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British rulers5/6/2023 In other words, we want absolute independence.” Our movement must not be limited to being against any particular law, but it must be for acquiring the authority to make laws itself. “We must stop complaining about this British officer or that officer, this law or that law. In a famous declaration before the society, he said: On sailing to England to study law in 1906, Savarkar founded the Free India Society to organise Indian students studying in England to fight for independence. “whenever the natural process of national and political evolution is violently suppressed by the force of wrong, the revolution must step in as a natural reaction and therefore ought to be welcomed as the only effective instrument to re-throne Truth and Right.” Savarkar was then an atheist and a rationalist, who had started out on a revolutionary road to rid India of her colonial yoke, asserting: While he disagreed “with his ideology”, Sardesai said he honoured Savarkar’s “spirit as freedom fighter”.Ī freedom fighter he definitely was, for a certain period in the first decade of the previous century, long before he’d begun articulating the notion of Hindutva. And somewhere in the stream of Twitter accolades from numerous BJP ministers that followed, the TV anchor Rajdeep Sardesai joined the chorus, albeit with a caveat. “Today, on birth anniversary of Veer Savarkar, let us remember & pay tribute to this great freedom fighter & social-political philosopher,” he tweeted. In 2015, commemorating Savarkar on his 132nd birth anniversary, the prime minister bowed before a portrait of the Hindutva icon in remembrance of “his indomitable spirit and invaluable contribution to India’s history”.įinance minister Arun Jaitley was quick to follow up on the act. Such is the man who was declared by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to be “the true son of Mother India and inspiration for many people”, in his Twitter salutation to Savarkar on his birth anniversary on May 28 last year. Post independence, Savarkar was also implicated in Mahatma Gandhi’s murder. He further destabilised the freedom movement by pushing his Hindutva ideology, which deepened the communal divide at a time when a united front against colonial rule was needed. Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (1883-1966) – mythologised in popular imagination as ‘Veer Savarkar’ – not only refrained from participating in the freedom struggle after the British released him from prison on account of his relentless pleas for mercy, but also actively collaborated with the English rulers to whom he had declared his loyalty.Īt the time when Subhas Chandra Bose was raising his Indian National Army to confront the British in India, Savarkar helped the colonial government recruit lakhs of Indians into its armed forces. Ambedkar as those “who spent life on the path of duty.” Note: This article was first published on May 28, 2017, and is being republished on August 15, 2022, after PM Modi mentioned Savarkar in his Independence Day speech, along with Mahatma Gandhi, Subhas Chandra Bose and B.R.
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