१८५७ का स्वातन्त्र्य समर (वीर विनायक दामोदर सावरकर - अंग्रेजों द्वारा छपने से पूर्व प्रतिबन्धित महाग्रन्थ)

SECRET ORGANISATION
ment. And, if the Sirkar did, by any chance, suspect
them, these political Sanyasis sowed the seeds of the
Revolutionary War in the very houses of the Sepoys in
the neighbouring village. The authorities at Meerut were
at last compelled to ask a Fakir, who was lodging near the
Meerut military cantonment, to move away. As soon as
this order came, like a simple, innocent man, this grand
person left the camp on his elephant, only to go to a
neighbouring village and establish himself securely in the
houses of the Sepoys! ¹¹ That patriot Moulvie Ahmad
Shah, whose sacred name has cast a halo round Hindus-
than, whose glorious achievements we shall have to des-
cribe very soon, began similarly to tour through the
country preaching the Revolutionary War. At last, when
he began to preach in Lucknow itself, to thousands and
tens of thousands in open meetings, that there was no
other way of saving the country and the religion than by
killing the English, he was arrested for sedition and sen-
tenced to be hanged !
It was the custom to have a Mullah and a Pundit in
every regiment for religious purposes. Taking advantage
of this, the Revolutionaries entered the service as regi-
mental Mullas and Pundits at the falling of the night, used
to preach Revolution to the Sepoys secretly. Thus, these
political Sanyasis toured from village to village for two
years preaching Revolution, and at last succeeded in sow-
ing the seeds of the terrible war to come.
While itinerant Sanyasis and itinerant preachers preached
in the villages and the country, local preachers were
being sent to the bigger towns. In all the important
places of pilgrimage where thousands of people congre-
gated, the ever-existing dumb dislike of the usurping
Feringhi rule was intensified into active hatred by the
Revolutionary preachers. The stir that was created at all
11. The Meerut Narrative.
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