Vinayak Damodar Savarkar
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar was an Indian politician and ideologue. Savarkar developed the Hindu nationalist political ideology of Hindutva while confined at Ratnagiri in 1922. The prefix "Veer" was given by himself when he penned his own biography under the pseudonym Chitragupta. He was a leading figure in the Hindu Mahasabha.
Savarkar began his political activities as a high school student and continued at Fergusson College in Pune. He and his brother founded a secret society called Abhinav Bharat Society. When Savarkar travelled to England for his law studies, he involved himself with organisations such as India House and the Free India Society. He also published books advocating complete Indian independence by revolutionary means. One of the books he published called The Indian War of Independence about the Indian Rebellion of 1857 was banned in British India.
In 1910, Savarkar was arrested by British authorities and deported back to India as a result of his involvement with India House. Upon returning to India, Savarkar was sentenced to 50 years of imprisonment in the Cellular Jail in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. He was released in 1924 after writing a series of mercy petitions to the British colonial government. Savarkar virtually ceased his criticism of British rule in India after he was released from jail. After being released from his restriction to Ratnagiri district in 1937, Savarkar started traveling widely, becoming a prominent orator and writer who advocated for Hindu political and social unity. In his Ahmedabad speech, he supported the two-nation theory. The Hindu Mahasabha under Savarkar's leadership endorsed the idea of India as a Hindu Rashtra.
In 1939, the ruling Indian National Congress resigned en masse over Britain declaring India a belligerent in World War II. The Hindu Mahasabha under Savarkar formed alliances with the All-India Muslim League and other non-INC parties to form government in many states. Subsequently, the INC, under Gandhi's leadership, launched the Quit India Movement; Savarkar boycotted the movement, writing a letter titled "Stick to your Posts''" and recruiting Indians for the British war effort. In 1948, Savarkar was charged as a co-conspirator in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi; he was acquitted by the court for lack of evidence.
Life and career
Early life
Savarkar was born into a Marathi Hindu Chitpavan Brahmin family on 28 May 1883 in Bhagur, a village in the Nasik district of the Bombay Presidency of British India. Nasik district, now known by Nashik district, is in the present-day Indian state of Maharashtra. His parents were Damodar and Radhabai Savarkar. He began his activism as a high school student. At the age of 12, he led fellow students in an attack on the village mosque following Hindu-Muslim riots, stating: "We vandalised the mosque to our heart's content." In 1903, in the nearby city of Nasik, Savarkar and Ganesh founded the Mitra Mela, an underground revolutionary organisation, which became Abhinav Bharat Society in 1906. Abhinav Bharat's main objectives were to overthrow British rule and revive Hindu pride.Student activist
Savarkar continued his political activism as a student at Fergusson College in Pune.Savarkar was greatly influenced by the radical nationalist leader, Lokmanya Tilak. Tilak was in turn impressed with the young student and helped him obtain the Shivaji Scholarship in 1906 for his law studies in London. To protest against Bengal partition of 1905, Savarkar led foreign-clothes bonfire in India with other students in presence of Bal Gangadhar Tilak.
London years
In London, Savarkar got involved with organisations such as India House and the Free India Society. He also published books advocating complete Indian independence by revolutionary means. One of the books he published called The Indian War of Independence about the Indian Rebellion of 1857 was banned by the British colonial authorities.Savarkar was influenced by the life and thinking of Italian nationalist leader, Giuseppe Mazzini. During his stay in London, Savarkar translated Mazzini's biography in Marathi. He also influenced thinking of a fellow student called Madanlal Dhingra. In 1909, Dhingra assassinated Curzon Wyllie, a colonial officer. It is alleged by Mark Juergensmeyer that Savarkar supplied the gun which Dhingra used. Juergensmeyer further alleged that Savarkar supplied the words for Dhingra's last statement before he went to the gallows for the murder. Savarkar met Mohandas Gandhi for the first time in London shortly after Curzon-Wyllie's assassination. During his stay, Gandhi debated Savarkar and other nationalists in London on the futility of fighting the colonial state through acts of terrorism and guerilla warfare.
