What do you think?
Rate this book
The Bhagat Singh Reader
Sporting a sharp handlebar moustache, his hat askew, Shaheed Bhagat Singh has been lionized in Indian imagination as one of the most influential revolutionaries of the Independence movement. Convicted and hanged by the British in 1931 for his role in killing a colonial police officer in the Lahore Conspiracy Case, he became a martyr at the young age of twenty-three, leaving behind an inspiring legacy.
Tales of Bhagat Singh’s heroism and bravery are part of popular folklore, as it were – how he exploded bombs at the Central Legislative Assembly in Delhi and showered leaflets on the legislators before surrendering himself to the authorities, or how he led Indian political prisoners in a hunger strike demanding better conditions in jail.
The Bhagat Singh Reader brings into prominence his less widely known intellectual output. It presents in a single volume a collection of his writings and thoughts: from his letters, telegrams and notices to articles that chalk out his subversive and progressive ideas, and his mails from prison to the colonial administration and judiciary.
His forty-three sketches of Indian freedom fighters throw light on the larger picture of the independence struggle. This is a book that reveals Bhagat Singh the man and the thinker, the Marxist and the idealist.
Tales of Bhagat Singh’s heroism and bravery are part of popular folklore, as it were – how he exploded bombs at the Central Legislative Assembly in Delhi and showered leaflets on the legislators before surrendering himself to the authorities, or how he led Indian political prisoners in a hunger strike demanding better conditions in jail.
The Bhagat Singh Reader brings into prominence his less widely known intellectual output. It presents in a single volume a collection of his writings and thoughts: from his letters, telegrams and notices to articles that chalk out his subversive and progressive ideas, and his mails from prison to the colonial administration and judiciary.
His forty-three sketches of Indian freedom fighters throw light on the larger picture of the independence struggle. This is a book that reveals Bhagat Singh the man and the thinker, the Marxist and the idealist.
- GenresHistoryIndiaNonfiction
879 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 25, 2019
29 people are currently reading
376 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 6, 2021
You must’ve it, read it, think it and speak it, if you want to understand the revolutionary called ‘The Bhagat Singh.’
I have the complete writings of Bhagat Singh translated in Marathi by Datta Desai(Manovikas publications, Pune). Still I purchased this English version, because of two things. One, I wanted to read the original by Chaman Lal. And second, it’s for my kids who are English medium students. But I must say, apart from the writings of Bhagat Singh, what fascinated me is the 50-odd page introduction and also the appendices with much needed elaboration by the author, Chaman Lal sir.
Go for it. Paperback quality, print and binding all are good. I wish it could have been a hardcover binding, as this is one book which has to be nurtured for ages.
I have the complete writings of Bhagat Singh translated in Marathi by Datta Desai(Manovikas publications, Pune). Still I purchased this English version, because of two things. One, I wanted to read the original by Chaman Lal. And second, it’s for my kids who are English medium students. But I must say, apart from the writings of Bhagat Singh, what fascinated me is the 50-odd page introduction and also the appendices with much needed elaboration by the author, Chaman Lal sir.
Go for it. Paperback quality, print and binding all are good. I wish it could have been a hardcover binding, as this is one book which has to be nurtured for ages.
May 10, 2020
It’s unfair to rate books of such significance. Ever since I read Jail Notebook (Bhagat Singh), I always wanted to read, more of his writing. This book is as comprehensive as it gets. Gives fascinating insights about what went in the 1920s, perhaps the height of Indian revolutionary movement. For all the glory which leaders like Gandhi, Bose, Nehru etc have received , I believe most of the leaders of revolutionary movement were very brave and much ahead of their times. Same gets reflected in NBS and HSRA manifestos and all of Bhagat Singh’s writings. Must read. If you find this book to long for your liking, try Jail notebook or his writings on Internet.
