Vinayak Damodar Savarkar
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (, Marathi pronunciation: ]; 28 May 1883 – 26 February 1966), known among followers by the honorific prefix Veer, was an Indian politician, activist, and writer. He developed the Hindu nationalist political ideology of Hindutva while imprisoned at Ratnagiri in 1922. He was a leading figure in the Hindu Mahasabha. Savarkar joined the Hindu Mahasabha and popularized the term "Hindutva" (Hinduness), previously coined by Chandranath Basu, to create a collective "Hindu" identity as an essence of Bharat (India). Savarkar was an atheist but a pragmatic practitioner of Hindu philosophy. Savarkar began his political activities as a high  school student and continued to do so at Fergusson College in Pune. He and his brother founded a secret society called Abhinav Bharat Society. When he went to the United Kingdom for his law studies, he involved himself with organizations such as India House and the Free India Society. He also published books advocating complete Indian independence by revolutionary means. One of the books he published called "The Indian War of Independence" about the Indian Rebellion of 1857 was banned by the British colonial authorities. In 1910, Savarkar was arrested and ordered to be extradited to India for his connections  with the revolutionary group India House. On the voyage back to India, Savarkar staged an attempt to escape and seek asylum in France while the ship was docked in the port of Marseilles. The French port officials however handed him back to the British government in contravention of international law. On return to India, Savarkar was sentenced to two life terms of imprisonment totaling fifty years and was moved to the Cellular Jail in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. After 1937, he started traveling widely, becoming a forceful orator and writer, advocating Hindu political and social unity. In 1938, he  was a president of Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in Mumbai. Serving as the president of the Hindu Mahasabha, Savarkar endorsed the idea of India as a "Hindu Rashtra" ("Hindu Nation"). He started his militarisation of Hindus from then in order to liberate the country and protect the country and Hindus in the future. Savarkar was openly critical of the decision taken by the Congress working committee in its Wardha session of 1942 to a resolution which said to the British colonial government: "Quit India but keep your armies here", which was intended to defend India against a possible Japanese invasion; Savarkar  was opposed to any form of Britain's presence in India whatsoever. In July 1942, as he felt extremely stressed carrying out his duties as the president of Hindu Mahasabha, and as he needed some rest, he resigned from the post, the timing of which coincided with Gandhi's Quit India Movement. In 1948, Savarkar was charged as a co-conspirator in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi; however, he was acquitted by the court for lack of evidence. Savarkar resurfaced in the popular discourse after the coming of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) into power in 1998 and again in  2014 with the Modi-led BJP government at the center. Life and career. Early life. Vinayak Damodar Savarkar was born on 28 May 1883 in the Marathi Chitpavan Brahmin Hindu family of Damodar and Radhabai Savarkar in the village of Bhagur, near the city of Nashik, Maharashtra. He had three other siblings namely Ganesh, Narayan, and a sister named Maina. When he was 12, he led fellow students in an attack on his village mosque following Hindu-Muslim riots, stating: "We vandalized the mosque to our heart's content." In 1903, in Nashik, Savarkar and his older brother Ganesh Savarkar  founded the Mitra Mela, an underground revolutionary organization, which became Abhinav Bharat Society in 1906. Abhinav Bharat's main objectives were to overthrow British rule and reviving Hindu pride. Arrest in London and Marseille. In India, Ganesh Savarkar had organized an armed revolt against the Morley-Minto reforms of 1909. The Indian Imperial Police implicated Savarkar in the investigation for allegedly plotting the crime. Hoping to evade arrest, Savarkar moved to Bhikaiji Cama's home in Paris. Case before the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Savarkar's arrest at Marseilles caused the French government to protest against the British, arguing that  the British could not recover Savarkar unless they took appropriate legal proceedings for his rendition. The dispute came before the Permanent Court of International Arbitration in 1910, and it gave its decision in 1911. The case excited much controversy as was reported widely by the French press, and it considered it involved an interesting international question of the right of asylum. The Court held, firstly, that since there was a