Movements for Rights of Political Prisoners

Bharat Dogra

There were several movements for rights of political prisoners in colonial times. Among these two have a special significance

1.         The fast of Ram Prasad Bismil, Roshan Lal and other accused in the Kakori case in 1925-26.
2.         The fast of Shahid Bhagat Singh, Jatindra Nath Das and their other colleagues during 1929.

Both these movements were initiated by jailed political prisoners and supported by a large number of people of India. The second fast attracted nationwide attention.

Another important aspect is that in the case of both these fasts later death sentences were given to leading participants in these movements and fasts.

In the case of first fast death sentence was given to Ram Prasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah Khan, Roshan Singh and Rajendra Lahiri, all of them being accused in the Kakori case. The farcical trial and the death sentences were widely criticised as being highly unjust. All four were executed (on different dates) in December 1927.

In the case of the second instance death sentences were given to Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev. All three were executed on March 23, 1931. Before this, another participant in the fast, Jatindra Nath Das, had died on September 13, 1929 as a result of adverse health impact of his 63-day fast and the atrocities inflicted on him by prison officials in the course of this fast.

These fasts and movements not only attracted widespread attention to the rights of political prisoners, their frequent violation and the tremendous hardships and atrocities suffered by political prisoners who were among the noblest citizens of the country.

Another related issue was that death sentences were being passed on some of the bravest and noblest youths of India who could have been very capable leaders of the country if they had lived. The trials were farcical and highly unjust.

These fasts and movements provided an opportunity to the wider freedom movement to take up the demands of the rights of political prisoners in a wider context and more specifically to demand that there should be no capital punishment for any freedom fighter.

It is a very accepted part of the thinking of non-violence that there should be no capital punishment or death sentence even for proven hardened criminals.

Then surely within the accepted thinking of non-violence there should have been no death sentence for freedom fighters who were among the noblest citizens of the country.

Keeping this in view a Congress-led, Mahatma Gandhi led movement should have been launched in 1927 to commute the death sentence of Kakori case freedom fighters - Ram Prasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah, Roshan Lal and Rajendra Lahari. The fact that these accused had become symbols of communal harmony and also included great poets among them further strengthened the case for such a demand for commuting death sentence.

The second opportunity for such a movement came in September 1929 when Jatindra Nath Das breathed his last after a 63 day fast. Hundreds of thousands of persons all over the country gathered to pay their tributes to this great martyr. This was perhaps the most opportunate time to launch a movement for rights of political prisoners and the first among various demands should have been that there should be no capital punishment for freedom fighters.

The third opportunity for such a movement came in early 1931 when the death sentence for Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru was announced. The movement for rights of political prisoners led by the demand for no death sentence for freedom fighters should have been launched immediately after this verdict, or perhaps a few months before the likely verdict.

Unfortunately, all these three opportunities were missed.

If these non-violent movements whose demands were entirely compatible with the principle of non-violence had taken place the lives of the noblest youths with the greatest potential could have been saved and the distance between the revolutionary movements and the Congress led non-violent movements could have been bridged. The mainstream movement was certainly the Mahatma Gandhi led, Congress led non-violent mass movement, but if it had received much greater support of revolutionary youths and if there was more continuation in it with the support of youths willing to make great sacrifices, then India would have realised freedom much earlier. The revolutionaries could have also contributed much more to communal harmony so that partition could have been avoided. Sectarian divides came in more when big upsurges of freedom movement stopped. Continuing work of revolutionaries could've checked

communal trends and the wider strength which came from cooperation of two streams could have been used to check communalism and communal forces. If Congress had won the support of revolutionaries with such movements for political prisoners at the right time, then there would have been no reason for Subhash Bose to leave the country in secret for an uncertain future.

The writer is a freelance journalist who has been involved with several social movements and initiatives.

The writer is a freelance journalist who has been involved with several social movements and initiatives.     

Back to Home Page

Frontier
Dec 4, 2019