GUWAHATI, June 25 - Not all incidents recorded in history can attain the status of heritage. Only some special incidents can craft heritage and such heritage heralds new paths for the society to traverse, said educationist and former principal of Cotton College Prof Udayaditya Bharali, while delivering a lecture on the roles played by Cotton College and Uma Sarma during India�s freedom struggle. The event was organised at Sudmersen Hall of Cotton University here on Sunday on the occasion of the birth centenary celebrations of freedom fighter late Uma Sarma.
Bharali described Cotton College as the breeding ground of intellectually superb and ground-breaking ideas of the bygone days. He said the college gave birth to the slogan �What Cottonians think today, the rest of Assam thinks tomorrow.� He said the college played historic roles in the non-cooperation and Quit India movements and also against imperialism and communalism.
This led to the rise of Cotton College Union Society (CCUS) general secretary like Sriman Prafulla Goswami, a believer in Socialism. It also led to the rise of revolutionaries like Khagen Barbarua and Communist leaders like Uma Sarma.
Student leaders like Uma Sarma got the Cottonians of his time involved in a strike against the imperialist war, took Guwahatians out into the streets and made the people aware of the need to oppose an imperialist war. Sarma aroused the masses by propagating Marxist ideas, Bharali said.
CPI-M leader Hemen Das focused on the role played by Uma Sarma in the democratic and Communist movement in the State.
