मेरा आजीवन कारावास / माझी जन्मठेप (स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकर - काले पानी का ऐतिहासिक संस्मरण)

Gopal had gone on hunger strike. Only a little quantity of milk was daily administered to
him through the nose. He was reduced to skin and bones. Even then this lad was
sentenced to stand for a whole week with chains on his hands and feet. But he remained
firm, nothing could deter him. But others, deeply touched by his sufferings—some six or
seven in number—went on sympathetic hunger strike. They were put in chains and
subjected to similar punishment. I had, by this time, my expected letter from India. But it
was not given to me on the ground that it contained some objectionable matter. And I
immediately joined in the strike. I was sentenced to stand for two weeks in a framework
of fetters for my feet. This punishment was followed by chains for hands and feet
interlinked with a chain between them. My informants told me the contents of that
objectionable letter. There was in it a reference to the criticism of Keir Hardie in
Parliament on my imprisonment in this jail.

Keir Hardie's Criticism

The gist of that criticism was that while in Ireland the Government had
taken no steps against those who had threatened open rebellion, who had raised armies to
fight the partisans of Home Rule on the soil of England, a man like Savarkar, whose only
crime had been to distribute pistols among his fellow-conspirators, was sentenced by the
Indian Government to fifty years' transportation to the Andamans. If I had received the
letter, the jailor felt, that criticism in particular against my incarceration might go to our
heads and it might lead to the intensification of strike in that jail. Hence the letter was
withheld from me. In the manifesto about the strike, we had made three principal
demands : (1) That, as political prisoners, we should have all the privileges of the first
class, (2) that we should, otherwise, be put in the category of ordinary prisoners, given all
the facilities accorded to them and the periodical visit to this jail be permitted to members
of our families; or (3) we should be sent back to serve our term in the jails of India, so
that we may get all the facilities of that jail life, including reduction in the period of the
sentence on certificate of good behaviour. During the strike we defied all ordinary
regulations of the prison. We were locked up separately and under strict guard. So it had
become difficult for us to communicate with one another. Even "the telephone
method" described in previous pages was no longer available to us. It broke down
completely because we could not reach the iron-grating near the floor of our cell and in
the wall to talk. Well, if the telephone had stopped, we hit upon the method of telegraph,
and that again of the wireless telegraph. It went on splendidly for a long time. We had
shackles on our feet and they had manacles on their hands. We rang them on the bars of
our doors according to a particular code. And the news went round not only through the
three or four adjoining rooms but through all the storeys of the near-by blocks. And in
this mode of communication there was no scope for the warders to betray us. We carried
on the communication in English to start with. My brother remodelled it into Nagari.
Thus we had a pure Swadeshi telegraphic code and message to run through the whole
building. Marconi may have invented the wireless for the world. My brother hit upon the
plan for our prison before Marconi's invention had reached the world of the Andamans.