32 HIS MAJESTY’S OPPONENT
patients suf fering from cholera and smallpox. He also devoted some
time to organizing youth for community work. At one of the students’
hostels, he found a Santhal student named Arjun Majhi facing the all-
too- familiar discrimination from the upper castes that was the lot of
this tribal community. When this student fell ill with typhoid, Subhas
took a stand against such prejudice and made sure he was nursed with
extra care. To his “surprise and joy,” his mother joined him in nursing
this Santhal student back to health, allying herself with her son’s cho-
sen path.^44
After a year’s absence, Subhas journeyed to Calcutta to try his luck
with the university authorities once more. Bengalis were deemed by the
British to be a “nonmartial race,” based on a spurious anthropological
theory about martial races and castes formulated in the late nineteenth
century. The bulk of the British Indian Army was drawn from the so-
called “martial races,” which included Punjabis, Pathans, and Gurkhas.
The exigencies of war, however, had led the British to start recruiting
for the “49th Bengalee Regiment” in 1917. Kazi Nazrul Islam, who
was to become Bengal’s greatest revolutionary poet, enlisted in this
regiment ostensibly because he wished to forsake the university for
the universe. Subhas too quietly applied for recruitment at the army’s
of fice on Beadon Street in Calcutta. He was disquali fied because of his
poor eyesight, even though he passed all the other medical tests. So
he headed back to the university and showed up at the of fice of Dr.
Urquhart, the principal of Scottish Church College. He explained his
situation and expressed his desire to enroll in the honors course in phi-
losophy. Urquhart wanted a note from the new principal of Presidency
College that he had no ob jec tion. Subhas was able to obtain this with
the help of his brother Sarat. In July 1917, Subhas returned to his stud-
ies in philosophy “with zeal and devotion.”^45
At Scottish Church College, he began to enjoy the philosophy lec-
tures and Bible lessons given by Urquhart, and found him a “tactful
and considerate” principal. Subhas became an active par tic i pant in
the seminars of the college philosophical society. On February 1, 1918,
he presented a paper en ti tled “A Defence of Materialism,” which was
sharply criticized by members of the society. On September 6, when he
gave a talk en ti tled “A Defence of Idealism,” the audience extended