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

THE STORY OF THIS HISTORY
“The British Raj in India has treated Savarkar’s book
as most dangerous for their existence here. So it has been
banned. But it has been read by millions of our countrymen
including my humble self. In trying to elevate the events of
1857, which interested Historians and Administrators had not
hesitated to call for decades as an ‘Indian Mutiny’, to its
right pose of ‘Indian War of Independence’. All be it a
foiled attempt at that! It is not a work of a Patriotic Al-
chemist turning base mutineering into noble revolutionary
action. Even in these days what would the Mahatmic school
have called the efforts of Subhas Bose’s Azad-Hind-Fouj if
Savarkar’s alchemy had not intervened? True. Both the 1857
and 1943 ‘Wars’ have ended in failure for our country. But
the motive behind—was it mere Mutineering or War for Inde
pendence? If Savarkar had not intervened between 1857 and
1943, I am sure that the recent efforts of the Indian National
Army would have been again dubbed as an Ignoble Mutiny
effectively crushed by the valiant British-cum-Congress arms
and armlessness. But thanks to Savarkar’s book Indian sense
of a “Mutiny” has been itself revolutionised. Not even Lord
Wavell, I suppose, can now call Bose’s efforts as a Mutiny.
The chief credit for the change of values must go to Savarkar
—and to him alone. But the greatest value of Savarkar’s Book
lies in its gift to the Nation of that Torch of Freedom in whose
light an humble I and a thousand other Indians have our dear
daughters named after Laxmibai, the Rani of Jhansi. Even
Netaji Bose in a fateful hour had to form an army corps named
after Rani of Jhansi. But for Savarkar’s discovery of that
valiant heroine, Rani of Jhansi should have been a long-for-
gotten ‘Mutineer’ of the nineteenth century.”
—Free Hindusthan, Special, 28th May, 1946
This history has literally resurrected from continuing to
be entombed in oblivion the spirits of the bravest of the leaders,
warriors and martyrs who fell fighting in 1857, and taught
us to pay our admiring and loyal tribute to Nana Sahib, Bala
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