मेरा आजीवन कारावास / माझी जन्मठेप (स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकर - काले पानी का ऐतिहासिक संस्मरण)

minute sub-divisions and disintegration but fusion and integration. This weighed with them somewhat, and all my Sikh workers succeeded in effecting a compromise. The Sikhs were to make a representation to the authorities and fill in the census-form as Hindus though within brackets they were to show themselves as Sikhs. This was a fair compromise. For their prison-warrants had followed the same procedure. First the prisoner's name, then his sect, then his particular caste, like the Jat and the Mahajabi— that was the order in which they were noted in their warrants. The mention of caste made them Hindus without distinction, whatever may be their sect and name. Every Sikh possessed his prisoner's sheet. And not one of them had claimed in it that he was not a jat and was only a Sikh. And the nomenclatures 'Jats' and "Sodhis" were clearly Hindu nomenclatures because they belonged to Hindu castes. And these had no objection, besides, to dine along with other Hindus. This procedure helped a great deal to spread and popularize my definition of Hindu and Hinduism throughout the community of Hindu prisoners in our settlement. Even the officers interested themselves in the discussion and gave it a serious consideration. At last when all forms were received in our office and were duly classified and tabulated, we found to our satisfaction that men of all castes and sects in Hindu society in which the Sikhs were also included had noted themselves by no other nomenclature but that of the simple Hindu. We had to spend days and days in the careful inspection of the prisoners' original warrants. These revealed to us many funny things. An originally depressed class man had changed his caste so many times in these warrants as he passed from prison to prison that ultimately he came out in them as a Brahmin. The Bhangi had effected the gradual change with a distinct motive. As a Brahmin he had a good chance of being selected for the cooking department of the prison. That a Bhangi should rise by this process to be a Brahmin was curious enough. But what was more surprising and insulting in the revelation of the records, was the fact that so many Hindus came out ultimately as Muslims in them; and it was due to the fact that thereby they had set themselves free from all the horrors and tortures of the prison-life. There was evident in them fraudulence and coercion all along the pages. I drew the attention of my friends to that fact, and showed what a change the Shuddhi movement had effected in their condition within but two years. In the final copy of the report, we had counted all as Hindus who were originally Hindus, including in them re-converts from Islam to Hinduism. It showed us clearly the triumph of the Shuddhi movement and the stopping of all efforts to convert Hindus to Islam. We could note from it the number of Hindus so converted as also of those taken back to Hinduism. And we could also count those who yet remained to be reconverted. If the agitation in the Andamans had not done all this, but had only awakened the conscience of the Hindus to the possibility that a Mussulman can also be converted to Hinduism, I would have achieved a great deal. For up to that time the question that was always put to us was, "A Hindu can become a Mussulman, no doubt; but how can a Mussulman be admitted into Hinduism?" Hundreds of Hindus had asked me that question and sincerely believed that there was no answer for it. But none put such a conundrum before us any longer. For the Shuddhi movement had shown that it could be clone, and