Rabindranath Tagore was born in 1861 in Kolkata. School education within the four walls of a room could not please him. He linked the open sky over his head and the earth under the feet to live and study. So he had attained his primary academic education with the help of private tutors at home.

Tagore was sent to England by his father for higher education. But there also, the traditional system of education did not suit his temperament. He returned to India, and established an open school named ‘Shantiniketan’ at Bolepur in Bengal which later came to be known as ‘Visva Bharti’ university.

From his boyhood, Tagore showed his poetical talent. His poems were published in various periodicals. He wrote a large number of poems, stories, novels, dramas and essays. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 for his famous book of songs called ‘Gitanjali’. Tagore composed the national anthem Jana-Gana Mana-manna and many other patriotic verses.

Tagore surrendered the ‘Knighthood’, once awarded to him by the British Crown, as a mark of protest against the inhuman massacre in Jalianwala Bagh, of unarmed and innocent Indian children, women and old men, by the British armed forces, without any probation from the latter.

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Tagore took part in the freedom movement. He established a ‘Swedish store’ selling only Indian goods. He was against the use of foreign goods by the Indians. Tagore passed away in 1941.