Sushant
“Revolution is the inalienable right of mankind. Freedom is the imperishable birthright of all.” – Bhagat Singh“
Bhagat Singh is the only figure of the Indian independence movement who is celebrated in both India and Pakistan. While these governments and most historians don’t put any effort to uphold the ideas of Bhagat Singh as they do for Gandhi or Jinnah, Bhagat Singh remained alive in the memory of people by stories and folk songs until his writings came into picture after the 1980s. After 75 years of Independence his ideology has become more relevant as our ‘Socialist’ preamble is reduced to an irony with the nexus of the big bourgeoisie, landlord, and their political pawns steamrolling the peasants and workers. Culturally, we see the ruling saffron brigade creating rifts using caste and religion. Today, the capitalists are successfully using the ‘Indian culture’ for its own marketing developments therefore completely distorting our thoughts and thinking capabilities resulting in decreasing our sense of responsibility and accountability for the country and humanity.
After independence the Zamindari system was abolished but are ‘Special economic zones’ not actually ‘Special Exploitative Zones’? Today when people fighting for their jal-jangal-jameen are hounded by the state to usurp their lands, it becomes our primary task to know about Bhagat Singh and his comrades. He said, “What difference does it make to them [workers and peasants] whether Lord Reading is the head of the Indian government or Sir Purshottamdas Thakordas? What difference for a peasant if Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru replaces Lord Irwin!” (Draft of Revolutionary Programme—A letter to the Political Activists). Bhagat Singh dreamt of a socialist society where true freedom for the masses is possible. In February 1931, Bhagat Singh, inviting the youth to embrace Marxism, pointed out that “Revolution means the complete overthrow of the existing social order and its replacement with the socialist order. For that purpose our immediate aim is the achievement of power. As a matter of fact, the state, the government machinery is just a weapon in the hands of the ruling class to further safeguard its interest. We want to snatch and handle it to utilise it for the consummation of our ideal, i.e., social reconstruction on new, i. e. Marxist basis.” Jitendranath Sanyal was imprisoned for publishing the biography of Bhagat Singh in 1931, in Court he said – “Sardar Bhagat Singh, I knew was neither a terrorist nor an anarchist; therefore to discharge my duty towards my late friend I thought of presenting his true and historical picture. In this I wanted to show that he was a communist and an internationalist and that people had misunderstood him.” Let’s turn the pages to see how Bhagat Singh evolved from a radical nationalist to a Marxist.
In November 1921 Congress under MK Gandhi gave a call for mass non-cooperation. On this call thousands of students left their studies including Bhagat Singh. Similarly in 1922 peasants of Bardoli started a mass-movement under the leadership of MK Gandhi and Sardar Patel but neither succeeded. In Bardoli a compromise was reached. Commenting upon this Bhagat Singh wrote, ‘This is nothing. As we see this Satyagraha was not started with the aim of fighting with the government. But this was for the redressal of grievance. Leaders (Gandhi-Patel) have accepted this. It is ununderstandable that instead of quarreling on grievances one by one, why root-cause is not redressed. Actually “responsible leaders” fear to take the responsibility and readily agree for a compromise.’(sic). Disillusioned with Gandhi and his methods, Bhagat Singh moved towards radical nationalism. He read and wrote extensively about the people’s movement against British imperialism and about the patriotic heroes who made great sacrifices for the cause of freedom struggle. In the beginning of 1924, Bhagat Singh left home and went to Kanpur to join underground revolutionaries. He became a member of the Hindustan Republican Association (HRA), started by Sachindranath Sanyal a year earlier. Ramprasad Bismil and Ashfaqulla Khan were the main leaders of HRA. Bismil and Ashfaq were arrested in 1925 for Kakori conspiracy. After that Chandra Shekhar Azad became the organiser and Bhagat Singh became the main ideological thinker of HRA. In 1928, HRA was renamed from Hindustan Republican Association to Hindustan Socialist Republic Association (HSRA) on Bhagat Singh’s suggestion.The HSRA, as stated in its manifesto, intended to “liberate…[India] from foreign domination by means of organized armed rebellion.” In 1925, Bhagat Singh returned to Lahore. Inspired by the philosophy of Karl Marx and Lenin, Bhagat Singh and his friends in March 1926, he founded the Naujawan Bharat Sabha with the political aim of “establishing a completely independent republic of the labourers and peasants of the whole of India “. The NBS, as HSRA’s mass front, was to propagate HSRA’s politics “to make the people really understand what the Indian revolution [a revolution by the masses and for the masses] would really mean.” In April 1926, Bhagat Singh established contact with Sohan Singh Josh and through him the ‘Kirti Kisan Party’ which brought out the monthly magazine Kirti in Punjabi. Bhagat Singh worked with Josh and joined the editorial