VOL - I
FEBRUARY 2021
ISSUE - 09
FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK
Seldom have the New Year felicitations signified so much. While on other years these had constituted a perfunctory “A Happy New Year”, this time the devoirs came with the parenthetic, “and a Corona-free Year”, but for that account, by no means a passing afterthought. Seldom has a year started on such a positive note, with such optimism; with the prophylactics round the corner, hopes have, indeed, soared high. From the first-to-breast-the-tape Sputnik V — the name gives away its origin — to the Oxford and Pfizer varieties, to the indigenous Covaxin. As for the perpetrators of this holocaust, their preventives, from Sinovac and Sinopharm, have failed to make the mark; finding few takers, they are trying to package it to some countries in the garb of halal vaccine! Kosher, their marketing pundits assure the sceptic.
One cheer for the governments, central as well as state, having spared no effort to contain the pandemic, two for the behind-the-scenes scientists who have laboured against time to bring us the much-awaited relief, and three lusty ones for the care-givers who have put their lives on the block ministering to the afflicted.
Formally launched across the country on 16th January, the vaccines have proved a beacon glowing brighter by the day. The development has proved infectious. What just a couple of months ago would have appeared beyond the ken of imagination, it has prompted people to cast off inhibitions and venture out of their immurement with an abandon that even a casual observer would be disposed to qualify as gay. It was reflected in the near normal activities at 19 in January.
Editor
INSTALLATIONS
Barring a couple which start their Masonic year in December, most of the Lodges installed their Masters in January. With all having a truncated stewardship because of the lockdown and the restrictions imposed thereafter on assemblages, quite a few Masters are repeating their stints on the Eastern Chair. Among the new incumbents, notable were the Installations in Lodges Prinsep and Light in Andamans. While in the former, Sen pere installed Sen fils, Bro Justice Tapen Sen handing over the baton – gavel, in the circumstance, would be more relevant — to Nilanjan, it was the other way round with the double-barrelled SenGuptas in Andamans; this latter, indeed, a rarity by any account.
What the festive boards might have lacked by way of elegance, shorn as they had been of the presence of ladies and their soignee, — Ladies’ Night, a tradition at most Installation dinners at 19 — they made up with an ebullience that effusive would be an appropriate term to qualify, never mind the frowns of the puritanically inclined at such choice of attributes as tautological. With the headiness precipitated by the virtually interminable string of toasts, the brethren were not entirely to be apportioned blame for what, on an occasion or two, might not have appeared to constitute de rigueur. Bro Amit Ukil recounts below his experience at a festive board with a difference.
SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
The 158th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekanada, nee Narendra Nath Dutta, was celebrated on 12th January. The bust erected at the porch of the Temple building, was garlanded by R Wor Bro Ajit Kumar Saha, the Regional Grand Master of the Regional Grand Lodge of Eastern India, and R Wor Bro Devendra Lal Thapar. The youth icon of the nation, the Swami had lived his mantra, “Jibe prem kore jei jan, shei jan shebichhe ishwar”. Translated to, “he who serves man, serves God”, a more pithy credo of Masonry is hard to find. The spiritual leader who would, nine years later, — yet another nine years later he was no more, — enlighten the West on Hinduism at the Parliament of Religions in Chicago, and without a doubt among the most illustrious Masons to have graced the hallowed portals of 19, Bro Dutta had been Initiated on 19th February, 1884 in Lodge Anchor and Hope, then number 234 in the register of the United Grand Lodge of England, presently holding primacy in the Indian Constitution.
REPUBLIC DAY
A clear, sunny sky with a bracing northerly wind – the snap unusually electing to cheer Calcuttans long after it normally gives way to the south-easterly that heralds the arrival of spring – greeted brethren on the morning of the 26th day of January. Better known as Republic Day, it was on this day seventy two years ago that the country had been declared a sovereign republic. Drawn up under the stewardship of Dr B. R. Ambedkar, the Indian Constitution had come into force on that day. The day had been so selected to mark the occasion when the Indian National Congress had declared purna swaraj, complete independence, from the colonial rule two decades previously.