pattern of collaboration between the two countries regarding the possibility of Savarkar's escape in Marseilles and there was neither force nor fraud in inducing the French authorities to return  Savarkar to them, the British authorities did not have to hand him back to the French for the latter to hold rendition proceedings. On the other hand, the tribunal also observed that there had been an "irregularity" in Savarkar's arrest and delivery over to the Indian Army Military Police guard. Trial and sentence. Arriving in Bombay, Savarkar was taken to the Yervada Central Jail in Pune. The trial before the special tribunal was started on 10 September 1910. One of the charges on Savarkar was the abetment to murder of Nashik Collector Jackson. The second was waging a conspiracy  under Indian penal code 121-A against the King emperor. Following the two trials, Savarkar, then aged 28, was convicted and sentenced to 50-years imprisonment and transported on 4 July 1911 to the infamous Cellular Jail in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. He was considered by the British government as a political prisoner. Prisoner in Andaman. Savarkar applied to the Bombay Government for certain concessions in connection with his sentences. However, by Government letter No. 2022, dated 4 April 1911, his application was rejected and he was informed that the question of remitting the second sentence of transportation for  life would be considered in due course on the expiry of the first sentence of transportation for life. A month after arriving in the Cellular Jail, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Savarkar submitted his first clemency petition on 30 August 1911. This petition was rejected on 3 September 1911. Savarkar submitted his next clemency petition on 14 November 1913 and presented it personally to the Home Member of the Governor General's council, Sir Reginald Craddock. In his letter, he described himself as a ""prodigal son"" longing to return to the ""parental doors of the government"". He wrote that his release  from the jail will recast the faith of many Indians in the British rule. Also, he said ""Moreover, my conversion to the constitutional line would bring back all those misled young men in India and abroad who were once looking up to me as their guide. I am ready to serve the government in any capacity they like, for as my conversion is conscientious so I hope my future conduct would be. By keeping me in jail, nothing can be got in comparison to what would be otherwise."" In 1917, Savarkar submitted another clemency petition, this time for a general  amnesty of all political prisoners. Savarkar was informed on 1 February 1918 that the clemency petition was placed before the British colonial government. In December 1919, there was a Royal proclamation by King-Emperor George V. The Paragraph 6 of this proclamation included a declaration of Royal clemency to political offenders. In view of Royal proclamation, Savarkar submitted his fourth clemency petition to the British colonial government on 30 March 1920, in which he stated that "So far from believing in the militant school of the Bukanin type, I do not contribute even to the peaceful and philosophical anarchism of  a Kuropatkin [sic.] or a Tolstoy. And as to my revolutionary tendencies in the past:- it is not only now for the object of sharing the clemency but years before this have I informed of and written to the Government in my petitions (1918, 1914) about my firm intention to abide by the constitution and stand by it as soon as a beginning was made to frame it by Mr. Montagu. Since that the Reforms and then the Proclamation have only confirmed me in my views and recently I have publicly avowed my faith in and readiness to stand by  the side of orderly and constitutional development." This petition was rejected on 12 July 1920 by the British colonial government. After considering the petition, the British colonial government contemplated releasing Ganesh Savarkar but not Vinayak Savarkar. The rationale for doing so was stated as follows Savarkar signed a statement endorsing his trial, verdict, and British law, and renouncing violence, a bargain for freedom. Restricted freedom in Ratnagiri. On 2 May 1921, the Savarkar brothers were moved to a jail in Ratnagiri. During his incarceration in Ratnagiri jail in 1922, he wrote his "Essentials of Hindutva" that formulated his theory of  Hindutva. On 6 January 1924 was released but confined to Ratnagiri District. Soon after he started working on the consolidation of Hindu society or Hindu Sangathan. The colonial authorities provided a bungalow for him and he was allowed, visitors. During his internment, he met influential people such as Mahatma Gandhi, and Dr. Ambedkar. Nathuram Godse, who later on in his life assassinated Gandhi, also met Savarkar for the first time as a nineteen-year-old in 1929. Savarkar became