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

And he performed the Puja. All the clerks, the peons and the villagers in Yeravada received invitations for the 'puja' and the 'prasad', and as I had already prepared their minds for it, they had all gone to his house for the occasion. The doctor, who was for twenty-five years out of the fold of Hinduism, now really felt that he was admitted back into it. And he wrote letters to that effect to his own people in Madras. I used to be informed many years after this incident that the man and his wife had made a happy home for themselves as converted Hindus. Major Murray, our former Superintendent in the Andamans and now an Inspector in the Yeravada jail, often used to ask me what I was going to do in life after I had become a free man. I gave him always a set answer, and that was that it depended always on the circumstances in which I happened to be discharged and which alone could shape my future course. The question and the answer never ended there but were invariably followed by a prolonged discussion about the future. And then I would conclude the whole argument with the proposition that if I were released unconditionally I would take my full part in the politics of the country. "What kind of politics?"— that was the question which inevitably followed. I had, then, to say that it also depended on circumstances of the hour. If the reforms were to bear good fruit and naturally led to the further enlargement of powers granted to the people, I would be for responsive cooperation and work out my goal through the path of peace and constructive constitutional work. If a ban were put on me not to participate in politics for a few years, I would spend the years in other fields of work open to me. I told Major Murray that it was my duty as a follower of responsive cooperation, to accept such conditions as would enable me to do better and larger work for my country than I was able to do during the years of imprisonment. I would be free thus to serve my mother country, and I would regard it as a social duty. This was not a new phase with me. I used to talk to the officers in the Andamans, when they discussed the matter with me in the same vein. But nothing so far had come out of these talks. And I naturally concluded that this discussion would follow the way of all previous conversations on the subject. I had entertained no hopes from the discussion. Of course, human being that I was, I had been exerting my utmost to get free. On the other hand, not banking upon fond hope, I went on with my day-to-day public work in the prison with such patience as I had at my command. A meeting with Sir George Lloyd One day when I was in the prison-hospital for the treatment of acute pain in the stomach and indisposition, a trusted officer sent me word that Sir George Lloyd, the Governor of Bombay, was coming to see me along with two or three big officials during the course of that week.