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

The Jubilee is coming
When any news of an impossible happening drifted on to us, the mind was
attracted more by the chance of its turning true, than could be induced to discover its
impossibility; and hope led to wishful thinking all over the place. Hence, almost every
year, and, certainly every two or three years, "the Jubilee was coming", and "release or
remittance of sentence was a surety"—these would become the talk of the whole prison;
and the poor, disappointed inmates, taken in by that rumour, experienced a sort of relief
in their minds, till the rumour had proved altogether a hoax. This had gone on now for
ever, and whenever it started again, prisoners still persisted in believing it, and if any one
sought to disillusion them, if any one assured them that it was like the proverbial straw at
which the drowning man caught, they became furious with him for thus damping their
hopes.
One always gets angry with another who says that there is absolutely no hope of
release from a danger or who contradicts a rumour leading to such a hope, even though in
cooler moments of reflection he himself may have come to the same conclusion. That is a
peculiar trait of human nature to which very few are exceptions. And I myself have
passed through the same experience. When I was sentenced to twenty-five years'
transportation on the first charge in the High Court of Bombay, I was ninety-nine per cent
certain, that, if the second charge was proved against me, I would be sent to the gallows.
And, in all conscience, I was preparing myself in mind to face such a fate. And yet, when
a visitor to me in the jail at Dongri drew the same inference, I became very angry and had
to control myself lest my anger might burst out in harsh words to him. I remember the
occasion too well to forget it even now.
But the memory of that experience hardened my mind against entertaining any
foolish hope of release on the occasion of the Durbar at Delhi. Other prisoners were too
sanguine to disbelieve it. Most of them began marking time and planning for their
journey homeward. They went the length of fixing the route by which they would go; and
they thought out beforehand what they would do when they had reached their destination!
But the wonder of it was that some of these were here on a term of seven, ten or fourteen
years hard labour, of which they had not yet completed even one-half or two years at the
most. I could never believe that these would get their discaharge for anything in the
world, when Government had put them there at such a huge expense and at considerable
trouble to itself. These were dangerous men in its eyes and, I was convinced, that the
prison-doors would never open for their release. All the same miracles do happen even in
such cases as history tells us about them. Ireland, Italy and Russia had furnished instances
of them. But it was ever wise never to count upon such miracles in individual and
personal cases, though one had every right of hoping against all hope. Life becomes
endurable and work a matter of course when one disabuses his mind of such exceptions.
It was my constant advice to fellow-prisoners never to build on such foolish rumours and
to prepare themselves always for what was inevitably in store for them. But nothing
could conquer their irrepressible hope and their wishful thinking. Some were put out with

me for my eternal doubt and pessimism. Others swore by the prophesy of Aravinda
Ghosh. When Aravinda got his discharge while others with him were sentenced to long
terms of hard labour in India or across the seas, he had addressed them from the
prisoner's dock in the following words: "Go, you young men go, you are sentenced today,
but I assure you that you will come back free within three years from now."
Aravinda's vision of Krishna
The rumour then was that Aravinda Ghose, as a prisoner on trial, had a vision of
Krishna in the jail in which he was confined during the hearing of the case, and it was
this vision which had emboldened him to make that prophesy. Naturally, these prisoners
had put their implicit faith in it. If the prisoners from Calcutta caught in the Bomb
Conspiracy Case were bound to be free, why not the prisoners from Agra and the Punjab
who had spread sedition by their writing? And if all these were sure to be let off, why
should the three Maharashtrians alone lag behind? Thus the logical chain was complete,
based as it was on that great prophecy of Aravinda Ghose. All will be free then—that was
the firm conviction of them all. The question now remained was how to count these three
years, from what date to what date. In whatever order of time we counted them, the
reckoning did not fit in with the date of the Jubilee or the Coronation Durbar at Delhi.
However with an amount of hair-splitting common to all logical disputants, somehow
they made it according as they were anxious to interprete it. According to them the period
of three years had definitely marked out the month of December—the Coronation Durbar
Day—as the day of general amnesty and pardon, and, therefore, the day of our liberation.
There was, as such, no end to our hope. We were to be free; we were to see the faces of
our dear ones as fresh as they were when we were taken away from them. Two or three
years would not make such a difference. We shall tell them the story of our prison-life in
the freedom and happiness and love of our hearths and homes. What a pleasant dream it
was ! The men from Bengal were flush with it and they wanted their Maharashtrian
friends to come to their homes and make a sojourn there ! So also with the Punjabis who
extended similar kind invitations to me. Everything was fixed for the journey, none
thought of any hindrances in their way.
Of course, I was among the invitees. Men in my division of the jail flocked round
me and talked to me with candour and affection. Every one came to me and accosted me,
"Tatya, do please come with me; do please pay a visit to our side of the country." Bengal
and Punjab were equally enthusiastic in welcoming me. And, if I seemed indifferent or
hopeless of my release, they tried their hardest to shake off my despair and indifference.
Every one of them was deeply pained to realise the hardship of my imprisonment of fifty
years to run in that jail. And then deep sympathy for me made them more happy over my
own release than their own.
At last the blessed day came nearer. It was to dawn tomorrow. The news went
abroad that orders had already been passed and received for our release on that day. Even

