First Quote Added
April 10, 2026
Latest Quote Added
"Don't mistake vivacity for wit, thare iz about az much difference az thare iz between lightning and a lightning bug."
"To a child's eye a lightning-bug outshines the brightest fixed star. There is no little childishness in every generation of grown-up people. The Lightning-bug never sees a second summer, the star shines on forever."
"The dark is wide and long, The gates are closed, the crowd's all gone, You're still shimmering and leading me on…Firefly that's what you are Burning for me in my darkest hour "Light breaks where no sun shines" So shine for me tonight — firefly."
"Before, beside us, and above The firefly lights his lamp of love."
"Every Lightning-bug has his night, but he never has had his day."
"And the fireflies, Wah-wah-taysee, Waved their torches to mislead him."
"Now, motionless and dark, eluded search Self-shrouded: and anon, starring the sky, Rose like a shower of fire."
"Many a night I saw the Pleiads rising thro' the mellow shade, Glitter like a swarm of fireflies tangled in a silver braid."
"The lightning bug is brilliant But he hasn't any mind He blunders through existence With his headlight on behind."
"Is it where the flow'r of the orange blows, And the fireflies dance thro' the myrtle boughs?"
"The fireflies o'er the meadow In pulses come and go."
"Tiny Salmoneus of the air His mimic bolts the firefly threw."
Young though he was, his radiant energy produced such an impression of absolute reliability that Hedgewar made him the first sarkaryavah, or general secretary, of the RSS.
- Gopal Mukund Huddar
Largely because of the influence of communists in London, Huddar's conversion into an enthusiastic supporter of the fight against fascism was quick and smooth. The ease with which he crossed from one worldview to another betrays the fact that he had not properly understood the world he had grown in.
Huddar would have been 101 now had he been alive. But then centenaries are not celebrated only to register how old so and so would have been and when. They are usually celebrated to explore how much poorer our lives are without them. Maharashtrian public life is poorer without him. It is poorer for not having made the effort to recall an extraordinary life.
I regret I was not there to listen to Balaji Huddar's speech [...] No matter how many times you listen to him, his speeches are so delightful that you feel like listening to them again and again.
By the time he came out of Franco's prison, Huddar had relinquished many of his old ideas. He displayed a worldview completely different from that of the RSS, even though he continued to remain deferential to Hedgewar and maintained a personal relationship with him.