12. ......Premor Obixone Ekhon Xomaj Jiyae Thakibo Nuware!
rr ....... (A society cannot breathe without love!)          

May, 2004, Canada: Dr. Nilakshi Mahanta and I were a part of the Group Study Exchange Tour (GSE) to represent India to District 5550 in Canada along with three other members. We had several interactions during the day at various Rotary Clubs from morning to evening during our one month stay there. We had to speak about India, about the different states we came from, our family, friends, work and we also had to sing and dance, as part of the cultural display. Interesting, as we enjoyed every second to the hilt. Nilakshi and I loved the singing bit, especially when we had to sing Bhupen da's "Manuhe manuhor baabe". I remember once when we were singing this song at a club, there was pin-drop silence while the Rotarians followed its English translation on the LCD screen. Soon after we completed singing this song, the club members gave us a standing ovation and the President of that Rotary Club announced that their club was now going to adopt this song. Nilakshi and I were over the moon in jubilation!

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24th May, 2014, Guwahati: When Deven Dutta, social thinker and writer, was asked by a lady, while we all sipped some hot tea after the e-book release,"Are you doing anything creative recently?", his answer was, "I am doing everything destructive." And then he went to say how his days and nights have been revolving around politics and "the dirty game". 

However, a half hour before this conversation, when he was at the lectern, he spoke of love with a passion unbeknownst to me earlier. Deven Dutta, the no-nonsense person, who practiced as he preached and spoke impassionately about the 'misdoings' of the government et al, who spoke his Assamese to perfection without a word of English in between, who said he never took a call while driving (and if he had to, he would park his car first), who slept little and thought more, said that even though he appreciated the beauty in another woman, he condidered no woman more beautiful than his wife, Arundhati. And all the while, Deven Dutta spoke of only love at the launch of the EPUB (2nd Edition) of "Let my songs be the door to a new dawn"; translation of forty one songs sung by Dr. Bhupen Hazarika into English poetry by Pronami Bhattacharyya.

Why I think it is a commendable effort is because Bhupen Da has no biography. A bohemian in the heart and his songs prove it, he had never really thought of an autobiography while he was alive. These forty one poems, which are available on Amazon and Flipkart for people wishing to grab an e-copy, will be a celebration of this most romantic man. The world will see how he cried when the poor cried, how he thought for the people through his poetic verses; his strains will warm the cockles of every aching heart,  like they always did, dominating love over hate. 

"Bhupen Hazarika was a people's person and lived his life to the last breath. Bhupen Hazarika had only love inside him." Deven Dutta, nostalgically said about his romance with music when he is unable to sleep and feels that it is music which can amplify emotions in a world robbed off all feelings. "No composition is possible without the element of love in it. All 37 of Shakespeare's plays revolved around love." 

Professor Amarjyoti Choudhury lauded the work of some young people who have put valuable information of some stalwarts of Assam in Wikipedia, saying that an e-publication is one of the answers to saving our trees and leaving behind some resources for the next generation. "We will probably not get another Bhupen Hazarika in the next 50-100 years. We find ourselves in each and every song that he sang. He took the lives of ordinary people and created his songs".

How apt and appropriate that Pronami Bhattacharyya has published her English translations of Bhupen Da's songs at a time when we needed them the most. She has made an effort in her own special way to fill in the vacuum in a world devoid of love; where there is hatred abound for the human brethren. 

This makes me quote in English from Bhupen Da's song 'Manuhe Manuhor Baabe...."If man does not think for Man, then who will, Tell me O Man!"

Glimpses of the e-book

Social activist and writer, Dr. Deven Dutta

Professor Amarjyoti Choudury

The translator, Pronami Bhattacharyya