the Officers believed that it was to happen accordingly. We learnt later that something
was on the anvil. This was the eve before that day. We were all of us in a line for our
evening meal. My political friends were sitting beside me. The Jamadar himself was in a
jubilant mood for he was also hoping to be released along with us. The only item that had
remained to be settled was by what train we were to leave from Calcutta for our
respective homes. As we were thus in the very height of our hopes, one Mirza Khan came
running up to me and, almost out of breath for the news, pressed my hand and told me,
"Barrister Babu, you are let off." This man was the worst of his kind among the prison-
warders. The dirty canal through which Mr. Barrie's palaver flowed on to us claimed him
as its very own. There were three of them who were similar channels of his messages to
us. They constituted the trident in the hands of the demi-god of Port Blair. It was this
trident with which he always pierced our hearts in this prison. But today its sharp end had
blunted. The Khan beamed with kindness upon me. These wretched minions are
opportunists all. They are kind or cruel as occasion suits them. Tomorrow, all of us were
to be free, were to leave the prison. What, then, was he to gain by being cruel to me?
Perhaps as a free man I may be of help to him. Knowing me as a man of law, he would
require my services to defend him as the accused in a future case of dacoity or similar
crime. It may happen like that, who knows. So it was discreet now to be on good terms
with me. At least it would cost him nothing to behave thus with me now. So the Khan
pressed my hand and, in anticipation, felicitated me. And he made the news public to all
the rest of them.
Bada Babu released
"But who told you this", I asked him with a smile. He said, "But why need any
one tell me this? Mr. Barrie himself has issued orders to assemble all the Jamadars in his
office tomorrow. For the prisoners have to be arrayed and sent off to their respective
places on the island and to be put on the boat that will take them home." "But how do you
say from that that I am included in that number?" The Khan replied, "I put a definite
question about it to Mr. Barrie and he laughed." Then it was on this slender thread of
hope that he had built up this news. All the same, I must confess that it gladdened my
heart to hear it. I also had my castles in the air. I shall go home; I will meet my brother,
and I will embrace him deeply. All released souls will wake up as from a bad dream and
gather together like humming bees,—these were the musings I indulged in. And with a
wave of joy it filled my whole being. I knew that it "was only a dream and yet it brought
to me peace and happiness. In the direst condition of overwhelming misfortune, what
man is there that will not clutch at such a hope for relief and consolation? It does blunt
the sharp edge of calamity that is ever at our breast.
The happy news made all of them fall into my arms and embrace me. Every one
of them was eager to say, "Now, at least, you will take it as true. Now you are sure of it,"
I shook my head and said, "No", when the most enthusiastic and forward among them,
Ram Hari by name, caught hold of my iron chain, and my breastplate with its marked

number, and said, "Tomorrow, this plate will be broken, and the chain shall fall to
pieces."
I again answered, "It may be true about you, but not so about me. Yet your release will
gladden my heart as much as mine. For it will mean much more good tidings for my
country." Damped by my answer, the prisoner pulled the chain and the plate with such
loving passion and vehemence that the plate fell off from my neck, and it slightly
scratched my neck as well. But he took it as
a good omen,
and the news went like fire all over the prison. This made assurance doubly sure for those
who were locked in other divisions of that place. I alone expostulated with him that this
good omen was to cost me heavily in the future for it was sure to bring on me added
punishment and suffering. And at last my forecast proved truer than the much announced
prophesy of Aravinda Ghose-
The day dawns
When tomorrow came all of us were called near the main gate of our prison. But
myself and a young man from Bengal were not so called to begin with. The assembly
stood there anxious to know their fate. They expected every moment that the gate would
open and they will hear either about their release, or, at least, some mitigation in their
term of imprisonment. As they were looking about them, they saw the Superintendent
coming up towards them.' Then followed Mr. Barrie in full uniform as the custodian of
the place. They called the prisoners one by one; my name was not among them.
Fortunately for me, my brother's name was in the list. He was the last to be called out.
The Officers announced that each of the prisoners whose names were called had a
remission of one month in a year in his total period of sentence. Accordingly, I was
entitled, at the minimum, to fifty months' mitigation. But I was told that I had
Neither release nor remission.
Even ordinary prisoners on simple imprisonment were given that remission but not I.
That day was celebrated for us by rice and potatoes boiled together for our feast. And I,
of course, had my share in that feast. So the Coronation Day of King George V set over
me without release or remission. It brought us potatoes and rice, and it brought for me, in
addition, punishment for the badge that had fallen from my neck. I must thank Mr. Barrie
specially for his address to me that evening in which he said, "I am very sorry, indeed,
that the man with the longest punishment in this jail should not get even a day's remission

on this happy day. But I must also remind you that a prisoner like you, who had not felt
the slightest compunction of soul for the horrible deeds he had done, did not deserve that
mercy at the hands of government. While others are mere political prisoners, you come
under the category of a 'common murderer.' You cannot claim, therefore, the concession
given to other prisoners on this great occasion." I replied, "I knew this before you had
told me. I often told them that I was regarded as a dangerous man and an anarchist, and I
expected no release at any time from the Government responsible for my incarceration. I
am not a political prisoner, I am not an ordinary prisoner either; so you will kindly take
away from me this dish of potato and rice, which is not my due because I am an anarchist
and as you put it `a common murderer' at that."

The Coronation Ceremony of 1911 had ended without release for a single political
prisoner and without even a day's remission for me. In the morning when they had been
brought out of their cells, they expected that they would not be returning to them in the
evening. That before sunset they were bound to be free and to start on their way to India,
or to wait somewhere for the boat to take them to India. But they had to bury themselves
once more into their solitary cells as before. Of all the occasions that I recall in my
prison-life, when the darkest shadow of despair, fear and melancholy had overcast the
faces of the inmates, this was perhaps the worst of its kind. Although I expected nothing
from this day, I could not escape the contagion of despair that had infected the rest of my
fellow-prisoners. What I had foretold lay confined within the four walls of my cell.
Outside utter darkness prevailed all about the prison-barracks. The atmosphere of
despondence and gloom prevailed all around me.

