Dr. Sujit Dhar (5.11.1934-5.10.2008): An Ideological pillar- an elder brother to me

Dr. Sujit Dhar (5.11.1934-5.10.2008): An Ideological pillar- an elder brother to me

I got the news of Dr. Sujit Dhar's demise on 6th October morning when I had just finished my Sandhya vandan and was about to start Chandi path at Jaynagar on the Indo-Nepal boarder where I was to be busy for a cycle march and a workers' training camp for the statehood of Mithila and was in no position to go to Kolkata.
I remained very close to him from 1986 to a few years back till he was mentally active.
I saw him first on December 7th 1986 at the National Medicos Organisation’s fourth(and in fact first nationally invited) conference. Ma. Shrishankar Tiwary had suggested me his name for inviting in conference and I had requested him by letter to preside over the concluding session of the conference where Mananiya Bhaskar Rao ,A.I. organizing secretary, Akhil Bhartiya Vanvasi kalian Ashram was to speak.
Dr. Dhar arrived by morning train from Kolkata and we put him in a hostel room of the MGM Medical college for rest.

Ma. Tiwary hinted me to give him some responsibility and I initially thought for vice president and asked a few workers younger to me- as I was the founder and key worker of the NMO everybody used to accept my verdict. I told Pramod Tiwary that I was not sure whether Dr. Dhar was an allopathic doctor or of any other system as his envelop had no mention of any degree or designation. He told me that at least that must be ensured before any declaration as ours was an organization of MBBS,BDS students and doctors.
Asking introduction from a such senior person was not easy yet I went to his room and asked that I wanted a few lines for introducing him in the concluding session. He gave me a CV which was very unusual and I took a few seconds to scan that he was on the editorial board of JIMA(Journal of Indian Medical Association) implying that he as MBBS at least and in fact I did not read other lines(and in later course could see one of his stamp that he was a DTCD and from someone could know that he was a MBBS from Medical College (the first Medical College of country is only named this in Kolkata)..
He could not have his MD, I presume because he opted for social work and truly Dr. Shanti Prakash, a senior friend of me, once told to me that he himself was degree.

I declared his name as the national President of the NMO in the concluding session; even without consulting him or the incumbent president Dr. S. J. Kale who for a few second, I guessed frowned in exclamation. Dr. Kale, in fact was a true Rishi, a sage in every respect and he was on chair. Not only he, many were exclaimed but wait after speech of Dr. Dhar everybody, had a satisfaction that the NMO got even a greater person as its President. I felt, I was a bit haste and undemocratic also but till such unusual decisions are taken, one could not get persons like Dr. Dhar to had an organization who was not even its member till date.
And Dr. Dhar remained NMO’s president till 8th February 1997 despite his reminders every year to change for other.
In him I found the sense of a true worker, a swayamsevak who embodied Sangh principle in life, a spirit what Swami Vivekananda would have in his vision and an action what Ma. Eknath Rande would have,
He was simple, sober and a man of unusual wisdom who wanted that the NMO be remain independent in its growth though with all ideological roots. He had asked us not to convene meetings at the Keshab Bhavan, not to have office in the premises of Vanvasi kalian Kendra, not to shift office to metro of Delhi , not because he was an ideologically deviant like me but had sad me once that posting a person from this to that post does not improve the working.

He had a vision for the NMO’s distinct image which I ever craved and in this respect he was close to Ma. Abaji who always wanted its self growth.

Dr. Dhar was close to Vajpayee and Advani and had told me the secrets of the day when they were tossing in Dr. Dhar’s house whether to make Government or not? Once while I was taking him to station he even told me that four persons were giving PM’s secretariat a bad name- when I spoke two such names he did not open his mouth further.

After Dr. Madhup and me dissociated from the NMO, grabbed by some workers, I had occasion to talk to him and he was sorry.
On 31st august, I had gone to his house from my sister’s house nearby at Kolkata, thinking to see him and also to take my bath there but his wife said that he was sleeping and also I felt that thee was a change in her response to me because I had dissociated myself from the ideological banyan though not left its roots in anyway.
I came out and went to Burra bazaar thinking that that was my last visit to that great Dr. Dhar’s house who was not only my elder brother in fact his name was printed above the name of my elder brother in my marriage card which made my brother too in a vexed mood though himself a root of the same banyan he could not reconcile who Dr. Dhar was at whose residence my marriage too was fixed on 16.12.1988 and there after on break of my marriage he was so sorry at.
He had told to the grandfather of Suman, my would be wife that he would happily go to distant village for my marriage which I did not agree and called him at Ranchi for marriage.
Last I talked to him in his son’s marriage where Ma. Sudarshnaji, Ma. Ashok Singhl were present. He recognized me and said a few sentences. I was always thinking a time will come when such persons were not with us and he had left us – when I was in fact to traverse the same village area where Dr. Dhar wold have loved to go to the interiors of Mithila where Mother Seeta had once seen Lord ram first ther in Pushpwatika
Country lives in village was known to Dr. Dhar though he was born and brought up in Kolkata and was the youngest among four( Puri, Bapat and one more I do not remember) who established Sangh in Bengal. Other three said him to marry and Puri provided his house where he remained till his death and even Purji was there and I could know after long that what was the story behind that house which was my Pushpwatika..