November 24, 2021
While Chaman Lal's efforts of recording history of Bhagat Singh are laudable, his politics is blinkered and it's unclear if that's due to a deliberate policy of abusing Hindus in name of secularism; abusing others can be dangerous, and perhaps it's also profitable to abuse Hindus with fraudulent accusations.
What isn't immediately clear but suddenly becomes so, is that there is a deliberate attempt to idolise, and what's more, create an Indian - purely "desi" - idol India to worship as a left icon; for while every Tom, dick and Harry of non Hindu cultures and faith is all too eager to accuse India, Hindus - and even those of other branches of their own faiths - as idol worshippers, reality is that people create and worship idols in every culture, every faith, and only very advanced level yogis can do without it; and one may say x or y is not an idol, or isn't subjected to worship, but that is merely by defining idol and worship in a narrow enough sense to fit such abuse of "other"s. For if one refers a person, a photograph, an image, a book, a statue, or a building of any nature, enough to be upset seriously when such an object - not a live person - is damaged, it's due to idol worship.
And just as congress in India has created two major and then a whole family as minor idols, so this idol worship is to be perpetual, left lacks or did one until now - for left might worship lenin and Mao, but they are meaningless for Indian population, and so politically useless to left in India, and politics of abusing Hindus isn't helping anyone.
So Chaman Lal on one hand accuses "communal forces" of trying to appropriate Bhagat Singh, while on the other attempting to hide this creation of, or raising a historical figure to, an idol, far more than an icon.
But fact is, he hasn't accused jihadists even factually of the massacres, genocides and worse, perpetrated across West Asia and Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, Europe and more; he knows as all so self labelled secular do that such criticism is dangerous to their lives, while abusing Hindus is not only safe, it's profitable.
And even more of a fact, which he falsified in stating that communal forces are trying to appropriate Bhagat Singh, is that perhaps the only group that can be said to do so is any khalistani terrorist groups and politicians. No Hindu or Muslim or anyone of any other religion has ever claimed that Bhagat Singh was either born as to converted to being one of them.
If he's respected by Indian regardless of his background or his ultimate beliefs, why should Chaman Lal take objection, unless he's trying not only to create a new god and an an idol thereof, but claiming that nobody else can touch this idol without converting first? This is a level of fanaticism not seen in another faith, unless one compares it to all non muslims being directed to drive onto another route, not one to Mecca, at a certain distance on the highway. And to a lesser extent, the necessity of obtaining permission from Vatican before one may visit Lourdes, purely for health reasons. (While Hinduism might ban "others" from entering a temple, nobody is prevented from buying or making an idol or image of the same deity, and making a corner in ones home for worship; in fact most Hindus have such a little temple at home, whether they go to temples or not; and Hindus not only don't object, they literally coukdnt care less, what someone else - outside ones own family - "believes". For Hinduism, Divine is not a matter if belief, but a matter of fact, not of demanding belief but offering knowledge thereof, and paths to arrive be united with the Divine.
That India respects Bhagat Singh for his patriotic life isn't to be labelled as appropriation; he was Indian, and that he fought for India is without any doubt. He could have been safe abroad, or in India, with no politics, but chose his path, and has respect for that, as do all those who gave their lives for India. Chaman Lal can label others and does, extremely abusively, but he's incorrect, and wrong.
*****
Here's a surprise.
"From the proceedings of the trial of the Lahore Conspiracy Case, it seems that some of the letters may still be in the police files of the case, which are still in the custody of the Government of Pakistan. From the letters recovered at Bhagat Singh’s father Kishan Singh’s house in Lahore, there are references to a letter from Rio De Janeiro (Brazil) in 1928 signed ‘AS’, taken away by the police, which indicates that Bhagat Singh was in touch with his uncle in exile at that time. Ghadarite revolutionary and late President of Desh Bhagat Yadgar Committee, Jalandhar, Baba Bhagat Singh Bilga, who spent some time with Ajit Singh in Brazil during his exile period, where he himself was Ghadar Party activist said that Bhagat Singh wrote three letters to Ajit Singh, his uncle in exile."
