The Cult of the Bomb
The first batch of political prisoners sent to the Andamans consisted of Bengalis involved in the Manik Tola Bomb Case, and two gentlemen from Maharashtra, namely Mr. Ganesh Savarkar and Mr. Wamanrao Joshi. Soon after them came another batch of six persons from Bengal implicated in the trial for political dacoity. Of all these, three from Bengal and two from Maharashtra happened to be sentenced to transportation for life. Others, who were all of them Bengalis, had been sentenced for three to ten years’ imprisonment. When I reached the Andamans there were the Bengali persons, I have menioned, and four editors of Swarajya from Allahabad with seven to ten years’ imprisonment against them. The latter were sentenced for sedition and treason against the Government and, not like us, for revolutionary crime against the State. Some of these editors were deadly against all revolution and had not even understood its theory or known its practice. Their association with us had this advantage, that they had begun to know both the theory and practice of revolutionary movement and had begun to sympathize with it. I must be satisfied with this general statement today for I do not recollect now the trials in which these men were involved, their names, and their opinions on the issues in question. I remember another being there in addition to those, I have already named. As the majority of the first batch were Bengalis, we were all, in prison- parlence, known as Bengalis, later on, the number was swelled by an influx from the Punjab in their hundreds, and several from other provinces as well. So we came to be designated now by the hybrid name- the Bomb-makers.
Politicals or Men of the Tongue
Those who had never heard the name- political prisoner- could not understand what it really signified. Thousands of such prisoners could, on the other hand, form a distinct notion of bomb-throwing and hence the generic name of bomb-throwers by which all of us were recognised in the jail at Andaman. Whenever Mr. Barrie had to send for any-one of us or all of us, he would order the Jamadar in the following words: “Go and fetch Bomb-golawalla No. 7” or “Go, and gather quickly all the bomb-throwers and shut them up.” All understood that order and did accordingly. When I had entered the place, I enlightened my fellow-countrymen on the distinction between the bomb-thrower and the political prisoner. I told them we were not charged with the crime of bomb-throwing. We were charged and sentenced for agitation to fight the Government, and win and establish Swaraj. Some of us no doubt used pistols and bombs and rifles, but others fought only with their pens. Many had not even seen a bomb; what then of using it! What we all of us, exercised most, was our tongue. You should, therefore, call us men of the tongue, if not men of the pen. Surely the appellation ‘bomb- thrower’ does not fit us. To this, my disciples answered humorously, “Tell us then the right name for you, we shall adopt it.” “We are rightly called political-prisoners. If you cannot easily utter it, then abridge it if you please in your vernacular as Raj-Kaidi.” This word was picked up quickly, and they could pronounce it easily. Henceforward, “political prisoner” became our common designation. Mr. Barrie did not welcome the change. He never put up with it. If any-one addressed us as ‘Babu’, Mr. Barrie would shout at him, “What Babu, who is Babu here? They are all prisoners, you fool.” Mr. Barrie, of course, distinguished between prisoners who knew to read and write and those who did not. He had no objection to call the former ‘Babus.’ But he resented that name being bestowed upon us. How then will he allow others to call us political prisoners?
‘D’ Ticket
“You are not political prisoners” that was Mr. Barrie’s slogan to the end of the chapter. If any prisoner pronounced that name in his presence, the Sahib would go at him, “Ah! What political prisoner? There is none here of that kind. They are all of a common class like you. Ticket No. D marks the so-called politicals, as it brands you all and the worst among you.” The letter D signified ‘dangerous.’ And the badge that we wore had this letter inscribed on it. The clothes we were given to wear also had badges with that letter. With all Mr. Barrie’s objection to these appellations, from the first day to the last, I came to be known as “Bada Babu.” Even Mr. Barrie, at times, would say, “Go, Havildar and fetch here the Bada Babu No. 7.” As my fellow-countrymen in that prison learnt to distinguish between ordinary prisoners and political prisoners, they all called us by that name. The word had the smell of Swaraj and that was why Mr. Barrie hated the word. On the other hand, I desired to stamp the word Swaraj upon their hearts. So I particularly stressed the point that, when referring to us, they should all mention us as political prisoners and, in course of time, that word became a current coin in the terminology of the Silver Jail.
An offering to a cruel deity (A sop to Cerberus)
The political prisoners in the Andamans, before my arrival there, were all put together in one chawl. They had one Pathan warder to watch over them. The hard upper covering of the coconut fruit was broken into pieces, dried in the sun and was given to the prisoners to pick out threads from them. ‘Picking oakum’ is the technical term for this kind of hard labour in the prison. This labour was hard enough but was not so exhausting and soul-racking as the grinding mill to which they were yoked later on. Ordinary prisoners who could hardly spell the three ‘R’s were employed in this prison for light desk-work and they at once became ‘Babus.’ But political prisoners were shut out from that work and given hard labour the kind of which their hands had never done. Surely they knew better the art of reading and writing then the prisonrs who had hardly spelt its rudiments, perhaps, this was their very disqualification for clerkship within the prison-door.
Though picking oakum was a task hard enough, its tedium was relieved by the company of prisoners working in the same chawl. An educated man desires company and association with his equals and, therefore, this mode of working was a solace to him- One or two of these prisoners were ailing and milk was provided for them. It was given to the Pathan warder as an offering to God. And the God -the Pathan-on that account was less cruel to them. All these factors made prison-life for political prisoners less endurable than it is today. My elder brother was in the same chawl.
Months passed on in this manner when a high official from Calcutta came to the Andamans to inspect the prison. When he saw the political prisoners picking oakum in the same tenement and in one another’s company, he was, of course, put out by it. He passed severe strictures upon local officers for ordering things in this manner. These men, he said, were not ordinary criminals-the thieves, the robbers, the murderers, the dacoits and others of that fry. They were entirely submissive and, therefore, praiseworthy men. But political prisoners! They are the worst prisoners in the world and they must be treated in this prison in a way that will break their spirit and completely demoralise them. This high policy the official from Calcutta had impressed thoroughly on the mind of the rude, matter-of-fact, soldierly Officers.
