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

provided for them. Their slogan was:- “ Enjoy till thou goest, mad! Enjoy, for tomorrow we die! Laugh till you go mad, and tomorrow be a morsel to fill the jaws of death!” In these pleasure-houses, the frenzy of laughter sometimes overstepped the bounds of decency, and let itself go in reckless dancing and mirth. For the reveler knew to certainty that his name, that was today on the dancing card, was to be enrolled tomorrow in the casualities of death. Verily the laughter of sorrow is the most hideous of all laughters. These prisoners, deprived of all the good things of life and reduced to a condition of existence which beast even may tremble to live in, their hands and feet bound in chains, their hearts seared and deadened by a career of crime, some of them, being new to sin, feeling the stings of conscience within them, fretting and fuming with anger, sighing and sobbing for grief, were still roaring with laughter- a hundred of them and more were weeping and laughing at the same time. The poignancy of their grief found no relief in light fun and humour. They reeled with the intoxication of the obscene of which they drank deep in this hell on earth. Some came from the province of Sindh, others from Dharwar, some belonged to Kathiawad and Gujarat, and others again were drawn from the Kokan. They talked in different tongues; their thoughts and feelings were so diverse, one form the other; they scarcely understood each other. But the obscene formed the common bond between them all. That had become their national language in which they could thoroughly participate and fully enjoy. This social union had come to them as an opportunity of a life-time, and they used it to the full and abandoned themselves completely to its pleasures and pastimes. The evening was the hour when this rebellious mood of frank and free indulgence in the broadly humourous found its fullest outburst. The whole wing on that side of the person was one pandemonium of shouts and cries, of abuses and peals of laughter, and of irrepressible utterance of coarse and foul language. But in this orgy of self-indulgence even, there ran an undercurrent of honour and duty. Human nature is, indeed, a strange amalgam of conflicting elements. These convicts indulged in this uproarious pastime as if it was a duty which they owed to themselves. It the lowest of the low had not laid this flattering unction to their souls, they could not have shamelessly gone in for the kind of life they were leading. The meanest and the most case-hardened among them egged on others, less perverse and less inured to these ways, by the slogans “ O, my brethren, sing, O, you fools, go on, for the name and notoriety of our outward-bound phalanx.” And they stressed their homily by adding that when they had been last in this place they had all caught hold of the prison bars and shaken them with all their might. They had hurled their pots and pans against the walls and the warders were hard put to it to control them and restore silence. They cajoled, they wept, the6y went down on their knees and they doled out to each one of us a little tobacco as a solatium. “Shout, shout, O, you nincompoops, do not disgrace the name of this gang.” Its Fair Name For it had made a name-this chalan to the Andamans-in the prison-world of those days. It was no mean institution of a body of men. To aspire to the membership of that notorious gang was no mean achievement. We had to pass through several examinations

for admission to that status. It began with the ordinary lock up; the magistrate’s court; the criminal session of the High Court; the jury; and the final verdict. Through these many sieves we had to pass before we became eligible for the crops that was ordered for the Andamans, sent to transportation for life. The troop here was made up of the picked ones of this corps. They constituted the representative leaders of their several provinces. And it was the crown and culmination of the underworld of crime. It had, indeed, a reputation to maintain, for whenever it came to Thana all the warders of the place-the warder, the jamadar, the havildar, the gaoler and the Superintendent-had a fright. The bars must be broken, the walls must collapse, heads must be shattered, a warder or two must have their thrashing, and twenty or more of the gang must receive their whipping and lashing, and their skins must cut open and bleed till this hell on earth would have its quietus. This was our chalan, with this tradition to maintain. The warders must wheedle them, if they at all cared for their lives. The chalan would incur disgrace if it did not bear up to this age-long reputation. The old ones of the gang admonished its recent members in the following words, “Why did you at all go in for crime, if you did not feel like coming up to the standard? Today we are the inheritors of its fame, and we must keep it. We should not tarnish it. Therefore, shout, cry, raise an uproar, dance and abuse. Oh, brothers, we are jealous guardians and cannot afford to lower its name.” Indeed, they felt that was their code of honour. When they indulged in the obscene and the slang common to their tribe, when they danced and jibed, and applause greeted them from all sides of the house. When some one appealed to maintain the honour of the chalan, whistling, clapping, the clanging of chains followed their pranks. And the whole atmosphere resounded to that noise. Thus the wheel ran on and completed its full circle-victims as they were of their brute instincts and sensual appetites. This continued far into the night till the midnight hour had sounded its arrival. The pride of the chalan as an institution made the warder bend before it. The Superintendent lost his self- importance, and all had to eat the humble pie before this outrageous multitude. The only way to soften it was to offer them tobacco and beg of them to maintain silence, to talk if they liked, without being a nuisance to the rest of the colony. The officers were anxious, above everything else, to hand over the party intact when it left the place and was taken in charge by those who were to give it safe conduct, under proper escort, to its last destination. It was, indeed, a heavy strain on their minds and the tension was relieved when the chalan had quitted the place in the same condition and numbers that it had entered it. We always follow the tradition of the community where we belong. There was no finer example of this esprit de corps than this chalan and its behaviour in our midst. If indulgence in the vulgar and obscene is the rule, abstention becomes a sin and a crime. In the days of our Holi, that man is a disgrace who abhors the time-honoured practice of mud-singing. The rest laugh and jeer at him for not falling into line with them. Such is communalism and its practice all over the world. That is, verily, the way of all flesh.

