In November 1913 , Tagore learned he had won that year 's Nobel Prize in Literature : the Swedish Academy appreciated the idealistic — and for Westerners — accessible nature of a small body of his translated material focused on the 1912 '' Gitanjali : Song Offerings '' . He was awarded a knighthood by King George V in the 1915 Birthday Honours , but Tagore renounced it after the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre . Renouncing the knighthood , Tagore wrote in a letter addressed to Lord Chelmsford , the then British Viceroy of India , " The disproportionate severity of the punishments inflicted upon the unfortunate people and the methods of carrying them out , we are convinced , are without parallel in the history of civilised governments ... The time has come when badges of honour make our shame glaring in their incongruous context of humiliation , and I for my part wish to stand , shorn of all special distinctions , by the side of my country men . ” In 1919 , he was invited by the president and chairman of Anjuman-e-Islamia , Syed Abdul Majid to visit Sylhet for the first time . The event attracted over 5000 people
Jallianwala Bagh massacre
Jallianwala Bagh massacre
Rabindranath Tagore