While the armed forces paraded their military might with the fly-past, large-calibre guns and the strutting PBI – poor bloody infantry, the cannon fodder that they turn out to be in any encounter — just a couple of furlongs away on Red Road, Masons displayed their vocal vigour here at 19 with the rendition of the national anthem. Bros Thapar and Saha together rolled the halyard to hoist the national flag, the staff having been brought down to more terrestrial moorings from its earlier almost-ethereal perch atop the Main Building. Could it be attributed, one wondered sotto voce, to a flagging of that bravado — bordering on the venturesome — that had prompted the two septuagenarians to climb the rickety, “rust-iron” winding staircase to the terrace five months ago on the 15th of August?
A FESTIVE BOARD WITH A DIFFERENCE
A report by Bro Amit Ukil on the fellowship following Installation of the 96th WM, Lodge of St Andrew, No. 4229.
The ninety-sixth Worshipful Master of Lodge of St Andrew No. 4229, Brother Utpalendu Majumder, was installed on January 16, 2021 at Freemasons’ Hall in Kulti near Asansol in much the usual manner as any other Installation. Worshipful Brother Amit Dutt conducted the installation with much his usual aplomb in the presence of 18 members and invitees, who had turned out in the usual attire as demanded by a formal Lodge meeting. The proceedings were conducted with what have now become the usual precautions as necessitated by the prevailing pandemic.
But what was unusual about the evening was the banquet that followed the rituals and accession by the new Master in the Temple. The Lodge members and invitees, who included brethren from a couple of English Lodges in Kolkata and the Regional Grand Lodge of Eastern India, Dhanbad, had settled down to a delicious and appetising dinner after a string of 10 toasts raised by the new WM, W. Bro. Majumder, and his senior officers. Now, it was either the spiritual euphoria toasted in, or the palatal delights being masticated (or both) that set off thought processes perhaps hitherto not experienced in usual festive boards.
And it was the flow of words voicing these thoughts that enabled an interesting interaction while munching on the meal, comprising corn chaat, harabhara kebab, chicken balls as starters; fish cutlet & chips as well as chicken roast and paneer lababdar as main course. Culminating the gastronomic delights were pastries and nolen gurer rosogolla.
So, along with the usual hi-hellos and how cold the weather was, came utterances that provoked thought and contemplation. Initiating the discussions was W. Brother Bipin Chattoraj, Treasurer of St Andrews, who asked why workshops on rituals could not be held between official meetings. Performances and salutations could thereby be improved upon, he pointed out. “We should also be aware of the meaning and significance of each sign and symbol,” he continued, even as others nodded in agreement.
Continuing on this train of thought, W. Brother Balbir Wasal from Lodge Pioneer, pondered on the relevance of Masonic activities in today’s world. “What is brotherhood? Is it just meeting once a month? Why can we not do something more instead of staying indoors in these days of the pandemic?” were some pertinent questions he raised. Veteran Mason W. Brother J.C. Lall, Secretary of the host Lodge, lamented the erosion of values among brethren over the years. “I find the attitude and aptitude, the commitment and compassion, that I once knew in the Masonry of the Eighties and Nineties missing today,” he said.
As a corollary to building awareness and understanding about Masonic activities, as well as spreading our objectives and ideals among a wider circle of the public, W. Brother R.K. Karan of Lodge Dhanbad, asked why the rituals should be restricted to the English language only. “Why can’t we have the history, the basics, as well as the rituals in Hindi or our mother tongues so that the meaning and significance of what we do is better understood?” he asked. The suggestion was forthwith negated by some senior brethren on the ground that being affiliated to England, English only must remain the medium of communication. There are enough English speaking men and women in the country to achieve that wider dissemination without resorting to a translation, it was added.
The festive board was not all serious. Some lovely rendering of popular Hindi film songs by Brother Dipak Singh, also of Lodge Dhanbad, had others singing along or at least tapping their feet to the beat. Brother Singh, who is an accomplished singer (no pun intended), has several numbers uploaded on YouTube. He ended the evening with a very touching delivery of Kabhi alvida na kehena…
In the end, there was enough food – for the tummies as well as for the thoughts – as brethren did bid alvida. “Till we meet again”, was the common refrain.
EDITOR: Amit Dutt
Mobile: +91 98312 23230, E-mail : a_k_dutt_06@yahoo.com
DISTRICT GRAND SECRETARY: Gyanendra Narain Singh
Mobile: +919230613338, 9903033599, E-mail : dgsofbengalfm@gmail.com
Freemasons’ Hall, 19, Park Street, Kolkata – 700 016, West Bengal, India.