The Prestige Of A Barrister I may have suffered the same fate but I escaped because I happened to be a bar-at- law, a member of the legal profession, and, hence, a man of prestige. The criminal class, and the worst of that class, fears a barrister as they do not fear or revere a poet, a man of learning, a saint or an astute statesman, even if the last be the Premier of England. Utter the name of a barrister and you will see the most hardened criminal raise his brows and ejaculate-“ Is it?” the reason for it was plain enough. Men whose life is spent in thieving and dacoity, in courts and prisons, fear and respect him who can unearth their sins, unravel their threads, and expose them to the world by his legal acumen or can shield them by equal chicanery from the arm of the law. He can prove them guilty or not guilty according to the position he takes up towards them. How can they not quail before him? Or how can they fail to regard him as their saviour? They look upon him as an extraordinary being, and, as such, fear him. The criminal class fears the lawyer and seeks to curry his favour. Stories go round about him in the prison world, not unlike those one hears about the great Birbal and his monarch. The prisoner in the dock trembles before the lawyer as people in Birbal’s time quaked before him. In brief, I must say that my professional degree, if it had served me for nothing else, did serve me in this, that it spared me the insolence and insult of neighbours around me. The most confirmed criminal at once felt humbled before me. I was standing that night near the door of my room. And I quietly watched them in their revelry, dance and riotous behaviour. For many days now I had never heard such noise, never witnessed such a scene. The mind fretting in solitude should have recoiled from the obscenity and riotry of the scene. But it happened to me otherwise. It was like an ignited match thrown into a tin of kerosine. All my repressed feeling flared up and in that blaze I stood there and lost myself in the show. And as I watched its progress, the mind analysed the emotion and traced its genesis to the wretched condition of my own heart. The heart in its woe-be-gone condition could not help turning outside for any relief it might have there. I watched the show because I could do nothing else and in order to forget myself in the ecstasy and revolt of grief I witnessed without me. I did not participate in it, and I found rest and sleep when the whole show had stopped on the admonition of its leader not to disturb me. He seemed to forgive me for not joining in the revelry. As the clock struck eleven the noise had reached its peak, when the warders reminded the party that my sleep was spoiled by their uproar. They had the goodness to listen and to end their shouting. It was about twelve midnight that my eyes drooped and I fell asleep. As I woke up in the morning, the idea came into my head that my elder brother, who was now a prisoner in the Andamans, may have proceeded with a chalan like this and must have stayed in this prison before being carried over. I asked the warder about him but, as he was new to his post, he could give me no information on the subject. An older man, after further enquiry, told me that my brother did occupy the very cell in which I was locked up now. The old man had left, when my brother’s image came up

before my eyes. He had to undergo considerable persecution here, as I had learnt from a co-accused in my trial. And I saw him vividly as he must have stood up under these tortures. He must have faced them unbending like the elephant at bay, as it stands rooted to the spot, while the rider rains upon its head blow after blow of his trident that it may move forward. Behind the bars of the prison-door, he, like an eagle, may have beaten his wings against them. He must have sat here thinking of me. He must have said of himself that it did not very much matter to him, if he was transported to the Andamans, so long as I was free to carry on the work behind him. If these were his musings, what will he say when he knows that I was going the same way as he. What a shock will it be to him? Would that I do not meet him in the Andamans, and that we live in different parts of the island. I think that if only I had suffered by myself, the agonies of my mind would not be one-fiftieth of what they are now. But now that I see my brother before me as he must have suffered, when I hear what he had endured, the thought of it is simply beyond my patience to put up with. My heart was cleft in twain and I felt that I was collapsing under the blow like the bunyan tree suddenly breaking down. I asked an Officer who I could trust, if my brother had to pass through any tortures in this place. He replied, “ Not here. He suffered terribly at Yeravada, as some of the co-accused with you informed me at at the time.” This assurance from him gave me a sort of relief. At least in this cell, he must have slept in peace. I asked the same Officer about Wamanrao Joshi, Soman and other fellow workers who had passed a period of their sentence at Thana. Brethren, Start We For The Sea Only two or three days after, our army o prisoners was taken out to proceed to the Andamans. I had shackles on my feet; I wore a chaddar, a banian and a short scarf over it. That was our uniform on the way to the steamer and across. For my bed I had a rough blanket and a hempen carpet which two could not be rolled into a bedding and was, therefore, hard to carry. Somehow I took it under my arm-pit, and carrying my tin-pot and tin-plate in the other hand, I stood ready near my door to fall into the line. The gang came on in a file, clanging their chains in measured steps. They saluted everyone on the way. “Come on brethren, we are proceeding to the Andamans”, they repeated as they marched on. The party came near the main gate and, one by one, they passed across. The soldiers were ready, fully armed to give it an escort along the road. The party walked on to the station under the full guard of the soldiers. I was left behind, I wondered why. A motor car came up to the door. Two big sergeants got down from it. I was put into it and they stepped in after me. The door was shut and the car started. I was not taken along the road like the rest because they feared that the crowd, who knew of my departure, had stationed itself on the road in scattered groups to have a sight of me. Besides I was a culprit who run away at Marseilles. Perhaps, I may be spirited away in the same fashion

by some member of the secret societies, of which there were many in those days. A mine may spring up beneath my feet, and, who knows, I may disappear on a sudden. These and other reasons of safety had decided the authorities to take me to the station all by myself, in a car, and along a different route. They did not want to repeat the mistake that they had committed at Marseilles. Whenever I was thus taken form one place to another in a special car and under a special guard, my fellow-prisoners thought highly of me. They used to say, “Why, he is a king; they take him out in a car; why should he tramp with us along the road?” others said, “Evidently Government is afraid of him. Otherwise they would not have given him a car to go in”. my effort to run away from the steamer-boat at Marseilles did do me some good after all! It procured me a car to enjoy a long drive. It created in the mind of these prisoners a sort of reverence for me. And, further, right or wrong, the more the authorities tried to belittle me, the greater the respect they showed to me. We came to the station and I was shoved one a separate compartment. The other end of my had-cuffs was tied to the hand of the Officer who was charged to carry me. Poor man, he had to be a prisoner like myself for the time-being. There were shackles on my feet as well. Not only did I wear hand-cuffs, but my two hands were tied together by a chain between them. I could not tuck up my dhoti, the Officer had to do it for me. If I had to go to the lavatory, he had, perforce, to accompany me, as he and I were holding together by a common chain. So also about sleep. Such wretched experience and dirty life I had to pass through during my journeys, to and fro, from one place to another. Although they had quietly put me in a separate compartment, people had noted my transit all night. They approached my compartment with eager expectation and as ruthlessly, they were turned out from that place. They were not only Indians but counted some Europeans among the number. These could come close to me, open the shutters of my compartment and addressed me in polite or rude words as they liked, and leave. There was no restriction or forbidding in their case. The train started, but at every station, where it stopped in the journey, I found the shutters of my window put down. Since the time I had left England, I was never allowed to travel in any compartment with windows up. But the Officer with me in this compartment had, as if by prearrangement, kept the window shutters up so that the European visitors should have a full look of me. A large crowd of them had come near my compartment. Some of these men had lifted up their women-folk on their shoulders that might see me clearly. One beckoned on to me to stand up. “There is he; that is Savarkar”, went up the cry form all sides as I stoop up. The European ladies and gentlemen on the station platform, of course, did not come so near me as I could talk to them. Four or five of them did come close enough. But I did not exchange a word with them. I did not enquire who they were. They were all polite to me; only rarely, I met with insolence from them. And if nay one of them was rude to me, I paid him back in the same coin. I simply cold-shouldered him, and so he melted away.