Surprise, because elsewhere, in his introduction, in another English language work on Bhagat Singh, Chaman Lal expresses regret about how, though his work in Hindi on the subject has far more material, the slavish attitude of people nevertheless gives more importance to everything in English and ignore works in other languages, however superior they are.
(Perhaps he should rethink his own, as well as that of his fellow leftists', attitude in this context, where they are vitriolic against India and her majority, her treasure of knowledge of antiquity, and the fact that her culture is a tradition living and flourishing since antiquity; the said attitude being no better than say, favouring destruction of ancient trees with several,millennia of life behind them, in favour of brand new fashionable varieties potted plants from locations foreign enough to be preferred by those born in atmosphere of slave mindset.)
But then, in this work he gives far more material than in his own work in Hindi on the subject!
Surely, in this era, he couldn't have found it too much trouble to issue, simultaneously, an improved edition of the Hindi work, if only on kindle version?
Or does it pay better to not do so?
*****
Bhagat Singh wrote and published an article comparing, the then young, two of the major leaders, Subhash Chandra Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru.
The article states that Subhash Chandra Bose is emotional, in his love of India, with less theoretical and intellectual basis, and Jawaharlal Nehru had more to offer, an intellectual basis and more of a knowledge of the world, especially having visited Russia after revolution. In this the editors conclude Bhagat Singh correct, as faulty a conclusion as it could get. This conclusion is, again, based on a blind following of leftist powers by the said editors.
Reality is, Subhash Chandra Bose risked his own life continuously from the moment he escaped, to when he brought an army consisting purely of Indian men and women into borders of India, fighting all the way from Singapore marching into Imphal. But more relevantly, according to a reply by Attlee when on a visit to independent India, it was due to Subhash Chandra Bose whose victories had changed Indian mindset that British were forced to flee precipitously, in such haste - specifically, due to strike on navy docks inspired by Subhash Chandra Bose's victories that made British fear a rebellion, and take flight.
Jawaharlal Nehru on the other hand wasn't elected PM of India, although he was the first PM; he was selected, and imposed, by Gandhi, who asked the elected PM, Sardar Patel, to step aside. This decision proved against interests of India. Gandhi advised independent India to not protest when pakis claimed an extra million square miles of territory in East, letting pakis have it; he went on a hunger strike, fasting unto death, if India did not give 55 millions of pounds to Pakistan, despite latter having attacked almost immediately after independence, and give this in midst of the said war, even despite certainty that the money was going towards arms and ammunition to kill more Indians. Jawaharlal Nehru and congress gave in.
Worst, Jawaharlal Nehru demanded army stop short of a decisive, complete victory in Kashmir, and took the matter to U.N. security council, and promised a U.N. inspected plebiscite, which fortunately did not play in favour of the jihadist Pakistan only because U.N. security council imposed a first condition about pakis withdrawal of forces, which Pakistan was never going to do - on the contrary, sending army trained terrorists, and army soldiers dressed in pyjamas, claiming they weren't pakis at all, but only locals.
And both editors, as well as Bhagat Singh, are simply incorrect in their assessment of Jawaharlal Nehru offering more intellectually than Subhash Chandra Bose, as evident ftom biography of the latter by a close relative and member of his family.
*****
Worth note - it is Bismil saying
"Now the question will arise that knowing everything beforehand, why did I send an apology, a mercy petition, and appeal after appeal? The only reason seems to me is that politics is a game of chess. ... "
And this is far from unknown to the opposition of the day, that is, since 2014; after all, it's a very thin pretence that Gandhi was a truthful holy man incapable of hurting anyone, to cover up the reality that he was a politician, just a tad more successful at most politicians do, but not as much as he's credited with by congress and co; that is, he was neither the only nor the major reason for independence, nor was he father of the nation as India exists now. Latter was far more responsibility of Sardar Patel, whom Gandhi swept aside despite being elected PM by elected representatives; as for independence, as Attlee told press when on a visit to independent India, Gandhi they could manage, but it was Subhash Chandra Bose affecting India that made them take flight in a hurry, after his arriving in borders of India with his army, resulting in the navy dock strike.
