“He (Rangaswami Iyengar) had ever a sunny smile and a friendly word for all who came to him for help and advice and none went away but felt comforted or fortified. Abstemious in his habits, and with little ambition except in the country’s cause, his generous impulses responded readily – a little too readily as those who were intimately associated with him might have felt at times – to the constant calls that were being made upon his kindness. Like his great uncle, Kasturiranga Iyengar, he liked to encourage talent wherever he saw it and in his desire to conscript such talent for the service of the country he had a missionary fervour.”
FEBRUARY 6, 1934
A great son of India
INDIA MOURNS THE LOSS OF ONE OF HER GREATEST SONS AND one of her foremost nationalists in the death, in the early hours of yesterday morning of Mr. A. Rangaswami Iyengar, after a short but painful illness borne with characteristic fortitude. And THE HINDU makes its appearance today under the shadow of a great bereavement, one which has deprived it of the services of an Editor who carried on with distinction the high traditions created for it by a succession of illustrious Editors. Great opportunities for service came to Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar and he acquitted himself greatly. But he had also more than the usual share of sorrow and travail; a brilliant son who was as the apple of his eye died in the full vigour of young manhood struck down by tuberculosis; early in life there fell upon him a monetary loss that well-nigh crippled him for life, a loss brought about by that ardent desire for public service which was later to be crowned by such rich achievements, and a naturally delicate constitution, taxed by the arduous conditions of public life and the sedentary habits to which life at the desk habituates one, was at all times a drag on his health and spirits. His only recreation was music of which he was a well-known connoisseur, but he had little liking for the latter day developments that, in his opinion, spoiled the purity and beauty of the art as it is currently expounded, and he sought less and less relaxation in it. He had ever a sunny smile and a friendly word for all who came to him for help and advice, and none went away but felt comforted or fortified. Abstemious in his habits and with little ambition except in the country’s cause, his generous impulses responded readily – a little too readily, as those who were intimately associated with him might have felt at times – to the constant calls that were being made upon his kindness. Like his great uncle, the late Mr. Kasturiranga Iyengar, he liked to encourage talent wherever he saw it; and in his desire to conscript such talent for the service of the country, he had a missionary fervour.
The journalist-politician, who is a comparatively rare phenomenon in the West, has, in the peculiar conditions of India, had to play the role of leader of public opinion. For one thing, among a people who look upon public service as a patriotic duty, conditions have not been propitious – though a change seems to be coming – to the emergence of a class of men who would make politics and politics alone their life’s business. For another, in the absence of a system of universal education which could provide the politician with his raw material, the Press, with its appeal to a numerically small but extraordinarily influential intelligentsia, offered in the first half century of Indian nationalism, the only effective platform for those who wished to awaken the masses to a sense of their birthright. In the early years of this century only those who chose to live dangerously could undertake this form of public service. But if it had its perils it had its fascination too. There was magic in the word Congress, and, to the last, loyalty to the Congress was a dominant factor in Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar’s life. This loyalty was reinforced by the conviction that the organisation which commanded the allegiance of the largest and most powerful body of public opinion in the country was, of right, entitled to have a predominant voice in the shaping of her destinies. But while he felt this and urged it day in, day out, with the whole force of his personality, as the reason why the Government should seek not to belittle the Congress but to persuade it into honourable cooperation if a definitive and amicable settlement was ever to be reached, he was also realist enough to prefer, without ever losing sight of the objective, the more practicable to the less practicable method of achieving it. An ardent admirer of Gandhiji’s saintly life, he realised to the full the nature and significance of the revolution that the Mahatma had effected in the thoughts of men and their ways of life; he paid his heart-felt homage to the heroic suffering and sacrifice by which the common people testified to their faith in the great liberator. But he never disguised either from himself or from others the fact that he had his own differences with Gandhiji. To his unique relations with the late Pandit Motilal Nehru, on the other hand, the only analogy that offers in recent Indian history is the peculiar bond that held Ranade and the younger Gokhale together. Panditji had in overflowing measure that serene wisdom and that equanimity which a profound knowledge of life brings with it; these qualities attracted Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar to him and Panditji in his turn was attracted by the alertness of mind, the constructive practicality, the amazing industry and the thorough grasp of constitutional history and theory and of financial questions which Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar brought to a partnership which was responsible for some of the most brilliant achievements of the Swaraj Party in the Assembly.
If Mr. C. R. Das was the prophet who foresaw the need for a new orientation in Indian politics, Pandit Motilal the statesman who by his sagacity and drive organised it for victory, and Vithalbhai Patel, the stormy petrel who was the spearhead of its onward thrust, it is not too much to say that Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar supplied the sustained intellectual effort and the patience that are required to build up a great party. No wonder that he felt extremely unhappy over the recent political developments, the growing bitterness and alienation of public feeling, the enthronement of reaction in the counsels of Great Britain and the consequent wrecking of the constructive work, such as it was, done by the various Round Table Conferences and the weariness and discouragement that have swept over the country. It was, however, characteristic of the man that he refused to give way to despair and believed that with the combined efforts of men of goodwill on both sides it should be possible to end the impasse and open the way to a happier era. He had hoped to work for this end with all his resources, but it was not to be.
Of the supreme value of Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar’s work as a journalist both in the field of vernacular journalism and as the Editor, at a most eventful period, of a great English daily, the public do not require to be told.
TO THE HINDU which he helped to build up and which for the past six years he directed with unrivalled authority, tact and foresight, his loss is too deep to be adequately expressed. His thorough grasp of constitutional and financial questions enabled him to give a wise and effective lead to public opinion in a sphere which is terra incognita to most and in which a false step would be fraught with the most serious consequences to the country’s interests. He inspired confidence alike in the public mind and in his fellow-workers; even in circles which did not hold with his policies, his sincerity, honesty of purpose and desire to be scrupulously fair were recognised and what he said was invariably listened to with respect.
The glowing tributes to his memory which have been received from all quarters show the immense reputation he had built up for ability and sterling service to the country and the universal esteem in which he was held. In the troublous days ahead, the country will miss in him a wise counsellor, an able servant, his friends – and they were innumerable – a genial and kindly spirit, his colleagues a leader of quenchless enthusiasm and inexhaustible patience and the world a great gentleman. In their hour of grief the members of his family will, however, have the consolation that their sorrow is shared by their countrymen.
Irreparable as its loss is THE HINDU is greatly heartened by the spontaneous sympathy it has received on all hands. On behalf of Mr. Rangaswami Iyengar’s family and of ourselves we tender our thanks to the public and to the numerous friends who have sent us touching messages.
Reference:
The First 100
A Selection of Editorials, 1878-1978, THE HINDU, VOLUME I