Kolkata: With his ever-popular songs,
poems and other compositions reverberating through the air across the state,
West Bengal on Sunday paid homage to Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore on his
155th birth anniversary.
From his birthplace here to Santiniketan in Birbhum
district, where he created the knowledge town of his dreams, people thronged in
hundreds to pay their homage to the versatile bard. A series of day long
cultural programs were held starting from the locality-level clubs to the top
social and cultural organizations.
People from all walks of life queued up at Jorasanko
Thakurbari in north Kolkata — Tagore’s sprawling ancestral home — since dawn to
see the room where he was born and watch a cultural programme, where well-known
singers, elocutionists and dancers participated.
At Shantiniketan, where Tagore founded the Viswa
Bharati university in 1921, the festivities began early morning with a “Prabhat
pheri” (morning choir) that went around the sprawling campus.
The teachers, employees, youths, children were all part
of the choir as the knowledge-town wore a festive look.
Born on this day Vaisakha 25 according to Bengali
calendar (May 7, 1861, according to the Roman calendar), Tagore in 1913 became
the first Asian Nobel laureate and the first non-European to win the prize for
literature.
He also holds the distinction of having authored the
national anthems of two sovereign nations - India and Bangladesh.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and leaders of various
parties in the state paid their respects to the poet.
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