Snehalatha as I know

Rabi Ray

“I have been knowing Snehalata since 1957. I met her at Sihora in Madhya Pradesh the venue of the All India Socialist Party Conference in 1957. It was the second conference of the All India Socialist Party after it broke away from the Praja Party in 1956. Dr.Lohia introduced her to me and we exchanged greetings. My first impression, after I met her, was that she had in her, the makings of a great artist. She was sweet, beautiful, self-confident and above all a good conversationalist. Her interest in the Socialist movement was not so much that of a professional agitator, but of a humanist who cannot stand the abject poverty of the vast masses of the Indian Humanity.

Pattabhi (her husband) and she were the finest couples that I have ever seen. Pattabhi’s calmness coupled with the sweet reasonableness of Snehaata presented a spectacle of a happy contented couple. Her house in Madras was a confluence of socialists, humanists, artists and above all the friends of Dr.Lohia. One of the National Executive Meetings took place at her residence in Madras. She was so much dedicated to the human and egalitarial content of socialism, that Dr. Lohia permitted her to reprint that famous book “Lohia and America meet” written by Harris Wooford. He was at one time an adviser to the Late President Kennedy. Mr.Harris Wooford belongs to that School of Lohia’s admirers in the USA who almost dedicated themselves to serve both Dr.Lohia’s ideals and the person himself.

The most fascinating aspect of the book that must have attracted the attention of Snehalata was that Harris Wooford depicted in his own inimitable style, Dr.Lohia first visit to the United States of America.Dr.Lohia in his capacity as the Chairman of Foreign Affairs Committee of the then Socialist Party, moved the people of America through his powerful elucidation of his concept of a new civilization that would be based on the theory of equal relevance of Capitalism and Communism.

It is in the fitness of things that Doctor Saheb entrusted the responsibility of publishing that book to Snehalata, as the book read like a novel and travelogue.

It would be worthwhile to mention that Snehalata fought against social ostracism & conservatism in her own way. Future reformers would do well to remember that Snehalata through her role in the Kannada film, ‘Samskara’ has used the film media to reform the society with distinction.

The very fact that she is no more in the world is unbelievable, but facts are facts. She died as a result of torture inflicted on her by the authoritarian regime of Mrs. Gandhi, while she was lodged in Bangalore jail during emergency. I consider her as a martyr in the cause of Human rights and Democratic freedom. She lived up to the dictum of Dr.Lohia ‘Let us burn like a flame than eke out a dull existence”. Socialists and Humanists would look upon her as an artist par excellence who risked her life and courted imprisonment so that the younger generation might live in peace.