TALK ON SAVARKAR AT THE 17TH ALL-INDIA VIDROHI SAHITYA SAMMELAN

Niranjan Takle

[Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (1883-1966), who coined the word Hindutva, is a leading icon of the political movement currently ruling India. His portrait now hangs in the Indian Parliament in close proximity to that of Mahatma Gandhi. Ironically, Savarkar was accused of supplying the pistol used to assassinate Gandhi on Jan. 30, 1948.

He was one of the defendants in the trial that followed but acquitted on a legal technicality. His guilt was established several decades later by a judicial commission appointed by the Govt. of India. Below we carry a transcription of a thoroughly irreverent talk on Savarkar given by the well-known Marathi journalist Niranjan Takle in Feb. 2023. The original talk was in Marathi. We are greatly indebted to our old friend Suhas Paranjape of Thane, India for translating and transcribing Takle’s talk from the Marathi recording. – Eds.]

The President of the 17th All-India Vidrohi Sahitya Sammelan (Rebel Literary Meet), the respected Shri Chandrakant Wankhede Sir, the President of the Maharashtra State Vidrohi Sanskritik Chalwal (Rebel Cultural Movement), the respected Ms. Pratima Pardeshi, Executive President Shri Kishor Dhamale, Shri Balkrishna Renake, who by a happy coincidence happens to be present today and for whose lifelong work among the Nomadic tribes and castes I have great respect, all the respected luminaries who are present here, and all the members sharing the dais with me, and all the rebel brothers and sisters gathered here today, the three speakers who spoke before me have already introduced the subject of my talk.

It is but natural that when someone makes fun of great men we hold in great esteem, we don’t like it. And when we begin not to dislike it, those who are out to defame them begin to succeed in their objective. Their objective is first, to hurt you by defaming them, and then habituate you to the defamation. You too may have experienced this. When I was a child, I was in the third standard and my teacher used to repeat 10 to 15 times a day “majboori ka naam Gandhiji” (Gandhiji is synonymous with helplessness). And then one day while playing at home I repeated this phrase. As soon as my father heard this, he called me and asked me where I had heard this phrase. I told him that my teacher says this all the time. Which teacher, he asked me and I told him, Chandratre Sir. He gave me one tight slap. And he told me not majboori but “majbooti ka naam Gandhiji” (Gandhiji is synonymous with Strength). And they were the ones who were helpless, as were the British. Not the people of India. And the next day he came to my school and slapped that teacher too.

I was learning all this as I was growing up. That this should not become a habit. Neither for the teacher to repeat it, and for all the small children to accept this as commonplace. This is a very important thing. They want to habituate you to it, want you to get used to hearing it all the time, this defamation and this misrepresentation.  And so, howsoever judgements are given against it, howsoever proofs and evidences are presented against it, by experts and historians, as Goebbels had shown, people get used to this defamatory maligning and the issue then is will we fall prey to these methods. If this is what they are doing do we then walk into their trap on our own. And this is done in many ways. For example, just now someone said they had done this so far with Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar. But they had already started doing it, didn’t they? They have been saying that he was a brahmin, his teachers gave him his present surname. They had tried to do this.

So, they will do this for all the great men we hold dear. There is a psychological reason for this. And I always describe this in respect of these RSS people in two words. It is the “arrogance of inferiority”. They know their inferiority, know that they can neither match up to Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, nor to Mahatma Gandhi, nor to Mahatma Phule, that their real worth is cannot even match up to the footwear on any of the stalwarts of this ideological lineage. It is this inferiority complex which feeds their arrogance, and they try to assuage their inferiority with a constant stream of abuse and defamatory insults. And character assassination is the only way out left for them to malign these symbols.

Tai just said, the perpetrators of the Bilkis Bano rape are freed and everyone watches helplessly. But the theory by which the Bilkis Bano rape perpetrators are exonerated has been laid down a hundred years ago by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, that rape is a political weapon, and should be used against your political opponents because it demoralises them. This theory is propounded a hundred years ago, and when on the eve of the Gujarat elections, when they need to demoralise their opponents, the Bilkis Bano rape perpetrators are freed, they are welcomed, garlanded and sweets are distributed in their honour. But what we do not consider is the theory behind it.