Arrest and transportation to India
In India, Ganesh Savarkar organised an armed revolt against the Morley-Minto reforms of 1909, and was sentenced to life imprisonment on the Andaman Islands. Around the same time Vinayak Savarkar was accused of participating in a conspiracy to overthrow British rule in India by organising murders of various officials. Hoping to evade arrest, Savarkar moved to Bhikaiji Cama's home in Paris, but against advice from his friends, returned to London. On 13 March 1910, he was arrested in London on multiple charges, including procurement and distribution of arms, waging war against the state, and delivering seditious speeches. At the time of his arrest, he was carrying several revolutionary texts, including copies of his own banned books. In addition, the British presented evidence that he had smuggled 20 Browning handguns into India, one of which Anant Laxman Kanhere used to assassinate the Nasik district's collector A.M.T. Jackson in December 1909. During the trial of Nasik Conspiracy Case 1910, government's advocate alleged that Savarkar was a moving part and inspiration behind assassination of Jackson. A Bombay court tried him in the Nasik conspiracy case and sentenced him for life-imprisonment and transported him to the notorious Cellular Jail of Andaman Island and forfeited his property.Although his alleged crimes were committed both in Britain as well as India, the British decided to try him in India. He was subsequently put on the commercial ship SS Morea with a police escort for his transport to India. When the ship docked in the French Mediterranean port of Marseille, Savarkar escaped by jumping from the ship's window, swam to the French shore, and asked for political asylum. Local French port officials ignored his pleas and handed him back to the police escort on Morea. When the French government was informed of the incident, they asked for Savarkar to be brought back to France, and lodged an appeal with the Permanent Court of Arbitration.
French Case before the Permanent Court of Arbitration
Savarkar's arrest at Marseille caused the French government to lodge a protest against its British counterpart, arguing that Britain could not recover Savarkar unless it took appropriate legal proceedings for his rendition. The dispute came before the Permanent Court of International Arbitration in 1910, and it gave its decision in 1911. The case excited much controversy as was reported widely by the French press, and it considered it involved an interesting international question of the right of asylum.The Court held, firstly, that since there was a pattern of collaboration between the two countries regarding the possibility of Savarkar's escape in Marseille and there was neither force nor fraud in inducing the port authorities to return Savarkar to them, the British did not have to hand him back to the French for the latter to hold rendition proceedings. On the other hand, the tribunal also observed that there had been an "irregularity" in Savarkar's arrest and delivery over to his police escort.
Trial and sentence
Arriving in Bombay, Savarkar was taken to the Yervada Central Jail in Pune. The trial before the special tribunal was started on 10 September 1910. One of the charges on Savarkar was the abetment to murder of Nasik Collector A. M. T. Jackson. The second was waging a conspiracy under Indian penal code 121-A against the King Emperor. Following the two trials, Savarkar, then aged 28, was convicted and sentenced to 50-years imprisonment and transported on 4 July 1911 to the Cellular Jail.Prisoner in Andaman
Clemency Petitions
1911
Savarkar applied to the Bombay Government for certain concessions in connection with his sentences. However, by Government letter No. 2022, dated 4 April 1911, his application was rejected and he was informed that the question of remitting the second sentence of transportation for life would be considered in due course on the expiry of the first sentence of transportation for life. A month after arriving in the Cellular Jail, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Savarkar submitted his first clemency petition on 30 August 1911. This petition was rejected on 3 September 1911.1913
Savarkar submitted his next clemency petition on 14 November 1913 and presented it personally to the Home Member of the Governor General's council, Sir Reginald Craddock. In his letter, he described himself as a "prodigal son" longing to return to the "parental doors of the government". He wrote that his release from the jail will recast the faith of many Indians in the British rule. Also, he said1917
In 1917, Savarkar submitted another clemency petition, this time for a general amnesty of all political prisoners. Savarkar was informed on 1 February 1918 that the clemency petition was placed before the British colonial government. In December 1919, there was a Royal proclamation by King George V. The Paragraph 6 of this proclamation included a declaration of Royal clemency to political offenders. In view of Royal proclamation, Savarkar submitted his fourth clemency petition to the British colonial government on 30 March 1920, in which he stated thatThis petition was rejected on 12 July 1920 by the British colonial government. After considering the petition, the British colonial government contemplated releasing Ganesh Savarkar but not Vinayak Savarkar. The rationale for doing so was stated as follows
Savarkar signed a statement endorsing his trial, verdict, and British law, and renouncing violence, a bargain for freedom.