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BHAGAT SINGH JAIL DIARY
by Yadvinder Singh Sandhu.
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This book is different from other works on Bhagat Singh's writings in two small but important details - one, this contains photographs of pages of the journal that Bhagat Singh wrote in a diary, provided to him September 1929, by the then government of India, and handed over yo his relatives after his execution; two, the book is presented by his grandnephew Yadvinder Singh Sandhu. In the latter respect, it has similarity to another book, Bhagat Singh Aur Unke Sathiyon Ke Dastavez, published in Hindi, which was compiled by Jagmohan Singh, another similar close relative - through a sister, while Yadvinder Singh Sandhu is through a brother.
"डॉ. जगमोहन सिंह शहीद भगत सिंह की छोटी बहन अमर कौर (अब दिवंगत) के बेटे। सम्प्रति पंजाब कृषि विश्वविद्यालय, लुधियाना, में कृषि इंजीनियरिंग विषय में अध्यापक और पंजाब जनतान्त्रिक अधिकार सभा के महासचिव।"
Yadvinder Singh Sandhu explains in the preface by him that he wished India to see Bhagat Singh's journal in his own handwriting, and it indeed makes an impression - his signature has a beauty, and his handwriting clearly that of a thinker, thoughts flowing too fast for his writing to be calligraphy, but making an impression of a good handwriting nevertheless. Añ expert in the subject would be able to say much more, of course, but nothing, one expects, that is unexpected after reading his writings and his diary.
Another incomparably valuable factor about this book, different from any other and making it worth possessing, is the set of photographs of Bhagat Singh ànd his close relatives, at the very beginning of the book. If one has read a little of the relevant history, one knows that the various family members who influenced the young boy were all involved in the freedom struggle of India, had suffered persecution and imprisonment by British government of India, and more. Looking at the photographs that span a century, or most of it, is quite an experience.
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The notebook, as remarked elsewhere, is not about daily activities or emotions of Bhagat Singh, as diaries or journals are normally understood, and for most people, are; in this case, it's his mind working out, from something as mundane as -
"Land Measurements:
"German 20 hectares—50 acres i.e. 1 hectare = 2 ½ acres1"
- to more complex matters.
Strangely enough, while Chaman Lal and so forth, who so proudly proclaim love of Bhagat Singh for Lenin, and inferred disdain for various Hindu things, do not publicise his open statement about the most common institution of civilisation -
"Marriage itself remained, as before, the legally recognised form, the official cloak, of prostitution . . ."
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Bhagat Singh seems to make notes in his journal about various topics, and from books he studies. He begins with Engel's Origin Of The Family, and civilisation beginning with stages of savagery and barbarism.
He seems to go entirely by sources West, or those of Europe, in any case outside India; in fact, apart from the atmosphere at home, his learning even about India seems to have been derived from sources outside India.
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"We have, then, three main forms of the family corresponding in general to the three main stages of human development:
"1. For savagery: “group marriage”
"2. For barbarism: the pairing family
"3. For civilisation: monogamy supplemented by adultery and prostitution.
"Between the pairing family and monogamy, in the higher stage of barbarism, the rule of men over female slaves and polygamy is inserted."
"Defects of Marriage"
"Socialistic Revolution and Marriage Institution!
"We are now approaching a social revolution, in which the old economic foundations of monogamy will disappear just as surely as those of its complement prostitution. Monogamy arose through the concentration of considerable wealth in one hand,—a man’s hand—and from the endeavour to bequeath this wealth to the children of this man to the exclusion of all others. This necessitated monogamy on the woman’s, but not on the man’s part. Hence this monogamy of women in no way hindered open or secret polygamy of women.
"Now the impending social revolution will reduce this whole case of the heritance to a minimum by changing at least the overwhelming part of permanent and inheritable wealth—the means of production—into social property. Since monogamy was caused by economic conditions, will it disappear when these causes are abolished?"
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It may come as a surprise, but he quotes Umar Khayyam - and that too, the most famous verses!