I recall how Dr. Dhar was distributing even food to delegates at Gwalior conference, convened by Dr. Madhup who organized any conference out of Bihar for the first time amid difficulties. My wife could not understand the ragged truths behind the novice like me’s work and though she attended conference left me too afterwards despite my saying that I was doing a nation building work like Dr. Dhar’s in erecting a Rock memorial of Vivekananda.
Ma.Eknath Ranade had said he was not putting one brick upon other by making the Memorial and so Dr. Dhar was making persons like me and my friends who can shplder the health responsibilities of the nation.
Whether we can do that is a question and a true obituary to him from us the members of NMO?
-Dhanakar Thakur

NMO will oranise Ist Dr. Sujit Dhar Oration in his memory at its XXXII National Conference, BHOPAL on Nov.15-16,2008. His life sketch as on web is following:

Dr Sujit Dhar, Member of Central Advisory Council of Vishwa Hindu Parishad,
passes away on October 5, 2008.

Born on November 5, 1934 in Calcutta, Dr Sujit Dhar had a brilliant academic career all through his student life. A merit scholar in the undergraduate medical course in the Calcutta Medical College, from where he graduated in 1957, he topped the merit list in the postgraduate examination of the
Calcutta University in the subject of his specialization Tuberculosis and Chest Diseases. He has to his credit 12 original scientific papers published in leading medical journals. For a long spell of 10 years (1964 – 73), he was the Chief of the Editorial Department of the Journal of the Indian Medical Association. Since 1974, he is practicing in Calcutta as a Consulted Physician and Cardiologist.

In his early boyhood he was attracted to RSS movement and as an ardent worker of the organization, shouldered various guidance of the Late Eknath Ranade from 1949 and it was at his behest that Dr Dhar became a Pracharak (a whole time worker) of RSS for 3 years (1960-63). In 1964, Dr Dhar joined Sri Ranade to work for the Vivekananda Rock Memorial Project. In 1970, when West Bengal was passing through a critical phase and the atmosphere was surcharged with violence and terror, a forum for rendering social services and fostering a nationalist intellectual movement was started in Calcutta under the name of “Yoyakshema”, and Dr Dhar was the General Secretary of this well-known and prestigious forum ever since its inception.

Besides being the Mahanagar Sanghachalak (President) of RSS, Calcutta, he was a member, Central Board of Trustees and an All-India Vice-President of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad; Vice President, World Buddhist Cultural Foundation; Member of the Governing Council of the Rural Development and Research Project, New Delhi, Member of the Managing Committee of Deendayal Research Institute, New Delhi; All-India President of the National Medicos Organisation (NMO); Honorary Visiting Cardiologist of the B M Birla Heart Research Centre and the Vivekananda Sishu Kalyan Kendra; and was connected with many other social organizations. As the Convener-Secretary of the Purvanchal Council of Vishwa Hindu Parishad, he had been closely watching the complex cross-currents operating in the sensitive and problem-ridden North-Eastern region of the country and disseminating valuable information on the subject to various all-India forums.

Dr. Dhar was very close to three RSS Sarsanghachalaks Sri M.S.Golwalkar, Sri Balasaheb Deoras and Sri K.S.Sudarshan and he was a close associate of RSS stalwart Sri Balasaheb Deoras. Under his guidance Dr. Dhar did a lot of work at time of Bangladesh War on this eastern front in 1971.

An impressive orator, who was equally fluent in Bengali, Hindi and English and published many articles in different national news magazines and journals. He was also known for his in-depth study of Bangladesh affairs. Recently, he took over the onerous duties of the General Secretary of the Seemanta Shanti O Suraksha Samiti, West Bengal, which had been set up in February 1986, to mobilize public opinion against the massive illegal infiltration of Bangladeshi Muslims in West Bengal.