Tilak Bal Gangadhar - Lokmanya Tilak: a biography

The imp r ession made by the first sentence that comes before us is more lasting than the one that comes later. That is why a particular type of education has to be given in childhood, declared Bal Gangadhar Tilak in 1908. The influences of childhood generally make a deeper impression and are more permanent. Very often they form a focus around which later impressions are grouped. Like a sensitive plant the young mind absorbs all that is congenial to it from the air, the soil and the growth around.

To understand correctly how Tilaks mind was moulded one has to go back to his childhood and see what ideas and impressions influenced him most. These ideas formed the structure of his mind and gave him a standard by which later day influences of books, men, and matters could be measured. Companionship in youth played a conspicuous part in serving to point his thoughts in a certain direction, giving him a clear line of action.

Tilak was born on the 23 rd July 1856, at Ratnagiri, in the Bombay Presidency, on the west coast of India, in a family of Chitpavan Brahmins. The people of this part have always been known to be hardy, industrious and practical; simple in their living and frugal in their habits. The Chitpavan Brahmins are known for their uncommon intellectual abilities and from the time of the illustrious Peshwas have earned a name for administrative as also martial qualities. In the British period, the Chitpavans were among the first to take to English education and filled many important positions with distinction.

Tilaks father, Gangadhar Ramchandra Tilak, popularly known for his Sanskrit learning as Gangadhar Shastri, was at first the headmaster of a primary school and later became an Assistant Deputy Educational Inspector. Though he did not have the advantage of an English education, Gangadhar Shastri was known for his learning, and earned for his knowledge of Sanskrit, the respect of such eminent Sanskrit scholars as Dr. R.G. Bhandarkar. The Tilak family came from the small village of Chikhalgaon of which they were the Knots. Tilaks grandfather, Ramchandra, was a storekeeper of the Peshwas before the Mutiny of 1857, and in his old age became a sanyasi. He left but little to his son, but the son, by dint of hard work and the frugality, characteristic of the people of the west coast, appeared to be fairly well off, particularly in his later days.

The birth of Tilak was a matter of particular rejoicing, because there had been three daughters before him in the family, and a son and heir was greatly desired. His mother Parvatibai, a devout religious woman, worshipped the sun so that she might be blessed with a son. The child was named Keshav first, but came to be known by the pet name Bal, given to him by his mother. This name, Tilak says, he continued in later life, to perpetuate his mothers memory. Tilak was sent to a primary school in 1861 and before his initiation had made very good progress in the traditional learning of the multiplication tables, arithmetic, Sanskrit declensions and synonyms from the Amarkosha.

In 1886, Tilaks father was transferred to Poona and took up lodgings in Budhwar Peth, in the heart of the city. Before Tilak entered the English school, his mother died and six years later he lost his father too, a few months before he entered college. In 1871, he was married to a girl of 11 from the Bal family, which also came from the Konkan. The Bals were known for their hospitality and charitable disposition and Tilaks father trusted Tilaks brother-in-law so much that at the time of his death he deposited with him all the money he had, without executing a bond of any kind. Tilaks grandfather lived at Kashi and Tilaks father wrote to him that he had an offer of marriage from the Bal family. The girl is plain and we shall not get much dowry. Many other better looking girls have also been proposed and we may get a dowry of more than Rs. 500. Tilaks grandfather replied that dowry or looks did not matter and that the girl from the Bal family should be chosen. Accordingly, Tilak was married at the age of 15.