This `Pappu’ Golwalkar writes a hundred years ago that “the minorities in this country are bloodsuckers they will either have to assimilate and merge with the majority community or they will have to live at the mercy of the majority community. They will not get any special rights.” He writes this in his book `We and Our Nationhood Defined’. So, this theory is propounded first and then today CAA and NRC are enacted. These two men, Modi and Shah are low IQ bulldozers. Remember this well. The theory has been written down by others, all they do is bulldoze it into practice. They are truly bulldozers, all they are capable of is to wreak destruction, bulldoze things. So, the theory is already written and since these are low IQ bulldozers they are predictable fools. We can predict what they will do. In contrast we are not bulldozers, we are not low IQ and we do have something sitting on our shoulders that we do use. And because we use our brain, we can, right away, today, determine how to deflate their plans, brainstorm about how to do it and decide on it.

And that is why I am going to talk in detail about this person who they consider their ideologue and such a great person. Who is this person? He is the one who was described by Acharya Atre (a famous Marathi editor-journalist known for his wit) as Swatantryavairi, (Enemy of freedom) Savarkar. I want to speak about that Vinayak Damodar Savarkar. There were some Anti-Superstition people who had come here, but they do not think that Savarkar is a superstition. I was actually expecting them to be here and had they come here we could have talked to them.  Savarkar is a huge superstition.

And by chance, today there is a big and important coincidence. On this very day 5th of February in 1948, 75 years ago, this very Vinayak Damodar Savarkar was arrested as one of the accused in Mahatma Gandhi’s murder. This was the day he was arrested. And that makes it even more meaningful to talk about this man. Those who would justify him by hook and crook say that he had a scientific outlook. But all of you would already know that this man with a scientific outlook had devised a yajna (a fire sacrifice) for the `purification’ of the dalits. Perform an agnihotra (fire ritual), get them to wear a janau (sacred thread) and thus declare them to be `purified’. And so, this man with a scientific outlook generates even new karmkanda (rituals). Strange science this! And since he believes that the dalit is `purified’ by this ritual, he also believes that the dalit is `impure’ by birth. And in spite of this we are to praise his scientific outlook.

This man with a scientific outlook marries his brother’s son to Gopal Godse’s daughter following all scriptural rules and circumambulating a sacrificial fire seven times. And we are to call him a man with a scientific outlook. So, this whole show of scientific outlook is reserved only for some people and for some time. This man did not open the existing Hindu temples for the dalits. He established a separate temple for them called the Patitpawan Mandir for them. What it says is that you do consider them patit (fallen) by birth and will become pawan (receive grace) by entering this temple. And I am supposed to call this a scientific outlook? I for one cannot call such a man scientific because this man himself has shown that all this talk about science is but a charade.

And let me tell you that whatever I say today about this man, I have documented evidence for everything that I will say about him. I have collected 22,000 documents from all over the world’s different archives to back what I am saying. So, whatever I say today, you can repeat fearlessly in any forum, I take the onus for providing the evidence for it.

First of all, let us consider that famous song that has fascinated so many and that is repeatedly played on endless occasions – Ne majsi ne parat Matrubhoomila (Take me back to my dear motherland). In 1906, when Savarkar was a student in London, his elder brother Babarao Savarkar lost his son Prabhakar. And Savarkar wrote a letter to his sister-in-law who had lost her son to express his condolences and said that I am sending you a virah geet (a song of longing sung by a separated lover) that I have written for you. And in this song, he wrote Ne majsi ne parat Matrubhoomila and the reason for writing matrubhoomi (motherland) was to take me back to the land of this mother who had lost her son. And he wrote the entire poem in that vein. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the Andaman prison. Never, ever did he call India his motherland. He always used the word Pitrubhoomi (fatherland) for India. He was an extremely patriarchal person. He never called India as Bharatmata.

For him India was always male gender and he addressed it as pitrubhoo or fatherland. In 1923, he wrote a book Hindutva to define who could be its citizens. Let me remind you, and it needs reminding, that this word Hindutva was nowhere in use by anyone before 1923. He is the one who gave birth to it in 1923. And this book in which coined this term, that book was written under a pseudonym and the pseudonym was `Ek Maratha’ meaning A Maratha Person. And in this book he defined who could be a citizen of India where he said that this country belongs only to him and him only or only he is its citizen whose punyabhoomi (land of religious merit) and pitrubhoomi (fatherland) is India. Which means that Christians born in India are not its citizens since their punyabhoomi is in Jerusalem which is outside India and similarly Muslims born in India are not its citizens since their punyabhoomi is in Mecca-Medina which is outside India and the same applies to Buddhists because their punyabhoomi too is outside India. So only the rest of the people excluding the Christians, Muslims and Buddhists are Indians. He categorically excluded persons of Indian origin who had converted to these faiths, since now their punyabhoomi was outside India.

