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172
YOUNG INDIA

given to Bengalee and Sanskrit, and in the case of Mohammedans to Urdu, Persian, and Arabic.

The National Education Movement in Bengal was in no way an anti-government movement. Though it owed its “ initiation to the threats of the Government to close the doors of the official schools and colleges and universities against those who would take any part in, even to the extent of simply attending, any political meeting or demonstration, the National Education Movement in Bengal sought to avoid all open causes of friction with the authorities and proposed to work independent of, but not in opposition to, the Government. Political in its origin, it tried to avoid all conflicts with the authorities by assuming an absolutely non-political attitude.”

Arabinda Ghosh. To this movement, Indian Nationalism owes the emerging into prominence of a quiet, unostentatious, young Hindu, who was till then comparatively obscure, holding his soul in patience and waiting for opportunities to send currents of the greatest strength into the nation’s system. He was gathering energy. His name was Arabinda Ghosh. Arabinda had received first class education in England. The headmaster of the school, where he studied before joining the university, is reported to have said that during the 25 to 30 years he had been in charge of the school, Arabinda Ghosh was by far the most richly endowed in intellectual capacity of any of the students that had come under his charge.

At Cambridge he distinguished himself in European classics and took first class honours. He