Pakhir Khonje And Humanism Essay

The spirit of humanism in Nilkanthha Pakhir Khonje can be measured in different scales. We can categorize them into four:
1) Humanism as reflected in the device of madness.
2) Humanism concealed in apparent rudeness.
3) Humanism amidst hunger and poverty.
4) Humanism in extreme religious disbelief.
Humanism believes in the use of reason, free enquiry and free thought in the service of compassion and human values. It does not need any external sanction, rather is an intrinsic part of human nature. It is also true that human nature and Nature itself include both selfishness and even cruelty on the one hand and sacrifice and compassion on the other; humanism believes in the latter. Nilkanthha Pakhir Khonje is a graphic description of humanity

Six and a half feet tall and handsome Manindranath falls in love with a Christian girl named Polin in his glorious student life. He feels romanticism in the core of his heart. He loves to read Keats’ poems and realizes the gist of joy in touch with nature and noble humanity. His father Mahendranath who was stunningly a conservative Hindu elite, can not accept such choice of life for Manindranath and forces him to get married with a Hindu girl of his own choice after applying a trick. Manindranath receives a great shock at that. Normal human reasoning can not help him to cope with the situation. He becomes mad. Madness gives him a rebirth. He roams hither and thither aimlessly day and night. Sometimes he claps looking at the sky, “As if thousands of his pet blue- tit birds are lost somewhere in the sky. He is trying to make them return” (16; ch.1). He sometimes becomes angry and utters a non sentence-‘Gatzchoretshala’. His every word, expression and activity becomes a gesture of a deep self revelation. People in his surrounding, irrespective of caste, class and religion, purely love him and respectfully call him ‘pagal thhakur’- a mad good

It has already been mentioned that the concept of humanism in Bengal predominantly centers on the life and messages of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. A trance like madness is also visible in his character. He left the comfort of home and family and all his physical identity and left for the destination which was unknown to the common. His only message was to serve humanity. Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Ishai- all appeared similar to him. Manindranath too, in his lunatic activities only serves humanity. His trance fulfills the quality of a true ‘Brahmin’ (man who originates goodness and bliss from the supreme creator) within him. In Dhammapada as referred by Prof. A. Chakraborty in his book, Humanism and Indian Thought (1935), where the teacher describes who is a true Brahman, it is said, “By day shines the sun, by night gleams the moon/The warrior shines in his armour, the Brahman shines in trance” ( 25). The author very symbolically keeping in mind the extraordinary celestial beauty of Sree Chaitanya, describes Manindranath as a man of six and a half feet tall and handsome with a calm and lovable appearance. The common picture of Sree Chaitanya raising his two hands upwards seems to be satiated in deep love in his way of searching the supreme creator of this universe. Manindranath, too, in his lunatic and ecstatic state of mind seems to be lost in a dreamy universe much above this mundane