Om Ekamevadwiteeyam
Satyam jyanam anandam brahma
Anandarupam amritam yadivibhuti
Shantam shivam advaitam
Shuddham apapabiddham.
O, Supreme One,
Thou art the one without a second,
Thou art Brahma — the source of all truth, wisdom and happiness,
Thou art infinite, eternal, serene and pure.
General Fund, Mission Fund, Charity Fund
Building Repair Fund, Mahila Bhavan Fund, Balya Bhavan Fund
Medical Aid Fund, Indigent Brahmo Family Fund, Indian Messenger Fund
Tattwakaumudi Fund, Publication Fund, Sadhan Ashram Fund
Calcutta Congregation Fund, Brahmo Samaj Relief Mission Fund, Mofussil Brahmo Samaj Fund
Library Fund, Brahmo Samaj Education Society Fund, Hindu Widows Home Fund
Brahmo Social Service Organisation, Brahmo Ambulance Fund
The rot and factionalism within the Kolkatta branch of the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj just got murkier. At stake are funds running into almost a crore of rupees, with several members complaining of mismanagment and corruption in one of India's oldest democractic bodies.
Ballot box trouble in Brahmo battle, by POULOMI BANERJEE, "The Telegraph", 10,Jan,2009
The general body elections of Sadharan Brahmo Samaj, one of the oldest democratic institutions in India, ran into rough weather on Friday after two of the contestants found the lock of the ballot box open.Elected representatives of the Samaj, a breakaway faction of Raja Rammohun Roy’s Brahmo Samaj, manage six schools, colleges like Amherst Street City and Heramba Chandra, a library and women’s and children’s homes in the city.
“Mina Mukherjee and I visited our Bidhan Sarani office to cast our votes and found the ballot box open. We alerted the other members,” said Utpal Bose on Friday. Both he and Mukherjee are contesting this year’s elections.
The annual poll is being held since 1878, when the Samaj was founded by Shibnath Shastri, Umesh Chandra Dutta and others. Polling started on December 26 and was to end on January 11. “We sent ballot papers to our 1,002 members spread across the country. They either mail their ballots or visit our office and drop it in the box,” said Asim Ahmed, the assistant secretary who is contesting for the post of secretary.
The keys to the ballot box and the room where it is kept were with Sitala Prasad, the caretaker of the building for decades. According to him, the ballot box was not locked. Secretary Samir Das insisted that the box was locked. He also refuted Ahmed’s claim that the box should not only have been locked but the lock should also have been sealed. “The lock might have been broken by those who want to hold on to their posts. Though no salary is paid, the honorary posts carry certain perks,” said Das.
“The financial strength of the Calcutta body is about Rs 88 lakh,” added the secretary.
A repoll, which has never happened in the organisation’s history, seems the only way out. The secretary will have to propose a repoll to the general committee, which will take the decision. It is the only way out for us now,” said president Ashish Kumar Pain.
Q1 What is the "Brahmo Samaj" ?
A1 The Brahmo Samaj, represents a body of men who are struggling, in India, to establish the worship of the Supreme Being in spirit as opposed to the prevailing idolatry of the land. The movement was started on the 20th of August, 1828, by Raja Ram Mohun Roy and his friends by opening a place of public worship on the Chitpore Road in Calcutta, and was duly and publicly inaugurated in January, 1830, by the consecration of the first house of prayer , now known as the Adi Brahmo Samaj. {NB: Sadharan Brahmo Samaj = General Community of Worshippers of the One God). The philosophy of Brahmo Samaj is contained in the Brahmo Dharma written in 1848 by Debendranath Tagore.
Q2 Why was the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj formed ? ?