The hope of individual freedom had proved a dupe. But what of my country as a
whole? I also tried my best to get information about the death-trap of revolutionary
struggle which had gone on for the last four or five years. Had India got some additional
rights in commemoration of that Coronation Durbar? That was what I was most anxious
to know. The few prisoners who were being sent out for work, and who were given work
in different parts of the island settlement, were always ordered in if they fell ill instead of
being treated in a hospital outside its walls. When they returned with their bedding for
treatment in the prison-hospital, they always brought to us some news of the outside
world. They often got newspapers to read in that world and whenever a political prisoner
had special news for his fellow-prisoners inside the jail, he contrived to fall ill and return
to the prison-hospital. While all of us were so anxious for news from our country, one
such prisoner suddenly returned to the hospital in the jail. It was not difficult for us to
conjecture what sort of illness it was. The prisoner, we concluded, had some important
news to give us and hence the illness. Next day I came as usual for my bath on the
reservoir at about ten o'clock when a prisoner in the chawl across shouted out to me from
the top-window of his cell and called out my name. I turned round and saw h i m looking
at me from the backyard of his own chawl. He was in the second floor room of that
tenement. As soon as our eyes had met he told me that the

Partition of Bengal had gone
I could not believe it. And I questioned him. Partition of Bengal? The settled fact
is unsettled? He smiled and answered yes. I told him it mishit be news as faked as that of
our release, and perhaps he was indulging in a guess as foolish as that. My friend assured
me that it was not so, and that the news was authentic news. I left my bath there, and
contrived to circulate the good news through all the seven divisions of the Silver Jail.
Soon after, we learnt that the Capital of India was transferred from Calcutta to Delhi. But
this news was not so important after all. The restoration of united Bengal had behind it an
orientation of policy fraught with wider political consequences than the removal of
capital to Delhi. It was the triumph of an agitation which filled our hearts with deep
satisfaction. And in that joy we forgot our personal disappointment. If the political
question affecting our country was to be solved in such a successful manner, it did not
matter in the least to any of us if we were within the prison or without it.
No matter if we are here
These words fell from the lips of every young prisoner when he had heard that
good tidings. The partition or non-partition of Bengal was in itself a minor matter
compared with the triumph of the principle involved. The deeper satisfaction came from
the fact that we had made the Government bend down to our wishes. Further, it
discovered to us the new method of achieving the goal. It created in us a fresh hope and
instilled in us a new faith that what we would we could. Some one asked me if I was
content with the single achievement. Will not this lay to rest our revolutionary campaign?
I answered, "No, this achievement will inspire confidence; it will give a philip to our
movement as the surest method of winning freedom for India. The people are bound to
feel that the revolutionary programme that annulled the partition of Bengal would also
fructify in bringing them Swaraj-" He who had experienced that quinine was the surest
remedy against malaria, would not fail to use it against malarial fever whenever he was
attacked by it.
Ujjain or Delhi
I was not in the least sorry that the capital of India was removed to Delhi. For
whenever we discussed among ourselves which should be the future capital of India, I
had always expressed my preference for Ujjain. But I never failed to add that though
from the standpoint of history, culture, industry and art as also from its geographical
position and military importance, I regarded that city as the best-fitted in the whole of
India to be its capital, I had no objection to Delhi taking that place, and I felt that the
probability was more in favour of Delhi than Ujjain. According to my conjecture and
forecast, Delhi had become the capital of India, and I felt no regret for the fact. Of course,
personally it would have pleased me to see Ujjain as the capital of India.

End of Chapter XIV

CHAPTER XV
The prisoner's food in the Andamans
While these changes were going on in India between the end of 1911 and the
beginning of 1912, I had nearly finished my one year of imprisonment in the island of the
Andamans. In spite of bad food and inhuman treatment in that prison, I had managed to
keep normal health, on the whole, during the period. I may, therefore, give here a general
idea of the kind of food we were served in this prison.
A Prisoner's Ration
The quantity of daily food allowed to a prisoner in this jail, measured by prison-
regulations, was both sufficient and nutritious. But there was no end of trouble for the
food to reach the mouth of the prisoner himself in quality as well as in quantity. The
prisoners from the Punjab and the Pathans consume, mainly, wheat as their staple food.
The large number of warders and jamadars in the jail came to be drawn from the
Mussulman prisoners hailing from the Punjab and the North-West Frontier of India. And
they were appointed, for the most part, as supervisors over convicts detailed for the
hardest labour in this prison. Hence, they could easily deprive the prisoners in charge of
the large quantity of wheat bread allotted to them as their daily food. They did it by
coercion, tempetation or both. As a result, these hard-worked prisoners generally went
without bread and had to feed themselves exclusively on boiled rice- When the meal was
being served to them, they had to put their quantity of bread in the bowl of the Pathan and
the Panjabi warder and be content with rice alone. And if any one refused to pay this
daily toll, prompt came the threat from the warder that he would make a hell for the
prisoner who would not part with his bread to him. And the warder never failed to shape
the deed to the word. He harassed the poor prisoner in his work, he made false allegations
against him, he got him tried for faked charges, and he got him punished for those
charges. A large number of these wicked warders consisted of Mussulmans from Sindh,
Punjab and the N.W.F. Province. And the prisoners under them were mostly Hindus. The
Hindu prisoners were persecuted by the Mussulman warders as a matter of religion and
fanaticism, and their complaints never reached the ears of the custodians of the jail. For
the warders and the jamadars were all-in-all in that work, and saw to it that their own
actions were not reported to the authorities above them. The warders took their meals in
prison and, therefore, they could part with their rice to the prisoners in exchange for
bread. But the petty officer and the jamadar did not dine in prison because they were
regarded as Officers. They were not allowed to do so. But the law did not prevent them
from making a meal of the food allotted to the prisoners. So they took away the bread of
the prisoners without giving them anything in return. Besides, this way of satisfying their
hunger saved them all the bother of having a kitchen in their own quarters. It saved them
a lot of expenditure also. The prisoners had to part with all their bread to these Officers in

