Last Of The Nation바카라�s First

These men and women are what바카라�s left of a struggle that involved tremendous sacrifices, whose ­significance has only become more ­profound over time. Fighters of the ­anti-colonial resistance against British Raj, they do not just form the bedrock of our national ethos, but also represent a set of values that can still guide the way in our collective strivings to live the ­freedom they once fought for. And on Gandhi바카라�s 71st death anniversary, they spell out the independent India he, and they, dreamt of.

Gopal Singh, Patiala

Sitting on a floral fleece throw on an armchair at his home in Patiala, sunlight gushing in through the windows, Gopal Singh, 93, recalls how he and fellow inmates were made to sleep on date palm leaves in Lahore jail. Singh was only 17 in 1942 when he was arrested for shouting slogans against the government of British India and had to spend 10 months in jail for refusing to apologise for his act of defiance. 바카라�The jails were packed that year,바카라� he recalls.

Born in 1925 in Motra village of undivided Punjab바카라�s Sialkot district, he had to leave his home and go to Sirhind on foot during Partition in 1947. 바카라�There were 60 of us. A group of 40 who preceded us were butchered at Saidan, Alipur. We had to cross their corpses,바카라� says Singh, adding that a detachment of the army바카라�s Maratha regiment saved their lives. He was accompanied by his aunt during the forced migration as his parents had passed away earlier. The aunt-nephew duo reached newly independent India empty-handed, hoping their migration was temporary and that they would return to their village in a few days.

For the first three years after Partition, Singh worked as a labourer, earning Rs 3-4 a day. He was then allotted a plot in Patiala바카라�s Dakaunda village. The official had asked him to choose between a good house and good agricultural land. He chose the latter, toiling hard along with his four bulls and a camel to rebuild his life. Decades later, he bought a second-hand jeep that he drove until his mid-80s. Now he lives at his son바카라�s house in Patiala city and rarely goes out. When he does, there are only two places he visits바카라�the gurudwara sahib and his fields.

Singh has been to Pakistan thrice in recent decades. Recalling his visit to his native village, he says, 바카라�The whole village gathered upon my arrival. 바카라�Look, a sardar who used to live here has come from India,바카라� they said.바카라� Their old house had been razed down and a new one built in its place. He met a few old friends on his first visit, but there were none left during his third.

So, is this the independent India he dreamt of? 바카라�We never thought about it,바카라� he says. 바카라�All we knew was that the British had enslaved us and, once we win independence, the oppression would stop.바카라� His 62-year-old son quips, 바카라�Somewhat like the way we keep hoping for 바카라�achchhe din바카라� (good times).바카라�

Shaukat Ali Hashmi, Delhi

The dark alleyway of Gali Mochiyan in Old Delhi바카라�s Chitli Qabar Bazar, with rusted iron pipes and crusted walls, and two-wheelers lining both sides, leads to the house of Shaukat Ali Hashmi. Sitting on one of the scooters is a boy, no more than 16, with golden streaks in his hair, a Sultanate-era beard chiselled to a pointed front, and velvet shoes. He shows the way to the 97-year-old freedom fighter바카라�s house at a cul de sac, which the sun somehow manages to illumine. Hashmi바카라�s son places a plastic chair for him, and the frail nonagenarian rises from a divan and eases into the chair.

The kurta-clad gentleman recalls that he wasn바카라�t even 20 when he joined the freedom struggle. His organisation, the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind (JUH), had lent political support to the Congress in its fight against British colonialism. 바카라�The Ulema said that being subject to British rule is proscribed as per Islamic teachings and so one must rebel against it,바카라� says Hashmi. Mahatma Gandhi had given a call for civil disobedience and, Hashmi says, one freedom fighter was courting arrest every day by raising the Indian flag and shouting slogans against the government. 바카라�We바카라�d meet secretly, discuss plans, get pamphlets printed, etc. Once the government sent a man from the CID to follow me, and I told him, 바카라�I바카라�ll tell you when and where I바카라�ll shout subversive slogans. You don바카라�t have to follow me.바카라� The official replied that it was his duty to follow him. There were times when I managed to dodge him,바카라� he recounts.

One day towards the end of 1942, Hashmi had a guest who told him that the JUH leadership wanted him to court arrest. Apprehensive that somebody might tip off the CID and he might be arrested in the night before the appointed day, the 21-year-old spent that night at a friend바카라�s house. In the morning, he left to meet a senior JUH leader and then went to Jama Masjid with some youngsters from the locality. The flag was folded and kept in a pocket. At the designated place, he took out the flag and unfurled it, shouting slogans against the British government. Within five minutes, he was arrested and taken to Daryaganj police station.

