'THE
REAL HERO' - Nathuram
Vinayak Godse.His Last
Speech:ANUARY 30th,
1949 - The Mahatma
was assassinated by a
man called Naturam
Godse.After he shot him,
instead of running away,
he stood his ground and
surrounded. He said,
"No one should think
that Gandhi was killed
by a madman"One of
the best speeches of All
time, which is compared
to Socrates's speech in
his trial. The Judge was
astonished by his
speech and commented
that if India had
followed the Jury system
of giving judgments,
Godse would have been
adjudicated as "Not
Guilty" by the Jury,
cause after the speech,
the whole audience was
in tears.This is the
speech given by
Nathuram Godse in the
court in his last trial for
the murder of Mahatma
GandhiBorn in a
devotional Brahmin
family, I instinctively
came to revere Hindu
religion, Hindu history
and Hindu culture. I
had, therefore, been
intensely proud of
Hinduism as a whole. As
I grew up I developed a
tendency to free
thinking unfettered by
any superstitious
allegiance to any isms,
political or religious.
That is why I worked
actively for the
eradication of
untouchability and the
caste system based on
birth alone. I openly
joined anti-caste
movements and
maintained that all
Hindus were of equal
status as to rights, social
and religious and should
be considered high or
low on merit alone and
not through the accident
of birth in a particular
caste or profession. I
used publicly to take
part in organized anti-
caste dinners in which
thousands of Hindus,
Brahmins, Kshatriyas,
Vaisyas, Chamars and
Bhangis participated. We
broke the caste rules
and dined in the
company of each other.I
have read the speeches
and writings of
Dadabhai Nairoji,
Vivekanand, Gokhale,
Tilak, along with the
books of ancient and
modern history of India
and some prominent
countries like England,
France, America and'
Russia. Moreover I
studied the tenets of
Socialism and Marxism.
But above all I studied
very closely whatever
Veer Savarkar and
Gandhiji had written
and spoken, as to my
mind these two
ideologies have
contributed more to the
moulding of the thought
and action of the Indian
people during the last
thirty years or so, than
any other single factor
has done.All this
reading and thinking led
me to believe it was my
first duty to serve
Hindudom and Hindus
both as a patriot and as
a world citizen. To
secure the freedom and
to safeguard the just
interests of some thirty
crores (300 million) of
Hindus would
automatically constitute
the freedom and the
well being of all India,
one fifth of human race.
This conviction led me
naturally to devote
myself to the Hindu
Sanghtanist ideology
and programme, which
alone, I came to
believe, could win and
preserve the national
independence of
Hindustan, my
Motherland, and enable
her to render true
service to humanity as
well.Since the year
1920, that is, after the
demise of Lokamanya
Tilak, Gandhiji's
influence in the
Congress first increased
and then became
supreme. His activities
for public awakening
were phenomenal in
their intensity and were
reinforced by the slogan
of truth and non-
violence, which he
paraded ostentatiously
before the country. No
sensible or enlightened
person could object to
those slogans. In fact
there is nothing new or
original in them. They
are implicit in every
constitutional public
movement. But it is
nothing but a mere
dream if you imagine
that the bulk of
mankind is, or can ever
become, capable of
scrupulous adherence to
these lofty principles in
its normal life from day
to day. In fact, honour,
duty and love of one's
own kith and kin and
country might often
compel us to disregard
non-violence and to use
force. I could never
conceive that an armed
resistance to an
aggression is unjust. I
would consider it a
religious and moral duty
to resist and, if possible,
to overpower such an
enemy by use of force.
[In the Ramayana]
Rama killed Ravana in a
tumultuous fight and
relieved Sita. [In the
Mahabharata], Krishna
killed Kansa to end his
wickedness; and Arjuna
had to fight and slay
quite a number of his
friends and relations
including the revered
Bhishma because the
latter was on the side of
the aggressor. It is my
firm belief that in
dubbing Rama, Krishna
and Arjuna as guilty of
violence, the Mahatma
betrayed a total
ignorance of the springs
of human action.In
more recent history, it
was the heroic fight put
up by Chhatrapati
Shivaji that first checked
and eventually
destroyed the Muslim
tyranny in India. It was
absolutely essentially for
Shivaji to overpower and
kill an aggressive Afzal
Khan, failing which he
would have lost his own
life. In condemning
history's towering
warriors like Shivaji,
Rana Pratap and Guru
Gobind Singh as
misguided patriots,
Gandhiji has merely
exposed his self-conceit.