Those Hot Plains The windows of my compartment were always kept shut. Across the bars in another compartment was huddled up the party bound for the Andaman islands. They were all in an uproar on that side. Those were hot summer days. The heat of the Sun overhead was like that of a burning furnace. A marriage party going in that train would have found the journey unbearable. I was only a prisoner sent to transportation for life. How then must have I felt it? the plains all about us were exuding hot vapour, and correspondingly it was steaming hot in the train. And both vied, as it were, with the dreariness and burning heat of the heart within. My soul and body were oppressed by both. In this state of mind and body I found the train running at full speed through the Mogul territory on its way to Madras. In desperateness, I recalled to my mind the treck of prisoners in Russia marched in exile to the bleak regions of Siberia. Their miseries made me cry, “You have not yet experienced a fraction of them. This is not a mere matter of words. As thou sowest so shalt thou reap. And he alone will reap who had dared to sow”. The train was leaping across village after village, town after town, through gardens and forests, across the rivers and over the valleys, along the mountains, up hill and down dale like an maddened tigress carrying in its mouth the prey which was no other than myself. The train was delivering me to the Andamans with the rapidity of a lightening. Will it bring me back to my own country with the same speed? Will it bring me back at all? How can it bring me back and when? Vain imaginings these and obstinate questionings! But the mind that hopes against hope cannot escape them. In far off Siberia, many a prisoner dies with the name of dear Russia on his burning lips. So may I die far away from dear India, and in the Andamans breathing the last word-my motherland! The train arrived at Madras. I was taken down from my compartment and was kept under guard apart from my fellow prisoners in the train. An Officer had accompanied the train right through the journey. Between every two stations he would come to my compartment, talk to the Officer in it, have a look at me and go back. I thought he was to leave us now as we had reached Madras. He approached me now and wished me good-bye. He seemed to be overcome with feeling as he said, “ I do hope, my friend, you will be let off in the coming coronation ceremony at Delhi.” That was to be on December. I answered, “Thanks for your good wishes. My wounds are so raw that nothing can heal them. It would be folly for me to bank upon this hope.” The officer assured me t the contrary as of he was in the know of things. “Believe me; you will be free before long; good-bye. Nothing will efface from my mind the impression of this your dignified courage.” Other Officers also took leave of me in the same manner. Having heard all sorts of report about my behaviour at Marseilles, they had conjectured that, in the journey, I would prove a horrible nuisance to them, I would hate the Englishman as a devil, I would burn with rage against him. They took me naturally enough for a ruffian, a braggart and an indecent fellow-a veritable miscreant in short. But I gave them no trouble whatsoever. And they could pass me on safely to the Officers in Madras. At long last!

They said to themselves, and heaved a sigh of relief. They found me a fine fellow, and taking off their hats and wishing me, they departed. I was now in Madras where its Collector, Mr. Ashe, was done to death by a man of the Abhinav Bharat Society. And the Officers suspected that it had some connection with the Central Association of that name in Europe of which I happened to be the leading figure. I had, therefore, expected that they would directly or indirectly sound me upon the incident. When I was arrested in England and was being brought back to India, I had not the slightest notion that the vice-president of the Abhinav Bharat, Mr. Aiyer, whose premature death since, we were all mourning as a great loss to the country, had proceeded to India. He had reached Pondicherry from Europe bearing all the rigours of the journey, when warrants were hanging over his head and the police were on his track all along the coast. He had eluded them all by assuming various disguises and offering excuses and making pretences as time and occasion had suggested themselves to him. At Pondicherry he took charge of a branch of the Abhinava Bharata, and had compassed the end of Collector Ashe through the instrument of the Shakta Brahmin. Such was the suspicion of the secret police against Mr. Aiyer. And I learnt this seven or eight years after my incarceration, in the Andamans, having then read the secret report about him. But while I was proceeding to Andamans I had no knowledge whatever of the return of Mr. Aiyer to India. I had, no doubt, information about this murder and I had also suspicion in my mind that some one from the Abhinava Bharat Mandal had done the deed. Presuming that I may know nothing about it and yet seeking to worm out some information from me, if he could about the Mandal, especially of its branch in Madras, an Indian Officer dressed in an up-to-date European style saw me while I was in that city. A steamer called Maharaja was anchored in the port to take us to the Andamans. All the prisoners were conveyed on board the ship, in a boat full-packed with them. I alone was left behind on the port. The Officers, including this Indian, presently arrived in a special boat to convey me on the steamer. I got into the boat. It was a rule with me to talk to none in these circumstances. For I was a prisoner and if I began talking, any one could put a stop to it. The Indian Officer opened conversation with me on several ordinary topics and, on a sudden, showed anxiety to know from me the history of my Society in England and its present state. I told him that it was for him to enlighten me upon it. How can I know anything about it from any person in India? “That is true enough” he interposed in order to encourage me. “And what poor plots they are after all? They could not count even four members to support them.” Smilingly I retorted “It was then for you to swell the number.” “Nonsense, we in Madras are level-headed fellows. We are not wild and senseless like young men on your side. If any one were to preach sedition or revolution here, he will not get a single person to follow him.” He kept on talking in this strain just to make me blurt out, by way of protest, the names of well-known revolutionaries in Madras. He was looking at me from time to time if I was about to fall n to his trap. After a time he himself said “What is your experience in this matter?” I retorted “You ought to know it better than myself.” “I feel”, he continued, “that everything in Madras is quiet.” I smiled and replied, “Yes, are you quite sure about it?” He caught the meaning of my remark. The other Officers smiled significantly, and interposed. “He knows all about the Ashe business. Only he is trying to pump you out, as you are trying to pump him.”

