Har Dayal


Lala Har Dayal Singh Mathur was an Indian nationalist revolutionary and freedom fighter. He was a polymath who turned down a career in the Indian Civil Service. His simple living and intellectual acumen inspired many expatriate Indians living in Canada and the U.S. to fight against British Imperialism during the First World War.

Biography

Early years

Har Dayal Mathur was born in a Hindu Mathur Kayastha family on 14 October 1884 at Delhi. He was the sixth of seven children of Bholi Rani and Gauri Dayal Mathur. His father was a district court reader. Lala is not so much a surname as a sub-caste designation, within the Kayastha community, but it is generally termed as an honorific title for writers such as the word Pandit which is used for knowledgeable persons in other Hindu communities. At an early age, he was influenced by Arya Samaj. He was associated with Shyam Krishnavarma, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar and Bhikaji Cama. He also drew inspiration from Giuseppe Mazzini, Karl Marx and Mikhail Bakunin. He was, according to Emily Brown as quoted by Juergensmeyer, "in sequence an atheist, a revolutionary, a Buddhist, and a pacifist".
He studied at the Cambridge Mission School and received his bachelor's degree in Sanskrit from St. Stephen's College, Delhi, India and his master's degree also in Sanskrit from Punjab University. In 1905, he received two scholarships of Oxford University for his higher studies in Sanskrit: Boden Scholarship, 1907 and Casberd Exhibitioner, an award from St John's College, where he was studying. In a letter to The Indian Sociologist, published in 1907, he started to explore anarchist ideas, arguing that "our object is not to reform government, but to reform it's away, leaving, if necessary only nominal traces of it's existence." The letter led to him being put under surveillance by the police. Later that year, saying "To Hell with the ICS", he gave up the prestigious Oxford scholarships and returned to India in 1908 to live a life of austerity. But in India too, he started writing harsh articles in the leading newspapers, When the British Government decided to impose a ban upon his writing Lala Lajpat Rai advised him to leave and go abroad. It was during this period that he came into the friendship of the anarchist Guy Aldred, who was put on trial for printing The Indian Sociologist.
published from ParisHe moved to Paris in 1909 and became editor of the Vande Mataram. But he was not very happy in Paris, so he left Paris and moved to Algeria. There too, he was unhappy and pondered over to going to either Cuba or Japan. After all, he went to Martinique, where he started living a life of austerity. An Arya Samaj Missionary, Bhai Parmanand went there to look for him and found him lonely and isolated. The two discussed founding a new religion modeled on Buddhism. Har Dayal was living an ascetic life eating only boiled grain and potatoes, sleeping on the floor and meditating in a secluded place. Guy Aldred later related that this religion's motto was to be Atheism, Cosmopolitanism and moral law. Emily Brown and Erik Erikson have described this as a crisis of "ego-identity" for him. Parmanand says that Har Dayal agreed to go to the United States to propagate the ancient culture of the Aryan Race.
Hardayal went straight from Boston to California, where he wrote an idyllic account of life in the United States. He then moved on to Honolulu in Hawaii where he spent some time meditating on Waikiki Beach. During his stay, he made friends with Japanese Buddhists. He also started studying the works of Karl Marx. Whilst here he wrote Some Phases of Contemporary Thought in India subsequently published in Modern Review. Parmanand persuaded him by letter to return to California.

Anarchist activism in America

He moved to the United States in 1911, where he became involved in industrial unionism. He had also served as secretary of the San Francisco branch of the Industrial Workers of the World alongside Fritz Wolffheim,. In a statement outlining the principles of the Fraternity of the Red Flag, he said they proposed "the establishment of Communism, and the abolition of private property in land and capital through an industrial organization and the general strike, ultimate abolition of the coercive organization of government". A little over a year later, this group was given of land and a house in Oakland, where he founded the Bakunin Institute of California, which he described as "the first monastery of anarchism". The organisation aligned itself with the Regeneración movement founded by the exiled Mexicans Ricardo and Enrique Flores Magón. He had a designated post of a lecturer in Indian philosophy and Sanskrit at Leland Stanford University. However, he was forced to resign because of embarrassment about his activities in the anarchist movement.
In California, he soon developed contacts with Punjabi Sikh farmers in Stockton. Punjabis, a great majority of whom were Sikhs, had started emigrating to the West Coast around the turn of the century. Having experienced hostility by the Canadians in Vancouver, they had already become disaffected with the British. Hardayal tapped into this sentiment of these energetic Sikhs and other Punjabis. Having developed an Indian nationalist perspective, he encouraged young Indians to gain scientific and sociological education. With the personal help of Teja Singh, Tarak Nath Das and Arthur Pope and funding from Jwala Singh, a rich farmer from Stockton, he set up Guru Govind Singh Sahib Educational Scholarship for Indian students. With Shyamji Krishna Verma's India House in London, he established his house as a home for these students. Amongst the six students who responded to the offer were Nand Singh Sehra, Darisi Chenchiah and Gobind Behari Lal, his wife's cousin. They lived together in a rented apartment close to the University of California, Berkeley.

Assassination attempt on Viceroy of India

At the time, he was still a vigorous anarchist propagandist and had very little to do with the nationalist Nalanda Club, composed of Indian students. However, Basanta Kumar Biswas's attempt on the life of the Indian Viceroy, Lord Hardinge, on 23 December 1912 had a major impact upon him. He visited the Nalanda Club Hostel to tell them this news at dinner. He delivered a rousing lecture, which ended with the following couplet of the Urdu poet Mir Taqi 'Mir' of Delhi :

Pagari apani sambhaliyega 'Mir' !
Aur basti nahin, ye Dilli hai !!
Take care of your turban Mr Mir !
This is not just any town, this is Delhi, India Okay !!