the first place and got no rice from them in return. If they did not do so, they were sure to
suffer in consequence and get beating from them into the bargain. Mirza Khan was the
worst offender among them. He regarded himself as the right-hand man of Mr. Barrie.
Nay, he was
"Chota Barrie".
Throughout the Silver Jail, Mirza Khan strutted out as miniature Mr. Barrie. He
made a sign, he had only to wink at a warder to get for him ten or twelve chapatis a day
from the prisoners' dole for the day. He would walk along the line of the prisoners, when
the meal was being served to them, with his eye on him who collected his ration of bread
from the prisoners. If a Hindu prisoner were to show the impudence to refuse, he would
at once turn round upon him and find fault with him, there and then, for some mistake or
another. He was not sitting in a line, he was looking insolently at the Jamadar; so on and
so forth was the expression of his grudge against him-And, shouting at him, he gave him
two sharp raps on the back with his big stick.
Every week a prisoner used to get half-a-coconut full of curds. This was a gala
day for the petty officers and the jamadars. For they filled their pots with the curds and
drank it off on the spot. Hardly a particle of it was allowed to be served to the prisoners
before them. They seldom touched a drop of it. Once a Hindu prisoner, instead of parting
it to the warder, poured it straight upon the rice. When the news was conveyed to the
Jamadar, he straight-away rushed into the line where Hindu prisoners were dining, picked
up the empty coconut-shell and pointing it out to him said, "0 you scoundrel, why did you
have this leaking shell?" It was an offence to use such a shell in the prison-ethics of the
Andamans. The Baluchi Jamadar instantly caught hold of his tuft of hair, and kept on
kicking him all the time. The hair had almost been wrenched when he exclaimed, "Kafir,
kafir with the tuft of hair", and abused him into the bargain. The prisoner raised a hue and
cry and Mirza Khan came on the scene. He noticed that the quarrel was between one of
his own and the Hindu prisoner opposite to him. He carried him to the jailor to frame a
charge against him. I was watching it all from my own place. I beckoned to the prisoner
to call me in as a witness. And I was sent for. I put before the trying Officers the facts of
the case as I had seen them. Mirza Khan, thereupon, began to shout at me. He said, "Sir,
this Bada Babu is ever found to complain against Mussulman warders and he tells lies
against them." I told the jailor, "Granted that I always give false evidence, I shall add one
more to it now. Go and search instantly the shed in which the Baluchi Officer has hidden
his pot of stolen curds. Come along and I will show it to you myself." The jailor was
obliged to accompany me. He got up and followed me to the shed and he found the pot
well-concealed behind a heap of coconut shells. I further deposed that the Baluchi
Jamadar had pulled the prisoner's tuft of hair, had called him kafir, and had kicked him
recklessly and for no misdemeanour whatever. On hearing this, the Superintendent
became red with anger, called the Jamadar in front of him, and, in order to teach a severe
lesson to the rest of them, pulled off his belt and dismissed him from the job. He was
reduced to the status of an ordinary prisoner and sent back to hard labour along with

them. Thus ended the scuffle between the Jamadar and his victim—the poor convict who
refused to be deprived of his share of curds by the lordly Baluchi who posed as Jamadar
over him. The kafir's tuft of hair had pulled all right the beard of the Gaji Mussulman!
Thus we tried to save the Hindu prisoners from the tyranny and persecution of
Mirza Khan—the 'Chota Barrie' of the Silver Jail. Occasionally, the latter would put us in
a tight corner in order to take revenge for the lesson we had taught him, and we had to
suffer a great deal on that score. We shall refer to these incidents in the course of our
story. Suffice it to say here that only the political prisoners here dared to challenge him
and to defy his authority. Others were meek as dumb-driven cattle before him. Out of
these again only five to ten persons would carry complaints against him to the highest
authorities. What we seek to emphasize in this place is the fact that though the prison-
regulations were fair about the food to be given to the prisoners, they did not properly
safeguard against its loot before it reached the hands of the prisoners themselves. In
consequence, the prisoners were normally semi-starved while the petty officer, the
jamadar and the warder systematically fed fat upon them.
Apart from this, there was another drawback in it, and that was about its nutrition.
Give a man insufficient food to eat, let there be no bread in it, but whatever you give him
let it be properly cooked. Here the rice that was served was not well-boiled, and the bread
was half-baked or burnt. Do not serve bread in the form of half-baked dough and do not
give rice that is as good as raw. Many a time we had to pray to the authorities to remedy
this evil. Of course, the prison had a big kitchen for nearly eight hundred persons. But the
cooks and caterers in it were all dirty men and some of them stricken with foul and
dangerous diseases. Their dirty clothes, their perspiring bodies, the perspiration dripping
down into the big pots of curry and rice which they brought out to serve —all this we saw
with our own eyes. And we had to eat such food to satisfy our hunger. Neither the cooks
nor the servants were to blame in the matter. In the hot blazing sun they had to do the
work. And there were only five of them to cook for eight hunderd persons. They had
undertaken the task because they could themselves eat freely of it in the privacy of the
kitchen. And even if they refused to work, none could set them free from it as they were
taken from the prisoners themselves. In these circumstances there was nothing like
taste in the food
served to the prisoners. A man enters the prison and puts the word taste outside it. Again,
the prisoners were not royal guests to be treated to the choicest dishes. They were to be
made to feel, as we understood it so well, that they were cut off from their kith or kin;
that they were secluded in this dungeon for some crime either against society or
government. Therefore, taste was no question here. Moreover, there was yet no
distinction made between prisoners with simple imprisonment and convicts on hard
labour. Again, political prisoners had not there been yet put in a class apart. Hence, these
could not claim better food or different food from ordinary convicts condemned to