But chief point here in mentioning these words of Bismil is the continuous abuse meted out to Veer Savarkar by the current opposition, for his appeal. Even apart from the question of the imprisonment of Savarkar being not comparable in any way with that of Gandhi or Nehru who were kept more like state visitors while Savarkar was tortured in Andaman, these words of Bismil are a key.
*****
Amongst the freedom struggle warriors written about by Bhagat Singh and his comrades, there is an unexpected one - that of V. G. Pingle.
It's significant that, while names of his Bengal comrades are known, his has been wiped out - congress inherited the fear and hatred of Marathi bravehearts, whether from colonial rulers or due to Gandhi's politics of wiping out legacies of other, greater, leaders and being against his great predecessor Tilak who was of the same community as Pingle it was communal politics of congress that worked, is uncertain; probably both, and more. Crazy yo appease all enemies of Hindus, Gandhi is known to have spoken of not only such great personae as Shivaji and Maharana Pratap, but also of Hindi Gods Raam and Krishna, in language that woukd have been considered blasphemous and heretic, if Hinduism were ruled by an institution like church of Rome, with burning at stake as an immediate consequence for the abusive politician.
*****
CONTENTS
A Note on Compilation and Editing
Introduction
Section – 1
Letters/Telegrams
Letters from School
Letter from College
Letters from Revolutionary Life
Letters to the Colonial Administration/Judiciary from Jail
Political Letters from Jail
Personal Letters from Jail
Telegrams from Jail
Section – 2
Posters/Notices/Leaflets
Section – 3
Court Statements
Section – 4 Essays, Articles and Sketches
Essays, Articles and Sketches in Various Journals
Sketches of Indian Revolutionaries in Kirti, Maharathi, Pratap and Prabha
Thirty-five Sketches from Phansi Ank of Chand
Section – 5 The Jail Notebook A Short History of the Publication of the Jail Notebook A Martyr’s Notebook The Jail Notebook References Appendices Manifestos Drafted in Consultation with Bhagat Singh Manifesto of Naujawan Bharat Sabha Manifesto of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association Language-wise Details of Bhagat Singh’s Writings Life Events of Bhagat Singh Genealogy Ordinance by Viceroy Lahore Conspiracy Case Judgement Privy Council Judgement
Newly Found Material Notes
Bibliography
Acknowledgments and Sources of Documents
Photographic Inserts
About the Book
About the Author Copyright
*****
A Note on Compilation and Editing
*****
"... Manmath Nath Gupta, a convicted revolutionary in the Kakori Case, who later turned into a historian of the Indian revolutionary movement during the freedom struggle and wrote the Hindi book Bharat Ke Krantikari (Revolutionaries of India) (Reference 1). I translated the book into Punjabi in the early 70s, and from there my interest was further piqued – even though I was a student of Hindi literature and worked mainly in Hindi literature and translation, revolutionary movements and the lives of revolutionaries were always on my mind. ... "
"Bhagat Singh went beyond the tradition of the early revolutionaries and gave an ideological direction to the whole movement, which had been missing earlier. ...
"Before Bhagat Singh, the revolutionary movement was the study of the bravery, fearlessness, and patriotism of the revolutionaries. With Bhagat Singh, it took an entirely different turn and became a study of the ideas of the revolutionaries, and not just about their brave actions.
