By Sitaram Yechury
Abiding Relevance
AS noted earlier in these columns, the year 2007 has a remarkable bearing on India’s historic struggle for freedom. It marks the 250th anniversary of the battle of Plassey; the 150th anniversary of 1857; the 60th anniversary of 1947; and the birth centenary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh.
Through the course of this year, many aspects of the life and work of Bhagat Singh have been written about. While Bhagat Singh continues to remain an icon for modern-day Indian youth, the fact that needs to be underlined is that he and his associates acquired the status of living legends even in their brief life time. This is confirmed by the fact that the British clandestinely advanced the hanging of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev fearing a public outrage. In an unprecedented manner, these legendary heroes of the Indian freedom movement were hanged until death at dusk on March 23, 1931 instead of the 24th morning. The British tried to surreptitiously dispose the bodies at Hussainwallah on the banks of the Sutlej.
In the few years of his active political life, being just over 23 years of age, when the British executed him, Bhagat Singh, along with his associates had radicalised the freedom struggle. The Delhi bomb case (“to make the deaf hear”) and the murder of British officer Saunders to avenge the death of Lala Lajpat Rai due to the severe lathicharge in the anti-Simon Commission protests brought on to the agenda of the freedom struggle, a militancy hitherto unknown.
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