a prolific writer during his years of confinement in Ratnagiri. His publishers, however, needed to have a disclaimer that they were  wholly divorced from politics. Savarkar remained confined to Ratnagiri district until 1937. At that time, he was unconditionally released by the newly elected government of Bombay presidency. Leader of the Hindu Mahasabha. Savarkar as president of the Hindu Mahasabha, during the Second World War, advanced the slogan "Hinduize all Politics and Militarize Hindudom" and decided to support the British war effort in India seeking military training for the Hindus. When the Congress launched the "Quit India" movement in 1942, Savarkar criticised it and asked Hindus to stay active in the war effort and not disobey the government; he also urged  the Hindus to enlist in the armed forces to learn the "arts of war". Hindu Mahasabha activists protested Gandhi's initiative to hold talks with Jinnah in 1944, which Savarkar denounced as "appeasement". He assailed the British proposals for transfer of power, attacking both the Congress and the British for making concessions to Muslim separatists. Soon after independence, Dr Shyama Prasad Mookerjee resigned as vice-president of the Hindu Mahasabha dissociating himself from its "Akhand Hindustan" ("Undivided India") plank, which implied undoing partition. Opposition to Quit India Movement. Under Savarkar, the Hindu Mahasabha openly opposed the call for the Quit  India Movement and boycotted it officially. Savarkar even went to the extent of writing a letter titled "Stick to your Posts", in which he instructed Hindu Sabhaites who happened to be "members of municipalities, local bodies, legislatures or those serving in the army ... to stick to their posts" across the country, and not to join the Quit India Movement at any cost. Alliance with Muslim League and others. The Indian National Congress won a massive victory in the 1937 Indian provincial elections, decimating the Muslim League and the Hindu Mahasabha. However, in 1939, the Congress ministries resigned in protest against  Viceroy Lord Linlithgow's action of declaring India to be a belligerent in the Second World War without consulting the Indian people. This led to the Hindu Mahasabha, under Savarkar's presidency, joining hands with the Muslim League and other parties to form governments, in certain provinces. Such coalition governments were formed in Sindh, NWFP, and Bengal. In Sindh, Hindu Mahasabha members joined Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah's Muslim League government. In Savarkar's own words,"Witness the fact that only recently in Sind, the Sind-Hindu-Sabha on invitation had taken the responsibility of joining hands with the League itself in  running coalition government In the North West Frontier Province, Hindu Mahasabha members joined hands with Sardar Aurangzeb Khan of the Muslim League to form a government in 1943. The Mahasabha member of the cabinet was Finance Minister Mehar Chand Khanna. In Bengal, Hindu Mahasabha joined the Krishak Praja Party led Progressive Coalition ministry of Fazlul Haq in December 1941. Savarkar appreciated the successful functioning of the coalition government. Arrest and acquittal in Gandhi's assassination. Following the assassination of Gandhi on 30 January 1948, police arrested the assassin Nathuram Godse and his alleged accomplices and conspirators. He was a member  of the Hindu Mahasabha and of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Godse was the editor of "Agrani – Hindu Rashtra", a Marathi daily from Pune which was run by the company "The Hindu Rashtra Prakashan Ltd" (The Hindu Nation Publications). This company had contributions from such eminent persons as Gulabchand Hirachand, Bhalji Pendharkar, and Jugalkishore Birla. Savarkar had invested 15000 in the company. Savarkar, a former president of the Hindu Mahasabha, was arrested on 5 February 1948, from his house in Shivaji Park, and kept under detention in the Arthur Road Prison, Bombay. He was charged with murder, conspiracy to murder, and  abetment to murder. A day before his arrest, Savarkar in a public written statement, as reported in "The Times of India", Bombay dated 7 February 1948, termed Gandhi's assassination a fratricidal crime, endangering India's existence as a nascent nation. The mass of papers seized from his house had revealed nothing that could remotely be connected with Gandhi's murder. Due to lack of evidence, Savarkar was arrested under the Preventive Detention Act. Approver's testimony. Godse claimed full responsibility for planning and carrying out the assassination. However, according to the Approver Digambar Badge, on 17 January 1948, Nathuram  Godse went to have a last "darshan" (audience/interview) with Savarkar in Bombay before the assassination. While Badge and Shankar waited outside, Nathuram and Apte went in. On coming out Apte told Badge that Savarkar blessed them ""Yashasvi houn ya"" (""यशस्वी होऊन या"", be successful and return). Apte also said that Savarkar predicted that Gandhi's 100 years were over and there was no doubt that the task would be successfully finished. However Badge's testimony was not accepted as the approver's evidence lacked independent corroboration and hence Savarkar was acquitted. In the last week of August 1974, Mr.  