Hello,
This post of mine might seem controversial to many readers. I have no apologies in store, as I am not writing to please or offend any soul. Its purely my opinion which came out of reading some pages in history.
"Mahatma Gandhi" - we Indians and of course many people in other parts of the world consider this name as a synonym for non-violence. But why this non-violence preacher has been assassinated? Why should anybody bore such animosity with a non-violent soul. These questions might have come to our minds many times. How many of us know the answers? Well, while some of us have the answers, and some of us blind trust myths. And some facts related to this assassination have been kept as a secret till date. Revived pages of history told that Godse was a Hindu extremist and he was against Gandhi's secular India call. Is it really the truth? Read on to know some facts.
Here are some facts that I came to know, Godse was a staunch follower of Veer Savarkar, Vivekananda, Tilak and many others. He considered Gandhi as his idol during his schooling. But what made him to take such a drastic step?
If Gandhi loved the country, Godse also did. He was not paid to assassin Gandhi. Neither he did for power. He knew the decision will ruin his future. He wasn't able to tolerate what Gandhi did for dividing the Country in 1947. Gandhi is well known for his "Satyagrah", he started fast unto death supporting Jinnah's demand for separate country. Godse believed that Gandhi had appeased the separatists while ignoring rest of the country. So he felt that the demise of Gandhi would bring change in politics. Godse and his friend/follower Apte believed that if Gandhi wouldn't have supported, the separation wouldn't have happened. Godse also claimed that he wanted to save Hinduism from being massacred under the non-violence principle of Gandhi. Godse opined that our epic heroes Rama, Krishna and Arjuna were dubbed as guilty of violence by Gandhi which provoked him to take such fatal decision to terminate Gandhi's monarchy. So, after the separation of the country, Godse decided to put an end to the Gandhian era .
In his deposition, Godse had no regrets for what he had done, he felt that it was inevitable.Godse defended, that an "armed resistance to an aggression is not unjust" and so he opposed Gandhi's call to Hindus to maintain non violence during the protests in 1946 and support to Jinnah's idea of separation.
These facts were all untold, they weren't allowed to be published officially till date. Reasons could be to maintain peace and tranquillity among different religions in the country. If Gandhi's ideology was to pacify the violence going on in the country in the name of religion, it has been going on even today at one or the other place in the country. So, separation has not achieved any good for the country.
I think I can neither judge Gandhi nor Godse for their beliefs and principles. But I have made some observations from Godse's reasons to assassin Gandhi. In any country, society or a family, it is very important to maintain harmony. If the harmony is lost, obviously the afflicted gets enraged over the other. Just as in the case of two siblings, when one is pampered because he/she is young/new to the family, the other sibling develops abhorrence. The same can happen with religion and also could happen anywhere in the society which I think is one of the root causes of the assassination. Another observation that I made was, when man gains immense fame, name and will be worshipped as god, and/or he believes that what he believes is only truth and rest doesn't exist, he tends towards monarchy. When he attains this stage, it means he is nearing his demise/downfall. There are proven examples in our history.
I agree with one line, in Pradeep Dalavi's play where he wrote "Both Gandhi and Godse are the cause of each others deaths."
In present situations, as per Gandhi, if non-violence is the answer to all the violence going on, then does it soothe the wounds of those families who have been suffering, does it stop the future attacks or should the government surrender to the protester's demands every time??? and as per Godse, if Violence is the answer, will it bring back all the lost lives or will it maintain any peace???
I have no concluding answer except for the above questions. If any of you readers would come up with a better answer, I would appreciate to see them in the comments column.
Cheers
Vennela