The boat touched the steamer Maharaja which had come from the Andamans. I was lifted up, with handcuffs on, the ladder of the steamer and taken on the deck. While I was climbing up, a whole crowd had gathered around to watch the scene. All the passengers on board the ship, all Officers, all men in the boats around her, and other spectators, had come out to see me. They saw me entering the steamer. They rivetted their eyes on me, as we witness a corpse being tied on the bier. With eager eyes and bare- faced shame they kept on gazing. Yes, climbing into that steamer to be transported for life was like putting a live man in his own coffin. Hundreds and thousands must have gone to the Andaman Islands during these years, and not ten in a thousand had returned alive to India! Young men of 18, as soon as they put their step on that steamer, became old and the shadow of death was visible on their faces when a man is put upon the bier, his relatives conclude that he had left the world for ever, and, overcome with bereavement, watch the corpse with vacant eyes. Even so, the spectators watched us a we climbed into that steamer, and felt that we were dead to motherland we were leaving behind. The people, watching the scene, fixed their eyes upon me with the same feeling in their hearts. I was dead to the outside world- that feeling was writ large on their faces. Really, I was being put on my funeral bier. The only difference was that I felt what has happening to me while my corpse would have felt nothing. Thousands looking at me in this plight were simply indifferent and altogether cold. They were looking at me as they would have seen any corpse passing along the road. “Poor man, he is dead and gone!” says the passer-by and forgets him the next moment. It was a pain to me to see them gaping at me- my fellow- countrymen that they were-more that that the consciousness that my transportation was to mean a death-in-life for me, could give me. If but a single one out of these my compatriots was to tell me, “Go, my brother, go, I and others like me swear that we shall make India free and fulfil your vow”, I would have felt my funeral bier as soft as a bed strewn with flowers.

End of Chapter IV

CHAPTER V The Black Sea They took me on the ladder and put me in the ground floor of that steamer. A portion with strong iron bars was set apart in that place, no better than a long and narrow cage to accommodate twenty or thirty of us, in which were to be huddled prisoners on transportation at least fifty in number. We were no better there than cattle huddled up on board the steamer. I saw in that iron cage all the prisoners-the chalan-the whole of it, from Thanaarrayed and standing cheek by jowl in the file. They were cribbed and cabined into a space too small to hold them, As I saw them I wondered whether I was to be put in the of that partitioned same place with them, when the door of room opened to welcome me, that crowd and in rank and file. Yes, I found my place in In England, I had suffered from bronchitis, and it had left its traces which always made my breathing hard in a narrow and congested room. I also had some pain in the chest due to such hard breathing. So I pointed out to a European Officer, who accompanied us, that it would be dangerous to lock me up in such a place. He conveyed the information to the doctor in charge of the steamer. The doctor asked me to stay there for a while, and, then, he would let me know about it. If anything went wrong, he assured me, he would certainly arrange for me elsewhere. In the meanwhile, he selected for me a spot in a far off corner of the same apartment, and ordered me to spread my bedding on that spot. How this special favour to me worked out in the end I shall narrate as I go on. A gentleman came up to me, while this was going on, and broached the topic of my escape at Marseilles and my arrest thereafter. In my turn, I spoke to him frankly on the subject. Thereafter, he said, "We have deliberately come here to see you. May God grant that you return safe and back to your motherland. That is all our prayer to Him, and a very sincere wish, we assure you." And the European gentleman and other Officers left the steamer bidding me good-bye and showing me reverence by taking off their hats There was only one person among them who seemed to be displeased by their behaviour to a miscreant and convict like me He despised me altogether as unworthy of this courtesy. He looked at me full of scorn, and went away without wishing me. The Steamer Starts The siren sounded, the funnel roared it was a rude shock to us. The boat rolled and began to move. The partition in which we were pigeon-holed had, high up, two or three window-like holes fixed with glass. Hanging on to them, some unfortunate

prisoners were casting their wistful glances at the receding harbour and fortification The wall of the fortification became invisible when one of them burst out, "O, brethren, our home we have left, left have we our home " He was so overpowered by that thought that lie Instantly sank to the ground. His wall sent two prisoners from Satara-peasants they were-into an outburst of tears. "No hope, now of seeing our country again, not the least hope!" they added. To them the retort came, "Do not weep my brothers, we are doomed for transportation, and no amount of weeping can save us " It came from the most hardened criminals among the party, who had already served their term in the Andamans once and were going back to it again. They consoled others like dispassionate philosophers standing in their midst. One of them suddenly turned round, and pointing his finger at me, exclaimed, "behold him, he is a barrister, Officers take off their hats to him. What is our grief before him? Brothers, let us not think of ourselves, let us think of him " at this they gradually gathered around me. Every one put me the same question, though they all knew it: "What, Sir, is your term of penal servitude?" I gave to them the iron plate with the figure writ large upon it. I had been tired of repeating the figure `fifty' over and over again. When the full realization of this fact had come home to them, those, who were sentenced, among them, to fifteen years' transportation, gathered courage and felt considerably relieved in mind Looking at me they learnt to forget their own grief. The Dirt On The Steamer The evening came. It was blazing hot and the crowd was unbearable. The party of fifty who were my Immediate neighbours on the ship, came from the dirtiest class of Indian population. Hindus, Muslims, thieves, dacoits, - they were all Inured to filth, cruelty and crime. Some of them were striven with foul diseases, some knew not what it was to brush their teeth, and all had piled their beddings one upon the other, and lay by each other without an Inch of space between them In this crowd I made my bed and lay upon it. My feet touched their heads, and their feet came up near my mouth. If I turned on the other side I found that mouth had nearly touched mouth. I lay on my back. Right in front of me I saw a big cask almost half-cut and open. It was placed a little apart from the thick of the crowd, with a little open space near it. The space on my side of the partition and in the corner that accommodated me, was not so full of prisoners as that on the other it was a little roomier and hence I was put there. But a horrible stank greeted my nostrils from that direction. And I had to stop my nose to avoid it. A neighbour pointed at the cask in the front. And I discovered that they used it all during the night as a chamber-pot and commode. One of them was actually seated upon it at the time to ease himself. And he was almost about to leave it in shame. I signed him not to do so "The claims of the body cannot be put off. There was no shame in answering the call of nature. In a moment, I may follow you. Do it freely. We cannot help it. We cannot afford to feel ashamed in