Manohar Malgonkar saw Digamber Badge several times and in particular, questioned him about the veracity of his testimony against Savarkar. Badge insisted to Mr. Manohar Malgonkar that "even though he had blurted out the full story of the plot as far as he knew, without much persuasion, he had put up a valiant struggle against being made to testify against Savarkar". In the end, Badge gave in. He agreed to say on oath that he saw Nathuram Godse and Apte with Savarkar and that Savarkar, within Badge's hearing, had blessed their venture... Kapur commission. On 12 November 1964, at  a religious program organized in Pune to celebrate the release of Gopal Godse, Madanlal Pahwa and Vishnu Karkare from jail after the expiry of their sentences, Dr. G. V. Ketkar, grandson of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, former editor of Kesari and then editor of ""Tarun Bharat"", who presided over the function, gave information of a conspiracy to kill Gandhi, about which he professed knowledge six months before the act. Ketkar was arrested. A public furor ensued both outside and inside the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly and both houses of the Indian parliament. Under the pressure of 29 members of parliament and public  opinion the then Union home minister Gulzarilal Nanda appointed Gopal Swarup Pathak, M. P. and a senior advocate of the Supreme Court of India as a Commission of Inquiry to re-investigate the conspiracy to murder Gandhi. The central government intended on conducting a thorough inquiry with the help of old records in consultation with the government of Maharashtra. Pathak was given three months to conduct his inquiry; subsequently, Jevanlal Kapur, a retired judge of the Supreme Court of India, was appointed chairman of the commission. The Kapur Commission was provided with evidence not produced in the court; especially the  testimony of two of Savarkar's close aides – Appa Ramachandra Kasar, his bodyguard, and Gajanan Vishnu Damle, his secretary. The testimony of Mr. Kasar and Mr. Damle was already recorded by Bombay police on 4 March 1948, but apparently, these testimonies were not presented before the court during the trial. In these testimonies, it is said that Godse and Apte visited Savarkar on or about 23 or 24 January, which was when they returned from Delhi after the bomb incident. Damle deposed that Godse and Apte saw Savarkar in the middle of January and sat with him (Savarkar) in his  garden. The C. I. D. Bombay was keeping vigil on Savarkar from 21 to 30 January 1948. The crime report from C. I. D. does not mention Godse or Apte meeting Savarkar during this time. Justice Kapur concluded: "All these facts taken together were destructive of any theory other than the conspiracy to murder by Savarkar and his group." The arrest of Savarkar was mainly based on approver Digambar Badge's testimony. The commission did not re-interview Digambar Badge. At the time of inquiry of the commission, Badge was alive and working in Bombay. Later years. After Gandhi's  assassination, Savarkar's home in Dadar, Bombay was stoned by angry mobs. After he was acquitted of the allegations related to Gandhi's assassination and released from jail, Savarkar was arrested by the government for making "Hindu nationalist speeches"; he was released after agreeing to give up political activities. He continued addressing the social and cultural elements of Hindutva. He resumed political activism after the ban on it was lifted; it was however limited until his death in 1966 because of ill health. His followers bestowed upon him honors and financial awards when he was alive.Although Savarkar and the  Golwalkar, the RSS sarsanghachalak were not particularly close to each other, two thousand RSS workers gave his funeral procession a guard of honor. According to McKean, there was public antipathy between Savarkar and the Congress for most of his political career, yet after independence Congress ministers, Vallabhbhai Patel and C. D. Deshmukh unsuccessfully sought partnership with the Hindu Mahasabha and Savarkar. It was forbidden for Congress party members to participate in public functions honoring Savarkar. Nehru refused to share the stage during the centenary celebrations of the India's First War of Independence held in Delhi. However, after the death  of Nehru, the Congress government, under Prime Minister Shastri, started to pay him a monthly pension. Death. On 8 November 1963, Savarkar's wife, Yamuna, died. On 1 February 