rigorous imprisonment. We did not, therefore, complain against tasteless food. Our
grievance was that the food should be
clean, well-cooked and healthy
The food in the Andaman Jail broke all rules of hygiene, nutrition and careful
cookery. We were several times accused of false complaints and punished for them. But
as political prisoners had to serve the longest terms in that prison, sheer tenacity and
constant protests did not go altogether unheeded. And those, who had survived the ordeal,
found, at long last, a considerable improvement in it. And the change in the dietary
proved beneficial to all of us. I may close here with a few instances of how bad the food
could be.
Kerosene oil in Konjee !
Occasionally, we found kerosene oil mixed in conjee. The conjee had to be boiled
very early in the morning. A big pot of enormous size was set on the fire-hearth, and rice
and water were poured to the brim in it for boiling. Every now and then the cook had to
look in to see that it was properly boiling. He could not watch it well without a light.
There was not sufficient light in the kitchen that he could dispense with the lamp. He
often carried his kerosene lamp right above the boiling pot. With half-sleepy eyes he did
that work. The dirty lamp sometimes leaked or the man spilled kerosene from it as he
lifted it right into the boiling pot. The pot contained conjee for eight hundred persons; as
such it could not be thrown out. The cooks were afraid of bringing the matter to the
notice of the Jamadar, and he himself could not report it to the jailor. For the cooks as
well as the jamadars were liable to punishment for gross negligence; so that the conjee
was served to us as it was. This happened at least once in every two months and it went
on till the time of our release. But the political prisoners would not take it quietly, and
they raised loud complaint about it. Once they refused to have that conjee altogether and
the man had to report about it to the jailor. The jailor, as was usual with him, came to the
spot and began to scold us. He shouted at a prisoner near us, and asked, "Do you really
tell me that the conjee has kerosene into it?" He knew what answer to give when the
jailor roared at him. He straightaway said,
"No Sir, Bada Babu tells a lie"
Mr. Barrie forthwith came up to me and spoke to me, fretting and fuming, "All of
them don't smell kerosene in their conjee; how is it that you alone smell it? Well, I am
going to take you to task for it." And he went away and all the prisoners that day had to
swallow that kerosene-mixed conjee. For if we did not drink it, we had to go without food

that day and do our daily work on an empty stomach. But more than that we would be
violating the prison-regulation that
whatever is put in the plate shall be eaten
It shall not be thrown out. Some of them may be given insufficient food, and
some more than enough; but all must consume whatever was placed before them. Weak
or strong, every one must have his ration to keep him going. But the rule is not generally
observed in all its strictness. But when it is sought to be enforced literally, the prisoner
has to suffer from it. I have seen instances of warders forcing the prisoners to pick up the
food they had thrown into the dust-bin because they had enough of it, and make them eat
it. I have already told you how we were compelled to gulp down the kerosene-mixed
conjee. If some prisoners had thrown it off, we could have easily proved that it did
contain kerosene. Speaking for myself, I did throw it, and Mr., Barrie threatened me with
punishment for that act of disobedience. It was my good fortune that the matter did not go
beyond that threat. He pretended to forget it all, and I was relieved in mind about it.
The political prisoners carried these complaints straight to the Superintendent. As
a rule, the Superintendent laughed them out and did not entertain them. But, sometime,
when he was in good mood, he did not fail to castigate those who were the cause of these
complaints. Of course, he did not do it openly, though Mr. Barrie was often hard put to it
to get over these complaints. He often resorted to the practice of advising us through the
months of traitors in our camp. At his instigation, they would say to us
it is only the selfish men who quarrel over food
To them our answer was that we would eat the worst kind of food, and even starve for
days together if thereby we could secure better food for hundreds of our companions in
this jail. If we were bent upon mere livelihood, we were not beggars at home, earning one
shilling a day in the streets of Ireland, to come in this jail for mere subsistence. This
remark had a reference to Mr. Barrie's condition before he came to the Andamans as
jailor of the Silver Jail. He was reduced to beggary in Ireland, his native country;
scraping together some money, he had made his way to India and had come into his own
as a white-skinned man. He had proved both bold and unscrupulous, and, hence, had got
the job he was holding then. After this episode all the political prisoners kept these
confidants of Mr. Barrie severely at arm's length and even openly denounced them. The
rest of the prisoners asked them point-blank, if they themselves had not confessed that the
conjee had kerosene oil in it. These gentlemen shamelessly replied that it was a mean act
to protest in matters of food as it proved utter selfishness of those who complained
against it. These fellows had no scruples of conscience to watch for an hour together to
steal a piece of dry coconut and their action was, of course, most honest and most
unselfish!

The selfish among political prisoners
Those of us, who had gone over to the enemy, and repeated parrot-like their
master's voice, had no shame whatever to eat a piece of bread and a slice of fruit—the
offscourings,—from their master's table, when, at the same time, they called us "men who
looked after their bellies", because we fought for better food on behalf of our fellow-
prisoners. If a man offered them chutney and onion on the sly, they had no conscience to
reject them.
But the political prisoners were not foolish or faint-hearted to be taken in by this
sanctimonious advice, or to care for these cowardly preachers. They persisted in catching
hold of half-baked chapatis, kerosene-mixed conjee ill-boiled vegetables or insufficient
quantity of rice, and similar bad stuff in the prisoner's daily ration and bringing it
promptly to the notice of the authorities. This made them popular with their brethern in
that prison. These looked upon us as a God-send. Though they had not the stuff in them
to stand up to Mr. Barrie's fulminations or give their evidence against him, they helped us
in many other ways out of sheer gratitude. If the political prisoners had derived no
sympathy from them, if they had not won their affection and reverence, their lot in that
prison would have been beyond endurance. They were not alone in their fear of Mr.
Barrie, but many a political prisoner himself could not summon up courage to give
evidence against Mr. Barrie. Once a political prisoner found kerosene in his conjee. He
refused to eat it and four others did the same. Other prisoners followed suit. The wave
began to spread all over the prison. In a moment, Mr. Barrie got the news and came up to
us. He approached the first man with a threatening look and said, "You, man from the
North, you are spoiling the discipline of this place. You are instigating revolt. Look at
others among you who utter not a word against that food." And he turned round to one of
his minions and asked him, "Well, Mister, does it contain kerosene or does it not? Tell
me." The gentleman replied, "Speaking for myself, I don't smell it." Well, that was final
with Mr. Barrie. If a whole tin of kerosene oil was emptied into the conjee, Mr. Barrie
would not have, thereafter, smelt it. He praised his man and went away.
A centipede and a serpent in the vegetables
We have already described the kind of centipede to be found in the Andamans. It
is one and a half foot long and has deadly poison in its fang. Every morning a batch of
prisoners was sent out to bring vegetables for the prison. On the way-side and in the
jungle-area grows a kind of esculent vegetable much liked by Indians. And, in between,
grow different kinds of green vegetables. The prisoners cut them with their sweeping
scythes and bring heaps of them in carts back to the prison. Then they are sorted and
bound into sheaves and with four curved instruments cut them into pieces, The
vegetables, so cut, are then piled into separate heaps to be taken into the kitchen for
dressing and boiling. That was the process of serving greens to the prisoners. Nothing
was cooked carefully; everything was done in a hurry and, therefore, reptiles went into

