JAI HIND!

When the saffron and White and Green was first unfurled over India on 15th August 1947…

The day we longed for has dawned at last. India awakes heaving like a mighty heart, thrilling with the first embrace of freedom. Her joy that sweeps through like a tempest from the snow clad Kinchinjanga and the green robed Khyber Pass to the saffron walled, foam fringed Kanya Kumari, speaks with the voice like the voice of many waters awaking all nations from their slumber with the reverberating salutation :

J A I    H I N D !!!

Shall we for whom patriotism is not merely a natural sentiment but also a divinely imposed duty, remain silent, unmoved? Oh No! Let all the strains of our joy mingle in one song, in one greeting: JAI HIND!

But more than voice or heart let our minds first gather in the full significance of this intoxicating twin syllable: Jai Hind. HIND? What is Hind? And what is the Jayam we wish to Hind? Is HIND an idol of the imagination? Is she a mythical goddess claiming some worship? Or is it merely the soil that gives us food?

Let our first Premier Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru answer this question: “Often as I wandered from meeting to meeting I spoke to my audiences of Bharata. Sometimes when I reached a gathering a great roar of welcome would greet me: Bharat Mata Ki Jai! I would ask them unexpectedly who was this Bharat Mata, whose victory they wanted... The mountains and rivers of India, the forest and the broad fields which give us food were all dear to us, but what counted ultimately was the people of India, people like them and me who were spread out over this vast land. Bharat Mata was essentially these millions of people and victory to her means victory to these people. You are parts of Bharat Mata, I told them, you are in a manner yourselves Bharat Mata, and as this idea slowly soaked into their brains, their eyes would light up as if they had made a great discovery."

Being commissioned to bring the good tiding to all men, we may and should put our whole heart in the wish: Hind, Our Land, we wish Jayam to thee!"

Motherland of thought and wisdom!
well-spring of kripa and ahimsa!
Hoary pyramid of an ancient civilization
Ivory palace of the arts and the muses
Velvet carpet of a perennial banquet!
Hind, our Hind, Land of our love!
We salute thee on this thy Day of Liberation

Bharat, our mother, we take the dust off thy dear feet in filial homage...

 

(Excerption from my uncle Rev. Fr. H. Patrick  Isaac’s article – "Jai Hind!",   15th August 1947)