this wretched condition. I can smell, you think; do you think you have no nose? Why, then, should I feel the stank more than you?" At this, the hardened one among them came up to me and said "Sir, we are used to this. I am one who has been, once to the island across and I know this practice too well. But you do not come over on the other side where there not much dirt. And I take your place here." My heart melted when I heard him say this. His generous offer was a wonder to me. I said, "O, my God, even in the hearts of the most sinful ones, thou mayest thy abode, turning it into a shrine of worship and prayer. Thou turnest what is dirty and untouchable into the holiest of the holy -the sacred basil-pot it becomes, when it was no more than a sink of filth and crime.” I thanked him for the offer and said "I could get a little breeze, a draft of fresh air from this side and so the doctor had put me here. I could recline near the bars and stretch myself a little more comfortably than the rest of you The Officer had no idea, perhaps, of this cask right under my nose. But I consider this even as a concession to me. So you need not worry. Why should I put you In the midst of dirt by exchanging my place with yours? I also must Inure myself to this kind of life " the night came and I beheld a file of them going one after another to that cask. Filth and stank had reached their peak of nausea and disgust. I shut my eyes and pretended to be fast asleep so that they may have no compunction on my account. Within me I said, "Alas! This was veritable hell on earth and I had to pass through it." But reason admonished, "True enough, but It all depends upon our thanking don’t you know that this place was assigned to you as a favour; then, why should you grumble? Why would you not reconcile yourself to it? May be, God desires by putting you here, that you should overcome your pride, your self-conceit, your separateness from the rest, your sense of superiority. The best of sages, saints, seers and yogis refrain from the `sadhana' which has come In your way to conquer and burn into dust the pride of caste, gotra, race, class and character and merge themselves into the universe and be one with its Creator. Why not use it to the full then? Do you not know the story of Trilinga Swami? He was arraigned before a Magistrate on the charge of obscene conduct. In the course of the trial, the Magistrate observed, "These call themselves Advaitis? Why do they eat food and not cowdung?" The Swami laughed, answered the call of nature right In front of the Magistrate, and before any one could stop him, ate his own excreta" Ramkrishna Paramahansa The story goes of Ramkrishna Paramahansa which enforces the same moral. He had exhausted all the sadhanas of experience of unity with the Divine. One sadhana alone remained, and that was the hardest to practice. In order to practice it he went to Calcutta and in the vicinity of the town where all the sewers of the town deposit its excreta. He turned it up and down with his own hands He put five blades of straw into the dirt and sucked the besmeared blades with his own mouth! You only smell it by the nose whale the prisoners are seated on the cask to use it as their commode and you try to run away from the cask because the stink is too much for your nostrils. But whale you seek to run away from it, how can you escape from the one which you carry on your person wherever

you go? You may hide it underneath your garment but as the saint has put it, "The more you hide it, the more it is exposed, and the more it fills the atmosphere with its foul smell." Ramdas is stall clearer on the point when he says, "You may eat the choicest meal. It is bound to be reduced to part pieces and part vomit. Drink the water of the pure and holy Ganges. It cannot help Itself from turning into urine." And the process is common to man-be he prance or pauper. None can wash out the dirt in his own stomach. If this be the fact true for all time, then you must put up with the stink and filth outside of you as you bear it within and of your own body. If one is no nuisance to you, the other must be borne as no nuisance. If eating is the need of the body, purging is as much its indispensable need And both the processes are equally beneficial to the human system. Why the world is like this, why the body and its senses feel happy in certain function and despise others as degrading to them, is more than man can either understand and explain. Only nature whirls created us can explain and justify This antagonism is beyond human intelligence to grasp Perhaps it is nature's play and nature enjoys it. Or nature is helpless to do other than it has done! Such conflicts between reason and sentiment, such battle between their opposing forces on the theatre of my mind was a comedy to enjoy. Henceforward I felt nothing of the close contiguity of dirt I have mentioned. I went to sleep at past midnight. The hour, I believe, was one o'clock at night and I had sound sleep during rest of the tame. While on board that steamer I never more showed my Inconvenience and discomfort. The placidity of my temper was a surprise to fellow-prisoners. One or two of them even passed strictures upon ,my behaviour. They said that their suspicion of me as a dirty man of an extremely low caste was more than justified by my recent conduct. This they said behind me and only among themselves. The Attitude of The Europeans The travellers and some of the Indian officers on board the ship desired to express their feeling of reverence for me by doing me service of one kind or another. They often used to pay me a casual visit. Some of the European soldiers treated me very politely. I was given some English newspapers to read as also some magazines. We got on with nothing else to eat but fried grams and peas. But the officers Insisted that I should have something better. I did not know what special things I should ask for and it was difficult for them to make an exception in my case. As a result some philanthropic merchants on board that steamer arranged a dinner for all of us with the permission of the Captain. It consisted of rice, fish and pickles and several other preparations. The whole of the prison- world in that steamer welcomed It with joy after two days of practical fasting and I was the cause of it. They were duly grateful to me for it They were all taken, for half-an-hour during the day along with me, on the deck of the ship to have a whiff of fresh air, and we were all treated during that time much better and with greater ease than in the prison-hold below. Naturally the prisoners expressed their gratitude to me in the following words. They said, "It is our good fortune, Sir, that we have your company in this voyage.