A2 The Statement of 5 Reasons explains this. See also Founder of Brahmo Samaj
We owe to the general Brahmo Public a statement of the reasons that have led us to form a separate and independent organization. We beg to inform them by this declaration that up to this time there is no regularly constituted body in the Brahmo Samaj to represent the views of the general Brahmo Community, and as a result of this sad want, the Church is a prey to manifold and serious evils. It seems never to have formed a part of the aim and object of the Adi Brahmo Samaj to organize and represent the general Brahmo Church ; whilst the constitution of the Somaj founded more than 12 years ago under the name of Brahmo Samaj of India is not at all favourable to the attainment of that object. It does not appear that during this pretty long period the Secretary has ever acted under the instructions of, or in consultation with, an executive committee; nor does it seem that any code of rules has ever been framed for the regulation and management of the society, even so much so, that the very question who are its members and who are not, has often been quite a puzzle on occasions of reference
During this long period, every important work connected with the society, such as the collection and disbursement of funds the appointment or removal of missionaries, etc., has been done exclusively at the option and by the authority of the Secretary. What could be a stronger illustration of this arbitrary way of proceeding than the fact that no trust-deed has yet been drawn up of the public building erected so long as nine years ago, by public subscription, as the house of worship of the Brahmo Samaj of India, and this in spite of repeated efforts made by members of the Samaj in private, as well as in public meetings, to have a trust-deed drawn up and trustees appointed ? But all these efforts to have the Brahmo Samaj property removed from uncontrolled individual authority and placed under the legal possession of the general Brahmo community have hitherto failed, owing to the aversion or indifference of the office-bearers. Whilst there was this unconstitutional and arbitrary way of proceeding on the one hand, many erroneous and superstitious doctrines were also being silently introduced into the Church on the other.
For fear of causing a division, we had so long passed over those breaches of constitutional conduct and the preaching of those corrupt doctrines. We have often seen the views and opinions of a few individuals given out and accepted as the opinions of the whole Church we have often heard many un-Brahmic doctrines preached in the name of the Brahmo Samaj of India, and as a consequence of the acceptance of these erroneous doctrines, we have also seen several members prostrating themselves at the feet of an individual, and many others leaving the Samaj in disgust and horror at such proceedings. We have often felt the whole Church, and ourselves with it, lowered in the estimation of the public on account of the foolish conduct of some individual members. But yet we have long, and in patience, suffered all this, in our anxiety to avoid an open rupture. But now, unfortunately, there have risen special causes to make independent action necessary on our part to preserve the purity and conserve the best interests of our Church
First : The present Secretary of the Brahmo Samaj of India, by marrying his daughter who is aged only thirteen and [a] half, to a boy who is fifteen and [a] half, by allowing certain idolatrous rites to be observed in connection with that marriage, and also by allowing the essential elements of a real Brahmo marriage to be subordinated to, and made secondary to those idolatrous rites, has made himself open to the serious charge of having countenanced early-marriage and idolatry, and has thereby violated two principal doctrines of the Somaj.
Secondly : Before proceeding to Kuch Behar, many members of the Brahmo Samaj of India entreated him to give up the intended alliance, but he turned a deaf ear to all their representations. Many waited on him as friends, but he denied them any access to the real facts. Many wrote humble and earnest letters, but he did not even condescend to reply to them. For instance, to all the queries personally put to him by Babu Bijay Krishna Goswami, the well-known missionary of the Brahmo Samaj of India, and member of the Missionary Conference, he replied by maintaining strict silence ; and in answer to the letter which Babu Bijay Krishna wrote after the marriage was announced as settled he was rudely given to understand that, after that, he forfeited his claims to the discipleship of bhakti. On the first announcement of the intended match, four letters were sent to Babu K. C. Sen from Calcutta, earnestly entreating him not to proceed with the match. The first was signed by 23 anusthanic Brahmos [11] of Calcutta (Brahmos by practice) ; the second by about 30 Brahmo students of the city ; the third (was) signed by about 20 Brahmica ladies, and the fourth by Babu Haragopal Sircar and three other known members of the Brahmo community. There was a separate letter signed by almost all the anusthanic Brahmos of Dacca. Besides these, letters from not less than 50 Mofussil Somajes were sent in and published, condemning the proposed marriage, in due time. But all these letters, remonstrances and expressions of opinion were ignored, and proved of no avail. Babu Keshub Chunder Sen declared it sinful even to look into the contents of the letter sent by Babu Shib Chunder Deb and others, contemptuously returned the letter of the Brahmo students, pleading want of leisure to go through it ; and the ladies' letter was deemed beneath notice ; and as for the other communications, they were also mostly doomed to the same fate. Thus fully conscious of our strong dislike our deep dissatisfaction and heartfelt sorrow, he went away to celebrate the match.
Thirdly : After his return, two letters of requisition, signed by many members of the Brahmo Samaj of India, were sent in, the one urging the necessity of calling a special meeting of the congregation of the Brahmo Mandir, and the other that of the Brahmo Samaj of India. Both these prayers were rejected, and the letters themselves were returned. But just after this, Babus Keshub Chunder Sen and Protap Chunder Mozoomdar called these two meetings in their own names. In the meeting of the Brahmo Mandir, Babu Keshub Chunder Sen was formally deposed from the office of the minister by a large majority, and yet he did not scruple to assert his claims on the pulpit with the aid of the Police; and as for the meeting of the Brahmo Somaj of India, it was on a sudden postponed sine die, without any particular reasons being assigned.