"“Ah, my Beloved, fill the cup that clears
"Today of past Regrets and future Fears—
"Tomorrow?—Why, Tomorrow I may be
"Myself with Yesterday’s Sev’n Thousand Years.
"Here with a loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
"A Flask of Wine, a Book of verse—and Thou
"Beside me signing in the Wilderness—
"And Wilderness is Paradise now!
"Umar Khayyam
Surprise, because, hed refused to get married and run away, when his father had arranged a martiage for him, thinking it'd keep him safer.
His fiancee, incidentally, is known to have lived her long life - well into our adulthood - alone, with no other man in her life, although she was very young when engaged to Bhagat Singh, the engagement carried out between the two families as per tradition. It's unclear if her family ever considered getting her married elsewhere, after his death. She explained it, when asked in her very old age, that, having been engaged to Bhagat Singh, it was out of question for her to consider another man, ever.
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"Definition of a Good Government
"“Good government can never be a substitute for self-government.”
"Henry Campbell Bannerman
"“We are convinced that there is only one form of Government, whatever it may be called, namely, where the ultimate control is in the hands of the people”.
"“Earl of Balfour"
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Bhagat Singh quotes Bertrand Russell on religion.
"Religion
"“My own view of religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear, and as source of untold miserv to the human race. I cannot, however, deny that it has made some contributions to civilisation. It helped in-early days to fix the calendar and it caused the Egyptian priest to chronicle eclipses with such care that in time they became able to predict them. These two services, I am prepared to acknowledge, but I do not know of any other.
"Bertrand Russell"
Egypt had far more knowledge, and Greece inherited one part, while Jews got another; Russell was unaware of these, and of course, of treasures of knowledge of India since antiquity. That Bhagat Singh was, too, unaware of much of the latter, despite it not only being his homeland, but his home being steeped in Arya Samaj tradition, seems a pity.
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These following astounding quotes tell much that is usually either not admitted, with the specific sayings pushed under the rug, hoping the world will forget about it, or worse, the opposite attitude is pushed continuously, so that they come as a surprise - and gratitude is owed to this young man who noted these down.
"Benevolent Despotism
"Montague-Chelsmford8 called the British Government a ‘benevolent despotism’ and according to Ramsay Macdonald,9 the Imperialist leader of the British Labour Party, “in all attempts to govern a country by a ‘benevalent despotism’, the governed are crushed down. They become subjects who obey, not citizens who act. Their literature, their art, their spiritual expression go.”
One must say, he was soft on British government to the point of falsehood, in calling it benevolent, and not acknowledging the deliberate nature of the havoc wreaked on India by the British following Macaulay policy of destruction of soul of India, of crushing spirit of India, in order to turn Indian people into slaves of British.
"Govt. of India
"Rt. Hon’ble Edwin S. Montague, Secretary of State for India, said in the House of Commons in 1917:
"“The Government of India is too wooden, too iron, two metallic, too antediluvian, to be of any use for modern purposes. The Indian Government is indefensible.”
"British Rule in India
"Dr. Ruthford’s10 words:
"“British Rule as it is carried on in India is the lowest and most immoral system of government in the world—the exploitation of one nation by another.”
"Liberty & English People
"“The English people love liberty for themselves. They hate all acts of injustice, except those which they themselves commit. They are such liberty-loving people that they interfere in the Congo and cry, “Shame” to the Belgians. But they forget their heels are on the neck of India.
"An Irish Author"
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"Mob Retaliation . . .
"Let us therefore, examine how men came by the idea of punishing in this manner.
"They learn it from the Governments they live under, and retaliate the punishment they have been accustomed to behold. The heads stuck upon spikes, which remained for years upon Temple Bar, differed nothing in the horror of the scene from those carried about upon spikes at Paris; yet this was done by the English Government. It may perhaps be said that it signifies nothing to a man what is done to him after he is dead; but it signifies much to the living; it either tortures their feelings or hardens their hearts, and in either case, it instructs them how to punish when power falls into their hands.
"Lay then the axe to the root, and teach Governments humanity. It is their sanguinary punishments which corrupt mankind . . . The effect of these cruel spectacles exhibited to the populace is to destroy tenderness or excite revenge, and by the base and false idea of governing men by terror instead of reason, they become precedents.”
