Indian Champion Chandrasekhar Azad

Chandrasekhar Azad (Freedom Fighter)


When I first read about the saga of courage and self-sacrifice of the heroic freedom fighter Chandrasekhar Azad (1906-1931), the following declaration made by Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) on 13 November, 1787 in a letter to his friend Col William Smith came to my mind: 'The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure'.

Chandrasekhar Azad was born on 23 July 1906 in village Bhavra in Jhabua district of the present Madhya Pradesh to Pandit Sitaram Tiwari and Jagarani Devi. At that time Bhavra was a Tahsil of Alirajpur State. His father, Pandit Sitaram Tiwari, had moved from Badarka village of Unnav District in Uttar Pradesh to Bahvra village in Madhya Pradesh, during the famine of 1856 and settled down as a milk vendor. Azad received his early schooling in Bhavra. He used to mix with the Bhils of his village, joining them in their hunting expeditions into the nearby forests. He had learnt the art of archery and became an expert archer. Endowed with extraordinary physical prowess and courage, he easily became the unquestioned leader of the village boys.

Pandit Sitaram Tiwari sent his son Azad to Benaras for further studies. During his stay in Benaras, Chandrasekhar Azad studied Sanskrit Grammar and other Hindu scriptures at the Government Sanskrit College there. When the Jallianwala Bagh massacre shook the country in April 1919, Azad was only 13 years old. He was drawn into the national movement. He used to attend public meetings in Benaras. He frequented public libraries and kept himself posted about the activities of freedom fighters in different parts of India at that time.

When the Non-Cooperation Movement started in 1921, Chandrasekhar plunged headlong into it. As a tender boy of less than 15 years, Azad was arrested in 1921 for participating in the Non-Cooperation Movement and offering Sathyagraha in front of the Government Sanskrit College at Benaras. Azad was produced before a Parsi Magistrate called Khareghat who was known for his cruelty and inhuman treatment of political workers and prisoners. When he asked the boy his name, pat came the reply:

My name is 'Azad' (Free).

'Father's name?'

Swadheen (Independent)

'Place of residence?'

Jail

Khareghat, who was a tyrant, considered the answers given by Chandrasekhar Azad as totally impertinent and uncalled for. He wanted to teach a lesson to the young boy. He passed an order to the effect that Azad should be given 15 whip stripes. Accordingly Azad was taken to the Central Jail where he was stripped naked and tied so fast that he could not move any part of his body. A stout sweeper wielded the whip and the jailor counted the strokes. As each stroke of the whip lashed his bare back, Azad shouted slogans like 'Vande Mataram', 'Bharat Mata Ke Jai' and 'Mahatma Gandhi ke Jai'. Like Veer Hanuman, he stood his ground even as the whip strokes came in torrents, making his entire back a mess of wounded flesh and oozing blood. Till that moment this brave and courageous boy was known as Chandrasekhar Tiwari. After this gruesome episode, he came to be known as Chandrasekhar Azad. The news of the crowd and cruel punishment meted out to a young boy of less than 15 years spread like a wild fire and when he came out of the prison he was given an ovation at a mammoth public meeting at Gnanbapi at Benaras. Thus Chandrasekhar Azad emerged as the unsurpassed hero of millions of his countrymen. 'The Maryada', a newspaper edited by Sampoornanand, published his photograph with a caption: (FEARLESS BOY AZAD)

When Mahatma Gandhi suddenly withdrew the Non-Cooperation Movement in 1922, like thousands of his countrymen, Azad too was greatly disappointed. Even as he came out of the prison after the historic punishment meted out to him, Azad had taken a pledge to the effect Azad will ever remain Azad (Independent!) and never will he enter the four walls of any Jail.

From that moment Chandrasekhar Azad resolved to answer the British in the language of pistols and bombs a fitting reply he thought for the inhuman atrocities perpetrated by them on the innocent people of India. Babu Shiv Prasad Gupta, a patriot and a rich man in Benaras took a fancy to Chandrasekhar Azad and started helping him in a significant way with financial assistance towards his revolutionary activities. Chandrasekhar Azad became a member of the revolutionary group working under the leadership of Ramaprasad Bismil.

In January 1926, the revolutionaries which included Rajendra Lehri, Ramaprasad Bismil, Roshan Singh, Ashfaqulla and Chandrasekhar Azad stopped railway train at KAKORI VILLAGE in Lucknow District and looted the train. They succeeded in taking away the railway cash to the tune of thousands of rupees. The accused were charged under Section 121 A (Waging war against King Emperor), Section 129 (Criminal conspiracy) and Section 302 (Murder). Of the ten persons who participated in the train hold-up at Kakori, Rajendra Lehri, Ramaprasad Bismil, Roshan Singh and Ashfaqulla were sentenced to death. Chandrasekhar Azad had managed to escape.

CHANDRESHEKAR AZAD AND HIS COMRADES


THE BRAVE MEN BEHIND KAKORI CONSPIRACY

After the train hold-up at Kakori, a meeting of important revolutionaries was held at Meerut. Two special invitees were Bhagat Singh from Lahore and Jatindra Nath Das from Calcutta. Chandrasekhar Azad took up the responsibility of organizing the revolutionary forces in northern India. Bhagat Singh and Chandrasekhar Azad thought that the best way to begin with was to rescue senior and tested revolutionaries like Sachindranath Sanyal, Jogesh Chatterji and Ramaprasad Bismil from Jail. They drew up a secret plan for the rescue operation. However the police got scent of the secret plan and consequently the attempt of the revolutionaries became futile.

On 8 September 1928, Bhagat Singh, Sukh Dev and other revolutionaries met at Feroz Shah Kotla in Delhi and established the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army (HSRA) for the armed liberation of India. Though Chandrasekhar Azad was not present at that meeting, yet he was unanimously elected as the Commander-in-Chief of the HSRA. Factories for making bombs were set up at Lahore, Saharanpur, Calcutta and Agra. In Kanpur, Azad set up a bomb factory for which the raw materials were produced in another factory in Gwalior. Azad later set up a bomb factory in Delhi which functioned under the name �The Himalayan Toilets�. In the day time this factory produced toilet soaps and in the night materials for bomb manufacture.

As the Commander-in-Chief of the HSRA, Chandrasekhar Azad was actively involved in the attempt to blow up the viceroy's train (1926), the shooting of Saunders at Lahore (1928) to avenge the killing of Lala Lajpatrai and the Assembly bomb incident at Delhi (1929).

Chandrasekhar Azad was constantly on the run after 1928 and was pursued by the police. On 27 February, 1931, Azad, Yashpal and Pandey had assembled at Allahabad to chalk out the future course of action. Later Azad went to Alfred Park to meet another revolutionary leader Sukh Dev. A member of the HSRA, Birbhadra Tiwari, betrayed them and passed on the information to the police. When Azad and Sukh Dev were engaged in a conversation, a large police party under the leadership of an English police Officer called Nutt Bower, surrounded the park. Azad jumped up and whipped out his revolver, instructed Sukh Dev to escape and challenged the police to take him alive. Gun shots were exchanged. A bullet from Nutt Bower hit Azad on the thigh. However Azad was overpowered by the police and before they could arrest him, he shot himself to death.Thus he fulfilled his vow 'Azad will ever remain Azad' (Independent).

Chandrashekar Azad’s dead body kept on public display by the British to serve as a warning message for other revolutionaries.