1966, Savarkar renounced medicines, food, and water which he termed as "atmaarpan" (fast until death). Before his death, he had written an article titled "Atmahatya Nahi Atmaarpan" in which he argued that when one's life mission is over and the ability to serve society is left no more, it is better to end the life at will rather than waiting for death. His condition was described to have become as  extremely serious before his death on 26 February 1966 at his residence in Bombay (now Mumbai), and that he faced difficulty in breathing; efforts to revive him failed, and was declared dead at 11:10 a.m. (IST) that day. Prior to his death, Savarkar had asked his relatives to perform only his funeral and do away with the rituals of the 10th and 13th day of the Hindu faith. Accordingly, his last rites were performed at an electric crematorium in Bombay's Sonapur locality by his son Vishwas the following day. He was mourned by large crowds that attended his cremation . He left behind a son, Vishwas, and a daughter, Prabha Chiplunkar. His first son, Prabhakar, had died in infancy. His home, possessions and other personal relics have been preserved for public display. There was no official mourning by the then Congress party government of Maharashtra or at the centre. Religious and political views. Hindutva. During his incarceration, Savarkar's views began turning increasingly towards Hindu cultural and political nationalism, and the next phase of his life remained dedicated to this cause. In the brief period he spent at the Ratnagiri jail, Savarkar wrote his ideological treatise – "". Smuggled out of the  prison, it was published by Savarkar's supporters under his alias "Maharatta." In this work, Savarkar promotes a farsighted new vision of Hindu social and political consciousness. Savarkar began describing a "Hindu" as a patriotic inhabitant of Bharatavarsha, venturing beyond a religious identity. While emphasising the need for patriotic and social unity of all Hindu communities, he described Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism and Buddhism as one and the same. He outlined his vision of a "Hindu Rashtra" ("Hindu Nation") as "Akhand Bharat" ("United India"), purportedly stretching across the entire Indian subcontinent. He defined Hindus as being neither Aryan nor Dravidian but  as "People who live as children of a common motherland, adoring a common holyland." Scholars, historians and Indian politicians have been divided in their interpretation of Savarkar's ideas. A self-described atheist, Savarkar regards being Hindu as a cultural and political identity. He often stressed social and community unity between Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains, to the exclusion of Muslims and Christians. Savarkar saw Muslims and Christians as "misfits" in the Indian civilization who could not truly be a part of the nation. He argued that the holiest sites of Islam and Christianity are in the Middle East and  not India, hence the loyalty of Muslims and Christians to India is divided. After his release from jail on 6 January 1924, Savarkar helped found the Ratnagiri Hindu Sabha organisation, aiming to work for the social and cultural preservation of Hindu heritage and civilisation. Becoming a frequent and forceful orator, Sarvakar agitated for the use of Hindi as a common national language and against caste discrimination and untouchability. Focusing his energies on writing, Savarkar authored the "Hindu Pad-pada-shahi" – a book documenting the Maratha empire – and "My Transportation for Life" – an account of his early revolutionary days, arrest, trial  and incarceration. He also wrote and published a collection of poems, plays and novels. He also wrote a book named "Majhi Janmathep" ("My Life-term") about his experience in Andaman prison. Hindu orthodoxy. He was an ardent critique of Hindu religious practices he saw as irrational and viewed them as a hindrance to the material progress of the Hindus. He believed that religion is an unimportant aspect of "Hindu identity". He was strictly against the caste system and in his 1931 essay titled "Seven Shackles of the Hindu Society," he wrote "One of the most important components of such injunctions  of the past that we have blindly carried on and which deserves to be thrown in the dustbins of history is the rigid caste system". Fascism. In a speech before a 20,000 strong audience at Pune on 1 August 1938, Savarkar stood by Germany's right to Nazism and Italy's to Fascism; their achievement of unprecedent glory in the world-stage and a successful inculcation of national solidarity justified those choices. Savarkar criticized Nehru for denouncing Germany and Italy, proclaiming that "crores of Hindu Sanghatanists in India [..] cherish[ed] no ill-will towards Germany or Italy or Japan." He proclaimed  his support for the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in the same