Skip to main content

The Second Crucifixion


 

‘The Second Crucifixion’ is the title of the last chapter of Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins’s magnum opus Freedom at Midnight. The sub-heading is: ‘New Delhi, 30 January 1948’. Seventy-three years ago, on that day, a great soul was shot dead by a man who was driven by the darkness of hatred.

Gandhi has just completed his usual prayer session. He had recited a prayer from the Gita:

                        For certain is death for the born

                        and certain is birth for the dead;

                        Therefore over the inevitable

                        Thou shalt not grieve.

At that time Narayan Apte and Vishnu Karkare were moving to Retiring Room Number 6 at the Old Delhi railway station. They walked like thieves not wishing to be noticed by anyone. The early morning’s winter fog of Delhi gave them the required wrap. They found Nathuram Godse already awake in the retiring room. The three of them sat together and finalised the plot against Gandhi.

Godse thought he would pose as a photographer in order to get near to Gandhi. But they couldn’t get an appropriate camera. Then they told him to put on a Muslim burqa. When he tried a burqa on, he found out that it was an unwieldy dress that would hinder his mission. “I will be caught in this woman’s dress to my eternal shame without having killed Gandhi,” he said.

Finally they decided that Godse would wear a kind of greyish military suit that was very commonly used by people in those days. Its loose shirt could conceal a pistol inside.

Having completed all arrangements, they went to Birla Temple. Apte and Karkare went inside and offered homage to the idol of Lakshmi Narayan and Kali, the goddess of destruction, while Godse chose to stay in the garden drawing courage from the statue of Shivaji.

4.30 pm. Godse and his gang take a tonga to Birla House. There is no serious security check. Godse manages to merge into the crowd easily. Gandhi comes out and people chant, “Bapuji, Bapuji.’ Godse walks straight to Gandhi, bows in respect saying ‘Namaste Bapuji’. When he straightens himself he has a pistol in hand which fires instantly. Three rounds. Into the chest of a slender figure that couldn’t take so much.

‘Thank God the killer is a Hindu,’ Mountbatten mutters in relief hiding his grief bravely. The retaliation is focused on RSS offices now.

‘The light has gone out,’ Nehru announces to the nation. ‘But that light will be seen … the world will see it and it will give solace to innumerable hearts….That light represented the eternal truths, reminding us of the right path, drawing us from error, taking this ancient country to freedom.’

Gandhi’s death shows how dangerous it is to be good, George Bernard Shaw said.

The Hindustan Standard left its editorial page blank. However, at the centre of the page was a single paragraph: “Gandhi has been killed by his own people for whose redemption he lived. This second crucifixion in the history of the world has been enacted on a Friday – the same day Jesus was done to death 1915 years ago. Father, forgive us.”

 

Comments

  1. Yes ! Gandhi was a forgiver forever and for all the offenders. He must have forgiven his killers (and his countrymen also). All the same, it's a rare virtue to realize own errors and Gandhi was no exception in this regard. Can't say whether he could understand the reason of his killing and the thought-train of his killer.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. He knew how the RSS and its people hated him as well as a lot many others. Wasn't it precisely that hatred that he resisted?

      Tragically that hatred has come to rule us today just as he feared.

      Delete
    2. The aberration on his part (in my opinion) which propelled many including Godse to go to the extent of killing him was his sitting on a fast unto death for pressurizing the newly empowered Nehru govt. to give financial assistance to Pakistan. This act of himself proved to be the spark for the ammunition already accumulated in the hearts of a lot of sufferers on account of the heinous crimes taken place against the innocents during the pre and post partition times.

      Delete
    3. Money given to Pak was just another excuse. Fundamentally the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha were Muslim-haters. Even today the entire right wing led by our very PM is driven by the same hate and nothing noble. That's the tragedy of the entire right wing history as well as its future.

      Delete
  2. If Gandhi wanted India to support Pakistan, he should not have surrendered to the idea of partition in the first place. We are still suffering due to the same and Super Powers are taking advantage of that rift till now.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Without Pakistan today what would be the relevance of the Sangh Parivar?

      Delete
  3. Really nice website 👍

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...

Dopamine

Fiction Mathai went to the kitchen and picked up a glass. The TV was screening a program called Ask the Doctor . “Dopamine is a sort of hormone that gives us a feeling of happiness or pleasure,” the doc said. “But the problem with it is that it makes us want more of the same thing. You feel happy with one drink and you obviously want more of it. More drink means more happiness…” That’s when Mathai went to pick up his glass and the brandy bottle. It was only morning still. Annamma, his wife, had gone to school as usual to teach Gen Z, an intractable generation. Mathai had retired from a cooperative bank where he was manager in the last few years of his service. Now, as a retired man, he took to watching the TV. It will be more correct to say that he took to flicking channels. He wanted entertainment, but the films and serial programs failed to make sense to him, let alone entertain. The news channels were more entertaining. Our politicians are like the clowns in a circus, he thought...

Stories from the North-East

Book Review Title: Lapbah: Stories from the North-East (2 volumes) Editors: Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih & Rimi Nath Publisher: Penguin Random House India 2025 Pages: 366 + 358   Nestled among the eastern Himalayas and some breathtakingly charming valleys, the Northeastern region of India is home to hundreds of indigenous communities, each with distinct traditions, attire, music, and festivals. Languages spoken range from Tibeto-Burman and Austroasiatic tongues to Indo-Aryan dialects, reflecting centuries of migration and interaction. Tribal matrilineal societies thrive in Meghalaya, while Nagaland and Mizoram showcase rich Christian tribal traditions. Manipur is famed for classical dance and martial arts, and Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh add further layers of ethnic plurality and ecological richness. Sikkim blends Buddhist heritage with mountainous serenity, and Assam is known for its tea gardens and vibrant Vaishnavite culture. Collectively, the Northeast is a uni...

The RSS and Paradoxes

The oldest racist organisation in the world is all set to celebrate the centenary of its existence. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was founded in 1925 with the specific goal of unifying the Hindus in India under a religious and cultural banner. The Indian Independence struggle that was going on in full force at that time was no concern of the RSS. Though it gave the liberty to its individual members to take part in the struggle, the organisation’s official policy was to stay clear of it altogether. That was only one of the many paradoxical ironies that marked the RSS which was a nationalist organisation that cared little for the Independence of the nation. Today, the Prime Minister of India is a man who was trained and nurtured by the RSS. Shashi Tharoor wrote a massive book on the paradoxes that underscore the personality of Mr Narendra Modi. The RSS and paradoxes go hand in hand, if we take Modi as a specimen of the organisation’s great achievements. Tharoor’s final asses...