Influence of Raja Ram Mohan and Brahmo Samaj on Bangla Literature and Music

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Those who know even a little bit about the Brahmo Samaj also knows that it was one of the seminal socio-religious reform movements that occurred in India and reached almost every level of the existent social strata. Founded by Raja Ram Mohan Roy in 1828, prior to his departure to England, the movement gave birth to a number of stalwarts who later brought significant social and intellectual reforms within the Bengali society, an act that marked the advent of the Bengal Renaissance. But fact remains that the renaissance didn’t only wear the social mask; Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s credits also lie in setting the foundation for the modern Bengali literature.

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In a society devoid of literature for the common people (by literature, we mean prose), Raja Ram Mohan Roy was the first to break the tradition. Apart from writing in the colloquial language, he also wrote a grammar in Bengali for educating the mass; the endeavor stretched to the introduction of the Bengali newspaper - Sambad Kaumudi and the Persian one - Mirat-ul-Akbar.

1815 witnessed Raja Ram Mohan Roy publishing his first book Vedanta Grantha; written in prose form with the minimal usage of Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian words contrary to the trend of the time, the next 30 years saw him to become the author of a total of thirty books in Bengali. Thus, we can claim that the excellence that Bengali prose achieved later on in the hands of Bankim Chandra Chattopaddhay and Rabindranath Tagore had its advent in the efforts made by Raja Rammohan.

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Till now we had a little idea about how literature found its new form in the hands of the founder of the Brahmo Samaj; though what we presented here may be compared to the tip of an iceberg if not lesser; however, the reformatory measures by Raja Ram Mohan also had another media to assert themselves. It was music.

Raja Ram Mohan’s compositions (Brahmasangeet), though primarily meant for serving the Brahmo Samaj, were derived from the root Indian classical; simple and direct in their approach, it’s the poignant meanings and adoration for the Supreme Being that made people think in his lines  - service to humans is the service to God. It’s what that Swami Vivekananda also preached later; Shib Gyaney Jib Sheba was how he preached the same idea once more.  

Raja Ram Mohan Roy received support from two more people; first, it was Keshab Chandra Sen and Debendra Nath Tagore; their joint ventures gave birth to a new set of devotional songs that represented an underlying theme of repentance and prayer, influenced greatly by Christianity, before moving on to embrace the Vishnava influence that Keshab Chandra Sen came across in his association with Bijoy Krishna Goswami, a direct descendent of Adwaitya Acharya. Brahma Samaj thus accepted sankirtan, ushering a spirit of universal theism and setting the foundation for a new spiritual relationship to begin.