Different Strokes

Radhanandan Jha's eyes were glued to a newspaper's report detailing the allotment of an eight room well furnished air-conditioned bungalow on the Prithvi Raj road, New Delhi to K. R. Narayanan on his retirement from the republic's highest post. When asked what was so special about the news item the septuagenarian Congress leader who had worked with Dr Rajendra Prasad suggested me to visit the Rajendra Smriti Sangrahalaya where the first President lived and died after his retirement.

Mr Jha's memory took him back to 1962 when Dr Rajendra Prasad returned to Patna- his karmbhoomi- to spend his last days following his retirement. He reminisced:I still remember how simple Rajen Babu was. He lived like a common man at what is Rajendra Smriti Sangrahalaya now and quietly left the world on 28 February 1963.

I visited the Sagrahalaya on Mr Jha's suggestion. From outside, the single storyed Sangrahalaya building did in no way suggest that someone who occupied the majestic Rastrapati Bhavan for two consecutive terms ever lived there after his retirement.

Drawing room of Sangrahalaya

At least, the Sangrahalaya has no match to the comforts and opulence of the one at the 34 Prithviraj road, which the 11 th President of the country has occupied after his retirement. If anything, the ordinarily built structure amidst mango groves on the northern outskirts of Patna suggests that it may have served as an abode of a down to earth Indian. But Hemchandra Singh, Sangrahalaya's caretaker dispels the confusion.

It's the same house where Rajen Babu lived, said Hemchanra opening the rusted iron door to allow me inside the forlorn building. Through the verandah I reached the door opening in the space Rajendra Prasad used as his bedroom, which has its ceiling caving in at several places.
The bedroom has two single wooden beds. Babu (Rajendra Prasad) used one of the beds for sleeping and other for doing his daily prayer.

The bed, which Babu' used to sleep on, has a thick bladed Usha fan hung with the ceiling over it. In the left hand side on the floor near the bed lay a pair of black pump shoes made of ordinary leather that Babu wore. It looks like any other pair of shoes that the archetypal old Indian villagers still wear. In a corner near the bed lies a round stand containing the Geeta and Bhajnavali (hymnal collection), which he read and sang. There are a few faded black and white pictures of the first President, his wife and his elder brother fixed in glass frames hung with the wall. The sangrahalaya has no resources to preserve and maintain these things, says Hemchandra.
The deep gray prince coat made up of coarse khadi that Rajendra Prasad wore at the time of his swearing in as the President hung in a wooden shelf in the drawing room adjacent to the bedroom. The shelf has developed several cracks. There is a row of other shelves containing some other pieces of prince coat and bandis that Babu would wear on formal and informal occasions. All the garments that he wore are made up of hand spun yarns. The shelves also contain an umbrella and a couple of crescent shaped cane sticks. Rajendra The drawing room contains the articles that Rajendra Prasad got as presents from dignitaries from across the world during office. There are cups and plates made of bamboo gifted by the Chinese head of the state Cho-En-Lai, pen stand presented by Khrushchev and sabers presented by the King of Nepal on a wooden counter stuck to the wall in the drawing room.
Moths have eaten into these articles, which have also developed ugly looking patches of dirt and crawl by insects. There are two broken charkhas, which he used to spin yarns during his retirement days in the drawing room.
There is a small puja room attached to the bedroom. The puja room has a couple of simple looking glass framed statue of Lord Krishna holding flute raised up to his lips. Babu worshiped Lord Krishna, says Hemchandra who was 13 year old when Rajendra Prasad came to live at the place. At that time his late father Misrilal Singh was the caretaker of the house. But I fully remember how an apostle of simple living and high thinking he (Babu) was. I watched my father preparing roti and boiled vegetable for Babu, he recalls. There lay a pair of wooden sandals that Babu wore to reach the puja room. A life size statue was put up on a table in the drawing room and another showing him sitting in a chair in his bedroom came up after he died in 1963.

Sangrahalaya building with its caretaker Hemchandra Singh standing in the campus

In the backside of the building is another verandah where Rajendra Prasad used to meet visitors. This verandah has a wooden cot he would to sit in to talk to the people calling on him during his post retirement days. The cot has a brass plaque stuck on it which reads: Hariye na himmat bisariye na Hari naam; Jahi vidhi rakhe Ram tahi vidhi rahiye (Never lose the courage and never forget the God; Live the way God wants you to live). Rajendra Babu used to chant this verse frequently to the visitors, said the septuagenarian secretary of the Congress office, Mr Indradeo Lal who regularly visited the first President in this building.
This verandah also has an elegant sofa presented by the then Indonesian President. Babu made the common visitors sit on this sofa, says Hemchandra adding: He did not keep any of the presents for his personal use.
Several glass framed gold medals and certificates of academic excellence that Rajendra Prasad-a brilliant student- earned during his student days are stuck to the walls in different rooms of the sangrahalaya. These certificates are not legible for crawling creepers have eaten through the wall and into the letters.
There are four more wooden shelves in a space adjacent to the drawing room. These shelves contain the books: India Divided, Satyagrah and Champaran, Sanskrit aur Sanskriti, At the feet of Mahatma Gandhi and other texts -all authored by Dr Rajendra Prasad. The shelves are rotting and breaking. Flood waters submerged half of the Sangrahalaya building
in 1975. All these shelves containing Babu related memories were remained sunk in flood waters for several days, informs Hemchandra. He says that the neither the state Government nor the central Government has given any aid to repair the things damaged during the flood and maintain the sangrahalaya building and its valuable possession.

Newspapers' reports say that Mr Narayanan brought to his new abode several pieces of rose plants he had tastefully nursed during five years of his stay in the Rastrapati Bhavan. But Dr Rajendra Prasad had no fascination for any plants that the Rastrapati Bhavan had then. He made it a point to see that no mango tree was felled while the house to accommodate him after his retirement was being built, says
Hemchandra.
The Bihar Government spares only Rs 34000 per year for the upkeep of the Sangrahalaya. I live on a salary of Rs 1000 per month only, says Hemchandra adding: The fund provided by the state Government is neither sufficient to keep a gardener nor to foot the electricity bills nor get the repair work done. When asked to draw a parallel between Dr Rajendra Prasad and Mr Narayanan or others who succeeded the first President in the Rastrapati Bhavan, Mr Radhanandan Jha says:Don't ask for such a comparison. Rajen Babu could be compared to Rajen Babu only, he was incomparable.
A resident of Zeeradei in north Bihar's Siwan district, Dr Rajendra Prasad jumped into freedom struggle through the famous Champaran satyagragah launched by Mahatma Gandhi in 1917. Patna was his karmbhoomi during the freedom movement. Thus, he returned to Patna to live and die at his karmbhoomi.

Comment...

Comments...

I have been an avid reader of your articles because of the topics you select and the element of reality you pour into them.
Dr. Rajendra Prasad was definitely a gem from Bihar who served as President of India twice. And still he had the Gandhian ideology of simple living.He is the real role model, a perfect icon of communal hormony for the people of Bihar forgotten in the days of Laloo/Rabri and their cheap mentality.
I wonder how another of our President (and other public holders of Govt. of India) Dr. Narayanan resides in the palatial bungalow at the expense of taxpayer's money even after his retirement. We must find a way to stop this waste of public money.
Thanks

Ajay Kumar
Graduate Student
www.utah.edu