breath. As World War II become imminent, Savarkar had initially advocated a policy of neutralism centered on India's geostrategic equations but his rhetoric grew coarser with time and he expressed consistent support for Hitler's policy about Jews. In a speech on October 14, it was suggested that Hitler's ways be adopted for dealing with Indian Muslims. On December 11, he characterized the Jews as a communal force. Next March, Savarkar would welcome Germany's revival of Aryan culture, their glorification of Swastika, and the "crusade" against  Aryan enemies — it was hoped that German victory would finally invigorate the Hindus of India. On 5 August 1939, Savarkar highlighted how a common strand of "thought, religion, language, and culture" was essential to nationality thus preventing the Germans and Jews from being considerable as one nation. By the year end, he was directly equating the Muslims of India with German Jews — in the words of Chetan Bhatt, both were suspected of harboring extra-national loyalties and became illegitimate presences in an organic nation. These speeches circulated in German newspapers with Nazi Germany even allotting a point-of-contact person  for engaging with Savarkar, who was making sincere efforts to forge a working relationship with the Nazis. Eventually, Savarkar would be gifted with a copy of Mein Kampf. In 1941, Savarkar supported Jews resettling their fatherland of Israel, in what he believed would defend the world against Islamic aggression. It remains unknown whether Savarkar withdrew his support for Nazi Germany after the Holocaust became common knowledge. However, on 15 January 1961 he had spoken favorably of Hitler's Nazism against Nehru's "cowardly democracy". Muslims. Historians including Rachel McDermott, Leonard A. Gordon, Ainslie Embree, Frances Pritchett and Dennis Dalton state  that Savarkar promoted an anti-Muslim form of Hindu nationalism. Scholar Vinayak Chaturvedi states that Savarkar was known for his anti-Muslim writings. Savarkar saw Muslims in the Indian police and military to be "potential traitors". He advocated that India reduce the number of Muslims in the military, police and public service and ban Muslims from owning or working in munitions factories. Savarkar criticized Gandhi for being concerned about Indian Muslims. Chaturvedi notes that there was a "shift" in Savakar's views: in his earlier writings he argued for "Indian independence from British rule", whereas in later writings he focused  on "Hindu independence from Christians and Muslims". In his 1907 "Indian War of Independence", Savarkar includes Muslims as heroes.. In his 1963 "Six Glorious Epochs", Savarkar says Muslims and Christians wanted to "destroy" Hinduism. In the 1940s, the two-nation theory was supported by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Savarkar, additionally Savarkar also urged Sikhs to establish an independent "Sikhistan". While Jinnah supported a separate country for Muslims as a part of this theory, Savarkar wanted both religions in the same country where the Muslims lived in a subordinate position to the Hindus. Since then, RSS continued pursuing this unequal citizenship . Legacy. The airport at Port Blair, Andaman and Nicobar's capital was renamed Veer Savarkar International Airport in 2002. One of the commemorative blue plaques affixed on India House fixed by the Historic Building and Monuments Commission for England reads "Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, 1883–1966, Indian patriot and philosopher lived here". In 1926, two years after the release of Savarkar from the prison, a biography titled ""Life of Barrister Savarkar"" and authored by a certain "Chitragupta" was published. A revised version was published in 1939 with additions by Indra Prakash of the Hindu Mahasabha. A second edition of the book was  published in 1987 by Veer Savarkar Prakashan, the official publisher of writings by Savarkar. In its preface, Ravindra Vaman Ramdas deduced that, "Chitragupta is none other than Veer Savarkar". There exists ample debate among scholars about the authenticity of this deduction. In January 1924 Savarkar was released from Jail and was confined to the territories of Ratnagiri District and was banned from engaging publicly or privately in any manner of political activities. The same year, a brief biography of Savarkar was published in Marathi by Sadashiv Rajaram Ranade titled "स्वातंत्रवीर विनायकराव सावरकर ह्यंचे संक्षिप्त चरित्र" which in English translates to  A Short Biography of Swatantraveer Vinakarao Savarkar in which he was first referred to as Swatantraveer throughout the biography. Books. He wrote 38 books in English and Marathi, consisting in many essays, two novels called "Moplah Rebellion" and "the Transportation", poetry and plays, the best-known of his books being his historical study "The Indian war of independence, 1857" and his pamphlet "".