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

Balwant Phadke were also sent to serve their Imprisonment in the Andamans. One or two of them happened to be discharged from this place about the time or some time after I had reached the settlement. Some Hindu culprits involved in the Hindu-Muslim riots of 1893 had also been here, as I was told. The Manipur Conspiracy Case had contributed its quota to this prison. And members of the Manipur Royal Family had been put on parole, and lived their lives in a place on the settlement, set apart for that purpose. Such is the story of these Islands since they were selected for the Imprisonment of political prisoners or prisoners involved in similar trials. Hundreds of them, before me, had passed their lives under hard labour in the jail of the Andaman island. But none had so far recorded the story of their imprisonment as I am led to do it now. None had treed so far to stamp it on the heart of India. It is, indeed, a peculiar conjunction of events that impels me to narrate that tale. Thousands of Indians in that place have their claim for consideration, sympathy and duty on the whole of India. They belong to no one province and owe allegiance to Mother India alone, in spite of their difference in caste and creed, in party and other persuasion. The fact is being realised today, however dimly, more than at any time in India's previous history. It is principally the political prisoners of India who have brought this home to the heart of her people.

Port Blair

Port Blair is the name of the harbour and the main island of this settlement. The Andamans contain, by far and large, a collection of Burmese and Indian prisoners. As such, during the last sixty or seventy years its population happens to be mainly composed of Indians. In the Nicobar Islands, on the other hand, the Burmese and the Malayans form their naturalised and settled population. These islands, therefore, are lost today to Indian culture and to contact with Hindu Society The Andamans are having less and less of Indian prisoners now. So there is every fear of their being cut off from contact with India, and the settlement itself being denuded of its Indian population. I, therefore, thank it to be my duty to write a few words here on this question in order to draw the attention of the Indian public to a matter of such vital importance I take upon myself all the blame of having neglected it before.

So soon as the number of Indian prisoners being sent to the Andamans had begun to decline, the Officers of the place planned to divide the whole island into plots, and to put out for sale, the right of Government plantation in coconut and betel-nut trees, to intending purchasers. They intended by this ruse to purchase the whole settlement for themselves and turn it out into a personal estate. As a result the best part of this land with its gardens and plantations is gradually passing into the hands of European and Anglo- Indian settlers on the island. There are almost no Indian merchants in the Andamans rich enough to bid for the purchase of these estates. The merchants in India know nothing about the deal. So the land is going cheap to the settlers mentioned above, with the result that the islands, before long, will be completely lost to India. Such of the local merchants as have purchased a few of these plots and plantations are without resource in proper men from India to develop them, and to enrich themselves with the wealth they contain. A