Author: Tarun Vijay
Publication: Organiser
Date: September 5, 2004
URL: http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=39&page=3
So much of hate is being generated
against the national icons, be it Savarkar or the tri-colour, that it's
going to affect the governance and health of the nation badly. It's a totally
un-Congress-like situation, a party which has stood for nationalism and
national pride in pre-Independence days. Under the shadow of a leader and
an ideology, both born in a foreign land, the un-Indian attitudes have
come to the fore in their most brutal form. On the one hand, Afzal Khan's
memory is sought to be ´honoured' by the Congressmen in the land
of Shivaji, while on the other, his ardent follower Savarkar is humiliated
and denigrated. A Chief Minister withdraws his own government's petition
to take back a ten- year-old case against another Chief Minister for the
´crime' of unfurling a national flag in an independent India while
the Muslim League, the party which led India's Partition, is made a partner
in the government and history is twisted with a vengeance to suit the ´hate
stations' of the communists. Patriotism and nationalism have become dirty
words in the lexicon of this order and political decency an outcaste.
The new Taliban of the Stalinistic
hue should look at a photograph showing the present Chief Minister of Maharashtra
and a veteran Congress leader with the old world charm still intact, sharing
dais with the then RSS chief, Balasaheb Deoras in 1983. The occasion was
to inaugurate a statue of Veer Savarkar in Nagpur. Shri Shinde was Finance
Minister of the state that time and he made a wonderful speech praising
Savarkar. As a cultured Congressman he believed that a mere difference
in ideology should not become a point of enmity and hence he had no qualms
in attending a Savarkar function with Balasaheb Deoras.
Hate has no place in public life,
least of all in the political arena. That's the beauty of a flowering democracy.
The same is being destroyed under the revengeful Super PM-Left rule.
The Communists, who helped the British
before 1947 and betrayed the freedom fighters, provided the much required
intellectual raison d'etre for the Partition, collected funds for the Chinese
soldiers in 1962, and have recently opened a ´counter' at the UPA
corner to issue ´certificates' of patriotism and obviously Savarkar
should not be on their list. For he is a mirror showing every de-nationalised
colonial mind in its true colours. Those who hate him, fall logically in
the club of the British sergeants.
A rebel and a non-conformist, Savarkar
was an ideal for the Indian youth, who could refuse to bow before the Empire
and have his barristership forfeited, while Communists were painting Subhas
Chandra Bose as ´Tojo's donkey' and sending testimonies of how they
wrecked the 1942 movement (memo from P.C. Joshi, general secretary of
CPI to Home member, Sir Reginald
Maxwell, dated March 15, 1943: ´Dear Sir Reginald, ...How effective
our propaganda and work is can be seen that a week to one month after August
9, Congress, Socialist and Forward Bloc elements began sending illegal
handbills throughout the country, holding us responsible for the collapse
of the struggle....and claiming that the struggle failed due to Communist
treachery....').
The Savarkar story can be one of
the most courageous and uncompromising tales of a revolutionary, who shook
the Empire so much that writhing in pain it awarded him a double life sentence.
From the adventure of jumping in the sea and swimming to the French shore
of Marseilles and then to the shores of Andamans, his life represents a
characteristic unease of a patriot unwilling to die in shackles. In Kala
Pani (Cellular Jail), he was the ´most dangerous prisoner' and the
harshest ´punishments' awaited him. He faced solitary confinement
for six months and seven days of standing with handcuffs, drove an oil-mill,
an extremely torturous ´punishment' for the most dreaded prisoners.
But all this further firmed his resolve. He was in his elements within
the jail too and not only stopped forcible conversions of Hindu prisoners
to Islam but also the practice of unto-uchability among them.
