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

distorting the history of my country and misrepresenting the principal characters in it. For to put up with such distortion. I regard as timidity and a sin. The British Government had itself appointed a Commission to review a report on the actions of Nanasaheb in this Mutiny And the report has completely exonerated him. The charges made against him, in the particular episode you have mentioned, have been found by the Commission to be baseless and exaggerated statements. They were declared to be emanations from the wicked brain of some soldiers in the English camp at the time." Who, pray, is not selfish? "You have described Nanasaheb and Tatya Tope as selfish men." "Yes, for Nanasaheb wanted back his Raj, and Tatya wanted to pass for a hero", said the visitor. I replied, "Yes indeed, but is it not true also that victor Emmanuel wanted to be the King of Italy, that George Washington desired to be the first President of the American Republic, and Garibaldi wished to be a hero? But strictly speaking they all fought for the Independence of their own country!" "Then, you also raised the revolt to seek independence" Mr. Barrie interposed. "That is a different issue altogether The Indian Mutiny of 1857 does not necessarily justify any revolutionary activity today Nor are we precluded from any such action on the ground that nothing of that kind had happened in 1857 The inference on either side is not only absurd but foolish as well " The visitor, it seemed, had read a book or two on Indian Mutiny. He retorted, "Then you mean to say that the slaughter of English women at Cawnpore by the mutineers is a concocted story " ."I have never said that" I answered. "It is a fact and it is a deplorable fact But the issue is who was responsible for the carnage, and how did it at all happen? The women in that prison-camp were first treated as prisoners of war. And this is proved from the evidence of the survivors, and of those who had independently testified to the fact. I have reproduced that evidence in my work on the subject. When the British army marched on Cawnpore, it set fire to the villages round about Allahabad and kept them burning. And in that fire were destroyed the females of those who had participated in the Indian Revolt The news inflamed the Indian regiments that had joined the Mutiny. Meanwhile, the English women who had been confined as prisoners of war, had sent secret missives to the army marching on Cawnpore. Their messages happened to be intercepted by soldiers in the Indian Camp. All this had contributed additional fuel to the fire that was already burning, with the result that you describe as the wholesale slaughter of English women by Indian soldiers. Both are equally guilty or not guilty If we are to regard these act: as blameworthy, we must blame in an equal measure the excesses of the British army, which were partly responsible for these actions. Do you regard Cromwell's action an Ireland, the massacre he carried on at Drogheda, as an act of monstrous cruelty? Are you ashamed of it? In times of fierce national crisis and revolution, such things are bound to happen. And however regrettable in themselves the