So, this is the way he defined Indian citizenship and wrote the book under a pseudonym. The reason for the pseudonym is that in case, the book raises controversy and generates excessive heat, the onus would always fall on `some Maratha’ who wrote it! And as usual with him he would come through unscathed. There the reason why I am saying `as usual with him’ is that when Madanlal Dhingra assassinated Colonel Wylie in London, he ran away. He fled to Paris along with Shyamji Krishna Verma. The same Shyamji Verma who was praised so much by Modi in London and who boasted that I am the only Prime Minister who brought back his ashes to India. So let us spend a little time on Shyamji Krishna Verma.

I also obtained documents pertaining to him from the archives in Paris. Shyamji Krishna Verma and Savarkar were provided accommodation by Madame Cama. And during his stay at Madame Cama’s house the police came to arrest him for having raped Madame Cama’s assistant. So, both of them fled Paris. One went to London and the other went to Switzerland. Shyamji Krishna Verma died in Switzerland. His final rites were also performed there. And, for this reason, all the earlier Prime Ministers were wise enough not to have brought his ashes back to India. The wise Prime Ministers. Our man (Modi) is the first one to do so.

And when Savarkar went back to London, he was arrested. Madanlal Dhingra cursed him in the foulest language. Which I will not repeat. But his words were reported verbatim in the London Times of that day. And we have a copy of that day’s London Times with us. They include `you are a coward’. That is what Madanlal Dhingra told him. And them Savarkar spread tales about his relationship with Madanlal Dhingra glorifying himself. That he is the one who had provided him with the pistol. Madanlal had two licensed weapons, he had a license in his own name and he had purchased both of them under his own name. He was a member of the two most prestigious rifle clubs in London. And he was the best shooter at both these clubs. And he came from a very rich family. But later, it was always, `I have nothing to do with Madanlal Dhingra’ while the British were still in India.

The first sentence Savarkar, this hero, received was for violating the modesty of a British woman in 1906 in London. The British in their usual way described it as attempting to violate the modesty of a British woman. I have obtained all those case papers pertaining to the incident. The charge sheet and everything. He admitted to the crime. In fact, those who were charging him used the politest language while he described in graphic detail what all he did and what all he had in mind. So, that was the first sentence he received. In 1906.

It is well known that he wrote a book on the 1857 rebellion. A very well written book, there can be no two opinions about it. He first wrote it in English under the tile ‘1857: The First War of Independence’ and later in Marathi, titled ‘1857che Swatantrya-samar’. But the British had proscribed the book. So, one of his friends who was also staying at India House, staked his own life and smuggled the pistols that Savarkar had sent as well as the manuscript of the book into India. He was the one who gave the manuscript to Savarkar’s brother, who then printed the book. Does any one of you know who this friend was? Can you guess? His name was Sikandar Hayat Khan. Hayat went on to become the Chief Minister of Punjab, the undivided Punjab before the Partition. He opposed the Partition all his life and was murdered for that very reason. Sikandar Hayat Khan’s name has been hidden from everyone in India because then it would be evident that a Muslim staked his life to smuggle his pistols and the book into India. How then would one be able to hate Muslims? It is to avoid this sort of doubt, especially among his Hindutva followers that this was done. Better to hide the name. But history is not so ungrateful. That name is preserved in its records.

After that, Anant Kanhere used the smuggled Browning pistol to assassinate Jackson in Nashik. Then there was a police case and Savarkar was arrested in London and brought to India. He was taken to India aboard the SS Morea. Four days before it dropped anchor at the port of Marseilles it had been announced that the ship would be docked in Marseilles for maintenance and repairs. So, while the ship was docked in the harbour, Savarkar jumped through a porthole into the sea. He was accompanied by two policemen specially sent from Bhagur (near Nashik in Maharashtra) to bring him back to India because they knew him and could identify him. Right after Savarkar jumped, they too jumped into the sea. And Savarkar himself writes that he was in the water for 7 minutes. He was apprehended as soon as he stepped out of the water and brought back on board. The two policemen were awarded prizes for the same. Forty rupees each. In fact, the letter granting these awards can also be found in the National Archives in Delhi.