He was the first Indian leader to
give a call for swadeshi even before Gandhi, the first to start militant
revolutionary activities in London and the first to rekindle a sense of
pride declaring that the ´Indian mutiny' was in fact India's first
war of Independence. He remains, till date the first and the only author
whose works were proscribed by two foreign governments even before their
publication. One of them was India's First War of Independence. A scholar
par excellence, he enriched Marathi language and started a reform movement
against untouchability and even supported slaughtering of old cows. Without
being provided pen and paper, he etched his poems and memoirs on the walls
of his solitary cell and reproduced each line later.
As an ardent follower of Shivaji,
he wanted to die in action and not waste his life in prison. Finding it
the only way out, he wrote six letters to the British, pleading for his
release. All the ´requests' were rejected outright. The Home Secretary,
Richard Craddock met him in the Andamans on November 16, 1913 and wrote
in his report to the Viceroy on December 19, 1913: "Savarkar's petition
is one for mercy. He cannot be said to express any regrets or repentance.
. . I pointed out to him that a mere statement of change of views could
not wipe out his record . . . in the case of Savarkar it is quite impossible
to give him any liberty here and I think he would escape from any Indian
jail. So important a leader is he that the European section of the Indian
anarchists would plot for his escape, which would before long be arranged.
If he were allowed outside the Cellular Jail in the Andamans, his escape,
would be certain. His friends would easily charter a steamer to lie off
one of the islands and a little money distributed locally would do the
rest."
Prof. Devendra Swarup has given
me a significant note about what Gandhi said in Bombay on Savarkar: "The
Savarkar brothers' talent should be utilised for public welfare. As it
is, India is in danger of losing her two faithful sons unless she wakes
up in time. One of the brothers (V.D.Savarkar) I know well. He is brave.
He is clever. He is a patriot. He was frankly a revolutionary. The evil
in its present form of the present system of the government, he saw much
earlier than I did. He is in the Andamans for having loved India too well.
Under a just government, he would be occupying a high position. I therefore
feel for him and his brother. (Young India, May 18, 1921, quoted in Dhananjay
Keer's Mahatma Gandhi.)
Savarkar's failing health and relentless
efforts of the Congressmen for his release made the British send him to
Ratnagiri in 1921 under house arrest, where he continued to inspire for
the independence struggle. Revolutionaries like Bhagat Singh, Rajguru,
Bhai Parmanand and many others visited him, seeking guidance. Mahatma Gandhi
took time off from his whirlwind tour of Maharashtra and specially visited
Ratnagiri for a dialogue.
True, he didn't agree with Gandhi
like many others. He championed the cause of fiery and uncompromising Hindutva
and gave a call to ´Hinduise the politics and militarise the Hindu
society'. While Gandhi became more acceptable to the masses because of
his Vaishnav personae and an all-encompassing message, he created his own
niche in the history of Indian revolutionaries like Netaji Subhas Chandra
Bose and Chandrashekhar Azad.
His extreme views made him a suspect
post-Gandhi murder. More than fifty thousand arrests were made and Savarkar
was one of them. The court acquitted him but the denigration still continues.
The only reason behind this vilification campaign is his ideology of Hindutva.
Savarkar stands brilliant in his
own class like a shining lonely star and any effort to deny him his rightful
place is as sinful as ´Stalinising' the pluralistic spirit of the
nation and the Constitution. And should I also remind the loyal Congressmen
about what Indira Gandhi said and how she supported the Savarkar memorial
in a very warm personal gesture? She had a postal stamp released in his
memory on May 28, 1970. The Mumbai Municipal Corporation gave a piece of
land for Savarkar memorial and bhumi pujan was conducted by Babu Jagjivan
Ram on May 20, 1979. Its first phase was inaugurated by the President of
India, Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma with the then Chief Minister Shri Sharad
Pawar standing by his side on May 28, 1989. Smt. Indira Gandhi wrote in
her message of good wishes to the Savarkar memorial, "He was a remarkable
son of India," and as a mark of her respect for Savarkar, sent Rs 11,000
from her personal bank account!
So who is right? The Mahatma and
Indira in whose name Congressmen swear daily or the present day avatars
of the Left infiltrators?
(The author is Editor, Panchajanya.)