'What a piece of good luck it has proved to be!" To which I would reply, "Well then, it was right, after all, that I was sentenced to transportation for life. You, at least, welcome it, it seems." Day and night I used to enter into conversation with them And the one thing I treed to impress upon them was that they should even thank of their country. And It was their duty to work for its freedom, and so on and so forth. When any one spoke to me, full of passion and sincerity, that it grieved his heart to find me in this pitiable condition, my answer to him always was, "Then you must be ready to fight. India must be fully armed to fight and wm her freedom, whatever be the cost of that struggle, whatever the ordeal she has to pass through to reach the goal. Then not only I but ship after ship laden with her cargo of prisoners shall be crossing the seas to go to the Andamans. You should realise this beforehand, for whoever reaps has to sow, and whoever sows has to reap " From the ordinary sailor to the highest Officer of the ship, from the prisoner right up to the soldier I had become an instrument of political discussion all round. Some of them heard things that they had never heard before What had never suggested Itself to them upto that time did suggest Itself to them now And convection came to them on matters of which they were never convinced previously. Barrie Baba Another Important matter which harassed my mind during the voyage and did not give it rest, was to know the kind of treatment meted out to the prisoners during their term of imprisonment in the Andamans That was the one question I put to everyone whom I met on the boat, the one question I pursued all along the route. The party of soldiers accompanying the prisoners was one prime source of that information. They were, as it were, the archpriests of that temple, and its authorized version. Whenever one uttered the name-transportation for life --the first response that came from that quarter was the word-Barrie Baba. The one happened to be the synonym for the other. When even the worst of the prisoners showed the slightest spirit of rowdyism or indulged in noisy mutual recrimination, the soldiers rebuked them with the exclamation, "Wait, you seem to be too proud of your devilry But remember that once you face Berrie Baba all this will at once disappear. You will shake and shiver before him like aspen leaves." As I felt that this mysterious personage and myself were soon to be life- long Intimates, I was curious to know who and what Barrie Baba was But I decided that it was no use questioning the sepoys about him. About the Andamans, they assured me that, within six months of my stay in that place, I would get my release from hard labour in the prison- house, and be detailed for some work in the office Itself An Intelligent and educated man like me, they further added, might even be put in charge of a whole district in that place, had a good chance there, during ten years, to make his pile, have a home for himself and to pass the rest of his life in happiness and peace. That was their constant refrain as they talked to me on that subject Am I being taken to the Andamans, I asked myself, to be rewarded for my revolutionary activities in India? It was well then that I was caught at Marseilles ! If life in the Andamans is as they depict it, it will not be harder than the days

of batter exile I had to pass in Europe wandering from place to place, and begging from door to door for refuge and shelter. May be, what they tell me is true. But will it fall to my lot to share it? No, that cannot be for me It was no better than a mirage in my case I knew what had happened to my brother, and to others who were the first batch of political prisoners to be transported to that place. Shall I ever meet them? And what of my elder brother? Shall there be any chance of my seeing him? Who knows? None could say anything definitely about it. I was told, however, that he was there in that prison. And I was probably taken to be confined in the same place. Of that, at least, there was no doubt in their minds. Today, they are all saying it, our steamer will touch the port of the Andaman Islands The hour was six In the morning, when the prisoners were brought up on the deck in serried ranks. The laskars and other servants on the ship were busy cleaning the steamer. The sun came up and the temperature went up along with it. It was burning hot on the deck. With the nearer approach to the Island, the transportation sentence wore a gloomier aspect. It had come so near to us, and the prisoners seemed scared by the thought. The thoughts of helplessness, separation, and grief, that were held in abeyance during the voyage, rose up rebelliously in my mind, like big fishes in the ocean that are tossed up on its surface in stormy weather. They created a storm In my heart. The shadow of transportation had completely darkened my soul. The sea is calm like a lake, and the boat glades smoothly on its bosom, like children, in colder climates, skating on the winter snow. The sun is looking down on the earth with his fixed and glaring eye. It seems he is dazed by the triumph of man over the elements, as wetness this steaming boat sailing defiantly over the element beneath An ocean-a vast, endless expanse of water--"The deep calling unto the deep " The boat- what a puny thing it is before his tenable might and his broad bosom-almost "a cockle-shell" as it were. But a small room in her, known as the captain's cabin, dominates the whole scene. The man in that cabin with his helm and rudder, handles the sea like a tamed elephant. His compass and needle help him to ride the sea as the trident helps the rider to master and drive the elephant. What a conquest is this of mind over matter! One day the very sun will be equally amazed to wetness man's victory over himself, and gaze at this very earth for that triumph. Man shall have then conquered his devilish Instincts and the brute and the tiger In him shall be no more. Those who suffer and those who make them suffer, shall have been an ugly dream of the past, and man shall live with man as a brother, tied to one another by the common bond of love. All other bonds shall snap, and freedom and goodwill prevail in the world of man A glorious day will dawn on the kingdom of man. And the sun will look down upon the earth from his place high in the heavens as now, but with a heart full of rejoicing for the millennium that had arrived Freedom will reign supreme then but for its allegiance to love On that day alone shall have fructified the endeavours, the sacrifices, the supreme struggles, and the high and unquenched hopes, of all the martyrs of the Earth And `nunc dimitis' will be the song sung on earth in honour of their souls Happy the man who saw this promised land In the

distance; happier he, who strove to bring it nearer; and happiest he, who has the fortune to enter it Would that I be one of that shining company! At least, some share of It will surely fall to me. What a glorious future that will be! The Present But the present? What is your state today? Dream, an empty dream, a foolish dream-"the golden morrow" that you so delusively paint on "the midnight sky of sorrow " Ages have rolled on since the Vedic Rishis had painted the golden scene. Man has ever been its dupe It offers us a gleam of light in the dark, the horrible night of the present Behold the sea, mighty, unfathomable, incomprehensible! A veritable giant in strength and power. And this little boat glides softly dancing on its bosom. But the sea lets her do it, that is all. He watches her play-the play of this gnat on his body. In a moment he may chafe and grow angry, and shake his giant body! A slap from him and she is finished So is the bold inventiveness of man If this mighty power rises and overspreads the land in a deluge, its single wave and spray are enough to shatter the boat to pieces, its Atlantean waves can swallow continents, and none shall know thereafter what was Asia and where was Europe! How puny is man! And of the race of this creature I am today the weakest and the most contemptible specimen. I am here squatting, In a corner, in the midst of the outlaws and the outcast of the world-the meanest and the self-condemned specimens of humanity on earth. I have to sit in a row with them, unseen, unwept and unsung. Manacled, gyved, bound on wrist and feet, here I am among them. So mean that the scavengers of the place are filled with pity; so abject that the hewers of wood and drawers of water could shout at me, "O, prisoner, get away from this place, sit there." And I am compelled to obey them'! The sea was calm, snoring like a giant. The boat was slowing down like the pulse of a dying man. The sun overhead was burning like a furnace. The weather was unbearably warm. We were very close to the Andamans. The travellers and officers behaved with me now as perfect strangers. They were reticent and curt. They kept themselves at a distance. The shadow of transportation had extended itself to cover and darken my countenance. End of Chapter V

