DILS Lakshmindra Sinha bares his heart

By DILS Lakshmindra Sinha

Regarding the topic “The Man Dils Lakshmindra Sinha” I have to say something which is given below. 

Thanks to Dils Debojyoti Sinha, for taking much interest on my works and activities. I know him personally as a learned and genius person. But he seems to be over conscious to pass his comment, contracting me, on the spelling of the name of my mother, “Juthi” and suggested the spelling to be “Jyoti”. In our tongue the two words are pronounced as “Juti”. But there is a difference in meaning – “juthi’ (in Sanskrit) is a flower of sweet fragrance (Jasmine), whereas ‘jyoti’ means light. In our Vaisnaba literature especially in Rasaleela songs and Basak songs Juthi is associated with Jadav ( as in the line “jadaba buliya juthi githia…” or “madhaba baliya gathe malati, jadaba baliya gathaye juthi” etc). It was an accident that my father, late Jadav Sinha married Juthi Devi (Sinha)( my mother) like one of my cousin Late Krishna Gopal married Late Radharani (sister-in-law).

Thanks to him again to bring into my memory other pen names and nick name etc., which are not in use for a long period. The bio-data, which I prepared on request, is meant for Mr. Sushil Sinha of Bangladesh. Mrs Anita found it suitable to paste in the newly designed Website “Bishnupriya Manipuri Writers Forum” as an experimental basis. The Website is going to be launched on 23rd instant.

In his writing, Mr. DJ Sinha highlighted me as an expert in many languages. To me it is an exaggeration. I don’t claim myself as an expert. I am simply a learner.

Regarding the Mahendra Memorial Foundation award he has further mentioned that “the Foundation award was presented to Prof. Monoranjan Sinha and a consolation prize to him( L.K.Sinha).” It is not correct and it may mislead the viewers/readers. It was an award of course (although I feel myself not worthy to receive such award or prize and I am not writing with the purpose to receive any prize out of writing). The citation was given as a “Manpatra” and not a Prize. The citation starts with the words – “The foundation feels honoured to confer a special award consisting of Rs. 3000.00 along with a chadar to Dils Lakshmindra Singha…..”. I did not join in any competition to have a prize organized by the Foundation so that they would offer me a consolation prize for my failure to have a main prize ( first, second or third etc) showing my excellence in the competition. However, there is a pain which I always feel in my heart that the organizers clearly mentioned to confer a Special literary Award’ in their invitation card (It is still in my memory that it was a simple unsigned letter typed on a white sheet, which was handed over to me when I made a personal visit to the organizer’s house at Silchar!) One week ago, before I received that letter, one day, Mrs Gitika Rani Devi ( the woman and the daughter of famous historian Mahendra Kumar Sinha who had played the key role for the formation of the Foundation) had made a telephone call from Pathaerkandi to me (posted at Guwahati) that they were going to present me the Foundation award and verbally invited for my presence in the meeting on 22nd Feb 2005. However, they have changed their decision later on and preferred to confer it to Prof. M.R.Sinha. I found their decision just and laudable. But the manner in which they conferred the special award was a chaos and graceful. I had accepted it only for the reason not to lower the dignity of Mahendra Kumar Sinha, the great hero of our past, to whom I owe my love, respect and gratefulness the most. At that time my sentiment of being a social worker prevailed over the sentiment of being a writer. However, I had expressed my displeasure to Simu Sinha (the grandson of M.K.Sinha). Here I seek to convey my humble request to the organizers conferring any kind of awards not to play with the sentiments of any writer.

In his writing Sri D.J.Sinha pointed out to a mistake and quoted the line “Lord Bishnu killed demon Murari"(Role of Feasts and Festivals in Bishnupriya Manipuri Culture-II and found it ‘flabbergasted’ and ‘tantamount’.

I wrote the original essay in Assameese ( to read before the multilingual audience of Sahitya Bharati’s monthly literary symposium ) which was published in a monthly journal “Satsori”. Ramlal Sinha, the executive Editor of the Sentinel translated it from my original text very sincerely and remodeled the essay in English(in my favour) to publish in the Melange (Sunday Special of the The Sentinel). I am grateful to Ramlal that he had taken much pain to do his considering the importance of the subject matter and showing his love and respect to me as a senior to him in age. He had shown me the translation before making it public. So, all credit goes to Ramlal if there be any merit in the subject matter of the essay. On the other hand, whatever the error in the work, none but myself only responsible for it. However, for the kind information of D J Sinha, I would like to say that in my original writing the line was “paramparagoto biswasmote (puranoto ullekh ase) murari (mur namor daityar ari) srihari bishnue ‘ekadoshi’ namere kanya ejoni sristi kori daityaraj muror binash korisil.” But the mistake done in translation can be ignored as a pen or printing mistake. The exact meaning of my original text should be – “Lord Bishnu or Murari killed Mura, the king of the demons". The word ‘Murari' means the enemy of Mura. However, I am thankful to D J Sinha for pointing out to rectify the error.