the boiling vessel along with the greens. When it was served out to us, sometime we
discovered in the vegetable boiled pieces of these reptiles. But the sauce to these strange
dishes was furnished by the spicy words of Mr. Barrie. He praised the greens, mixed with
these pieces of boiled flesh, to the skies and interspersed that praise with showers of
abuse on us who objected to it.
Whenever we lifted up these pieces of centipedes and serpents from the boiled
vegetables and showed them to Mr. Barrie, he would exclaim, "O, it tastes very well." If
we complained to the Superintendent, he would say ditto to Mr. Barrie. We had, then, no
other alternative than to throw out the pieces and eat the vegetables. For there was
nothing else on our plates to eat bread or rice with. If we went without food, that was
going to give us no respite from our routine work. Mr. Barrie knew this too well and
would, therefore, not care. Occasionally, the discussion between me and my friends on
this matter brought some condemnation to Mr. Barrie. On one such occasion he came to
me and sought to pacify me with these words: "Oh Savarkar, don't you think much of
these scoundrels." "If you so choose", he added, "I will ask the man to prepare it
separately for you. But do not expose its defects before them. They are no better than
beasts. They will override me in no time. Thousands before them have eaten these boiled
centipedes, but not a single death has occurred as its result."
It seemed that Mr. Barrie would improve matters only after a fatality had occurred
in the jail in consequence of such eating. He had another card up his sleeves to silence us
in this matter. When he saw that neither cajoling nor threat were to stop us from protests
and complaints against this kind of food and other mismanagement in this prison, he
would throw the blame of it all on the Hindu warder or petty officer.
Hindu Jamadar the cause of it
Whenever we lodged the complaint that there was kerosene in the conjee or the
vegetables had no oil in them, and, perhaps, the oil was stolen instead of being put in the
boiled vegetable, Mirza Khan used to defend himself before Mr. Barrie that the mischief
was all the doing of the Hindu petty officer, and not he but the Hindu Officer was guilty
of the offence. Mr. Barrie, of course, supported Mirza Khan and added that he shall
have to proceed against the Hindu petty officer. In this situation, not wishing to make a
scape-goat of an innocent person and knowing that the decision would be his dismissal
and supercession by a Mussulman Jamadar, we preferred to remain silent and not press
the matter any further. At least, that was my attitude, all along, in such cases in my
prison-life.
Later on, these complaints began to produce their desired effect and the prisoners
got better food than they had ever done before. This was the result of continuous and
relentless vigilance and agitation. In five or six years, a distinct improvement had taken

place precisely because of these efforts on our part to set things right at any cost. The
change of Superintendent had also much to do with the reform. The new Superintendent
was a gentleman and a fair-minded Officer. His appointment over this prison was also the
fruit of ventilating our grievances in the Indian Newspapers and their discussion in the
Central Legislature of India. The Andamans had, thereby, become the topic of the day
and the Government of India could no longer ignore it as in the past. The Superintendent,
kind-hearted as he was, could not avoid moving with the times and the prisoners had
benefitted by the change.
In addition to bad, insufficient, and sometimes unhealthy food, we had to suffer as
much from the way in which we were handled while we were at our morning and evening
meal. The prisoners were seated in a line in the hot noon-clay sun or in drenching rain.
None could sit out of the line. To avoid this nuisance, the prisoners, as soon as the food
was served in their respective plates, would hasten to go under a shelter from the sun and
the rain; but the petty officer in charge abused them and Mr. Barrie proceeded against
them for having broken the line. And the Superintendent would punish the offenders for
encouraging disobedience among others of their number. All the same, the toughest
among us never gave up the practice of sitting for dinner in the shade as protection from
sun and rain.
And this was not the rule only for the prisoners inside but also for those who were
sent to work outside. Other Officers treated these batches no better than Mr. Barrie
himself. Sometime these were made to take their meal standing. Their clothes were wet
with rain, their bodies shivered with cold, and they held their plates in one hand and
dined with another all the while standing, and the drops of rain falling on the bread and
rice in their plates. And this mode of serving and eating was not an exception but the rule
with the prisoners working outside the jail and in different parts of the island settlement.
Those alone escaped from this imposition who had the privilege given them to cook for
themselves and eat independent of the rest. But no political prisoner, detailed for work
outside, was ever given that freedom. He had to suffer all along and yet he did not shrink
from the struggle to relieve the misery of his fellow-prisoners in and out of the prison-
walls of the Silver Jail. The political prisoners suffered continuously and exceptionally;
they incurred the severe displeasure of their custodians, but they did not give up till they
had seen that things were changing for the better in the prison where they had to serve the
longest term of incarceration. Besides this hardship of the sun and the rain over their
heads, they had another grievance and that was the petty officer who never gave them
sufficient time to finish their meals. The time given was very brief, and, as soon as it was
up, the petty officer went round shouting, "The time is up, get up." And the prisoners had
to stand up and leave, whether or not they had finished the food in their plates. The
remainder had to be thrown into the dust-bin. If they refrained or hesitated, the petty
officer would rush into the line, brandishing his stick, and knock the plates out of their
hands, and he would also give a blow or two to some of them. Stragglers were then
hauled up before the jailor and the Superintendent invariably punished them. It took us
five years of persistence and agitation to change all this. The prisoners were gradually
allowed to sit in the shade, to take their meals without unnecessary hurry and bustle; they