바카라�I openly admitted at the trial that I had shouted the slogans, and said I바카라�d keep on doing so until the British left the country,바카라� says Hashmi, who was sentenced to six months in prison. His father, a supporter of the Muslim League who disagreed with his politics, met him in jail. 바카라�He told me, 바카라�Son, don바카라�t ever apologise.바카라�바카라�

Nagalingam Shanmugam, Chennai

He hopes he would have little use for the whitener at least for the next few years. In the past one year, Nagalingam Shanmugam has had to whiten out the names of two office-bearers from the letter pad of the 바카라�All India Azad Hind Fouj Association (TN HQ)바카라�, a group of former veterans of the Indian National Army (INA) founded by Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. 바카라�The two died of age-related illness. Most of us are in our late 80s or 90s, and staying healthy is the biggest challenge now,바카라� says this 90-year-old veteran who served in the INA as a civilian volunteer in Burma in the 1940s and is the secretary of the Tamil Nadu unit that operates out of a small office in Red Hills, an outer suburb of Chennai. Most INA veterans in Chennai have been living in and around Red Hills since they were shipped out of Burma as refugees in the 1960s.

Clad in a starched white dhoti and shirt, a tricolour towel draped on his shoulder and sporting a Gandhi cap, with his flowing white beard and holy ash smeared on his forehead with a kumkum in the middle, Shanmugam could pass off as a spiritual leader. 바카라�I am very religious. Most of us in the INA were. Being religious taught us discipline. Like getting up early, having a bath and doing our prayers before starting our work of organising supplies for the INA and going house to house collecting funds,바카라� recalls Shanmugam.

Born to a Tamil father who had migrated to Burma, Shanmugam was 17 when he listened to Bose at the Jubilee Hall in Rangoon calling Indians to give their blood and win their freedom. 바카라�My friends and I were electrified by the speech and enlisted as civilian volunteers for the INA. We were given basic training in self-defence, but our job was to mobilise funds and supplies to the combat units of the INA,바카라� he says. Collecting funds was the easier part as there were more than five lakh Tamils and a large number of Gujaratis in Burma, who were more than willing to give away their savings, gold and even cattle. Aiming to cut off the supply of money and material to the INA, the British jailed hundreds of volunteers like Shanmugam. 바카라�We spent six months in jail in 1945. It was monsoon time and our biggest enemies in prison were leeches and mosquitoes. Only after we were released did we hear about Bose바카라�s disappearance, but we refused to believe it. We saw it as a ploy by the British to weaken the INA, which, by then, had been reduced to a shadow of itself. We had little choice but to back to our schools and fields,바카라� Shanmugam says.

A bigger shock came in 1964 when Indians in Burma were stripped of their rights and belongings, and sent out of the country. After a few months at a refugee camp in Tamil Nadu, he settled down in the Red Hills area along with many other INA volunteers similarly deported. He lives a spartan life in a small two-storey house with one of his sons. He has two sons, two daughters, and is fit enough to use public transport for his association work.

Ranchhodbhai Shah, Ahmedabad

At 94, he is still fit and sound. 바카라�Gandhiji advocated a healthy body for a healthy mind,바카라� says Ranchhodbhai Shah, a Gandhian who plunged into the freedom struggle in 1942 when he was 17. 바카라�I was in the higher secondary classes (then called intermediate), doing science, in Vadodara when the call for the Quit India movement was given in August that year. Our teachers also instilled in us the spirit of nationalism.바카라� He left college and joined the movement, never to look back.

In his own eyes, however, his actual participation in the struggle started when he first went to jail. 바카라�In 1943, orders were issued to arrest freedom fighters. I was held in police custody at Leela Bungalow for two days, and then sent to the Vadodara Central Jail after my bail was refused,바카라� he recalls. He spent four months in jail as a political prisoner, which, he says, only strengthened his determination to fight for freedom.

바카라�I could never meet Gandhiji, but listened to him and also read him. I took up social service and later joined the Sarvodaya Ashram set up by veteran Gandhian Navalbhai Shah at Gundi village in Ahmedabad district,바카라� he says. Shah now lives with his son, who retired from Canara Bank. Besides visiting Gandhian friends and institutions, Ranchhodbhai regularly reads half a dozen periodicals.

He says he has no complaints about his freedom fighter바카라�s pension of Rs 10,000 a month. 바카라�This is the recent one introduced by (Gujarat바카라�s first woman chief minister) Anandiben Patel. Initially, the pension was only Rs 500, which I had been getting for some 25-30 years, until then chief minister Chimanbhai Patel hiked it to Rs 6,000 in the 1990s,바카라� he says.