CHAPTER VI The Andamans The group of islands, including the Andamans and the Nicobars, constitute a link not only with the past history of India but also with her development in the world of tomorrow As such no Indian can afford to be Ignorant about this group of islands. India of today is bound to have cultural contacts with other parts of the world ; and the Andamans are a part of it that she is bound to influence. This group of islands is six hundred miles distant from the city of Calcutta, and spreads like a long range in the Bay of Bengal It is not an unbroken range of land The islands are dotted and scattered along the entire area of the Bay Interspersed with the waders of the sea flowing between them. Of this group the Andamans constitute the largest range. In the map you will notice the group divided into three parts-the northern, the southern, and the middle or the centre. It has the shape of an elongated circle-of an ovum or an egg Hence its name-the Andamans. Some have traced the origin of that name to Hanuman, the monkey-god of the Ramayana .But there is no reason to believe in its authenticity The North- Andamans is 51 miles in length; the middle portion is 59 males; and the southern part of it is 49 miles The island of Rutland has the length of 11 miles. The whole is known as the Greater Andaman. At the top of its southern territory there is a portion of land known as the lesser Andaman with an area of 30 by 17 miler. This last is a long stretch of dense forest which remains unpolarised to this day. The forest is so dense that the rays of the Sun cannot penetrate it during the best part of the day. It rises sheer from the sea-beach into a height of mountain- wall that protects it on the rear, and has in the mid-area dark, thick jungles yet untrodden by the feet of civilised man. The forest officers of the place have, however succeeded, at tremendous cost and labour, in making a survey of this portion and marked the spots and the trees in it which they are now to Indicate on the chart of these islands. The highest mountain peak in this range is three thousand feet above the sea level ; and the point is known as Sandal Mount. There are no big rivers crossing the forest ; only streams and rivulets trickle down from the mountain into the valley below. The hot-bed of Malaria As the place is full of jungles, rainfall there is continuous throughout the year Even in autumn it rams a drizzle. But, in between, the sun glares fiercely over- head. In the part of the forest, where spaces of the jungle happen to be cleared for cultivation and residence and gardens of coconut trees are found planted, the climate and the seasons have changed to conform to the tropical parts of our own country. The main seasons, however, are the summer season and the rainy season, with winter only peeping in to

disappear. The sea not only engirdles the Island group on all sides of it, but rushes between the range so as to cover and divide it into several portions of two islands each. The islands have greater length than breadth, and are thus full of creeks and marshy places. The dry leaves of the jungle trees accumulate in these watery marshes They lie upon them in thick layers and become breeding places for malaria, all over the area In addition to malarial mosquitoes, the Jungle is full of a variety of flies which make the spot a nuisance to its stray Inhabitants. The flies hum and spread over the place in thick swarms, and cover it with their regular network. The big ones stand up on their wiry and long legs and swing in the air to the humming tune. They appear to the onlooker, as they swing, like a black long line, and one wonders whether it is one big fly or a continuous row of them.

Leeches and Serpents

Besides the flies that are carriers of malaria all over the region, there is a pest of leeches that are found in this part, here, there and everywhere. In mud, on leaves, and underneath the layers of dry leaves, they lie in thick masses, as they are also found hanging on trees, clinging to their branches and stuck to their foliage. In the hot sun they go into their hiding; with rain drizzling, they emerge on the top. The smell of human flesh is a joy to them, and they fall from trees and leaves like a shower of continual raindrops. They stick to the soles of your feet; they stack fast to your calves and thighs; and they suck blood from wherever they glue themselves. The hardened bad mashes, the most unashamed criminals, who defy the worst punishment in jail, quake and shiver when they are sent out into this forest to cut and clear the jungle. It is the fear of the leeches that makes them quail. When they return from their work at sunset, one finds their bodies bathed in blood For leeches have pierced them ; and through the holes that they have bored into their bodies, jets of blood are found flowing. And there are not one or two of these that invade them thus. They come in swarms. While one catches them in handfuls and throws them off his body, leeches drop down upon him in a heap from trees above his head, or crawl up his feet from the earth below him. From all sides they stick to his body like limpets and suck his blood all right.

This jungle contains a species of serpents only less hurtful than the leeches. But their bite is fatal to the life of man. This species is one foot in length and an inch or more in thickness. They are so venomous, that a man bitten by them is struck down with paralysis, and the pangs that they give are simply unbearable. The ordinary variety of serpents is not to be found here. There is, here and there, a kind known as the viper which is extremely poisonous, and there is an occasional specimen of the python Uninhabited by man, the species has grown into an enormous number. That they devour one another, is the only control upon their abnormal growth. Tigers, lions, bears and other carnivorous animals are not here. Now and then you come across a wild boar. There are no Indian birds in this jungle. The British Government has tried recently to import and naturalise in these parts the cuckoo, the parrot, the peacock, the squirrel, the baj and the maina. It has even introduced here the ubiquitous crow. They have brought here the deer, the dog, the

jackal, and other tamed animals Hence, today, the jungle resounds with the sound of Indian birds and beasts. The wonders of the sea, in this part of the world, are as boundless as those of the jungle. Conches, shells and hailstones, of variegated shapes and colours, convoluted and lined, strew its sandy beach in overwhelming proportion. The Creator here . proves himself a wonderful artist and painter. His handiwork is simply marvellous. Who can describe its beauty and grandeur? The shells and conches are arrayed within and without with lanes of shaded colour that excel the beauty of the rainbow. If a human artist were to transfer to his canvass a fraction of this glorious display in line and colour, he would make himself immortal He will furnish forth a specimen of art worthy to find its place in any museum of the world. Nature, as it were, is behaving like a prodigal in lavishing her plenty, in minerals, stones, reptiles and other creatures, on the foreshore of this belt of sea round the islands. The procession of an emperor goes along the road of a busy thorough- fare, and leaves the whole path behind him strewn with flowers of gold and pearl, which his admirers shower upon him in the passage. So do the conches, shells and hailstones lie here like sprays of colour thrown off the brush of a master artist. Fishes, crocodiles, alligators and sea snakes rise and fall on the sea-shore with the ebb and tide of its rolling billows Of how many shapes are they indeed ! Some with a sword-like pointed tail, ready to cut our feet and flesh with its lash , others with the mouth of a horse; others, again, with tails that flash with the charge of electricity; others having human faces;-an endless variety of them which only a few travellers in these regions have enumerated and described in their works. Many and varied are these creatures to be seen rolling on the sea-beach, or sorting on its waves in the vicinity of these islands. Andaman and Hindustan A reference to this works of Marco Polo range of Islands is found in the and Nicolo, as also in the earlier writings of Arabian and European travellers. But India must have had contact with them far earner than this. There are allusions in India's ancient history to sea- voyages from Magadha kingdom in the north to Ceylon in the south. Similarly the Andhras, the Tamils and other peoples in the south had carried invasion into the heart of Burma, Siam, Pegu and Java, as we know from their ancient history. The conclusion cannot, therefore, be escaped that the Indian travellers of those days had some personal knowledge of these Islands. The specific mention of their names is found in the annals of the Pandya kings, and in the description of a naval war in the 11th century A.D. The sea-faring monarch of this dynasty invaded and conquered Pegu; and while returning home with his naval forces, he landed on the Andaman and the Nicobar, islands to plant his flag and establish his rule over these regions. This account finds its mention in the contemporary records of that monarch's rule. However, we do not find in these Islands today any traces or landmarks of these visitors either as travellers or conquerors. An Officer had told me, while I was in the prison of that place, that excavations in these parts had discovered relics of ancient palaces. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of that report, and I have had no time since then to investigate personally into that question. So much,

