, the Rivers of 
Bengal&quot;, &quot;My Golden Hindusthan&quot;.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
I have heard that Ullas is still alive, though almost half-dead, they say. Ten 
or twelve years of jail in the Anda-mans deranged him in body and mind. But this 
after all was part of the ritual of sacrifice. As Barin used to say, &quot;Such 
indeed was the vow in this kind of marriage&quot;.</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent:25pt" align="justify">
For, the enthusiasm of that day, that reawakening to </p>
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<font size="2">Page - 4</font></p>
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new life, took no account whatever of the gains and the losses. It forged ahead 
by itself, it drew its secret support from its own momentum. That was why people 
gazed wide-eyed in wonder, that was why they all joined in a mighty chorus:</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left:75pt">
&quot;A day indeed has dawned,</p>
<p style="line-height: 150%; margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0; margin-left:75pt">
When a million hearts</p>
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Have known not to fear</p>
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And leave no debts unpaid.</p>
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Life and death are</p>
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Bondslaves at our feet;</p>
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Our hearts have forgotten to care.&quot;</p>
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<font size="2">Page - 5</font></p><hr>
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