G.G. Parikh, Mumbai

He vividly remembers when he became a 바카라�confirmed freedom fighter바카라�. It was in 1942, when G.G. Parikh, now 94, was arrested as a 17-year-old teenager trying to stop trains at Mumbai바카라�s Churchgate station, after picketing at St Xavier바카라�s College. Those were the initial days of the Quit India movement. His arrest came close on the heels of the historic August 9 meeting where Mahatma Gandhi raised the 바카라�Do or Die바카라� slogan. Recalling his time at a temporary jail created at Worli in Mumbai, he says, 바카라�We were 18 people in a small room on the third floor. Some people were shouting slogans outside, but we couldn바카라�t hear properly. When we tried to look out, we were beaten up. When I was thrashed, that was the moment I became a confirmed freedom fighter.바카라� Parikh spent 10 months in jail and became not just a freedom fighter, but also a socialist.Earlier, at his Kanpur school, he had started a handwritten magazine and almost got rusticated, but managed to create a stir. It was at Mumbai바카라�s St Xavier바카라�s College that he was introduced to Marxism and became a student activist. 바카라�We formed the Students Congress, which was very active when the party leadership was in jail,바카라� he says about the 1942-47 period. After studying medicine in Mumbai and becoming a doctor, Parikh never left the socialist cause. He was jailed eight times after Independence, with the Emergency (1975-77) sparking another defining struggle.

K.C. Narayanappa, Bangalore

It바카라�s a windy day in Bangalore, but that doesn바카라�t bother 92-year-old K.C. Narayanappa as he recollects old memories. 바카라�Everybody participated in the freedom movement voluntarily. There was a lot of support in all the villages. That was how it was,바카라� he says. In the years leading up to 1947, Narayanappa, who is from a landed rural family in Doddaballapura, was a college student in Bangalore, about 70 km to the south. 바카라�I was the first graduate in my village,바카라� he says. Subsequently, Narayanappa also started a Seva Dal unit in Doddaballapura, and went to jail. Last August, he was among those invited to the President바카라�s reception for freedom fighters.

In 1944, there was a famine in the region. 바카라�We had no ration and no drinking water. We had to dig out tubers to eat,바카라� says Narayanappa, who was a teenager at the time of the Quit India movement. Many leaders were imprisoned in Bangalore Central Jail during those days.

바카라�Large crowds gathered when Nehru came to Bangalore, and also during General K.M Cariappa바카라�s visit,바카라� he says. 바카라�In those days, there was little consideration for money바카라�. Now money, not principles or rules, runs everything. Sometimes, I feel gaining Independence has turned into a misfortune. Everyone got corrupted and nobody is safe.바카라�

The nonagenarian continues to be sprightly. 바카라�I know every person in Doddaballapura, and I ride a motorcycle even now,바카라� he says, offering his right hand for a firm handshake. 바카라�See, it바카라�s strong.바카라�

Subhadra Khosla, Delhi

Once, while she was studying in Lahore, Subhadra Khosla (born 1928) was asked to weave a piece using wool as part of a school activity. When she was through with the exercise, her father, Lala Achint Ram, also a freedom fighter and a Gandhian, asked her to bring it along with an oil lamp. 바카라�Yeh videshi hai (this is foreign material),바카라� said her father and set it on fire. 바카라�Until the kids aren바카라�t prepared for the struggle, how will we get independence?바카라� She says she suffers from 바카라�khaddar ki beemari바카라� since then바카라�in other words, she can only wear khadi, the homespun Indian cotton cloth. 바카라�What is there in the market does not even remotely affect us,바카라� she says, sitting at her house in Delhi.

Khosla is from a generation that worked with the principle of sacrifice as the touchstone. When India became free in August 1947, she was not even 18. But she had already been to jail for her role in the freedom movement. On August 26, 1942, she joined her mother, younger sister and three other women at Lahore바카라�s Anarkali bazaar and unfurled the Indian flag, and courted arrest. 바카라�My mother told the judge that she couldn바카라�t keep going to jail again and again as she has to cook for her husband, so the British government should give us independence as soon as possible,바카라� laughs Khosla, who narrates events from the trying time in jail with great relish. The jail in-charge often mocked at the kids, saying, 바카라�So these kids will wrest independence from the British!바카라� and one of the women would respond, 바카라�When we are independent, you바카라�ll come to us asking for jobs.바카라�

While recollecting the memories of the freedom movement, she reminisces how the people then had 바카라�tyaag바카라� (sense of sacrifice) and 바카라�lalak바카라� (ardour). While talking about those times, she often breaks into a song. One of the songs goes:

Azaadi ke naaro se

Duniya ko hila denge

Soton ke kya kehne

Murdon ko jaga denge

Hum mulk ke bachche

Mulk ki khidmat mein

Bachchon ko kata denge

Ghar-baar luta denge....

Khosla바카라�s father was one of the very first members of the Servants of the People society founded by Lala Lajpat Rai. Her family lived in Lahore바카라�s Lajpat Bhavan. In 1947, when India bled during Partition, Khosla and her family hosted and served the uprooted families there. Her days would be spent serving chapatis to the survivors. In 1948, the family moved to New Delhi and Lala Achint Ram successfully contested general elections twice. Khosla바카라�s brother, Krishan Kant, went on to become the vice-president of India in 1997. Her late husband was a commandant in the CISF.