Be that as it may. But what was the tale spread around in India? He jumped into a stormy sea and fought his way onto land! He was in the water for a mere 7 minutes (jumping from a ship in safe harbour). Then there was another tale that was spread. In one of those TV debates that took place after my book was published, one of his great-grandsons told us that the matter had to be taken to the international court for arbitration. How could British policemen arrest someone on French land? I told him, wait, the International Arbitration Court was established in 1946, after the Second World War. We are talking about 1910. Why are you confusing the issue? After that he shut up. Then there was a lot of discussion. But the point is that SS Morea then came to India. There was a trial at the Qila Court in Mumbai. At the trial he submitted a written statement. It is filed in the State Archives in Mumbai, and anyone can see it. And I have a copy as well. In it he says that I had sent those pistols to my brother for his self-defence. And if one of those had been used to assassinate that Collector, then he is responsible for it and I have nothing to do with it. Of course, there were many more instances of abdication of responsibility yet to come.

So, he had to stand trial and he was sentenced. He was sent to Andaman Jail, what used to be called Kala Pani, where he arrived on July 4, 1911. According to the Jail Manual of the Cellular Jail there, every prisoner was weighed every fortnight, and he too was weighed on arrival. On July 4, 1911 he weighed 112 lb. And for every prisoner, the Jail maintains a Jail Ticket, in which are recorded the details of what work the prisoner was assigned, whether he refused to work, any punishment he received, if he fell ill what the treatment he was administered, etc. The Jail has detailed records for all the 80,000 prisoners it jailed. And every fifteen days the ticket history was signed by the Jailor and the prisoner. So, in that first noting on arrival on July 4, the Jail Superintendent noted that the oil mill weighed 80 kg and the material that we feed into one batch weighs 30 kg. This man who weighed 49 kg would not be able to handle the oil mill and hence when he is to be given some work, he should be given the work of making ropes.

According to the rules every prisoner had an initial confinement period of six months during which he was to be confined to his cell. During this period, no punishment, no work assigned, nothing. He started that period of six months confinement on July 4. Now, on 29 August, less than two months later, he submitted his first mercy petition. Many people call him a mafi-veer (the hero of apologies), I don’t. These are not apologies they are mercy petitions. He begged for mercy. Submitting one mercy petition would be asking for mercy, submitting six is begging for mercy. And he was joined in this beggary three times by his sister-in-law, three times by his brother and three more times by his wife. (A total of 15 mercy petitions.) The number itself is so large that I had called him ‘a mercy beggar’ in the story I wrote. It is actually much worse than a simple apology. But even calling it an apology incenses his followers. So, he submitted his first mercy petition on August 29, 1911 and then there followed a series of them.

He submitted his third mercy petition on November 14, 1914. At that time, the Home Secretary of India, Reginald Craddock was visiting the Jail. It is even more important to tell you about his incident in Wardha (as will become clear a little later). He sought an audience with Craddock and personally handed over his petition to him. His weight as recorded on that date was 126 lbs. He had gained 14 lbs in three years after his arrival. No wonder, so hard was prison life! He had to roll ropes.

If you go and read his own account of his stay in jail called Majhi Janmathep (My Life Sentence), it serves us a number of thrilling and entertaining stories about his jail life. One of them is about how we prisoners had developed a language with the sounds of our handcuffs by way of which we communicated with one another. And then suddenly one day all the prisoners would go on a hunger strike, and the authorities would be at their wit’s end as to how we communicated with each other. And as an electronic engineer I was fascinated by this novel idea, which frequencies would they have used and so on. And how did they teach others to use it. I may develop a system for myself, but how did I teach it to other fellow inmates. There were 896 cells and seven wings in the jail. And so only 896 by 7 prisoners in one wing. And they would meet for work or for exercise a short while. How could they all be taught the use of this language in such a short time.