were seldom semi-starved and the 'Zulum' of the petty officer, the jamadar and the jailor
on the top of them had almost come to an end. At the end of the fifth or the sixth year of
my prison-life, Mr. Barrie had almost ceased to address us as scoundrels, or to say to us
that we were sent there for work and not for eating. All his rigour and hauteur had gone
for nothing and he had become soft as putty. This is the record of years reckoning up to
1914-16 from the day I went into the prison in 1910. We shall see presently to what
further development this change in food had led. It was almost the beginning of the end.
End of Chapter XV

CHAPTER XVI
Suicide, Mental derangement, arrests, the second and the third strike
In the first six months of my sentence in the Andamans, I was treated as a
prisoner in solitary confinement. As a matter of fact almost all other prisoners were sent
outside the prison for their work after they had finished their term of six months of simple
or hard labour in the prison itself. But at the time that they were taken out, I was released
from my lonely cell. Even then I was not allowed to mix with other men, but only made
to sit in the gallery and opposite the door of my own room all by myself. Other political
prisoners were free to talk and move with neighbours in their own block and those in
common work with them. I alone was kept apart and all alone by myself. A special watch
was kept on me to prevent me from any intercourse with other people of my class. For the
whole day I sat in the gallery and in front of my room busy in making coils of rope—my
daily labour at the time. With the evening I was sent back to my own room and locked for
the night. Years went on in this round of dull routine. The only exception of it being my
hours of dinner, morning and evening. For two hours in the day, I could see human faces
and exchange words with them.
During ail this period, I had kept myself rigidly to the time-table I had chalked out
in the Thana Jail. My object ever had been, while working for public good, to adhere
strictly to the rules of prison-life and thus, by good conduct, shorten the period that would
entitle me to be sent for work outside the prison-walls. I felt that if I was so taken out I
would be better able to do some propaganda work in these islands as also plan for my
release from the Silver Jail. Hence, though I did my best to improve the conditions of our
life inside the prison and to change its regulations, I ever took care not to come in the
clutches of law and to give no occasion for the Officers to frame any charges against
me. The one excuse that these Officers always found for stopping the prisoners from
going out was that these had refused to do their normal work in the prison itself. Hence I
was extremely cautious that none of them had any chance to make that accusation against
me. What little I could do for my fellow-prisoners in the prison itself, I would have
multiplied a hundred-fold if I were free to help them from the outside. Again, that would
have considerably facilitated my freedom from the settlement itself. Hence, I patiently
followed the course I had chalked out for myself and was biding my time to get out of
this prison.
The prisoners, who got the first opportunity to work outside, were all convicts
sentenced from three to five years' hard labour. None with transportation for life went out
with them. And they had to do as much hard work in the settlement as they had to do
inside. I would still induce them to remain outside, for their remaining outside
would pave the way for others to follow them and, in course of time, as their number
would increase, their propaganda outside would grow with them in strength and volume.

So I would beseech them to give no opportunity to the authorities to send them back to
their own cells. Agreeing with me, they had all remained outside till the day of the
Coronation in December 1911. After the first strike and after the Coronation, some four
more were let out from this prison, and my brother and myself were not in that number.
The letting off of these four prisoners had, at least, this good side to it that political
prisoners could be so let off. And I hoped that I could take full advantage of the
precedent. Hence, I worked on with hope and courage waiting for the day when I could
be as free as the three or four who had gone ahead. But news began to filter in that these
political prisoners had a very hard time of it even outside the prison-walls. They were
given such heart-breaking work to do that they preferred to it the swallowing of some
drug that would bring on illness and get them back to the kind of life they had left behind.
We always think of medicines that cure a malady. They thought of potions which would
bring them one. Strange, indeed, is the psychology of prison-life !

Give me medicine for fever and diarrhea !

When any prisoner asked this favour of another in a suppressed voice and with a
dejected mind, it did not imply that he demanded mixture to drive out these maladies but
to induce them into him. A man, it was reported, gets high fever if he swallows the paste
of 'Kanheri' roots; another told me that the easiest way to get loose continuous motions,
with blood in them, was to drink the paste of red berries called "Gunja." If a thread
soaked in some liquid—I forgot which—were sewn into a wound, another said, the
wound remained raw and open for six months on end. This was the talk of the prison.
And if I questioned the authenticity of these reports, they told me that the medicines were
tried and found effective for these purposes. Prisoners, put on the oil-mill or sent out to
cut down the jungles or detailed to pick oakum and weave the threads into a coil of rope,
were so much done up with the work and felt such a terror for it, that they preferred
anything else to going on with it. Hence, they would resort to these dangerous shrubs,
roots and berries or would make a wound to their feet, with the scythe they carried, to fall
ill and come back into the hospital. They would sow a thread into that wound to keep it
from healing. They would prick their throats with a needle and to convince the physician
in charge that the blood had come out with their spit and from their chest. Any of these
tricks they employed for purposes of escape from the toil under which they were being
ground down in their prison-life.
Others feigned madness, and, to prove that they were really mad, would besmear
their faces with urine and excreta, and, occasionally ate them also.
To convince the doctor and obtain his certificate to be transferred to the hospital
was the one aim of these self-imposed tortures. I have seen such specimens in the prison
with my own eyes; and travellers spending a week in the Andaman Settlement have
testified what I have stated here. These prisoners would dupe the doctor endlessly with
these methods, and it became hard for him, at times, to mark the genuine from the

