On the Bengali and the
Mahratta1Sri Aurobindo
Bande Mataram
Political Writings and Speeches. 1890–1908
Part One. Writings and a Resolution 1890 – 1906
On the Bengali and the
Mahratta1
The relation of the Bengalis to other races of India
traditions. weight of intellectual basis. Rajput. Islam. Bihar.
resulting unerringness of tendency as illustrated by vernacular literature, preparatory light for religious and social reconstruction. tendency towards science and industry – failure in education and physical training.
Necessity of provincial before national development
Literary reconstruction. Academy, its duties.
Political Reconstruction – the masses
Elements in Bengal, Prince, pleader and peasant
Prior necessity of Provincial Union... let the Bengalis and Mahrattas organize themselves and spread their influence over the rest of India.
the genius of the Bengalis is at present original, creative, moving towards development and acquisition, the genius of the Mahrattas critical, conservative, standing in the concentration of what it has already developed and acquired.
Mahratta activity has been the most brilliant passage in our 
history since the fall of Prithvi Raj and we may well look back to it with pride and admiration but it is to be feared that it did not proceed upon a sufficiently intellectual basis.
Had the movement of thought and intelligence expressed in the writings of Ramdas, Tukaram, Moropunt been allowed first to fulfil itself and the Mahratta development refrained from transferring itself too hastily into the sphere of political action, the result might have been more sure, more lasting.
The Bengali is not weighted in the race by traditions inconsistent with present necessities.
That we should all act together, is a fine thing, but the question still remains what will that action come to? When all the limbs are themselves too weak and incoherent to effect anything, it is cold comfort to be told that they are learning to cohere with one another. Let them cohere among themselves first.
In a struggle between a strong Govt. and an organized nation, when that struggle is put to the arbitration of armed force, all the chances are with the Govt., and in nine cases out of ten it is morally sure of victory, but where the struggle is decided by the clash of social and intellectual agencies and under conditions of law, the relations are exactly reversed, and indeed they are more than reversed.
The India of today may be presented under the image of the Greek biga [incomplete]
This work was not included in SABCL, vol.1 and it was not compared with other editions.
1 Jottings on a loose sheet of paper; date uncertain. Editorial title. 1902 – 6. Written on a sheet of paper that was among those seized by the police when Sri Aurobindo was arrested in May 1908. The sheet was put in as evidence in the Alipore Bomb Trial and subsequently reproduced in a government file containing transcripts of documentary evidence. This file was later reproduced in Terrorism in Bengal: A Collection of Documents, volume 4 (Calcutta: Government of West Bengal, 1995), pp. 647 – 749. Published here for the first time in a book of Sri Aurobindo’s writings.