So, since I was fascinated by this novel idea, I thought it would be good to obtain the memoirs of some of his contemporary inmates. I could lay my hands on six such memoirs. One of them I found in the National College Library in Dhaka in Bangla Desh which I promptly xeroxed. It is titled ‘Thirty Years in Prison’.  The writer spent 30 years in jail. There was also Ulhaskar Dutt. He spent 18 years in jail. They had spent a much longer time in the Andaman jail. Savarkar spent about 9 years and 10 months in that jail. And, as I read those memoirs, I realised that all those thrilling and entertaining stories did not hold water. And one of them quotes him as saying that if we join the hunger strike, we will lose the concessions we enjoy here. Which also means you enjoyed concessions. So, I began to look into what privileges he enjoyed there. He was the one and only prisoner in the Andaman jail who was allowed to meet his wife. His wife and his younger brother had travelled to Andaman to meet him.

Every week, three prisoners were hanged. His cell overlooked the hangman’s courtyard where the hangings were carried out. Every month more than nine prisoners committed suicide. Let me mention one incident, actually there are two. Ulhaskar Dutt and Indubhushan Roy were two nineteen-year-old young revolutionaries belonging to the Anusheelan Samiti. Indubhushan Roy was kept in a cell adjacent to Savarkar’s cell and Dutt was the next cell adjacent to Roy’s cell. Unable to bear the torture Roy hanged himself with the help of his clothes. And when he realised that Roy was doing so, his close friend and comrade the 19-year-old Dutt was shouting throughout the night that Roy was hanging himself pleading all the while for someone to come and save him. No one came to his rescue. Who could have joined Dutt and lent his voice and joined him in his pleadings? Savarkar, who was in the cell adjacent to Roy’s cell on the other side. He kept silent. The next day, when the doctor was brought in at 6.30 in the morning, Dutt showered a volley of curses at the doctor holding him responsible for the death of his young comrade Roy. Dutt was transferred to a mental hospital for the next 12 years. And after 12 years, when he had completed his term, he was declared a mental patient and released. His father looked after him and he was under treatment in Kolkata for a year. After he was cured, he once again joined the freedom movement, once again he was sentenced to a jail term in the Andaman jail. There are so many real stories of the inmates of the Andaman jail that will send shivers through your spine simply listening to them. An inmate Mahaveer Singh had gone on hunger strike. He was on hunger strike for 26 days. On the 27th day, David Barry, the Jailor and six soldiers entered his cell to force-feed him. He fought with them for one and a half hours. Then they forced him to the ground and the six soldiers literally sat on him and held him down. Two on his chest and four on his legs. And David Barry pushed the pipe down his nose and poured milk into it. But the tube had gone into his lungs, so the milk went into his lungs and he died. These are the true tales of true freedom fighters. But these are not the ones told to you in the Light and Sound Show in Andaman. When you listen to the show you will come away with the impression that in all the 896 cells there was only one prisoner. And in the photo exhibition of freedom fighters that has been put up there, it includes photos of Hedgewar and Golwalkar, who have nothing to do with the freedom struggle. But this is the state of things in Andaman today.

And after that there was a flood of petitions and we all know he was a very good writer and had an excellent command over the language. And if you begin to visualise those mercy petitions – ‘where else will this prodigal son turn but to the merciful doors of the parental government,’  ‘I beg to remain your most obedient servant’. Rahul Gandhi’s translation was couched in polite language, I have given here the literal translation with all its servility. ‘I am ready to do whatever you command. I and my brother are ready to lay our lives at your feet. The country will progress only through the way you show us.’ And for the first time he suggested indirectly in these letters that I will help you fight the Afghan-Turkish peril that is lurking ahead. Or in other words I will help you create a Hindu-Muslim divide within the country. This he submitted in writing.

And after he came back, he worked on the same agenda. He came back to India in 1921. Until 1924 he was lodged in Yerawada Jail in Pune. It was during his period in Yerawada jail that he brought out that accursed under the pseudonym of ‘A Maratha’. And that was the first time he spelt out his two-nation theory in clear cut terms, that it is impossible for Hindus and Muslims to form a homogenous nation.