counterfeit. These criminals were hauled up before the Magistrate and were caned for
their dishonest practices, after they had been cured and released from the hospital. The
offence was obvious, the practice objectionable; but it cannot be gainsaid that the
prisoners were forced into these tricks of having 104 to 105 degrees of high fever or
getting continuous blood-stained stools, and suffering pain in the stomach, by the horrors
of the prison-life to which they were doomed for all their crimes. Some of them were
seasoned convicts and not new-comers, and still they did it, which only shows how hard
the work must have been. If dacoits, robbers and other confirmed and dangerous
criminals found it beyond their endurance to go through the hard labour, it is easy to
imagine how the political prisoners must have felt about it. I need not describe their
wretched condition and the horror of their lot in the Silver Jail of the Andamans.

Disease was better than this labour

I quote here specific instances of such prisoners and describe the tortures of their
lives in their own words. One such political prisoner was Babu Upendra Nath Banerji. He
says about himself: "Most of the prisoners that had come before me in this jail from the
Indian Mutiny of 1857 onwards, on transportation for life, did not return alive to India. I
learnt this fact and realised the horror of it while I was myself passing through the
sentence of hard labour. I often felt that I should take a rope and put an end to my life
forthwith to end all my troubles. But I could not summon up courage to do it. I kept on
crushing the coconut pieces for oil by going round the grinding mill patiently and without
any complaint. One day, working from morn till eve, I felt my body stark and stiff like a
plank of wood; I found my palms blistered over; I saw blood trickling from the cracks in
my hand; and yet, at the end of it, the yield had not come to the regular quantity of 30 lbs.
a day. I felt I was swooning; I heard abuses hurled at me by the petty officer in charge; I
felt them like whips against my heart, and, at last, I was dragged before the jailor. He
abused me downright with the choicest slang and threatened me with caning. I was
brought back from the office and seated in my place for the evening meal. Grief, pain and
insult choked my throat and I could not swallow a morsel of the food put before me. A
Hindu petty officer took pity upon me, and whispered to the cook to serve me more rice.
He said, "The Babu is stricken with grief. He cannot eat his bread, give him some more
rice." This made me cry aloud and burst into a loud wail. I tried to control myself and
stop this exhibition. A blow with a stick would have been borne at that time better than
these words of pity and compassion from the mouth of my fellow-prisoner—the Hindu
petty officer."

Better die than suffer insult

A young man named Indu Bhushan Roy was convicted of guilt in the Maniktola
Bomb Case and sentenced to ten years' rigorous imprisonment in the Andamans. He had
also to suffer from hard labour on the 'Kolu' and had his full taste of similar soul-killing
experience. He was one of those who were sent out to work. But he found the work

outside more fatiguing and humiliating than the labour inside. He had thought he would
get some concessions, but, instead, he found that he had more rigorous work to do in the
settlement. If a prisoner outside happened to fall ill, he was sent to a hospital relatively
better than the hospital in the jail. But if a political prisoner became sick, he was punished
all the more for that sickness. For if he had fever or suffered from loose stools, he was
made to walk the distance of four miles, carrying his own bed, to the jail, and was,
instantly, locked up in his own cell. Indu Bhushan was fed up with it and returned to the
jail of his own accord. Chains were put on his arms and hands, and he was marched on to
his old residence; but he refused to go back to his work in the settlement. He was
punished for this recalcitrance. No sooner was Indu put in his cell than Mr. Barrie came
on the scene. He said, "Well, you have returned! You think, perhaps, that by coming here
you will be spared all work. Nothing of the kind." And turning to the Jamadar he ordered,
"Put him on the oil-mill, and at once." Indu Bhushan was immediately marched off to
work on the 'Kolu.' He was simply disgusted with his own life. I tried my hardest to help
him bear up. I told him to think of me who had fifty years' burden on him to live in this
jail, whereas he had to live there only for ten years. While he was taking his quota of oil
to the Jamadar, I again, met him and could address only a few words of solace. He said,
"No, I cannot bear it; better death than life in such disgrace." That was his constant
refrain. I argued with him, I entreated him, I tried to soften him. I ended, "For the sake of
our country, Oh my brother, we have to sacrifice our self, our life, and even our honour at
times. We owe this duty to her at any cost. You are very young, you are not even twenty-
five, of the same age as myself. You have better hopes to be free and alive than I have.
So, cheer up. Suffer and live, so that, when free, you will serve the country as before."
These words were exchanged in a hurry and on the sly. Two or four days passed off.
Every evening I saw Indu Bhushan returning from the 'Kolu', dead tired, with drops of
perspiration on his face, the chaff of the coconut clinging like saw-dust to his body from
top to toe, chains clanging on his feet, a weight of about 30 lbs. on his head, and a sack of
chaff on his shoulders. I saw him coming up bent down under this weight, and staggering
to the place. All of us were in the same plight. One fine morning as our doors were
unlocked for the day and we were all coming out, a warder approached us and, requesting
not to disclose his name, broke the news that

Indu had hanged himself last night.

I was astounded by the news. Only yesterday evening I had seen him a man in the
prime of youth before he went into his cell for the night. I had exchanged a few words
with him. And in the morning he was found dangling from the top window, hanged by a
noose made of his torn clothes ! His neck broken, his tongue lolling out, his feet
dangling, his throat strangulated by a cord whose one end lay tied to the bar of the
window, and corpse suspending from it in the mid-air. The young man must have found
life too burdensome, for the loss of his self-respect, to bear and to endure. Dark deep
shadow had spread over the whole building. Once in two months we had found such
incident happening. But Indu Bhushan was the first political prisoner of his kind to put an
end to his life thus. I was saying to myself, "Who knows, one day your fate will be the