Fourthly: Upon this, the before-mentioned members of the Brahmo Samaj of India sent in another requisition, requesting that a meeting should be called within a week. It is indeed curious that when the Secretary and the Assistant Secretary called the meeting in their own names, three days' notice was deemed quite sufficient, but when the requisitionists were concerned, they thought six months' time, at the least, necessary for convening a meeting, and refused on that ground to accede to their prayers. Not despairing, however, the requisitionists sent in a third letter, insisting upon calling a meeting upon three weeks' notice. This request also was not complied with by the Assistant Secretary, Upon the strange excusej as we subsequently learnt, that a larger number of members had sent a letter asking the Secretary not to accede to our wishes. The third letter of the requisitionist was sent on the 26th April, and in that letter it was distinctly stated that upon the reception of that letter, should the officebearers decide to call a meeting, then the notice of the same should appear not later than a week, and should they on the other hand choose to treat it like the preceding two letters they would be so good as to inform the requisitionists of their purpose in three days. For a fortnight did the requisitionists wait daily expecting a notice or a reply. But nothing like either was forthcoming, till the notice of the Town Hall meeting to found a separate organization had appeared in the papers.
Fifthly : Nothing perhaps can better illustrate the utterly unconstitutional character and the degradation of the Brahmo Samaj of India, than the fact that notwithstanding that hundreds of Brahmos and Brahmicas and a very large number of Mofussil Samajes had protested against the marriage from the beginning notwithstanding that a large number of the members in a public meeting had declared their deep sorrow and condemnation, and withdrawn their confidence from the present Secretary notwithstanding that a vast majority of the worshippers of the Mandir in their congregational meeting publicly deposed him from their pulpit ; yet did not the Assistant Secretary scruple to describe a letter of defence, written by him as an apology for the Secretary, as a document proceeding from the Brahmo Samaj of India, and its decisions as the decisions of that Samaj. This is what he says in the letter written by him in reply to the third letter of the requisitionists.
You have brought two principal charges against the Secretary. The answers to them have appeared in full from the Brahmo Samaj of India in my name. In that letter I have expressed my regret on his behalf for everything that occurred without his knowledge or sanction ; consequently when the matter has been formally decided in the name of the Brahmo Samaj of India, I have nothing more to add."
We are then to accept the apology put forth by a single individual as a formal decision arrived at by the Brahmo Samaj of India. Could there have been a proceeding more unconstitutional, more unreasonable and more illogical than this ? We feel reluctant to notice in detail the unfair and unworthy treatment that the office-bearers and their organs have accorded to those who felt themselves unable to approve of this marriage, and felt if to be their duty to stand up in vindication of what they conceived to be the true principles and the recognized teachings of their Church. They have not hesitated to invent stories against them with a view to lower them in public estimation ; they have not scrupled to impeach their personal characters in their papers, and yet have denied them the right of self-defence by shutting their columns against them ; nor have they shrunk from ascribing the foulest motives to them for their conduct. These are not matters for utterance before this assembly. Our wonder and regret is that those who have devoted many years of their life to preaching the words of truth, men who have often taught lessons of charity, forbearance, and meekness,and who have been looked upon as patterns of Brahmic life, could yet be guilty of conduct like this.
For the reasons mentioned above, we are strongly convinced that as long as the present office-bearers are in office there is no hope of the welfare of the Brahmo Samaj of India, no cessation of the apprehension of her future peril. We could have called a meeting of the Brahmo Samaj of India in the name of some of us, and could have deposed the present Secretary and the Assistant Secretary, but the quarrel would not cease there. They are not the persons to give up power easily. Worsted by constitutional means, they do not scruple, as experience has shown, to ignore such decisions, and still retain their office. Under such circumstances, we deem it the better course to work separately and independently for our spiritual advancement and the good of our Church, rather than involve ourselves into ceaseless quarrel about the name of an institution, or allow the Brahmo Samaj to continue to be a scene of agitation and perpetual discord. Any course that promises better results and greater good to our Church is the one we should adopt.
The foregoing reasons have thus influenced us in forming a separate and independent organization.
Q3 What is the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj doctrine ? ?
A3 The ORIGINAL DOCTRINE & PRINCIPLES OF SADHARAN BRAHMO SAMAJ, See also Doctrine and principles of Brahmo Samaj