however, is beyond dispute that Indians knew something of these islands and that they ruled and stayed on them for some time in their past history. The condition of these islands However that may be, it made no change whatever in the life of the aborigines of that place. As the natural condition of these islands shows no traces of the agricultural and other cultivation of the soil by its early colonists, so the life of its natives reveals no effect of the cultural influence of India upon it, either in the field of religion or in intellectual and moral life. The Andamans is a small island engirdled by the sea. It demanded a long and continued influence of India to reclaim it for civilisation and progress, from its wild and savage environment. The wilderness of nature and the wildness of man could only be conquered by permanent impression in that soil of civilised life, with all the accompaniments necessary for the stabilisation of such a life. As soon as the contact and Influence are withdrawn, the island relapses into its state of barbarism. And this law holds not only for the natives of the soil, but also for others who have to dwell there, for some reason or another, for a good long time. In the Great War of 1914-18, steamers could not ply between India and the Andamans for four months at a stretch; and provisions of all kinds were entirely cut off during the period. The result was that the inhabitants of this island had to go without clothing; had to feed on flesh for want of cereals and rice; and agriculture perished for want of necessary implements and seeds. The suspension of civilised life took the island back to fifty years. Imagine then how the Hindu colonists of that island, in its remote past must have suffered a set- back for want of any communication with the outside world. In those days, crossing the seas was regarded as a sacrilege. No wonder if the civilised Hindus themselves had turned into savages during the period that they had dwelt among them, in order to civilise them. Having lost all touch with their own countrymen, they must have either withered away, or been absorbed in the people with whom they had come to stay. The aborigines in the Andamans today resemble in life and habits similar aboriginal tribes in other parts of the world. The groups of islands round Java contain savages who look like monkeys. One or two savages from the Nicobars, brought here as prisoners, had a three-inches- long bone, at the lower end of the spinal cord. They found it impossible to sit comfortably in a chair. The doctor of the place drew my attention to them. That bone had no hair on it and no tuft of hair at the end of it. Their faces and chins exactly resembled those of the monkey. Such savages, with the tall and appearance of a monkey, are occasionally to be seen even in the Andamans. The only difference between them and their originals is the latter's want of speech and the former's use of some kind of language. The tribe of savages in the Andamans, known as Javra, have men and women from four to four and a half feet tall. They have a coal-black complexion, hard, short hair standing on their skulls, which they tie in tufts on the top of their heads, like the

Negroes of Africa, They have no hair on their chin and upper laps; they, move about stark naked; and wear not a rag upon their person. They besmear their bodies with red earth, like some Sadhus in India, and thus satisfy their lack of clothing. The women-folk, the most ostentatious of them, wear as a piece of additional ornament, a leaf round their waist. The Javras live a kind of austere and simple life of which the ascetic, scorning every kind of pleasure in this world as sin, yet only may dream to realise. They are primitives, remote from any temptation natural to civilised and human existence. They know no match- boxes, no clothes, no bullock-carts, much less, therefore, do they know vicious habits of railways, ocean-liners, aeroplanes and malls. They know no chairs to sit on, and no shoes to wear; no house to live in and no art of agriculture either. They do not cook their food and use no machine, neither the Charakha, nor the spanning wheel. Civilisation and its accompaniments, which are considered by a certain school of devotees as the enemy of plain living and high thanking and a danger to mankind, the Javras know not and desire not. They are not only strangers to it, but they dislike it. The simplest and the most ascetic among us have, at least, the need of a loin-cloth round their body. But the Javra not only does not wear it, but is not even tempted to wear it. Are they, therefore, contented and happy? By no means. They cultivate no soil, hold no plough and use no bank notes. But for a fish in a creek, or a little space in it that he may call his own, he will fight like any other human being, he will jealously guard it; and be full of anxiety lest he might lose it. Not even the Kaiser of Germany, or the Czar of Russia will, as jealously, guard his possessions, as the Javra will guard his own. The Javra has to struggle for his edibles every day of his life,-which are roots underground, fruits on the top of trees, fish in the waters, and flesh of the hunted animal on earth. He works and fights for it as hard as a civilised man fights hard for his dally subsistence. He has to hunt and angle, pluck and dig, as much as we have to plough the soil, sow the seed, and reap the corn. He has to depend upon chance more than we have to depend on it, for his daily subsistence. A hail-shower of arrows There is another tribe in these parts as savage as the Javras. The men of this tribe are taller than the Javras, and, in some respects, more progressive than they. Perhaps, this tribe is a cross-breed between the early colonists and the aborigines of the place. The Javras are monogamous and know the use of the bow and arrow to perfection. The bow they use is six feet in length. They are fine shots with the bow. With the help of this weapon they have still maintained their freedom. Of course, they cannot hold their own against the rifle and the aeroplane. Even then, they are stall free, and the Englishman has fabled to conquer them. The Javras come out from the forest, lie in ambush, and attack Government camps or the policeman's cabins, or stray prisoners. They are, of course, driven back to their haunts in the dark recesses of the forest, but the Government forces do not pursue them further, for it is so very dangerous to do so. It is not so easy to beat and conquer a brave people like the Javras, to stand the hail-shower of their arrows, as it is to conquer and subdue a province of India. That question is not urgent at the present moment; and the Javras roam about unmolested in these jungles. They settle in batches, in the empty spaces of their jungles, and they lead a life as their ancestors had lived it