The Oil-Mill
And everything changed since that time in this prison. A new era had begun. The political prisoners were split up, and put in different chawls, and one in each cell of that chawl. If their talk with another excited the slightest suspicion, handcuffs were put on them, and they were subjected to all kinds of punishment. On the tank for a bath or in a row for their meal, if they merely signed to one another to inquire alter health, the sentence for that infringement was to keep a man standing with handcuffs on, for seven days. And to crown it all, the sentence of picking oakum was substituted by work round the grinding oil mill. Yes, they had determined to break our spirit and to demoralise us. So they gave us that hard work to do for two months continuously, then one month on picking oakum, again the grinding work on the mill. We were to be yoked like animals to the handle that turned the wheel. Hardly out of bed, we were ordered to wear a strip of cloth, were shut up in our cells and made to turn the wheel of the oil-mill. Coconut pieces were put in, the empty and hollow space to be crushed by the wheel passing over them, and its turning became heavier as the space was fuller. Twenty turns of the wheel were enough to drain away the strength of the strongest cooly and the worst, brawny badmash. No dacoit past twenty was put on that work. Hut the poor political prisoner was lit to do it at any age. And the doctor in charge ever certified that he could do it! It was the medical science of the Andamans that had upheld the doctor! So the poor creature had to go half the round of the wheel by pushing the handle with his hands, and the other half was completed by hanging on to it with all his might. So much physical strength had to be expended on crushing the coconut pieces for oil. Youths of twenty or more, who in their lives had not done any physical labour, were put upon that labour. They were all educated young men of delicate constitution. From six to ten in the morning they were yoked to the wheel which they turned round and round till their breath had become heavy. Some of them had fainted many times during the process. They had to sit down for sheer exhaustion and helplessness. Ordinarily all work had to be stopped between ten and twelve. But this ‘Kolu’, as the oil-mill labour was called, had to continue throughout. The door was opened only when meal was announced. The man came in, and served the meal in the pan and went away and the door was shut. If after washing his hands one were to wipe away the perspiration on his body, the Jamadar-the worst of gangsters in the whole lot—would go at him with loud abuse. There was no water for washing hands: Drinking water was to be had only by propitiating the Jamadar. While you were at Kolu, you felt very thirsty, The waterman gave no water except for a consideration which was to palm off to him some tobacco in exchange. If one spoke to the Jamadar his retort was, “A prisoner is given only two cups of water and you have already consumed three. Whence can I bring you more water? Prom your father?” We have put down the retort of the Jamadar in the decent language possible. If water could not be had for wash and drink, what can be said of water for bathing?
Must finish your quota
What of bath? Even of our usual meal it was the same story. The dinner being served, the door of the prison-cell was locked; and the Jamadar was upon us to see, not if we had dined well, but if we had not already begun our round of the grinding oil-mill! He paraded through the chawl, halting before each room and announcing to its inmates in bad and threatening words that, come what may, the usual quota had to be completed by evening. He added that otherwise the prisoner would get a sound thrashing from him and some additional punishment from his superior. When we heard this shouting, while we were just at our meal, the morsel in our hand would not go down, and we had to stop eating all at once. I’or every one of us had seen how a man who had failed to do his quota had a belabouring of kicks and fisticuffs from the august Jamadar, in addition to his bludgeoning him with the stick. The anticipation of this terror took away all appetite, though we were, all of us, indeed, very hungry. We got up, and began our work of pushing the handle and going round the mill like a yoked buffalo, with perspiration dripping down from our face, and its beads falling into the dish we were carrying in the other hand. I have seen prisoners working in this pitiable condition, -swallowing, anyhow, the food in their plate, and running round the mill at the same time. The claims of hunger could not be put off while the demand of labour was equally excruciating. The work of the ‘Kolu’ had to be carried on in this condition till five o’clock in the evening with the hurried meal preceding it, the mode whereof I have already described. Out of a hundred, only one with a callous body could hardly complete his daily quota of thirty pounds of coconut oil. The rest took two days, at the least, to crush so much oil out of dried coconut pulp. The novitiates, the simpletons, the inexperienced, and the honest were the greatest sufferers in the process. They always got the severest beating from the Jamadar, when they poured out before him the quantity of oil they had crushed from the substance; and they went back to their cells with tears in their eyes and groaning with pain. I see their weeping faces vividly even to this day!
The ‘Kolu’ work at night
In spite of this, if any day none of them could finish the quota allotted to them for the day, Mr. Barrie would come upon the scene, when they were all sitting down for their expected evening meal, and announce to the assembly that there would be no grab for them, as they had not done the work; and none would get anything to eat till he had finished his quota. Imagine a prisoner rising with the day; beginning his work at six; toiling at it till eleven; and continuing it without rest till 5 o’clock in the evening; with the morning meal half-finished and hurriedly gulped down or hardly eaten at all; and you will realise the cruelty and injustice of this punishment, if you can at all picture it to yourself. For it beggared description. Some forty or fifty persons could not go through their work with all their will to finish it. But Mr. Barrie would not realise the hardship and the harshness of the imposition. He would bring his chair in the chawl, sit upon it, and would see the slackers, as he imagined these fifty helpless creatures to be, going on with their work far into the night, The rest of the prison was, of course, closed for work at night, and no one dared report against Mr. Barrie that this part of the Chawl was being treated at night to this grinding piece of work. If any one dared he was sure to be falsely charged for some offence and put to trouble. Everywhere was the stillness of night; but here the mill creaked on till 8 or 9 P. M. In the meanwhile, Mr. Barrie dozed in his chair; woke up at intervals, his mouth full of abuse, and cursing the labourers that they had not yet finished their day’s work. “Woe be to them”, he would exclaim “punish them now; do not reserve it for the morrow; cane them, Jamadar, within an inch of their lives; the scoundrels are idlers, they are slackers, no mercy on them.” And presently he would doze again and snore.
Pretext of ailment
None was spared, among political prisoners, from the rack of that inhuman toil. Most of them were unaccustomed to any kind of physical labour; the best part of them were college youths; some had not turned sixteen or seventeen; they were tender in age and body. But they were forced, for months on end, to do this grinding work-Kolu. Their tortures knew no bounds. Among them many had fallen ill, and preferred death to this work. As they became worse, they were declared to be feigning illness. If their bodies burned with high fever, they were shut in their own cells and were never taken for treatment to the prisoner hospital, for they were all “honourable men” political prisoners! The thief, the dacoit, the cut-throat had his bed in the prison hospital but not the poor political prisoner! That was the ethics of prison-life at Port Blair! Fever, motion, vomitting were obvious diseases. But not so, head-ache, heart-ache, stomach-ache and heavy breathing! If political prisoners showed such symptoms, then the diagnosis was invariably that they were feigning! And the reason given was- they were shirkers. The most hardened of convicts in this prison knew drugs that would make them vomit, pass motions, and even to burn with high fever. And they would use them cleverly when they desired a transfer from the prison-bed to the hospital-cot; no doubt about their feigning in order to avoid work. But if the prisoners preferred I03 to I04 degrees of high temperature to their work on the oil mill, then the fault was not of the prisoner but of the inhuman torture that was such work. And to such racking toil was a political prisoner yoked as soon as he had crossed into the prison! And worse still, if he really fell ill as the effect of his work, he was sent mercilessly back to it with the reason that he was only feigning it. To such kind of soul racking labour was my elder brother yoked. And he was the first to be yoked to it, because he belonged to the first batch of political prisoners transported to the Andamans.
An experiment to tame him
My brother was suffering from hemicrany as a chronic complaint even while he was free. The hardships of prison-life, physical and mental, with the added work of the grinding mill, had not subdued him, but had made him fierce and fearless. Not a word had escaped his lips about his fellow-prisoners, no piece of information could thus be wrung out of him, and he never prayed for any leniency from the authorities. That was why Mr. Barrie was persistent in his efforts to ‘convert’ him, though he had no scruples to treat all political prisoners as if they were animals in his menagerie. In this plight and as a result of Mr. Barrie’s coaxings, one day the hemicrany came down upon him with a vengeance. As the day went up with my brother’s Work round the grinding mill, his headache also pursued him with an increasing pain. He could not bear the heat ofthe sun, and yet the sweating work-had to be carried on, for the Jamadar was ever behind him shouting “Crush, crush, grind on at the oil mill, don’t relax; for I know nothing but to get the work done. Go on.” Overborne by this, my brother petitioned to the Superintendent on his rounds that he was suffering from a severe attack of hemicrany. The Superintendent said that it was not his business to attend to him, and the doctor should be sent for. The doctor was an Indian and would say, when he did not find the patient suffering from fever, that there was nothing wrong with him. He directed that the patient should be referred to the jailor. The thermometer, of course, did not register fever. And there was no other test there to detect hemicrany. Hence it must be feigning, especially so with a political prisoner like Ganesh Savarkar.
I alone can say who is ill
The doctor realised the untruth of his statement. But he was more afraid of Mr. Barrie than of lying. For he knew that the former would constantly goad him in these words"Doctor, you know but too well that you are a Hindu and these political prisoners are Hindus. There is no knowing when they will let you down. If anyone sees you talking to them without my permission, he may report you to the authorities. So, please, be careful. If you care for your job you must not say anything about them, do anything for them; you hold a degree but I have more experience than you. I know who feign illness and who do not; so that, be guided by me in these matters. When I say a man is well, he is well; when I say a man is ill, he is ill. Understand me, will you?” He said this as if lightly; and, smiling to himself, he went forward. Once, an hospital assistant realised the pitiable case of my brother and could not contain himself. My brother had severe pain in the head, and the doctor saw him dashing it against the prison wall, and yet carry on his grinding work unintermittedly. The doctor came up to him and told him that he was removing him to the hospital as an observation case. He asked him to take up his bed and proceed. My brother was making ready to depart, when, on a sudden, Mr. Barrie confronted him, dashing his stick upon the floor. He accosted the Jamadar gruffy,“Where is this bomb-thrower going?’ The Jamadar shivered all over, and said, ‘it is under the doctor’s orders, Sir, that I am taking him to the hospital for observation.” “Why the hell, did you not ask me? Who is the wretched doctor to give the law here?” Mr. Barrie’s voice went like an echo and a thunder throughout the whole building. ‘Take him back to work", he ordered, “I shall take care of the doctor. I must rate you as well; you, to take him out without my orders?” And he saw the patient back into his cell and at work again. He had the door locked before he went away. The doctor, strictly speaking, was not under the gaoler but under the Superintendent of that jail. But the Hindu jailor and his Hindu myrmidons took great care that no news about the political prisoners reached the ears of the Superintendent. As a sequel, the doctor had to eat his words; he apologized to the jailor, and solemnly resolved never more to interfere with the political prisoners, and did not take a single patient from them to the hospital without the permission of the Superintendent. For all others the hospital remained an open door. Prisoners with ten years’ sentence against them, those who had broken open the prison itself, had free access to it under any pretext of illness. Permission was never denied to them. It was for the doctor to decide if he would keep the patient or discharge him. Of course, the jailor had no voice in that decision. But, for political prisoners, the hospital ever remained a closed door. With hemicrany and the hard labour of the grinding mill, my brother felt dead-tired by the time he had finished it, and delivered his quantum of oil to the blessed Jamadar. Sweated and exhausted, he tottered to his cell and threw himself at full length on the wooden plank of his bed in that prison, where he groaned the whole night for the pain all over his body. The day dawned again; hemicrany, the Jamadar, the insult to the Indian doctor and the tortures ofthe oil-mill, stood like grim spectres before him. Weeks, months he had spent in this dire condition, and they were to be his inevitable lot, all his life.
Enough of this life
Who can describe the suffering-these agonies of mind and body? I may give you an instance, however, to point the moral. Of all the hardships of prison-life in the Silver Jail of the Andamans- gruelling work, scanty food and clothing, occasional thrashing and others-none was so annoying and disgusting as its provision for urinals and lavatories. The prisoners had to control the demands of nature, of hours together, for want of these arrangements in the cell itself. Morning, noon and evening-these were the only hours when prisoners were let off for this purpose and at stated time only. It was an outrage to ask the Jamadar for this convenience
at any other moment than the stipulated hour. The prisoners were locked in their cells at six or seven o’clock in the evening and the lock was opened only after six the next morning. A sort of clay-pot was given them to use it for that purpose during the night. As I have already told you, the prison is called Cellular Jail, because the prisoners in that jail were confined each in a separate, solitary cell. During twelve hours of the night, the warders insisted that the prisoner shall have no occasion to ease himself. The pot was so diminutive in size that one could not discharge into it even once during the night. As for nature’s call, one had to go down on his knees to the Jamadar to let him out. The warder may or may not take the call seriously. He may be reluctant himself or he may fear the Officer. The prisoner had, therefore, to check it till the morning. If the warder relaxed and carried the matter to the Jamadar, the Jamadar would severely rate the convict for the call at such an odd hour. He would severely reprimand the warden also for having heard the prisoner. He would or would not report to the doctor as his fancy or memory may guide him! The doctor’s report on the ailment was never made, or made only in one case out of a hundred. That report had to go to Mr. Barrie and Mr. Barrie would take action upon it at his own sweet will. Imagine the prisoner’s condition during the night and during this process of red-tape, particularly when the call was not normal but an abnormal and sudden ailment! In the morning, Mr. Barrie would sit in judgement upon it, rebuke sternly the warder and the Jamadar for their lapse of duty. When he brayed in this fashion there was no answering him. The prisoner was also cross-examined by Mr. Barrie. And if the former said that he could not help the call of nature, Mr, Barrie turned round upon him fiercely with the ejaculation. “Why the devil did you have it?” And if the wretched creature had the courage to say, “I got it because I got it”, the Jamadar would give a slap in the face and scold him forgiving such an insolent answer. Usually the prisoner was let off only with this cannonade of words. But Mr. Barrie’s particular kindness to the prisoner always ended in an order to put him immediately on the grinding mill!
A Pinch of tobacco
In this unbearable state of mind, some prisoners found it impossible to control the call of nature and answered it on the floor of their cells. The cell was eight by ten feet, and the prisoner had to sleep with his head near the nuisance he had committed. As soon as the lock was opened for the day, he had to persuade the sweeper to clean the room of the filth. He promised him the much desired tobacco in return. It was well if the scavenger agreed to do so. Otherwise he would cry out for the Jamadar and break the fact to him. The Jamadar kicked the prisoner and rained fisticuffs on him if he was meek enough to bear them. If he resisted, the Jamadar instantly took him to Mr. Barrie and lodged complaint against him. The complaint was that the prisoner had dirtied the room. Mr. Barrie passed orders that the prisoner was to clean the room himself or was to be put in the stocks for three to four days. Standing in the stocks meant continuous stoppage of urine and secretion, compulsorily so for four or five hours on end. The sentence was executed between six to ten in the morning, and from twelve to five in the afternoon, during which the prisoner had to stand with chains on hand which were fastened to the top above him. During this period he was not to be let off for either of the two functions.
This hardship all had to bear equally but the stringency of it was felt more by the political prisoners than by others. For whether they worked or not during the day, they were in solitary confinement all along. So during the day, as also at night, to answer the call of nature was prevented in their case as it could not be prevented in the case of other prisoners. Betimes, they had to relieve themselves either on the floor or on the side-wull of their cells. The other prisoners felt neither compunction nor shame about it. They would let themselves off in the face ofthe passer-by and roar into laughter for doing it. But the political prisoners could not be
so brazenfaced. It was a trial to them, when, inspite of themselves, they could not help answering it either in the room or on the wall or right in - the public eye. The jail regulations condemned as a crime what was simply a function of the human body without making decent provision to discharge it decently. The jail punished the act, as it had banned from its precincts its other needs like wholesome food and decent clothing. It considered ail the three as useless luxuries.
Ethics of the Andamans
My elder brother had to suffer terribly for the perpetration of the crime. And he was given the alternative to pick oakum by way of relief. And he contracted dysentery. He had gripping pain in the stomach as one of its symptoms. The pain and the sensation were acute after each meal. But once the door was locked in the morning, it was opened only for the evening meal. Other patients were removed to the hospital for the treatment of the disease. And they could ease themselves comfortably-if comfort that be called-in that place. But a political prisoner was an exception to the rule, till he was entirely bed-ridden by the ailment. When in his cell, the pot that was furnished him was also equally ailing!. The doctor, unless the ailment was acute, could not certify removal. So he had the hell of his life in that sickness. My brother informed the warder and the Jamadar of his acute ailment. But it took two days to reach the ears ofthe doctor in charge. The sickness had aggravated into diarrhoea. The badly boiled rice made the complaint still more acute and persistent. Add to it the work of picking oakum and close confinement. So he had to discharge it all over the room. And when the evening revealed it, he had to bear all the abuse about it. The matter was exposed all over the prison, additional punishment followed with disgrace to crown it all. To avoid it all, my bother covered the nuisance under a heap of rubbish in that room and when he was released in the evening for removing the rubbish, he removed the nuisance along with it and swept the room clean. Whenever he was put in the stocks and hands were manacled, he had to go for days together without the function. But diarrhoea and dysentery could not be put off. So he had to do the double function standing in the stocks and was punished for it. This was not an occasional trial with him as with many other political prisoners. It had become his ordeal for years. He had to stay and sleep in that dirtied room and in that wretched condition ofhis body all along, and throughout the many years ofhis stay in the Cellular Jail.
The cattle yoked to the cart or the plough are treated better in this respect than the human material in this prison-house of ours. It is considered a cruelty to obstruct them as they obstruct us here at night and during the period of close confinement. A political prisoner in this jail was worse off than the cattle under the yoke. He did not enjoy the freedom of movement that the dumb-driven animals enjoyed under the whip of their drivers. The ethics of prison-life in the Andamans condemned asking for such freedom between twelve and six during the day and in the night that followed it. We petitioned to the Commissioner of Prisons against it. But Mr. Barrie interfered, and deposed that the complaint was a fake. He brought in as his witness the Jamadar of the place and piteously moaned, “Look here, Sir, ask him if I treat them so badly. It is all a fabrication against me; it is their trump-up to damn me; they lodge this complaint to disgrace me.” The Commissioner and the other Officers with h im exonerated Mr. Barrie and warned the complainants not to make such allegations against an honest servant of the Crown. Why should political prisoners, of ail others, file such a petition? Why should not the rest make any grievance of it? The fact of it was that these did not suffer that way; they did not suffer as much; and, last, they bore it meekly for fear that Mr. Barrie might belabour them with kicks and caning, and detail them for the horrible grind of the oil-mill,-the eternal rack of the ‘Kolu’! So they dared not utter a word against Mr. Barrie.
The Right of Nature
We had to take up the matter, at long last, with the Government of India that this political right be secured to us against all injunctions. We got the primitive right of answering the calls of nature established in our favour by carrying an agitation till the grievance had reached the Home Member of that Government. How we achieved it will be narrated during the course of the story. When the Home Secretary happened to visit the place and went about inspecting the prison-cells, some of us took the complaint before him. As usual Mr. Barrie protested, when one Mr. Nanda Gopal- a Punjabi and fellow-prisoner -challenged him on the spot and offered to take the Home Member round the cells that he may see them for himself and be convinced. He added, “You have only to step in, Sir, and smell the comers of our rooms and be assured if the arrangement in our prison for urinals and lavatories does suffice or help us in our lock up in these cells. Your nose will be our best witness.” Although this outrageous language got for him the rebuke of silence from the authorities, and although the political renegades among us sought to flatter Mr. Barrie by denouncing his language and challenging it as unbecoming and insolent in the extreme, the Home Member caught the force of it and severely remonstrated with Mr. Barrie for his prison-management. Thenceforward this disgusting practice had almost ended. At least it ceased to be harassing as before, and no more so rigorously enforced. It reminded me constantly of the text of the Yoga-Sutra-the disgust for the body going along with attraction for the same in another. Nanda, Gopal himself had an experience similar to my brother’s. Hence Mr. Barrie had condemned his outburst as an act of malice against himself.
The First Strike
The series of endless hardships described above ended in a manner that came as a surprise to the jail authorities. The political prisoners reacted to it each in his own ways. The general trend among them was to obey and do the allotted work as far as it lay in them to put up with it. But when the discipline and its rigid enforcement had become too harsh, well-nigh impossible to endure, then the question that faced one and all was “to live or not to live.”
It was no longer an academic discussion, no mere philosophising, but a stem reality. And it effected two extremes in a different way. The one extreme was but to practise abject flattery and be relieved of it. Among these were those who had lost heart and the control of their minds. Safety first, safety at all cost had become an obsession with them. At the other end were those who, suppressed and downcast as they were by all the rigours of their prison-life, were now out to fight it out to the finish, and never submit at the cost of self-respect and honour. Fight, fight to the last ditch. That had become a slogan with them. There were those in the centre whom their inner voice had told not to seek death but live, so long as you can live without being false to your principles, and work up politically to remove the grievance. At the same time, if life with self-respect became an impossibility, they would, of course, prefer death to it and without a moment’s hesitation.
I have already described to you the type which chose for safety at any cost. The other which went on for fight, and those who counselled discrimination, resolved to join hands and go on passive resistance against the unendurable rigours and humiliations of our prison existence. As a first step they were to refuse work that involved hard labour. And it materialised in the political prisoners’ non-co-operation with the “Kolu”-the grinding mill that had ground down their lives. This was the first strike in the history of the Silver Jail. It was a strike on a small scale, but the very act was regarded as an impossibility under the stern regime of Mr. Barrie, and its beginning created a stir and excitement in the prison-world the like of which it had not witnessed before. Mr. Barrie regarded it as a great personal insult, and was infuriated by it. Poor Mr Barrie’ This was but the beginning of the end. And the insult was nothing compared with what he had to face in the sequel.
The Demi-God of Port Blair
To all other prisoners and occasionally to us also Mr. Barrie would sometime harangue as follows:- “Listen, ye prisoners. In the Universe there is one God, and He lives in the Heavens above. But in-Port Blair there are two: one, the God of Heaven, and another, the God of Earth. Indeed, the God of Earth in Port Blair-that is myself. The God of Heaven will reward you when you go above. But this God of Port Blair will reward you here and now. So, ye prisoners, behave well. You may complain to any superior against me, my word shall prevail; I hold my own. Mind ye well” One day to make a display of his power before us and to show us how they all trembled in his presence, as also to dazzle us by the display, Mr, Barrie arranged all prisoners before him in a row of two cach, and while the petty officers and jamadars were standing in front of it, he suddenly rushed into the seated line and asked a petty officer if it was day or night. The petty officer, new to his task, replied that it was day. Seeming to fly into a rage, Mr. Barrie affirmed that it was night. The petty officer said it was day, and Mr. Barrie persisted it was night. Not content with the duck, Mr. Barrie suddenly turned to his trusted servant and questioned, “Well, Jamadar, is it day or night now? I am sure it is complete dark and night " The Jamadar replied, “Yes, Sir, it is night.” Mr, Barrie remarked significantly, “You speak aright, but you will realise that you don’t tutor your petty officer aright. Well, take care, let not this happen again.” And, indeed, the trusted servant of “Barrie Baba” never failed to improve upon the lesson.
A Slight to God
The man, who ruled the prison with an iron hand; who made the prisoners tremble in their shoes, could not bear the slight to his authority by political prisoners like us. It is no surprise that he was terribly annoyed by it. Up to that time even the Jamadar dared pour fowl abuse upon us, and Mr. Barrie had instigated him to do so. And the Jamadar and his lieutenant slapped any-one of us in the faee it” he wtts found talking or had not finished his day’s work. And if he happened to report the incident to the jailor, the latter would laugh outright in his face. The same political prisoners had now turned against the Pathan warder to the extent of returning word for word, abuse for abuse, and slap for slap. Two of our political prisoners, who had stopped all work, did not spare Mr. Barrie himself from such humiliation. They began to show him up as he had never been shown up before.
Mr. Barrie exposed
I give here one example of how they made fun of him. Mr…………. had been sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment in this jail. He came from a respectable family in the Punjab, and was himself a man of education and culture. For the first time that he was put on the grinding mill, the gentleman entered his cell, did the work in a leisurely fashion till ten o’clock, and came down for dinner pot upon the hour. The prisoners put on the grinding mill were not allowed to bathe or dine before they had finished their allotted task. But this man did not mind it. He straightaway went for his bath, had his full time of it, and quietly sat down for his meal. By this time, the other prisoners had already been driven back to their work by their warders, with abuses and fisticuffs amply bestowed upon them. The man in question had his shower of abuse like others, but, as if it was not meant for him, he went on unperturbed until he had his full. The warder and the petty officer goaded him on to hasten and go back to work. But they could not move him from his seat. They sent for the Havildar. He tried his best to bring the man round. But the latter quietly said to him, “Look here, Havildar, I must have a full bite for each morsel that I take in, or else I may not digest it. To gulp down one’s food was a sure way to spoil the stomach and I won’t do it.” Discomfitted, the Havildar took the complaint to Mr. Barrie. All others used to be frightened out of their wits to hear that Mr. Barrie was coming. Mr. Barrie caine and this gentleman kept on eating as if nothing had happened. Mr. Barrie shouted at him and expostulated, “All the prisoners have gone back to their work, and you are still at your meals. Do you take yourself to be a gentleman-at-large? Who will finish your work? I will break your bones, remember it too well.” Biting slowly and, deliberately the food in his mouth, he said to Mr. Barrie, with a calm and smiling face, “Sir, I am not idling away my time. Medical science insists that a man must give, at least, ten bites to every morsel that he chews. Our digestion, you know well, begins with this process in the mouth, and one dare not hurry over it.” Full of fury, Mr. Barrie abused him for that information, and declared with a loud voice that he would proceed against him the following morning for such breach of discipline. Softly our prisoner answered, “Look here. Sir, from ten to twelve is our time for rest, during which you have often forced us back to work. If any-one is unlawful in this affair is it not you? I have broken no law.” Mr. Barrie was taken aback, for he did break the law, as the prisoner had brought it home to him.
Mr. Barrie told him to go on with his food as long as he liked, but when he had finished it, he must return to work forthwith, and that if he did not finish in time his allotted work, he would not spare him, for anything in the world, but flay him alive with the strikes ofhis cane. He said this and walked away, sad at heart and stamping his feet for the insult he had received before all the prisoners in that part of the building. How much he would have liked to thrash and make an example of him before the whole world! But he knew full well that, in spite of kicks and fisticuffs, the political prisoners had gone beyond his power to control them and was, therefore, uneasy at heart that they were on the verge of a general strike.
Another Principle
The gentleman had at length finished his dinner. And the petty officer, the jamadar and the Havildar felt relieved in mind. They brought him to his cell and locked him in for his usual round of work. They beseeched him to proceed with the work as he had finished his food as he had desired. For, if the prisoner failed in his task, it was the Jamadar that incurred severe censure from Mr. Barrie. Having tried thus to win him by flattery, they left the place for their usual rounds. When they returned after a time, with the full expectation that the prisoner was hard at work, to their utter dismay, they found him at full length in his bed, fast asleep and snoring and with a Konkat covering his body and face. The Jamadar was full of exasperation and shouted, “O, the devil that you are, what is wrong with you that you pester me so? It is already twelve now, you had your meal, why don’t you begin work, I wonder.” Our prisoner opened his eyes, signed them not to make such an uproar. He then said, “Jamadar, if I were to turn the oil-mill immediately after my meal, I shall not digest my food. To take a little nap after meals was a good rule of health; my grand-father always used to tell me so.” The prisoners all round burst into a roar of laughter. The Jamadar lost his temper, but had not courage to go and beat the prisoner. Instead he gave hard slaps in the face of some of the jeerers. In the evening, the gentleman delivered to the Jamadar fifteen pounds of coconut oil which he had pressed from the oil-mill. That was, according to the prison-calculation, half-a-day’s work. Others could not have given even that much quantity of oil, but he was a strong and sturdy fellow, so he could do it. We have already spoken of his courage. He was punished for his slackness, he was kept on reduced ration, and, at last, the Superintendent had to promise that they would take him off the oil-mill if only he gave them his complete quota for three days in continuation. The prisoner, it must be admitted to his credit, completed his three days’ work, taking leave, for the time, of his strict medical observance. Mr. Barrie, puffed up by this success, broke the promise and sent him back to the oil-mill. The prisoner flatly refused to go back. He said that he was not an ox to be tied so to the grinding wheel. “We are all men”, he added, “and must be treated as such.” Thus began the prisoners’ first strike in the Andamans.
The political prisoners on strike were subjected to all kinds of punishments in succession. Hand-cuffs, shackles, solitary confinement and other regular forms of punishment were inflicted upon them to last for a week. But the prison authorities gave them punishments severer than these in order to put down the strike. They were in some cases against the sanction of the prison- regulations. Thus the prisoner whose story we have already related was made to subsist on ‘Conji’ for ten days continuously, when other punishments had proved in his case of no avail to subdue him. No prisoner could be put on ‘Conji’ for ten days in succession. It was a clear violation ofthe prison-rules. Sometimes three days on Conji was a limit. And it was inflicted to tame down the prisoner by weakening his power of resistance. But the prison-calendar did not include this form of punishment. Later on when a high official from the Government of India visited the place, we drew his attention to this fact and Mr. Barrie flatly denied that he ever had recourse to it. The prisoners subjected to this ordeal have declared to me on oath that they were not only kept on Conji but, at the same time, they were treated to large dozes of quinine, so that they felt dizzy; their stomachs turned, and they had suffered in body and mind beyond any power of human endurance. But it availed not in the least to overcome their passive resistance. Their unityand their courage and its unfavourable effect on the mind of fellow- prisoners at last compelled the authorities to surrender to their demand which was never to put political prisoners for work on the oil-mill. The authorities had to assure them on the point, in order that the strike may be called off. They pledged their word that “Kolu” shall be administered only in rare instances and the political prisoners shall be detailed for lighter work outside the prison-walls. From what they had heard of this kind of work they had inferred that it would mean more freedom for them. And once the right was conceded, it was sure to pave the way for further concession, namely, after five years’ term of imprisonment in the jail they would be entirely free to work on their own within the bounds of those islands, and in ten years’ time, they shall have the privilege of setting up an independent home there with the necessary ’ticket’ of the prison authorities themselves. These considerations led the political prisoners to conclude that the relaxation as regards work on the oil-mill was the thin end of the wedge and, therefore, it would not be unwise or cowardly on their part to call off the strike although it was not to be done all at once. Some of these prisoners had already filled their one year’s term of imprisonment, and they would be set free immediately to go on work outside the prison. These began to go back to work one by one and thus the strike had gradually come to an end. Within a few days, the first batch of political prisoners was sent out to do all kinds of sundry work. Some of them had to dig in the mud, others to load their buckets with the mud so dug out, others were detailed to sweep the streets, and others, again, to carry loadfuls of coconut fruit-so on and so forth.
Yoked to the carriage
In the Andamans it is the fashion for the Government Officers to drive in carriages to which, instead of harnessing bullocks or horses, they harness convicts from the Silver Jail. It was a common sight in the streets of this island to meet such carriages. The prisoners ran them over steep climbs nearly breathless with that exertion and received epithets from their inmates, like “Go on, you scoundrels, run on quickly.” A few of them, I knew, had refused todrive in carriages driven by these human animals. But there was none among the prisoners themselves to offer resistance. This fact was, later on, brought home to them by Mr. Barrie’s indiscretion. He had no penetration of intellect to perceive the folly of his action. But the outrage became too patent when, in order to impress upon the Superintendent the recalcitrance of political prisoners, he had arranged with the jamadars to make the daring experiment of yoking the stoutest and the most daring among them to such carriages. The experiment was made on a batch recently set free to work outside. But the experiment failed and failed miserably. When the Jamadar concerned proceeded to carry out the orders of his master, those selected for that humiliating operation refused to move. They refused to be harnessed to the carriage like dumb-driven animals. “We are not oxen or horses that we should be made to pull the carriage”, that was the firm reply they gave. Mr. Barrie felt that he had got what he wanted. He, at once, called the attention of the Superintendent to this act of disobedience and remarked, “Now, you can judge for yourself how vile and hopeless they are; they wanted to be free and we have given them freedom; and yet they would not do what we bid them to do! They will not pull the carriage; what other work can I give to them which they deem unobjectionable? And if I detail them for lighter work or work that they consider decent, others may blame me for being partial to them. So I am in a fix here.”
The God-fearing Mr. Barrie
But had not the same god-fearing Mr. Barrie swallowed all his scruples when he had given the lightest of work to those who least deserved it? He had appointed in his office or at his residence men to do work who did not know how to spell their rudiments. He had selected for desk-work some of the worst characters in that jail. And he had bestowed such favour upon those of the political prisoners who had served him as spies, or who had won light jobs by sheer flattery and similar demeaning behaviour. Where had his conscience gone when he had shown these preferences and exclusions? The definition of favouritism in Mr. Barrie’s vocabulary of words was evidently an action that had inevitably led to the fall of his favourites! When I reached that prison, the condition of political prisoners was as I have described above. This I came to learn within a month’s time of my being in that prison. Some of these prisoners were definitely against the policy of strike as a matter of conviction. Others had decided to give implicit obedience. These Mr. Barrie had used to sow dissensions between the strikers, and to bring home to them that strikes were a great blunder. Between stem resisters who would use abuse for abuse, insolence against insolence, he sought, through these renegades, to create aversion for such tactics, as being quite unbecoming to them as well-bred young men. Naturally they desired to seek my opinion on all these matters. Not they alone but Mr. Barrie himself was anxious to know what I thought of it. He had striven his hardest to pump me out upon the whole question. After a fortnight of close and secluded life in my cell, he brought me down on the chawl nearby, and on its ground-floor to work there during the day.
Picking Oakum
There I was to pick one pound of oakum on the first day. Usually the piece of work to do for an ordinary prisoner is no less than one and half or two pounds of oakum. Mr. Barrie declared that it was a favour done to me as a special case and in consideration of my superior status. So he harangued briefly to his listeners. The work may be less and inspired by added kindness, as Mr. Barrie sought to put it; but this kindness did not make the oakum less hard for my hands to ply with, and there was no kindness in it to soften the labour for me. My muscles were swollen by it and the pain it gave me was unbearable. My palms blistered and blood flowed from its cracks. I showed them to the Superintendent and asked him if he could not change it. I exhorted him to give me a respite from it for a few days at least. To it the inevitable answer was, “that is the experience of all of them here. Take it as a favour that we gave you one pound to do, and not like others, one and half or two pounds a day.” And the Superintendent went away I had to do the picking all the same. And the material I had picked was stained with the drops of my blood. Mr. Barrie was careful to note if it was one pound. He did not care to note the drops that had stained it. He had no time for such attention.
Rascals! I will cane you
And yet not a day passed when he had not exchanged a few words with me. Gradually he introduced, in his ten minutes’ daily talk with me, reference to the attitude of political prisoners under him. Others were strictly banned from carrying information from one of them to the other or even to convey greetings from one to other. And if any one was caught in the act, the punishment visited upon him was reduction from his post as a warden or a week’s hard labour on the oil-mill. But the same information Mr. Barrie was free to carry from one member to another; only it was to be an information to sow dissension and to create division among them. Mr. Barrie knew well that I had all the past information about these prisoners and it had come to me inspite of his strict watch to the contrary. Why not then put forth one’s own point of view? So had Mr. Barrie thought to himself and would open his talk with me upon that subject. He would bestow full praise upon those who had turned informants; he severely censured those who had gone on strike, who had resisted his authority, who would not tolerate his abuse, and who burnt no incense at his shrine. And he indulged in panegyric or censure to convince the person he talked to, that he should never follow in the wake of the recalcitrants and the resisters but behave in a manner that became him as a man of high education and culture. In this lay his good finally and truly. This appeal to me I heard with perfect silence. I neither endorsed nor contradicted him so far as I could help it. But sometimes his conversation became intolerable, full as it was of jibes, abuse, scandal and misrepresentation of those who, I knew, did not deserve them. To say ditto to him was impossible for me. To be silent was equally unpardonable. Mr. Barrie ever sought to draw me out. What do you say to that? How does it strike you?" That was his constant refrain. To quote only one instance out of many, he would describe the gentleman who had given him the utmost trouble and with whom, I have already told, began our strike in this prison, as an insane fellow and as a man of low birth. And he capped the observation by praising me to the skies, He would draw me out to know what I thought ofthe man and his action, if it was not an action of a madman and an idiot.
Mr. Barrie’s Plot
I could no more listen to him with patience, and I told him plainly that I knew some of the persons whom he had mentioned; yet, the account he had given to me about them did not make me think that they had done anything unbecoming to them, or which went to show that they were off their minds. If their sufferings had become intolerable and if the prison authorities had begun to punish them in defiance of their own regulations, what remedy had they against them, and what other method could they hit upon, except that of striking work, and of passive resistance? And it was true as much of ordinary prisoners as of political prisoners. Desperate diseases demanded desperate remedies. I added, “Whatever you may tell me about Mr……… , he looks a gentleman. He is no rogue or a mere quill-driver”. My plain answer exasperated Mr. Barrie. He grew red in the face and he brought his conversation abruptly to an end; but next day he arranged another drama to influence me. The political prisoners that were sent out for work every morning returned to their cells at about eleven in the afternoon to have their morning meal. They had been asked that day to take their seats for dinner near me. They had not yet finished their bath, their clothes were all ditty with the mud they had worked in. It had covered their body and their clothing In that wretched condition they were standing right in front of me. Suddenly Mr. Barrie came there and began scolding them. He looked at me, and then turning his back upon me said tothe batch in a stern voice, “How is it that you have not thrown in as many buckets of mud as your Jamadar had directed you to throw? Look here, I shall not tolerate this any longer. I will give you a sound thrashing.” Then turning to the Jamadar he continued, “Look here, Jamadar, if these fellows do not complete their task by the afternoon, bring them up to me. I will cane them all right. I will cane them on the buttocks till they burst.” As if to excuse himself for uttering such foul language within my hearing, he addressed me, “Mr. Savarkar, a man like you ought not to mix with such people. They are a despicable lot. You are well-bred and a gentleman. These wretches will go back to their homes after running their term of eight or ten years in this prison, and the world will forget them. That is not so with you. You have to pass here full fifty years of your precious life; and you are no mere political prisoner. You will lose much if you associate with them, go on strike with them, or sympathise with them. Even talking with them is fraught with danger to your future. Whatever you intend to do, do it on your own. You take care of yourself never forgetting your ticket. Do you understand me?”
You are no political prisoner
I did not answer his last question and went on dining which, not a little, abashed him. He left the place repeating, “This is to your interest. You are not a political prisoner; you are an ordinary convict with a sentence of fifty years to run.” It was for the first time that I learnt that I was not a political prisoner. I do not know how many times this was dinned into my ears by the gaoler, the Superintendent and other Officers of the place.
Mr. Barrie had gone. He had arranged this show of scolding the political prisoners to give me an object-lesson of what was in store for me and thus to cow me down into submission to him. It filled me with compassion for the political prisoners to see them used by Mr. Barrie as an object-lesson for me. Its effect on me was, however, quite the contrary of what Mr. Barrie had counted upon. It did not damp my courage. It emboldened me to make a common cause with them, to bear all the insults that they had borne, so that they may feel less the language used by Mr. Barrie against them, the taunts he had given them as vagrants, wretches and the scum of society. He had made me realise deeply, as I had not done before, all the mental agony through which they had passed and I resolved to soften it by fully throwing in my lot with them. I began to talk to them openly, I asked them their names, and looking at their pale faces I said to them, “Do not feel small, do not be dispirited by what Mr. Barrie said of you in my presence. What he says of you today, he will say of me the day after. Thereby he does not insult you and me; he only insults and degrades himself. We are helpless today, the world holds us in disgrace today, but a day is sure to come when it will honour you, perhaps, raise statues to you in this very place where they rev ile you, and thousands will visit this place to offer their tributes to you as martyrs to the cause,”
My speech did not go home to their hearts as it should have done; for many of them did not fully understand the significance of what I had said to them, At least, they did not feel so deeply as I felt it myself, in addressing to them. I did not note on their faces any sign of animation, courage and heroism. On the other hand, I found them in dark despair, Only one of them seemed to be roused and put me the question: “Do you really feel all this?” I answered, “It may happen as I have described it to you. I think it ought to happen.”
No sooner had I finished what I had to say to them, than the petty officer and the warden raised a howl near me saying, “Babu, what is coming over you? If Mr. Barrie were to know that you were talking to them, he is sure to make a public example of us. Come away, we respect you. But if you are to continue like this, then………….” They pulled me from that place, and locked me back in my own cell.