board of Kirti. In Kirti Bhagat Singh wrote articles on many contemporary topics of national importance. He was an objective writer, he had dedicated every move and every work for a purpose, and that purpose was to make the people ready for revolution.He wrote about Congress and their views: “What is the motive of Congress? I said that the present movement will end in some sort of compromise or total failure. I have said so because in my opinion the real revolutionary forces have not been invited to join the movement. This movement is being conducted only on the basis of a few middle class shopkeepers and a few capitalists. Both of these classes, specifically the capitalists, cannot venture to endanger their property. The real armies of the revolution are in villages and factories – the peasants and workers. But our bourgeois leaders don’t dare take them along, nor can they do so. These sleeping tigers, once they wake up from their slumber, are not going to stop even after the accomplishment of the mission of our leaders.” Bhagat Singh was not only anti-capitalist but also recognised caste as a huge impediment. He questioned the relevance of a system in which people become untouchable because of being born in a particular caste. He knew well that the Indian bourgeoisie would always compromise with the British imperial class to save their interests. Since congress took support of capitalists so the workers and peasants will get exploited even after independence. In such a scenario casteism and exploitation will continue. In the article ‘Different Thoughts of New Leaders’, 1928, he criticises the ‘Back to Vedas’ approach along with the revivalist philosophy of Sadhu Wasvani. He underlined the anti-Bolshevik and anti-worker ideological character of Sadhu Wasvani’s arguments. Bhagat singh compared and admired both Subhash Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru and acknowledged their greatness but he critised the basic nationalist limitations of Netaji who advocated only political change.
The HSRA leadership now decided to let people know about its changed objectives and the need for a revolution by the masses. Bhagat Singh and BK Dutt threw two sound bombs in the Central Legislative Assembly on 8th April 1929 against the passage of the Public Safety Bill and the Trade Disputes’ Bill (The Trade Dispute Bill was against the workers right to make trade unions). Shouting – “INQUILAB ZINDABAD” and “DOWN WITH THE BRITISH IMPERIALISM”, they threw pamphlets. Bhagat Singh was chosen because he was very articulate and well-versed in the history and philosophy of revolutionary movement and political thinking and BK Dutt was chosen to lend a pan- India coloration to the entire operation. After dropping the innocuous bomb that, as expected and designed, injured none from the Public Gallery of the CLA, Delhi, Bhagat Singh and BK Dutt stood rooted to the ground. They declared that their sole purpose was “to make the deaf hear” and “give the heedless a timely warning”.
In jail Bhagat Singh studied more on Marxism-Leninism and just twenty days before his martyrdom on 23rd March, 1931 Bhagat Singh sent out an explicit message to the youth saying: “. . . the struggle in India would continue so long as a handful of exploiters go on exploiting the labour of the common people for their own ends. It matters little whether these exploiters are purely British capitalists, or British and Indians in alliance, or even purely Indians.” Bhagat Singh had a clear idea about the basic classes of revolution. In his jail diary he wrote that “Proletariat as the Vanguard of Revolution” and “the necessity of Dictatorship of the Proletariat for establishing a Socialist Society.”
He says, “Revolution whether it is national or socialist, the forces which we can depend upon, are workers and peasants’’ (Draft of Revolutionary Programme). So he is not only clear about the concept of revolution but also about how to make it. He writes, “Name of the party should be, communist party. This party with solid discipline will lead the other parties. It will have to lead the other parties (organising) of workers and peasants. Party will strive to dominate the congress of trade unions and other such mass and political organisations. Party will conduct a printing campaign disseminating not only national politics but also class-consciousness. A simple and easy socialist theory shall be given to the masses….Apart from this; party must have a military wing. It is very important.” Negating his earlier methods, he writes, “It is not necessary that party shall work only secretly. Though policy of voluntarily going to jails should be abandoned. Many activists may have to head an underground life.” The core of this party shall be a professional revolutionary, stressing this Bhagat writes “We would like to use very clear word of Lenin, ‘Professional Revolutionary’. Those who have no other aim except revolution. More such activists, nearer will be revolution.” He was reading Lenin in his last moments before being hanged in a Lahore jail on March 23, 1931.
“The colonial tyrant called you the
terrorist Bhagat Singh that day,
The neofascist despot calls you the
terrorist Naxalite today.
But you will be remembered as the
morning star tomorrow”
A stanza from a poem by the
Telugu poet, Sri Sri,
a tribute to
Bhagat Singh and the Naxalites