From Yerawada he was sent to Ratnagiri in Maharashtra Konkan. He entered into an agreement with Viceroy Linlithgow, in his own handwriting. Yes, he wrote the minutes of the meeting himself titled Memorandum of Understanding. And the first clause read, – I will spend the rest of my life to fulfil the common objectives of the British Empire and the Hindu Mahasabha in opposing Gandhi, Muslims and Congress. And immediately, the next day he was granted a pension! He was the first revolutionary in India who was granted a bungalow in Ratnagiri. Other conditions he had already assented to, that he would not take part in politics, he will not participate in any political events/programmes. And yet, in spite of that, he kept being granted permissions all the time to roam all over the country. The first permission he asked for in 1925 was to visit Nashik. Why? Because the priests of Nashik were donating a purse of Rs. 50,000 to him. He wanted to go there to receive that purse.

He was given a pension of Rs. 60. And on the website of the Savarkar Smarak Nidhi (Memorial Fund) in response to a question the official reply said that he used to receive an alimony of 60 Rs. From the British. I call it a pension. Because alimony is generally paid as part of a divorce. We do not know where the alimony came about. Be that as it may, the letters he wrote to the Collectors asked for a raise in the pension he received from 60 Rs to 100 Rs. And the Collector sent him a letter that said that while his pension was 60 Rs, his own salary was 53 Rs. And it was outside his competence to raise the pension. But meanwhile Savarkar also wrote that the current price of gold was Rs 18 a tola (10 gm) which meant that he had a pension that could buy him more almost 3.5 tolas a month of gold.  I have no idea what 35 gm of gold would fetch at current prices. That would perhaps work out to a sum of over 1.5 lakhs a month. And recently there was all this hubbub about Rahul Gandhi’s T-shirt. A 40,000 Rs. T-shirt. At that point I had reminded them that when your Grandpa Savarkar was receiving the princely sum of Rs. 60 from the British, Rahul’s Grandpa was gifting 3,600 Rs to Subhash Chandra Bose every month.

Such was the pension saga. Meanwhile he became President of the Hindu Mahasabha. In the Hindu Mahasabha convention that followed the very first resolution to be passed was that Hindus and Muslims cannot be one nation. This was a resolution passed in 1937. The Muslim League passed a similar resolution much later in 1940. The League brought a resolution on Pakistan in 1940 at its Lahore convention. Fazlul Haq tabled this resolution. This resolution was passed. Then in 1941, Fazlul Haq became Chief Minister of Bengal and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee became the finance minister in his cabinet. And Savarkar writes at that time, that joining the Muslim League government was constructive opposition. They shared power with those very people who had passed a resolution supporting the formation of Pakistan.

Next, on the eve of Independence, the Dewan of Travancore (present day Kerala) C. K. Ayyar declared Travancore a Hindu nation and Savarkar welcomed it, called it a historic step and congratulated Ayyar for deciding to step out of the pseudo secular India and form an independent Hindu nation. We have that letter with us. Then he wrote to Sardar Tara Singh that at the dawn of independence the people of this pseudo secular country should be confronted with the formation of a new country, Sikhistan (Khalistan). He wrote similar letters to the rulers of Junagadh and Mysore. The Raja of Mysore shot down 20 freedom fighters who were attempting to hoist the tri-colour. Savarkar wrote to the Raja congratulating him on his action. He wrote to Hari Singh (Maharajah of J&K) to declare Srinagar and Jammu as separate states. He wrote to Prem Singh Dogra to declare Ladakh a separate state. These people who made all efforts possible to partition India into as many pieces as possible are supposed to have murdered Gandhi in the name of an akhand (unpartitioned) Bharat. What a height of hypocrisy and impunity! Who do they kill, a man who fought till the last against partition, who kept saying that only over his dead body would partition take place. And this man who was writing to all and sundry to divide this country into pieces, he is to be called a Veer (Hero)? I, at least, refuse to commit this crime.

When the World War came, they (British Raj) opened recruitment boards all over India. Through these boards they called on people to join the British Armed Forces. And why should people do this? To repel the aggression on British India that is taking place from its North-Eastern regions. Who was this force who would attack India from the North-East? The Azad Hind Sena! Led by Subhash Chandra Bose. So, they set up these recruitment boards basically to fight Subhash Chandra Bose’s Azad Hind Sena. The British appointed Narayan Damodar Savarkar (his brother) on the Central Recruitment Board. Immediately Savarkar sent a letter of thanks to the Viceroy that ‘I feel obliged’ that you appointed my younger brother to the Central Recruitment Board.

