Sister Nivedita & the struggle for the 'Consciousness of Unity'
In her later years, Nivedita’s desire to uplift her Mother India gained further momentum as she vociferously strove to further her Master’s revered legacy, writes Anirban Ganguly.
As a part of her multi-dimensional action, in the later years of her life, till 1911, Nivedita's activities saw a prolific output in terms of talks, interviews and writings, all with the predominant objective of instilling in the youth of India a sense of their country's greatness, exposing them to her vast civilisational repositories of knowledge, wisdom and rooting a belief in their own capacities for determining their future direction.
On a lecture tour of Nagpur in 1902, for example, she openly exhorted the youth to exercise and to meditate on developing not only intellectual but also physical strength and prowess for national uplift, 'The country needs robust and patriotic men instead of persons who serve a foreign government and dominate over their countrymen. They alone can uplift the country.' In her inimitable style, she told those youngsters who had gathered to listen to her that they 'should feel disgusted to perpetuate the authoritarian rule of a foreign government by serving it.'