"(Rights of Man, pp. 32,
"T. Paine)"
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"King’s Salary
"It Is inhuman to talk of a million sterling a year, paid out of the public taxes of any country, for the support of an individual, whilst thousands who are forced to contribute thereto, are pining with want and struggling with misery. Govt does not consist in a contract between prisons and palaces,14 between poverty and pomp; it is not instituted to rob the needy of his mite and increase the worthlessness of the wretched."
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"“Give me Liberty or Death”
"It is in vain, Sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, peace, peace—but there is no peace. The war is actually begun. The next gale that sweeps from the North . . . to our ears the clash of resounding arms. Our brethren are already in the field. Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so a dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, almighty God! I know not what course others may take. As for me, give me “liberty or death”.
"Patrick Henry"
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Bhagat Singh quotes Charge Of The Light Brigade, and there is a photograph of the journal page where one sees he'd written it diwn in his own hand (presumably he did not dictate his journal, but wrote it himself).
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"Czarist Regime and the Bolshievist Regime
"Frazier Hunt tells that in the first fourteen months of their rule, the Bolsheviks executed 4,500 men, mostly for stealing and speculation. After the 1905 Revolution, Stolypin,59 minister of Czar, caused the execution of 32,773 men within twelve months.
"p. 390 Brass Check"
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Bhagat Singh quotes, after Charge Of The Light Brigade, also Internationale and Marseillaise. In English, of course.
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"Slavery Religion a supporter of the established order:
"In 1835, the General Assembly of the Presbytrain Church resolved that:
"“Slavery is recognised in both Old and New Testaments, and is not condemned by the authority of God”.
"The Charleston Baptist Association issued the following in 1835:
"“The right of masters to dispose of the time of their slaves has been distinctly recognised by the Creator of all things, who is surely at liberty to vest the right of property over any object whomsoever. He pleases.”
"The Revd. ED, Simon, Doctor of Divinity, a professor in Methodist College of Virginia wrote:
"“Extracts from Holy Writ unequivocally assert the right of property in slaves, together with the usual incidents to that right. The right to buy and sell is clearly stated. Upon the whole, then, whether we consult the Jewish policy instituted by God Himself, or the uniform opinion and practice of mankind in all ages, or the injunctions of the New Testament and the moral law, we are brought to the conclusion that slavery is not immoral. Having established the point that the first African slaves were legally bought into bondage, the right to detain their children in bondage follows as an indispensable consequence. Thus we see that the slavery that exists in America was founded in right.”"
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Bhagat Singh quotes from Iron Heel by Jack London, apart from several quotes from Cry For Justice by Upton Sinclair.
He briefly notes about the coal and railway strikes of England early in the century, and of Black Friday. He speaks of Bukharin, of world revolution and of comparison between Labour with and without machines, quoting figures by United States Bureau of Labour. He quotes Lenin on dictatorship, and on his retort to Kautsky 're proletarian dictatorship.
Wonder if his utopian ideas about communism would have survived long, if he hadn't died, and instead seen the massacres carried out by totalitarian regimes that had little difference between labels of left or fascism. It's unlikely someone so sincere woukd resort to the tactics other leftists resorted to, holding to party lines and shutting up their thinking, obeying either one or the other communist power.
He quotes Tagore on marriage. He now begins to mention Greeks, Aristotle and Socrates and more, and Romans. He goes on to Thomas Aquinas and Italians, Descartes and reformation, Huguenot and Rousseau, Buchanan, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke and more. He goes on to French revolution, Bastille and Versailles. He comes to Russian revolution. He arrives at British rule of India, Congress and more.
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November 14, 2021 - November 15, 2021.
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BHAGAT SINGH JAIL DIARY
by Yadvinder Singh Sandhu
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November 14, 2021 - November 19, 2021.
Purchased November 12, 2021.
Kindle Edition, 268 pages
Published by Prabhat Prakashan
ASIN:- B07BR5NQBS
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https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4345347266
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