Earlier in my talk I referred to Wardha but forgot to follow it up. A school was being set up in Wardha and Savarkar was asked after whom they should name it. And whose name did he suggest? He suggested that it be named after Reginald Craddock, the very same Craddock to whom Savarkar had handed over his third mercy petition in person. We have that letter too with us. This is the history.

After that there was partition. Then Mahatma Gandhi was murdered. And Savarkar was arrested. And many people have written on this. There is a book by P. L. Inamdar. He was the advocate representing Gopal Godse and Parchure. Inamdar has written that in court Savarkar sat like Sphinx staring straight ahead never even glancing at his co-accused. Perhaps he had taken this stance to wanted to show that he had nothing to do with any of them. But one day, writes Inamdar, he called me over and spent three hours with me and during those three hours he kept repeating one question – Will I be acquitted? He was not asking whether the accused Inamdar represented would be acquitted or not, all he was concerned was whether he would be acquitted or not! And he was asking this question of an advocate who did not even represent him.

Justice Khosla who was Judge in the Simla High Court where the trial was taking place has written a book. And by the way, all this talk about the Supreme Court having acquitted Savarkar, there was no Supreme Court at that time! The Supreme Court was established after the Constitution came into effect. The case first came up for trial in Delhi before Atma Charan and later it was shifted to the Simla High Court. And Justice Khosla writes that when he read out the death warrant – it has to be read out by the court and the accused had to stand up – Nathuram was crying. And Nathuram said that during the entire trial, Tatyarao (Savarkar) ignored us completely. We expected at least one smile, one friendly glance but he disillusioned us. And later when they were taken to be hanged, Narayan Apte was shouting Akhand Bharat Zindabad (Long Live Unpartitioned India), but Nathuram could barely speak. He was crying uncontrollably and after being hanged his body was thrashing about for five minutes while Narayan Apte died in a trice.

The Kapoor Commission was established to look into Mahatma Gandhi’s murder. And as always there are a number of questions that remain unanswered. Gajanan Vishnu Damle, Savarkar’s secretary and Appa Kasar, his bodyguard, both testified before the Commission and both of them testified that the entire conspiracy took place at Savarkar’s place and that he was indeed the prime conspirator and the Kapoor Commission concluded that it was indeed so. But both these testimonies were recorded under section 164 by Jimmy Nagarwala in 1948 but they did not come before the court. And that is why he was acquitted for lack of corroborative evidence. But later the Commission indicted him. So, this is the history behind his acquittal.

There was a book by the name of `Sati’, which I am about to reissue. A biography of his wife. And when it came out, their entire sect saw to it that it disappeared from the market. But I am going to print it. And since it is no longer restricted by copyright it will be easy to do so. There a lot of things that have been said about him in this book. `Since I learnt that he has to work the oil mill I used to walk around on my knees which were permanently damaged because of that.’ But (once he was back) he would not maintain relations with me. But throughout the day, various different women would visit, the door would close and all sorts of noises would emanate from the room. And when I used to complain about it to the family I would be told, he has been starving for ten years. Well, if he has been starving for ten years, was I having full course dinners?’ These things have been written by his own wife. I am not making anything up. And when she died, he was at home, his daughter was at the hospital and he sent a message saying he won’t come to the hospital. She is lying there bedridden and she is of no use to me and I will not come to the hospital. And when Appa Kasar came to him to inform him of her death, he told him to go back, take her body to the burning pyre, perform whatever rites are necessary, but do not forget to remove her bangles and the ring on her hand!

And Savarkar’s Prime Minister today has the gall to ask, did Nehru attend Sardar Patel’s funeral! Well, Nehru did attend the funeral, but Savarkar refused to attend his own wife’s funeral. Did Nehru go and meet Bhagat Singh? Yes, he did. But when Amit Shah was in jail, you did not go meet your colleague in jail. And when Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Lal Krishna Advani, and Balasaheb Deoras were in jail, you did not go to meet them, you were absconding in the guise of a Sardar. So, my dear PM, we know much better how to stand by one’s values, how to pay the price for doing so and be prepared to do so in the future. We know that very well. So don’t ask us for certificates of patriotism. Indeed, it is we who have the right to issue such true certificates. Today you are forcing people to say ‘Bharatmata ki Jay’, but when it was really necessary to do so, you were engaged in informing on those who said it. And then accepting prizes for having done so.