The hostel then became a party with dancing and the singing of Vande Mataram. Hardayal excitedly told his anarchist friends of what one of his men had done in India.
He quickly brought out a pamphlet called the Yugantar Circular in which he eulogised about the bombing:
In April 1914, he was arrested by the United States government for spreading anarchist literature and fled to Berlin, Germany. In Berlin he became instrumental to the formation of the Berlin Committee and cooperated with the German Intelligence Bureau for the East. He subsequently lived for a decade in Sweden. He received his Ph.D. degree in 1930 from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London. In 1932, he got his book Hints For Self Culture published and embarked on a lecture circuit covering Europe, India, and the United States.
He died in Philadelphia on 4 March 1939. In the evening of his death, he delivered a lecture as usual where he had said: "I am in peace with all". But a very close friend of Lala Hardayal and the founder member of Bharat Mata Society, Lala Hanumant Sahai did not accept the death as natural, he suspected it as poisoning.
In 1987, the India Department of Posts issued a commemorative stamp in his honor, within the series of "India's Struggle for Freedom".
The Article "Karl Marx:Modern Rishi", written by him for the March 1912 issue of the Modern Review was translated to Malayalam and printed by Swadesabhimani Ramakishna Pillai after four months. Since there was no proper attribution of authorship, this can be considered an instance of plagiarism. This was exposed by reputed Editor and Writer Ramachandran in the January 2018 issue of Granthalokam,the Kerala Library Council publication. The similarity between the two has been noticed by Kiran Moitra in his book "Marxism in India".

Works by Lala Har Dayal

Some of his books with available references are listed below:
  1. Our Educational Problem: Collection of Lalaji's articles. It was published in Punjabi, from Lahore, as a 1922 book with introduction by Lala Lajpat Rai
  2. Thoughts on Education: Lalaji wrote many articles in Punjabi and Modern Review ; most of them were against the Education Policy of British Government in India. Mr Hem Chand Kaushik gave to the author this book which he published in July 1969.
  3. Social Conquest of Hindu Race: A booklet containing 21 pages, proscribed by British Raj and kept in National Archives of India under Acc.No.74.
  4. Writings of Lala Har Dayal: This book was published in 1920 by Swaraj Publishing House, Varanasi, as mentioned in the book by Vishwa Nath Prasad Verma Adhunik Bhartiya Rajneetik Chintan on page 389.
  5. Forty-Four Months in Germany and Turkey: This book was published in 1920 by P.S. King and Sons in London when Lalaji was living in Sweden. Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthy quoted many references from this book in his Kranti Ka Udghosh.
  6. Lala Har Dayal Ji Ke Swadhin Vichar: This book was translated into Hindi by Sri Narayan Prasad Arora and was published in Raghunandan Press, Kanpur by Pt. Ganga Narayan Shukla in 1922. It can be seen in Seth Soorajmull Jalan Library, Calcutta.
  7. Amrit me Vish: This was the Hindi Translation of above book 'Thoughts on Education'. It was published by Lajpat Rai Prithviraj Sahni from Lohari Gate, Lahore in the year 1922. In the National Library, Calcutta under catalogue no 181.Rc.92.33.
  8. Hints for Self Culture: This famous book of Lala Har Dayal was published by Hy.S.L.Polak and Co. London in 1934. Jaico Publishing House published it in 1977 from Bombay by obtaining copyright from its original publisher in 1961. Its Hindi Translation has also been published from Kitab Ghar, Delhi in 1997 under the title 'Vyaktitva Vikas-Sangharsh aur Safalata'.
  9. Glimpses of World Religions': It was the presentation of several religions by Lala Har Dayal from so many angles of history, ethics, theology, and religious philosophy. It reflects the individuality of every religion in a rational way of thinking. This book was also published by Jaico Publishing House India from Bombay.
  10. Bodhisattva Doctrines: Lala Lajpat Rai, who was a mentor of Har Dayal, had suggested him to write an authentic book based on the principles of Gautam Buddha. In 1927 when Har Dayal was not given permission by the British Government to return to India, he decided to remain in London. He wrote this book and presented it to the University as a thesis. The book was approved for Ph.D. and a Doctorate was awarded to him in 1932. It was published from London in the year 1932. Motilal Banarsidass Publishers of India re-published this book in 1970 as The Bodhisattva Doctrines in Buddhist Sanskrit Literature.

    The Bodhisattva Doctrines in Buddhist Sanskrit Literature

This 392-page work of Lala Hardayal consists of 7 chapters which deal with the Bodhisattva doctrine as expounded in the principal Buddhist Sanskrit Literature.
This book contains comprehensive notes and references besides a general index appended at the end. This book has been written in a particularly lucid style which exhibits scholarly acumen and the mastery of Lala Hardayal in literary art.

Appreciations

According to Swami Rama Tirtha, Lala Har Dayal was the greatest Hindu whoever came to America, a great sage and saint, whose life mirrored the highest spirituality as his soul reflected the love of the 'Universal Spirit' whom he tried to realize.
In another appreciation Prof. Dharmavira has sketched the picture of Lala Har Dayal which is being quoted here in verbatim: