The second reminiscence comes from the fascinating pen of Mr. Asaf Ali, Bar-at-law, and will enable the reader to see Mr. Savarkar as seen by others in London who were more or less in the know.
“Darkness and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares with memory a great part even of our living beings: we slightly remember our felicities, and the smartest strokes of affliction leave but a short smart upon us. Sense endureth no extremities, miseries are slippery, or fall like snow upon us… To be ignorant of evils to come and forgetful of evils past, is a merciful provision in nature, whereby we digest the mixture of our few and evil days.”
“Hydriotaphia—Sir Thomas Browne”
The extract given below is taken from a letter written by Savarkar from the Andamans.! Came across a copy of it with a friend in Paris, and while reading it, was struck by the penetrating pathos of the entire document—De Profundis presents another type of the pathos or penitence although it is a very distant cry from Oscar Wilde to Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.
Life in the Andamans
Says Savarkar: “….for nowadays I am in a cell from which a bit of the sky is visible. I watch the glorious sunset and the pomp of light and shade, and loss myself in the rose, the lily, and the lilacs of the West…” The language is that of Savarkar, but the spirit is that of a poet, or a word-painter. It seems as if “being cabined, cribbed, confined” means an awaking of dormant powers, in fact, all suffering, all sorrowing, unbandages the inner eye and uncovers the mental ear, and the sufferer wakes in a subjective world of colours and songs bidden from early senses.
A prisoner’s musings
And here is an inimitable description of lonely musings, “and if at times the mind like a child gets silly, and will weep, the grand man Reason steps in and smilingly “Well, sweetheart what ails thee? What—unknown you suffer? How silly— did you want to be the king of India yourself? If you did, well then you deserve to be baffled and defeated in such a selfish and demoralizing ambition. But God and I know; you did not want any reward personally. No, neither fame, nor name, nor money. Nay, not even happiness. The only thing you wanted was to be privileged to suffer most—at least that is what you used to say in my presence! To sacrifice most for others, or humanity—Then lo! Where is the disappointment?
He sends greetings
Again I come upon another quotable fragment. “ And now shall I express myself,” says he, “names dearest, not to utter which seems a sacrilege, and yet which cannot be uttered for their own sake from this jail. Wherein not only limbs but tongues are fettered.” More musings
Another fragment, which I seem to have carefully preserved gives his views on the study of abstruse subjects, might be appropriate in America and England (this was before the world- conflagration broke out), but not in India which, he thought, had yet to reach that stage of development which might enable her people to devote their attention to the recondite problems of life and death, of God and soul. He rounded off his observation with the pregnant remark that Baji Rao II was a great Vedantist and that is why perhaps he could not see the difference “between a kingdom and a pension.” He emphasized the study of History, Political Economy and Science.
Reminiscences
And now I shall attempt to jot down such of my reminiscences as are associated with the name and personality of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar. For the first time I heard of Savarkar in the most casual way from Riza just before I left for England in 1909. But I had no idea of who and what he was. On arriving at the India House, Highgate, London, I, my old friend Saiyad Haidar Riza who distinguished himself as a powerful platform speaker in the year 1907 and 1908, and another friend (all the three of us having traveled together), were ushered into the dining room, where several cheerful faces greeted us. Saiyad Haidar Riza carried a reputation with him, especially as he had been granted a scholarship by old Pandit Shamji Krishna Varma (which, however, he like others, resigned within a short time of his arrival there), and therefore it was natural to expect that Savarkar, who was the “boss of the house”, would personally welcome Saiyad Haidar Riza. I meet Savarkar
I took another gentleman, who looked rather prominent, and who has since then become sufficiently distinguished in his own to be Governor of the House, but he hastened to inform us that Mr. Savarkar would soon be down. Presently the door of the dining room was thrown open and there entered a short but rather agile figure, bearing a clean shaven and smiling face, a pair of keen and, I thought, fascinating eyes behind a gold pince-nez secured by a real gold chain attached to the left ear, hair parted on one side so as to make a neat bracket with curls on a moderately open forehead. The moment he opened his lips there emanated from them a sort of juvenile musical voice, which was inclined to be shrill but not unpleasantly so. There was a softness in his appearance and a something in his voice, which bordered on the feminine—to be something out of the ordinary one must posses something of opposite sex, for is not genius sexless? This was Savarkar, fragile as an anaemic girl, restless as a mountain torrent, and keen as the edge of a Toledo-blade. There was no hesitation, no stopping to think about him. All opinions and actions came from him in an easy flow, and bore the stamp of unshakeable self- confidence. He seldom opened lips except to convince or at least silence the listener. As I think of it now, I wonder how so young a person—for he could not have been much beyond two or three and twenty in 1909 - commanded the will of almost everyone who came into contact with him. I knew he was accused by some of his intellectual friends as a born leader, a man cut out for the part. He typified in himself the rivals as a “tyrant”, but Vinayak was a spirit of Shivaji and, I believe, consciously imitated Giuseppe Mazzini in his general behaviour. Savarkar’s manner
He used to be an ardent admirer and a very careful student of Mazzini’s life teaching and owned much of his politics, inspiration to that Italian patriot and thinker. But apart from what he had consciously acquired or unconsciously assimilated he seemed to posses no few distinctive marks of character, such as an amazing presence of mind, indomitable courage, unconquerable confidence in his capability to achieve great things, and a subtle genius for mastering complete details and devising astonishing means to reconcile conflicting interest. A born captain, he loved and clove to his lieutenants and those who could fit into his scheme of things, but he brooked no rivals and somehow managed to leave every claimant to the first position in the cold, in a manner that you failed to notice any manoeuvre about it. He struck me as an incomparable strategist; whose manoeuvres were sure and certain, and so cleverly marked that the practiced eye failed to detect the process, and yet the results were there, and you admitted his nimble skill. Saiysd Haidar Riza was the next to measure swords with the Maharatha leader, and the former was no mean rival, being a skilled protagonist and well equipped with the double-edged sword of eloquence. The contest was precipitated at the earliest opportunity that offered itself, the usual Sunday gathering at India House. The proceedings commenced with either Savarkar or somebody else in the chair. The interest of the audience was concentrated on the much-talked of “Agitator from Delhi,” who in his turn must have felt a great deal uneasy in his mind, for the combat appeared imminent and was perhaps consciously brought about, and if Saiyad Haidar Riza lost, he stood to lose more than a mere reputation. He could therefore be excused for nervousness. A battle of Giants
On the other hand Savarkar stood on firm ground—the esteem and affection of his adherents. Some nonentity opened the debate, and some other nonentity carried it further. Until a third or fourth nonentity made a breach in the bulwark, and here was a chance for Riza, who allowed himself to be coaxed to mount the breach (Riza had not learnt to eschew a certain silly trick, which had its origin in vanity pure and simple, of holding out until appealed to.) He rose deliberately, with the mien and gesture of a self- conscious actor (scarce realizing that sincerity is a fatal weapon against the artificial cannon of rhetoric), in fact, almost scorning the danger, in excess of confidence, he led the with a recklessness obviously histrionic in execution, and failing to make any marked impression even on the neutials—heroically cost off his heavy blunderbuss of mere rhetoric and brandished the sharp rapier of sentimental appeal, but the performance proved ineffective. The winding up was a matter of indifference to us myself and another friend who were supposed to be sworn partisans—because the earlier failure meant a regular stew to us and since defeat was evident, we hung our heads in dejection.
Savarkar Speaks
And now rose Savarkar—he was always careful to have the “last word” which never failed of effect—and the difference, not in rhetoric but in lucidity of expression and sincerity of feeling, was marked from the beginning. Although Savarkar’s speech used to be marked by a certain indifference to grammatical precision, he had a magic way of riveting the attention of his audience and holding every one spell bound for the whole time he spoke. His words proceeded from a deep feeling and conviction and penetrated to depth of the listener’s heart. His appeals were never made in vain; they went straight to the heart. As I review the past to day, I feel bound to acknowledge that the quality which secured his speeches a place unmistakably superior to that claimed for studied rhetoric and polished oratory, was deep “Sincerity of feeling.” Nor is it an exaggeration to say Savarkar is one of the few really effective speakers I have known and heard, and there is hardly an orator of the first rank either here or in England whom I have not had the privilege of hearing— excepting Mr. Eardily Norton, of whom I have heard so much that I should be almost reluctant to avail myself of the opportunity of hearing him speak lest I should be disappointed. So it was a walk over for Savarkar and poor Riza had lost his chance.
His Political Inspiration
The Sedition Committee have more or less fully dealt with Savarkar and his so-called revolutionary activities. But to understand his political ideals one must know the source of his inspiration. Shivaji and Giuseppe Mazzini were his two heroes. He worshipped at their shrines and one thought, deliberately imitated their illustrious examples. His mind was fully saturated with Mazzini’s teaching before he proceeded to England and the free atmosphere of the British Isles served to nourish and ripen the lessons he had imbibed. Mazzini’s life and teachings hourly fed the flame of his soul, and seemed to inspire his activity in the minute details. His own speeches at the Sunday meetings at India House were liberally leavened with the revolutionary ethics of the Italian patriots, and when the fuller history of his life comes to be written, his biographer will find no great difficulty in tracing the simplest acts of his life to some sentence in the “Duties of Man” or to the life of the Maharashtra leader who successfully harassed and sufficiently humiliated The Emperor Aurangzeb, by humbling the pride of the Mughal Generals with a handful of predatory Maharashtra horsemen. One may say that with Mazzini he believed that “when a man has once said to himself in all seriousness of thought and feeling, “I believe in liberty and country and humanity, “he is bound to fight for liberty, country and humanity, fight as long as life lasts, fight always, fight with every weapon, face all from death to ridicule, face hatred and contempt, work on because it is his duty and for no other reason.” This is what Mazzini once wrote to a friend and I have already quoted an extract from Savarkar’s letter from the Andamans. There is a close kinship of thought in these two quotations. An analysis
Har Dayal happened to be in Honolulu at the time Savarkar was extradited from England, or sometime later, and conceived the idea of writing his biography. He wrote to a friend in Paris to collect all the necessary material for the purpose. This friend appeared to all those who knew Savarkar and asked me also to furnish Har Dayal with what I could recollect. Savarkar was looked upon by those who had ever met him as a youth of a distinctly intellectual stamp, and a passionate patriot who thought nothing of the highest sacrifice for his ideals. To him lift was nothing but incense to be burnt on the altar of ideals. He was inexperienced, like a great many other youths, and was so completely consumed by the passion to realize his vision of free India and an emancipated humanity, that he had cheerfully walked headlong into the very jaws of Death and sacrificed the flower of his youth in the hope and the belief which to my mind, must have been inspired by a pregnant observation of Joseph Mazzini, namely. Ideas ripen quickly, when nourished by blood of Martyrs.‟ And there is yet another observation of Mazzini which may fairly be presumed to have affected Savarkar’s thoughts to no small degree. The Italian revolutionary leader once said: Sometimes I fancy I am hated by those I love tonight, and ask pardon of my God for having been a conspirators; not that I least repent the reasons for it, or recant a single one of my beliefs, which were and are and will be religion to me, but because I ought to have seen that there are times when the believer should only sacrifice himself to his beliefs. “To be quite candid, this is a trend of thought which has characterised the mental process of most of those whom I have known to be associated with an movement involving sacrifice. It reduces the field of one’s proselytisation to the “ego” only, for the moral responsibility of converting others is so crushing that none but the strongest minds dare undertake to shoulder so heavy a burden. Weaker minds must succumb to weight, and that is a contingency always to be dreaded by thinking men. However, all this was parenthetical.
Idealist not Cruel
I was saying that Savarkar, so far from being regarded as a cut-throat, was considered a high souled young man of unimpeachable honestly, perhaps woefully inexperienced and decidedly ideologist. And therefore there seemed no reason why he should not find a worthy biographer in Har Dayal, who however, to my knowledge has not executed the projected life sketch. Such material, however, as I could possibly furnish Har Dayal, I am now endeavouring to set down here. When Goethe made Ottilie put down in her diary, “We venture upon anything in Society except only what involves a consequence,” he intended a great truth to be stated in an epigram. The necessary corollary is obvious: “To venture upon a thing involving a consequence you must possess a soul of a hero.” And in this sense Savarkar is born hero, he could almost despise those who shirked duty for fear of consequences. If once he rightly or wrongly believed that a certain system of Government was iniquitous, he felt no scruples in devising means to eradicate the evil. On original Idea
His optimism discounted adverse odds and he condemned consequences. I shall never forget a certain academic discussion which arose from a speculative proposition, based on the assumption that the British had withdraw from India bag and baggage and left the country entirely to her resources, exposed to naval invasions by other powers. “What then,” question was, would be India’s opportunity to defend her shores against the invading hosts?” A full summary of the various answers would be futile though interesting, but the suggestion put forward by Savarkar was as astounding as it was (as I think now) irredeemably imaginary. He proposed the removal of our coastal inhabitations some 20 miles inland, to the right out of the possible zone of fire. The longest range of the naval gun known at the time was 14 miles, if I remember aright, and in case the present defences of our ports, (which were regarded adequate) were in some way rendered ineffective, long range guns (of which a plentiful supply was presumed!) were to keep the dogs of war and engines of horror off our coast. Such ingenuity could be born of inordinate optimism only, although I confess I myself may have admired it 15 years ago. The late war has taught a host of salutary lessons to great many military experts today, and I have not the least doubt that Savarkar himself would be the first to laugh at any such strategy to-day.
Youthful experience
The impatience and experience of youth coupled with the ardent passion of the idealist are to blind one to some very broad facts, when the most childish plants appear as the most perfect human mind can ever devise, but to ridicule such a state of mind or to penalize it is a contemptible remedy. Experience, closer grips with hard facts of life alone serve to disillusion the so-called “impatient idealist” and restore his sense of proportion. And this reminds me that once, early in 1912, a certain very highly placed official invited me to discuss the Nationalist programme (which was an eaphmism for “the Revolutionary programme”) with him and confronted me with the pulverizing blow when in the plenitude of candour and what I regarded as just pride, he said, “But where is the sense of proportion in all these elaborate theories? We have left no temptations; the army and the navy, which alone can form the basis of a successful revolution, are entirely in our hands.” This was a “facer.” But should that gentleman or any other of his like chance to read this now, let the following reflection of Mazzini be my final reply:-
A thoughtful reply
“Ideas rule the world and its events. A revolution is the passage of an idea from “theory‟ to practice.‟ Whatever men have said “material‟ interests never have caused and never will cause a revolution. Extreme poverty, financial ruin, oppressive or unequal taxation, “may‟ provoke risings that are more or less threatening or violent, but nothing more. Revolutions have their origin in the “mind‟, in the very root of life, not in the body, in the material organism. A religion‟ or a philosophy lies at the base of every “Revolution.‟ This is a truth that can be proved from the whole historical tradition of humanity.” No heavy guns and howitzers, not millions of fighting men, nor mountains of gold; but “ideas” effect revolution. Such is the daily accumulating testimony of current events.
Savarkar’s unpublished book
Savarkar had ransacked the rich library of the India Office and unearthed a vast variety of historical treasures after patient toil of months, to adorn a book he had written. When I made his acquaintance he had already finished his labours, and was the author of the unpublished work The History of the Indian War of Independence of 1857. Chapters of this work used to be read out at some of the Sunday meetings at India House. Savarkar had collected very rare accounts of most of the events of the year 1856-7-8 and had incorporated them into his book in such a way that served to bear out theory that the rising of 1857 was far too well-organised and purposive to be a mere caprice of mutinous troops; it was a systematic attempt by the leaders of decaying power to shake itself free of alien domination Savarkar used to be a very careful and, I believe, not an uncritical student of history and politics, and was not, except of set design, oblivious of the fallacious nature of the title he had selected for his book. He knew that abortive attempts for the overthrow of a paramount power must ever go down in history as “mutinies and rebellion,” only successful rising being entitle to be remembered by the dignified expression “wars of Independence.” He was fully aware that George Washington, had he been defeated, would have come down to us as an arch rebel, a traitor to Great Britain, a name abhorred and execrated through all time; but he maintained that the rising of 1857 was not a mere mutiny and India should not be imposed upon and the memory of her coming generations poisoned with so monstrous a lie.
Basis of his Theory
History after all is the representation of certain facts according to the authors, and chroniclers‟ points of view. Given a certain set of facts each individual draws his own inference. The very facts which went to substantiate the theory of mutiny, were successfully employed by Savarkar to sustain his contention about a National Rising.” He had exhumed some very interesting documents which formed the basis of his argument. There was a proclamation or an appeal by the Begums of Oudh, and another by one Maulavi Ahmad Shah which called upon all Hindus and Musalmans to unite in self-defence against the rising “Usurper” i.e., the East India Company’s governing organization or the parent of the present bureaucracy.
His book Proscribed
Members of “Abhinava Bharat” or “New India Society” of Cromwell Avenue, London, contributed funds for its publication, but the Government conceived a violent dislike to this work and proscribed it before its publication. Maulana Mohamed Ali tells an amusing story about obtaining it on loan from his “old friend” Sir Charles Cleveland, not for review in the late “Comrade” but for his personal delectation. This book, it appears, was smuggled into India by an ingenious device: it was wrapped in a cover marked “Posthumous papers of the Pickwick Club” and sent out under a famous Oxford bookseller’s wrappers; but the vigilance of the “Argus-eyed monster” at the Bombay Custom House spotted it. I hold it as my firm opinion to- day as before that Government even from its own crabbed point of view was not less wise in proscribing the book, than it is in shutting the doors of India in the face of the so-called revolutionary young men who are now in exile. Having read myself I can safely assert that it is absolutely innocuous as compared with, say the narrative told by Hudson of Hudson House or some others works written on the subject and within everybody’s reach.
Thrashed for justifiable Protest
There are a host of minor anecdotes which I could relate here, I shall content myself with reproducing two or three of them. The first of these takes me back to stirring incident which illustrates Savarkar’s remarkable courage and astonishing presence of mind. Sir Curzon Willie’s assassination stirred the social and political circles of London to their very depths, and evoked a public condemnation of the “dreadful” and, as it was generally described, “dastardly deed” by the Indians resident in England. A public meeting was accordingly convened: but while Madanlal Dhingra was under trial, Savarkar saw the fallacy of these proceeding and determined in consultation with his friend to protest against a premature verdict. He went to the meeting which was being held at Caxton Hall, H.H. the Aga Khan presiding. Among those present were Mr. B.C. Pal, Sir Mancharji Bhavnagri, the Right Hon. Sayed Amer Ali, Sir Surendranath Banerji and a host of other celebrities, real and pseudo patriots and so forth. Savarkar, to the horror of a great many present and to the admiration of his friends, rose and protested against the premature proceedings, when he was brutally attacked by some ultra zealous Indian and carried out bleeding!
The words on his lips wore “I was perfectly within my right.” He happened to be staying with Mr. B.C. pal at the time—not many house from my diggings. I paid him a visit soon after my return from that meeting and found him confined to bed with fever. He had a wet bandage across his brow and over the injured eye and was tossing restlessly in his bed in pain; but his mind was active as ever, and he was dictating a letter to the press, justifying his protest against the proceeding of the day on the obvious ground that passing a verdict on an under trial prisoner out of court was undeniable “Contempt of Court.” Who could help admiring his courage and presence of mind? I forget whether this letter appeared in any paper, but I have an idea that it did. I believe Savarkar had to quit Mr. Pal’s house very soon after this, and if I am not mistaken he went away for a change.
India-House Brother hood
The Willie assassination marked the disintegration of the India-House Brotherhood; for Madanlal had once been inmate of that placed, and all sort of insinuations and rumours filled the air, and ultimately led to the desecration of that House. But the Sunday meeting did not cease. They continued to be held in other places, and nearly went the round of the lodgings of all the members of Abhinava Bharat. I have noted this fact to show the earnestness and truthful constancy of those who belonged to this brotherhood. Sometime after this Savarkar was down with pneumonia, and had a very near shave of it.
A Nasty Incident
I may be permitted to recall a certain incident here which may cause a raising of eye-brows. I happened to be the guest of a certain Anglo- Indian friend about this time. He expressed much uncommon interest in Savarkar, and learning that he was laid up with a nasty attack of double pneumonia, seemed to evince what at first appeared to be tender solicitude for him and began to make minute inquiries about his medical adviser. As I was not altogether unaware of the nature of this gentleman’s interest in Savarkar I was not little surprised at this unexpected manifestation of concern. But a subsequent remark, altogether uttered in the gentlest of tones, betrayed the horrifying nature of his seeming solicitude and gave me a glimpse of the flaming pit underneath, and the shock was so violent that my host found no difficulty in gauging its magnitude from my face. We parted a moment after that with altered feelings on either side; but this was my first experience of the inhuman callousness of certain types pf humanity. He was a very different sort of man in every other way. However I lost no time in going to Savarkar straight. It was not my habit to burst with narratives, but having satisfied myself that Indian of qualification was also in attendance, desired it to be very clearly understood that he must be present at all consultations. This affair marked an epoch in my life; for the shock of this disillusionment led to a clear perception of certain things. Takes refuge in Paris
Savarkar recovered from this illness, but the air grew thick and stifling with “warnings” and he was persuaded to seek the healthier and clear atmosphere of the French metropolis. This was sometime after poor Dhingra had met his fate, Savarkar was followed by some other members of the fraternity. Whether there was any real danger to them or not, they were all warned in to escape any process of law which might have operated against them, and then came the fateful event in Savarkar’s life. One fateful day he crossed the Channel and was placed under arrest immediately on touching English shore. Extradition Proceedings
The extradition proceedings opened at the Police Court in London. The late Sir Alfred de Ritzen, the presiding officer, was a typical magistrate, with a pair of hawk-like eyes, which seemed to penetrate deep into your soul. Savarkar appeared thoroughly calm and composed in the dock, and smilingly nodded to all the friends, who had gone there to hear the case. A certain K.C. and Indian councel were engaged to oppose the petition for extradition, and a certain police officers who had gone from Bombay attended also the Court in a garb suited to the Indian climate, but strangely out of place in London. Some unmannearly young fellows openly made fun of it, and passed audible, rude remarks and were threatened by Inspector McKarthy to be disallowed to re-enter Court—for this happened outside the Court during the lunch interval. Those who carefully followed the proceedings, consequent on the petition for extradition, regarded the optimism of certain friends with grave misgivings.
Irish to the
Rescue Certain Irish friends wondered that an Indian could not be found to take Savarkar’s place, after helping him to escape and volunteered to help any attempts at rescue. Out of this arose a veritable romance of modern times. I came to know of it from a friend who had heard it from another friend in Paris. Thus it has all its value as fiction. A certain friend of Savarkar acting in concert with some Irish friends devised an elaborated plan of rescue, which involved some desperate things. Either somebody was to visit Savarkar in prison and change places with him, or perhaps, the taxi-cab in which he used to be conducted to and back from the Court was to be held up by a band of men hired to rescue him, some such desperate step had to be taken. While this other equally wild plots for rescue were, I presume, being hatched, Sir Alfred had found against Savarkar and he was duly extradited. Sensation in three Countries
However, Savarkar himself was to furnish three countries, England, France and India, a most thrilling adventure. He was supposed to have dispatched a message to friend in Paris (before sailing under arrest) to meet him at Marseilles. One morning the newspapers were full of “A thrilling Escape at Marseilles.” The boat which was carrying the illustrious prisoner touched at Marseilles, and while it lay at anchor Savarkar asked the escorting police officer to let him have a bath Divesting himself of his clothes and soaping himself all over, he slipped out of the porthole of the bath room and swam a distance of no less than 100 yards, (if anything upwards,) and reached the French soil! The sight of a nearly nude person swimming from the side of the boat shoreward was too conspicuous to escape notice. The truth of the matter was soon discovered and proper signals to those on shore led a French “gendarme” to arrest Savarkar the moment he touched land, although after a race and some physical struggle! Had not Savarkar been out of breath after swimming so long a distance no “gendarme” could have overtaken him. The friends who had gone to Marseilles to meet him, arrived there too late!
The Huge Mystery
I am altogether hazy now as to whether or not the friends who were to meet him at Marseilles had guessed that an escape would be attempted, but I think some sort of rescue was contemplation, and an automobile was to be waiting. Had Savarkar been conversant with French, it would have been of immense value to him. But he was handed back to the officer who was escorting him, apparently in flagrant contravention of the international “convention about the right of asylum.” M. Langust and socialist deputies left no stone unturned in endeavouring to bring this left no stone unturned in endeavouring to bring this case before the Hague Tribunal and declare Savarkar as one was entitled to right of asylum in France—and up to this day it is treated as a mystery in India circles how that tribunal decided the case against French Government. I am convinced up to this moment that Savarkar’s arrest by the French “gendarme” and his restoration to the ship on board which he was carried a prisoner were gross violations of international rights, and I say this irrespective of the charges proved against Savarkar afterwards. And this is the story how the hero of a real and truly thrilling adventure was delivered over to the coils of the boa-constrictor of law. A Great Speech
One more anecdote and I have done. “Mr. Gandhi of South Africa Fame” (and not Mahatma Gandhi of our day) happened to be London in 1909, I think, and India House decided to invite him to preside at a dinner organized on the occasion of Dussera Mr. M.K. Gandhi was greatly admired for the firmness of his attitude in regard to what was regarded an onslaught on the rights of south African Indians: but India House looked upon him (and also Mr. Gokhale), as a man of moderate views who was too good- natured or perhaps weak to think of any vigorous line of action. However, Mr. Gandhi deserved to be respected. But Mr. Gandhi, who attended the dinner in a swallow-tail coat and a stiff front shirt, spoke just a few non-committal words and resumed his seat after saying “But Mr. Savarkar, the speaker of the evening, is to follow me, and I should not like to stand between you and him!” Although that veteran orator Mr. B.C. Pal was one of the speakers of the evening, Savarkar rose in all the confidence of one, who was admitted to be easily the first and who himself felt as much, and delivered one of the finest speeches I have ever listed to. APPENDIX II
In spite of the fact that, after the second conviction and sentence and the result of the Hague Arbitration which admitted the inability of the International Tribunal to force England to hand over the famous Indian prisoner back to France, Mr. Savarkar was transported to the far off and lonely isles of the Andamans and hid from public gaze in prisons there for more than 14 years, his grateful country did not, and could not, forget him even for a day. His memory was cherished as a sacred trust, his heroic figure grew into a mythical character in the eyes of the young and rising generation and his name became a nucleus round which romantic legends clung. The press and the platform never ceased to agitate for his release. After the war a national petition signed by no less than sixty to seventy thousand persons was submitted to the Government demanding his release. Towns and cities all over India held meetings and demonstrations, Provincial Conference year in and year out passed resolutions and people organized and observed “Savarkar Weeks,” evincing the deepest concern with the sufferings of the illustrious prisoners in the Andamans. The National Congress itself, in a special resolution proposed from the Presidencial Chair, expressed its sympathy with the patriot. And when at last he was partially released and veritable rose out of his grave, rejoicing nation offered him an enthusiastic welcome. He was, under the conditions of his release, to be interned in an out of the way town, in Ratnagiri, and so could not visit other places. Yet few towns he could visit on his way carried him in crowded processions. The city of Nashik especially poured out in thousands to honour her heroic son and Savarkar’s entry into Nashik was indeed a triumphal. Procession. Nor did the people of Maharashtra as a whole lag behind. A national purse was collected and offered to him as a humble token of the love admiration of Maharashtra and a national address was read by Mr. N. C. Kelkar in the name of all Maharashtra where leaders and distinguished representative of the people gathered from far and near under the presidency of Dr. Moonje. Shri. Shankaracharya too blessed the occasion. We take the liberty of rendering the national address into English.
“To Deshbhakt Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, B.A., Bar-at-Law,
The people of Maharashtra beg to express on this occasion the high esteem in which they hold your name for your intense patriotism and untold sufferings you underwent in the interest of the national cause.
In politics, as in religion, many a way leads to the ultimate goal and under differing circumstances different means have resorted to and held justifiable by history in the realization of great ideas. Your public career, before your imprisonment, justifies the dictum in Mahabharat—it is better to blaze a while than to only smoking and smouldering all through.
It is this courage of conviction that finches not to act up to the dictates of one’s conscience nor hesitates to brave its consequences that carries within it the seeds of manly progress.
To stay out the term of transportation for life is regarded as a veritable rebirth amongst our people. The fact that your extraordinary staying power and fortitude should have enabled you only to survive the horrors of this fearful terms of imprisonment, but should still inspired you to take up your public mission immediately you came out, is indeed marvellous. All Maharashtra takes pride at this sight.
We have organized this public function to present you with this humble token to express, however inadequately, these our feeling of esteem and gratefulness and marvelling love that we all cherish towards you. We earnest hope that you will oblige us all by accepting it in the spirit it is offered.
Though released from prison, you are still pent up within the thorny hedge of internment. Still that too will soon be removed and you will once more be free to carry your work unrestricted. In this hope Maharashtra offers you this humbles present of a purse and devotedly prays that God may grant you sound health and long and useful life.”