S.N. Sahu 
Prime Minister Narendra Modi – apart from being the only prime minister of our country who repeatedly invokes the name of V.D. Savarkar in his addresses to the nation – has recently set the unenviable record of laying the foundation of a college in Delhi University named after Savarkar. Such acts on his part constitutes an affront to the vision of Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, B.R. Ambedkar and the ethos of the freedom struggle.
Gandhi on V.D. Savarkar
It is worth noting that while Savarkar fought against British rule during the first decade of the 20th century, after his incarceration in the cellular jail in the Andamans, he submitted multiple mercy petitions between 1911-1914 for his release. He even gave undertakings that he would be loyal to the British rulers without ever participating in the freedom struggle.
In fact Savarkar’s brother, D.N. Savarkar, sent a telegram to Mahatma Gandhi on January 8, 1920 saying that the names of Savarkar and one of his imprisoned brothers did not figure in the list of those released from jail based on their mercy petitions. Gandhi wrote back on January 25 saying that the offences committed by them should be persuasively presented before the public as purely political in nature.
Gandhi, in his article ‘Savarkar Brothers’ published in Young India on May 26, 1920, recalled Savarkar’s sensational attempt to escape the custody of the police by jumping through a porthole of a ship in French waters and pleas for their release by citing, among other grounds, that “They both state unequivocally that they do not desire independence from the British connection”. Savarkar and his brother’s stand that they were not for independence of India stood in contrast to the spirit of freedom struggle.
Savarkar preceded Jinnah on two-nation theory
Apart from abandoning the freedom struggle, Savarkar propagated the divisive and toxic narrative that Hindus and Muslims should constitute two separate nations. He did so while addressing the session of Hindu Mahasabha in 1937 in Ahmedabad. “I warn the Hindus that the Mohammedans are likely to prove dangerous to our Hindu nation and the existence of a common Indian State even if and when England goes out,” Savarkar said, displaying his hatred against Muslims.
In the same address he shockingly referred to Hindus and Muslims as “two antagonistic nations living side by side in India” and accused “several infantile politicians,” committing “…the serious mistake in supposing that India is already welded into a harmonious nation, or that it could be welded thus for the mere wish to do so”. Describing them as “well-meaning but unthinking friends” he remarked that they “take their dreams for realities” and “are impatient of communal tangles and attribute them to communal organisations”. “But the solid fact is that the so-called communal questions are but a legacy handed down to us by centuries of a cultural, religious and national antagonism between the Hindus and the Moslems.”
Such venomous pronouncements Savarkar in 1937 closely corresponded to Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s two nation theory which he expounded virulently in the 1940s.
Also read: BJP, RSS and 99 Lies From Goebbels’ Grandchildren
Gandhi, Patel and Ambedkar’s indictment of Savarkar
On August 8, 1942, a day before the Quit India movement was launched by him, Gandhi, while speaking at the All India Congress Committee meeting in Bombay, referred to a “fratricidal war” in the context of the call for vivisection of the country in the name of religion. He said “Those Hindus who, like Dr. Moonje and Shri Savarkar, believe in the doctrine of the sword may seek to keep the Mussalmans under Hindu domination. I do not represent that section.”
The divisive and violent dimensions of Savarkar’s ideology flagged by Gandhi in 1942 was underlined by Ambedkar in his book, Pakistan or Partition of India, first published in 1946. In fact, in it he strongly indicted Savarkar’s divisive vision articulated in 1937 and wrote, “Strange as it may appear, Mr. Savarkar and Mr. Jinnah instead of being opposed to each other on the one nation versus two nations issue are in complete agreement about it”. He further said, “Both agree, not only agree but insist, that there are two nations in India—one the Muslim nation and the other the Hindu nation.”
“They differ,” Ambedkar said, “only as regards the terms and conditions on which the two nations should live”. Outlining that difference, he observed, “Mr. Jinnah says India should be cut up into two, Pakistan and Hindustan, the Muslim nation to occupy Pakistan and the Hindu nation to occupy Hindustan. Mr. Savarkar on the other hand insists that “…the two nations shall dwell in one country and shall live under the mantle of one single constitution; that the constitution shall be such that the Hindu nation will be enabled to occupy a predominant position that is due to it and the Muslim nation made to live in the position of subordinate co-operation with the Hindu nation.”
“But Mr. Savarkar in advocating his scheme” Ambedkar said, perhaps with some sadness, “is really creating a most dangerous situation for the safety and security of India.” Ambedkar went on to explain that by saying, “But it can never ensure a stable and peaceful future for the Hindus, for the simple reason that the Muslims will never yield willing obedience to so dreadful an alternative”.
It is indeed appalling that V.D. Savarkar was held to account by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel only after Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination on January 30, 1948. Almost a month later on February 27, he wrote to India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, “It was a fanatical wing of the Hindu Mahasabha directly under Savarkar that hatched the conspiracy (to murder Gandhi)”.
Also read: How Did Savarkar, a Staunch Supporter of British Colonialism, Come to Be Known as ‘Veer’?
Savarkar, who was tried as an accused in the Mahatma Gandhi assassination case later got discharged in the absence of corroborative evidence. But charges cited by Patel in his letter to Nehru were reaffirmed by the Jeevan Lal Kapur Commission Report on Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination in 1970. The letter is published in the book Sardar Patel Correspondence, 1945-50, Vol VI, edited by Durga Das and published by Navajivan Publishing House in Ahmedabad.
Savarkar against Travancore joining the Indian Union
Savarkar, who called himself Veer, is also unforgivable for offering his support to the princely rulers of the Hindu Kingdom of Travancore in their refusal join the Indian Union on the specious ground that Travancore’s sovereignty flowed from the Hindu deity Padmanav who could not be subjected to the sovereignty of India.
In this context, it is appropriate to invoke the then President of India K.R. Narayanan, who, while unveiling the statue of Sardar Patel on August 14, 1998 in front of the central hall of the old Parliament building, referred to Dewan of Travancore, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy Iyer’s argument, that no one could negotiate a merger of the state with India as Travancore was ruled “in the name and on behalf of the tutelary deity, Sri Padmanabha.” Narayanan then quoted Sardar Patel who asked derisively “Is that so? Then please tell me how Travancore’s rulers allowed Lord Padmanabha to become subservient to the British Crown?”
During those trying times when Sardar Patel was engaged in the arduous task of unifying India, the so-called Veer Savarkar was standing on the side of Travancore’s rulers.
Vikram Sampath in his book, Savarkar : A Contested Legacy 1924-66 wrote, ” Savarkar’s ill-advised support to the Dewan of Travancore, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy lyer, who was planning to declare autonomy and independence of the Hindu princely state was unfortunate and detrimental to the integration process of the new Indian Union.”
Modi’s stand negates his fundamental duty
So why is Prime Minister Modi projecting Savarkar as a towering icon of our nation and laying the foundation of a college bearing his name? In doing so, Modi is heaping insults on Gandhi, Ambedkar, Sardar Patel and the values of the independence movement which, he, as per the fundamental duties enshrined in Article 51(A)(b) of the Constitution should “cherish and follow the noble ideals which inspired our national struggle for freedom”.
S.N. Sahu served as an officer on special duty to former President K.R. Narayanan.