Remembering Shahid Udham Singh…
71 years ago on this date, Udham Singh was hanged to death in Pentonville Prison in UK.
He was hanged for the assasination of Michael O’Dwyer, ex Governer of Punjab and the man Udham Singh held responsible for the Jallianwala Bagh massacre..
It is said that the mass killing in Jallianwala Bagh deeply affected Udham Singh “…and proved a turning point in his life” After a bath in the sacred sarovar at Golden Temple,”Udham Singh took a silent vow and solemn pledge in front of the Golden Temple to wreak a vengeance on the perpetrators of the crime and to restore honour to what he saw as a humiliated nation.”
It took him almost 21 years to fulfil his vow. On 13th March 1940, at a meeting held at Caxton Hall, Udham Singh fired at O’Dwyer who died immediately. He also fired shots at Zetland, the Secretary of State for India, injuring him but not seriously.
Udham Singh did not intend to escape. He was arrested on the spot.
On 31 July 1940, Udham Singh was hanged at Pentonville Prison.
Incidentally, Gandhi and Nehru both condemned his act at the time. Gandhi remarked that, “the outrage has caused me deep pain. I regard it as an act of insanity…I hope this will not be allowed to affect political judgement“.
Nehru wrote in his National Herald: “Assassination is regretted but it is earnestly hoped that it will not have far-reaching repercussions on political future of India”
Subhash Chandra Bose was perhaps the only leader of the independence movement who approved of Udham Singh’s action.
Nehru, ever the astute politician, however did an about turn few years later. Writing in the daily “Partap” in 1962, he remarked,”I salute Shaheed-i-Azam Udham Singh with reverence who had kissed the noose so that we may be free.”
Please take a moment to remember this Hero..pl share with your friends and family..
Related Posts: Remembering Punjab Kesari…, I bet you forgot… and Remembering Madan Lal Dhingra…
Image courtesy: Satya Itihas
References: “Harijan”, March 15, 1940; “Harijan”, March 23, 1940; “National Herald”, March 15, 1940; Nehru Quoted in: Udham Singh alias Ram Mohammad Singh Azad, 2002, p 300, prof (Dr) Sikander Singh and Wikipedia
Shaheed ko Pranaam!!
He is a Hero of Mother India.
It is heartening to see this blog remind us of TRUE Hero`s.
It’s heartening to see that those who faught for country are being remembered still. If not by government, at least by people who matter. Us, the common Indians.
He was a great man and a real hero.
Excerpts from <"How the militant aspect of India’s freedom struggle was sidelined” by Arjun Subramaniam, October 22, 2021:
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…The film (Sardar Udham) also shines a light on the failure of traditional Indian historiography to assess the countervailing impact of the more publicised non-violent freedom movement over the several violent expressions of angst amongst the Indian people, and its bearing on British rule.
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Beyond a chapter or two, I do not recall having read much in school about the various violent and militant expressions against British rule beyond the rather disparaging analysis of the 1857 Revolt, which was showcased as a failure and a manifestation of a divided India. The narratives that influenced many young Indians like me were the building of the road-railway-telegraph network by the British; or the Quit India Movement, Dandi March or the several imprisonments of Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi in urban prisons, and not the trials, tribulations and even torture of prisoners like Udham Singh, or those incarcerated in the Andamans. Seminal events such as the Indian Naval uprising of 1946 and other violent acts of defiance by youth across the country have been subsumed by an Anglicised pedagogical system that drew heavily from colonial archives. Making matters worse was the inability of vernacular historiography to contribute to the predominantly Oxbridge and Delhi-centric histories churned out since Independence.
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