Remembering our forgotten heroes!!

With the 65th independence day nearing it is now time to write a post on 3 of the revolutionary freedom fighters india produced in the last century. I am talking about Chandrashekhar Azad, Veer Savarkar and Madanlal Dhingra. This post will give a glimpse of this lesser known daredevil Madan Lal Dhingra and the other two will be talked about in the following posts.
Madan Lal Dhingra was a born patriot. He got sacked from his college in Lahore for protesting against the Principal's order to wear uniform stitched from English cloth. He got sacked from his job for trying to organize a union (he had a job under British). He made contact with Abhinav Bharat founded by Savarkar and managed to get a seat at University College, London. In London he trained under Savarkar. Abhinav Bharat Mandal mandal was trying to prepare a bomb on its own and dhingra played a crucial role here. One interesting instance:
The members were boiling a chemical for preparing bomb late night and all fell asleep. The chemical was on the verge of bursting out when a member got up to extinguish the flames. But what he saw was a miracle. Dhingra was holding the vessel which was more than 300 degrees hot with his bare hands and coolly placed it on the floor. The skin of his fingers was charred and blood was oozing out but he was calm as if nothing had happened.
The is one more such instance in his life:
Once there was a meeting to talk about the bravery of japanese in the war against the british. Dhingra was annoyed and said that Indians were brave too. All the people made jokes about him. Then ensued a verbal duel btw those people and dhingra. After some time a man poked dhingra's arm with a big needle saying "Let me see how brave indians are". Dhingra was unmoved. He stood still while the needle pierced its way through his hand. Such was his love for this country.

Dhingra assasinated Sir Curzon Wyllie who was then termed as the old unrepenting foe of india. Dhingra fired at Curzon with a revolver when he had attended a function organized by National Indian Association in London. He was later sentenced to death in London. Below are some excerpts from his words during and after trial:

"I do not want to say anything in defence of myself, but simply to prove the justice of my deed. As for myself, no English law court has got any authority to arrest and detain me in prison, or pass sentence of death on me. That is the reason I did not have any counsel to defend me."

"And I maintain that if it is patriotic in an Englishman to fight against the Germans if they were to occupy this country, it is much more justifiable and patriotic in my case to fight against the English. I hold the English people responsible for the murder of 80 millions of Indian people in the last fifty years, and they are also responsible for taking away ₤100, 000, 000 every year from India to this country."

Gandhi criticized Dhingra for his act. He said:
"It is being said in defence of Sir Curzon Wyllie’s assassination that...just as the British would kill every German if Germany invaded Britain, so too it is the right of any Indian to kill any Englishman.... The analogy...is fallacious. If the Germans were to invade Britain, the British would kill only the invaders. They would not kill every German whom they met.... They would not kill an unsuspecting German, or Germans who are guests. "

This statement shows the low logical skills of our Father of the Nation. If German's invade Britain the British cannot obviously ask everyone whether he s an invader or not before killing. Moreover Curzon had been deemed as a foe of india long before this incident.
And amazingly Dhingra got support from the British:
Talking about Dhingra Churchill said (Taken from Wikipedia):
 Churchill said that there has been much discussion in the Cabinet about him. Lloyd George had expressed to him his highest admiration of Dhingra's attitude as a patriot, in which he shared…He will be remembered two thousand years hence, as we remember Regulus and Caractacus and Plutarch's heroes and Churchill quoted with admiration Dhingra's last words, as the finest, ever made in the name of patriotism…"


Dhingra's Last Words:
"I believe that a nation held down by foreign bayonets is in a perpetual state of war. Since open battle is rendered impossible to a disarmed race, I attacked by surprise. Since guns were denied to me I drew forth my pistol and fired. Poor in wealth and intellect, a son like myself has nothing else to offer to the mother but his own blood. And so I have sacrificed the same on her altar. The only lesson required in India at present is to learn how to die, and the only way to teach it is by dying ourselves. My only prayer to God is that I may be re-born of the same mother and I may re-die in the same sacred cause till the cause is successful. Vande Mataram!"