He was, paradoxical, as
it may appear, a violent
pacifist who brought
untold calamities on the
country in the name of
truth and non-violence,
while Rana Pratap,
Shivaji and the Guru will
remain enshrined in the
hearts of their
countrymen forever for
the freedom they
brought to them.The
accumulating
provocation of thirty-two
years, culminating in his
last pro-Muslim fast, at
last goaded me to the
conclusion that the
existence of Gandhi
should be brought to an
end immediately.
Gandhi had done very
well in South Africa to
uphold the rights and
well being of the Indian
community there. But
when he finally
returned to India he
developed a subjective
mentality under which
he alone was to be the
final judge of what was
right or wrong. If the
country wanted his
leadership, it had to
accept his infallibility; if
it did not, he would
stand aloof from the
Congress and carry on
his own way. Against
such an attitude there
can be no halfway
house. Either Congress
had to surrender its will
to his and had to be
content with playing
second fiddle to all his
eccentricity,
whimsicality,
metaphysics and
primitive vision, or it
had to carry on without
him. He alone was the
Judge of everyone and
everything; he was the
master brain guiding the
civil disobedience
movement; no other
could know the
technique of that
movement. He alone
knew when to begin and
when to withdraw it.
The movement might
succeed or fail, it might
bring untold disaster
and political reverses
but that could make no
difference to the
Mahatma's infallibility.
'A Satyagrahi can never
fail' was his formula for
declaring his own
infallibility and nobody
except himself knew
what a Satyagrahi
is.Thus, the Mahatma
became the judge and
jury in his own cause.
These childish insanities
and obstinacies, coupled
with a most severe
austerity of life,
ceaseless work and lofty
character made Gandhi
formidable and
irresistible. Many people
thought that his politics
were irrational but they
had either to withdraw
from the Congress or
place their intelligence
at his feet to do with, as
he liked. In a position of
such absolute
irresponsibility Gandhi
was guilty of blunder
after blunder, failure
after failure, disaster
after disaster.Gandhi's
pro-Muslim policy is
blatantly in his perverse
attitude on the question
of the national language
of India. It is quite
obvious that Hindi has
the most prior claim to
be accepted as the
premier language. In
the beginning of his
career in India, Gandhi
gave a great impetus to
Hindi but as he found
that the Muslims did not
like it, he became a
champion of what is
called Hindustani.
Everybody in India
knows that there is no
language called
Hindustani; it has no
grammar; it has no
vocabulary. It is a mere
dialect; it is spoken, but
not written. It is a
bastard tongue and
crossbreed between
Hindi and Urdu, and not
even the Mahatma's
sophistry could make it
popular. But in his
desire to please the
Muslims he insisted that
Hindustani alone should
be the national
language of India. His
blind followers, of
course, supported him
and the so-called hybrid
language began to be
used. The charm and
purity of the Hindi
language was to be
prostituted to please the
Muslims. All his
experiments were at the
expense of the
Hindus.From August
1946 onwards the
private armies of the
Muslim League began a
massacre of the Hindus.
The then Viceroy, Lord
Wavell, though
distressed at what was
happening, would not
use his powers under
the Government of India
Act of 1935 to prevent
the rape, murder and
arson. The Hindu blood
began to flow from
Bengal to Karachi with
some retaliation by the
Hindus. The Interim
Government formed in
September was
sabotaged by its Muslim
League members right
from its inception, but
the more they became
disloyal and treasonable
to the government of
which they were a part,
the greater was
Gandhi's infatuation for
them. Lord Wavell had
to resign as he could not
bring about a settlement
and he was succeeded
by Lord Mountbatten.
King Log was followed by
King Stork.The Congress,
which had boasted of its
nationalism and
socialism, secretly
accepted Pakistan
literally at the point of
the bayonet and abjectly
surrendered to Jinnah.
