'BUCHMAN KI JAI!'

After four weeks of plays and meetings, S. A. Sabavala reflected in the Bombay Chronicle, 'So far no one has tried to analyse the reasons for the very obvious resentment to its (MRA's) simple philosophy. We pride ourselves as the sons of Mahatma Gandhi, the man who lived the teachings of Christ and the Buddha. Since Independence we have developed a superiority complex about our spiritualism and an exalted sense and understanding of non-materialistic values. Now along comes a band of men and women, non-Indians, who are practising what we preach. They are encroaching on what we thought was our exclusive preserve and many of us do not like this at all. I think much of the hostility and exhibition of bad manners at Dr Buchman's press conference springs from this particular resentment . .. The truth is that we, the heirs of Gandhi, are a little ashamed that others are doing what he told us to do and which we say we are doing ... I think MRA will catch on in post-freedom India. It represents a challenge just as Gandhiji did many years ago.'7

Not everyone agreed with Sabavala. In particular, the widely circulated far-left weekly, Blitz, carried adverse reports of the whole tour. Nevertheless, the departure from Bombay came near to an ovation. Crowds blocked the railway platform and groups from three trade unions - dockers, cement workers and textile workers - arrived with banners and loud cries of 'Buchman ki jai!' Garlands multiplied. Many called for the international chorus to sing the national anthem, as they had done in the theatre each night. Buchman was moved to tears: 'They are a great people. Some of them said, "God be with you." I thought, "If that can be a reality, then India could lead the nations."'

Many superlatives were to come Buchman's way during this tour. The Ceylon Minister to the United Nations classed his visit as of equal importance to the coming of Independence, while the Thai Ambassador referred to him as a 'second Buddha'. 'When the history of the century is written, we will think of FDR, of Stalin, of Churchill, Hitler, Mussolini, Gandhi,' declared the President of the Bombay Rotary Club. 'But if the creed of "what is right and not who is right" should succeed in permanency, then we shall see Frank Buchman's name there.'8

Buchman was not unduly impressed. At one point he dictated these thoughts to Baynard-Smith: 'Be calm, prudent, not caring what men say nor held in their wiles by their ill-considered praise. Be a simple man of God, and then God will love you. A loyal band about you. Ties of deep affection. Willing to give their all, or will be as you work together.'

One of his main personal sources of poise throughout the tour was old hymns, which Baynard-Smith would hear him repeating to himself again and again. 'Nothing in my hand I bring, Simply to Thy Cross I cling'; 'Jesus, I my cross have taken'; 'Jesus, lover of my soul'; 'At the Cross, at the Cross where I first saw the light...'; 'Perverse and foolish, oft I strayed, and yet in love He sought me...'; '0 for a passionate passion for souls'; and many more. At bedtime, he often repeated, 'Jesus, I my cross have taken, All to leave and follow Thee; Destitute, despised, forsaken, Thou from hence my all shalt be.'

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