And on the background of this reality, there is absolutely no need to carry an inferiority complex. I said this at the Muslim Sahitya Sammelan and am repeating it today. During the 1857 rebellion, when the British armies finally entered Delhi on 29 September and took it over, the next day on 30 September, the British hanged 28,000 Muslims. And the Governor of the East India Company has noted that a Muslim corpse hangs from every tree in Delhi. Such is the price we have paid. The Indian Government has published a List of Martyrs. This list does not include those who were hanged. This is a list of all those others who paid for their lives by participating in demonstrations, who were shot down during such actions, those who succumbed to injuries during a lathi charge and those who lost their lives protesting against the abominable conditions in the prisons and so on. This is an alphabetical list published by the government. Everyone in Maharashtra knows of the legendary Babu Genu. But we do not know that there were three Babu Genus who lost their lives. And all three of them were Muslims. But this is never acknowledged. Look at those lists and tell me who were the 80 per cent from that list. The List is in English. I am now trying to bring it into Marathi and Hindi. There is a short five-line introduction about the life of each individual. Which place he is from, where did he live, where and how did he participate in the movement, and how did he lose his life. A very short intro. And there are six volumes for all of India. Of the six, one full volume is devoted only to Maharashtra. Volume No. Three. And that is why it is of utmost importance to awaken our people about all this.

Today there is this conspiracy going on to defame great men, men we revere, and to glorify those who have no merit whatsoever. This is a conspiracy. Take Deendayal Upadhyay. On my way I saw a road named after him and also some institution in his name. The Railway Station Mughalsarai was renamed after him. Well, after Deendayal Upadhyay’s murder the erstwhile Jan Sangh established a Fact-Finding Committee. It was chaired by Balraj Madhok, one of the founder members of the Jan Sangh. And after about six months of investigation, the Balraj Madhok Committee submitted its Report. The Committee concluded that Balasaheb Deoras, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Nanaji Deshmukh had killed Deendayal Upadhyay. So, the net outcome is that they renamed Mughalsarai after the murder victim and rewarded the murderers with Bharat Ratna (the highest civilian award in India)!  These are people who have always stood by the murderers. Ram Jethmalani was the advocate for the murderers of Indira Gandhi, He was the advocate for General Vaidya’s killers as well. The daughter in law of the advocate for Nathuram Godse, Meenakshi Lekhi is a Minister today. They have always stood by murderers in India. Stood by those murderers who wanted to destroy the India we want. Not a single Muslim has ever murdered an Indian mahapurush (great man). So, there is no need to feel inferior on that count. Right down to the recent Gauri Lankesh murder. The murderers all belonged to this one single ideology. 

This ideology breeds robots. Do not think, do not question. Robots. Just do what you are told. They do it that way. Ekchalakanuvartitva! (One person drives, the others follow.) Only one person will drive, the rest will follow him. So, you are being programmed. They call Mahatma Gandhi pratah smaraniya (worthy of being remembered every morning), but they love the dead Gandhi, not his life, not what he lived for. They really love his death, hence [he is] worthy. So, all this is sheer hypocrisy. And in the face of such hypocrisy what else remains, but rebellion? Rebellion is inevitable.  It is inevitable because I have lived my life, been brought up in a secular, religion-free, caste-free family and social milieu. And that was possible because my forefathers had paid the price to bring about such a milieu. They were part of our freedom struggle. And if I think that my daughter should get the same secular, caste-free, religion -free milieu, I must be prepared to pay the price for it. Not one of the 33 crore (gods) is going to lay it in my lap. We have to be ready to pay the price. Democracy, Secularism and Socialism are not a permanently engraved copper grant deed given to us. Every generation has to pay the price for maintaining and protecting them. For my part, I am prepared to pay that price. I am ready to go anywhere and speak. I will always speak the truth. Telling the truth and shaming the devil is the duty of every journalist. If I am alive, it is as important that I must be seen to be alive. So, it is important to keep talking. If you too think it is important. it is for you to prove it so.

I hereby thank the Vidrohi Sahitya Sammelan, its organisers, and all of you here for having organised this session on one of the most important topics and for giving me an opportunity to speak about one of the many actors involved.

Jai Hind, Ji Bhim, Jai Maharashtra

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