India was vivisected and
one-third of the Indian
territory became foreign
land to us from August
15, 1947. Lord
Mountbatten came to be
described in Congress
circles as the greatest
Viceroy and Governor-
General this country
ever had. The official
date for handing over
power was fixed for
June 30, 1948, but
Mountbatten with his
ruthless surgery gave us
a gift of vivisected India
ten months in advance.
This is what Gandhi had
achieved after thirty
years of undisputed
dictatorship and this is
what Congress party
calls 'freedom' and
'peaceful transfer of
power'. The Hindu-
Muslim unity bubble was
finally burst and a
theocratic state was
established with the
consent of Nehru and
his crowd and they have
called 'freedom won by
them with sacrifice' -
whose sacrifice? When
top leaders of Congress,
with the consent of
Gandhi, divided and
tore the country - which
we consider a deity of
worship - my mind was
filled with direful
anger.One of the
conditions imposed by
Gandhi for his breaking
of the fast unto death
related to the mosques
in Delhi occupied by the
Hindu refugees. But
when Hindus in Pakistan
were subjected to
violent attacks he did
not so much as utter a
single word to protest
and censure the
Pakistan Government or
the Muslims concerned.
Gandhi was shrewd
enough to know that
while undertaking a fast
unto death, had he
imposed for its break
some condition on the
Muslims in Pakistan,
there would have been
found hardly any
Muslims who could have
shown some grief if the
fast had ended in his
death. It was for this
reason that he
purposely avoided
imposing any condition
on the Muslims. He was
fully aware of from the
experience that Jinnah
was not at all perturbed
or influenced by his fast
and the Muslim League
hardly attached any
value to the inner voice
of Gandhi.Gandhi is
being referred to as the
Father of the Nation.
But if that is so, he had
failed his paternal duty
inasmuch as he has
acted very treacherously
to the nation by his
consenting to the
partitioning of it. I
stoutly maintain that
Gandhi has failed in his
duty. He has proved to
be the Father of
Pakistan. His inner-
voice, his spiritual power
and his doctrine of non-
violence of which so
much is made of, all
crumbled before
Jinnah's iron will and
proved to be
powerless.Briefly
speaking, I thought to
myself and foresaw I
shall be totally ruined,
and the only thing I
could expect from the
people would be nothing
but hatred and that I
shall have lost all my
honour, even more
valuable than my life, if
I were to kill Gandhiji.
But at the same time I
felt that the Indian
politics in the absence
of Gandhiji would surely
be proved practical, able
to retaliate, and would
be powerful with armed
forces. No doubt, my
own future would be
totally ruined, but the
nation would be saved
from the inroads of
Pakistan. People may
even call me and dub
me as devoid of any
sense or foolish, but the
nation would be free to
follow the course
founded on the reason
which I consider to be
necessary for sound
nation-building. After
having fully considered
the question, I took the
final decision in the
matter, but I did not
speak about it to anyone
whatsoever. I took
courage in both my
hands and I did fire the
shots at Gandhiji on
30th January 1948, on
the prayer-grounds of
Birla House.I do say
that my shots were fired
at the person whose
policy and action had
brought rack and ruin
and destruction to
millions of Hindus.
There was no legal
machinery by which
such an offender could
be brought to book and
for this reason I fired
those fatal shots.I bear
no ill will towards
anyone individually but
I do say that I had no
respect for the present
government owing to
their policy, which was
unfairly favourable
towards the Muslims.
But at the same time I
could clearly see that
the policy was entirely
due to the presence of
Gandhi. I have to say
with great regret that
Prime Minister Nehru
quite forgets that his
preachings and deeds
are at times at
variances with each
other when he talks
about India as a secular
state in season and out
of season, because it is
significant to note that
Nehru has played a
leading role in the
establishment of the
theocratic state of
Pakistan, and his job
was made easier by
Gandhi's persistent
policy of appeasement
towards the Muslims.I
now stand before the
court to accept the full
share of my
responsibility for what I
have done and the
judge would, of course,
pass against me such
orders of sentence as
may be considered
proper. But I would like
to add that I do not
desire any mercy to be
shown to me, nor do I
wish that anyone else
should beg for mercy on
my behalf. My
confidence about the
moral side of my action
has not been shaken
even by the criticism
levelled against it on all
sides. I have no doubt
that honest writers of
history will weigh my act
and find the true value
thereof some day in
future.-NATHURAM
GODSE
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