"To study ideas, one needs documents and physical records of their thoughts and actions. Bhagat Singh became the first such Indian revolutionary, who like the socialist revolutionaries from around the world, would write and record his thoughts. Bhagat Singh was just sixteen when he wrote his first essay available to us, apart from the few letters he had written earlier to family members. His first published essay, ‘The Problem of Language and Script in Punjab’, was published ten years later in a Hindi journal Hindi Sandesh in 1933. He wrote it for a competition and won the first prize of Rs 50, which in those days would be close to Rs 5000 of today. But from his very first essay to the last, none among those discovered till now are in Bhagat Singh’s own handwriting. Most essays or sketches, are found in print form and almost all are attributed to fictitious names; one hardly finds any printed essay remotely associated with his real name. For example in an essay in the Delhi-based Hindi journal Maharathi one finds the mention of a writer B.S. Sindhu. One can identify this as Bhagat Singh Sindhu, as his family clan title was Sindhu. ... Interestingly, when his niece, Veerendra, took to writing the family biography and edited his documents, she took the same title ‘Sindhu’- Veerendra Sindhu and not Sindhu, as is popular (Reference 3)! The only documents found in Bhagat Singh’s own handwriting are either letters or the Jail Notebook. Though not all letters are preserved well, quite a few letters are still conserved, including the oldest ones which he wrote to members of his family at the age of fourteen in 1921.
"Bhagat Singh’s writing life and active revolutionary life run simultaneously. He joined the revolutionary movement at the age of sixteen in 1923 and had less than seven years to achieve his goals of the revolution. During this time, he not only carried out political revolutionary acts – which are referred to in the introduction to the book – but also wrote prolifically. He travelled a lot all over India and spent a lot of time reading the best books from all over the world, be it history, politics, economics, or literature. Bhagat Singh wrote in four languages – Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, and English. He had a good command over Sanskrit, as he had studied it in school, all the more encouraged by his grandfather, Arjun Singh. He understood Bengali very well, and could recite verses by poets such as Nazrul Islam and Tagore fluently in Bengali. At one time, he was learning Persian as well. He wrote more than 130 documents in seven years, covering nearly 400 hundred pages! He wrote more than fifty letters, apart from numerous court statements, pamphlets, essays and sketches. Yet, it is believed by many, on the basis of the accounts of one of his comrades in jail, that Bhagat Singh wrote four more books in jail – these manuscripts were smuggled out but are yet to be found!
"The 59 letters available and presented in this book are in all four languages – Urdu, Punjabi, Hindi and English. Letters from his school period are in Urdu and Punjabi. Urdu was the primary medium of instruction in schools those days, and also commonly used in the socio-political life among all the three communities of Punjab – Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus. One can see from his three letters to his grandfather, Arjun Singh, which are all in Urdu, that Bhagat Singh had a good command over the language. However, in the two letters written in Punjabi to his aunt, Hukam Kaur, one can see many spelling and grammatical errors. This is perhaps, due to the fact that Bhagat Singh had learned Punjabi on his own in the year 1921, when the Nankana Sahib tragedy took place, in which innocent devotee Sikhs were killed at the hands of Mahant cohorts, supported by the British colonial government, and there was a massive movement against the Mahants and the British government. ....
What isn't immediately clear but suddenly becomes so, is that there is a deliberate attempt to idolise, and what's more, create an Indian - purely "desi" - idol India to worship as a left icon; for while every Tom, dick and Harry of non Hindu cultures and faith is all too eager to accuse India, Hindus - and even those of other branches of their own faiths - as idol worshippers, reality is that people create and worship idols in every culture, every faith, and only very advanced level yogis can do without it; and one may say x or y is not an idol, or isn't subjected to worship, but that is merely by defining idol and worship in a narrow enough sense to fit such abuse of "other"s. For if one refers a person, a photograph, an image, a book, a statue, or a building of any nature, enough to be upset seriously when such an object - not a live person - is damaged, it's due to idol worship.
And just as congress in India has created two major and then a whole family as minor idols, so this idol worship is to be perpetual, left lacks or did one until now - for left might worship lenin and Mao, but they are meaningless for Indian population, and so politically useless to left in India, and politics of abusing Hindus isn't helping anyone.
So Chaman Lal on one hand accuses "communal forces" of trying to appropriate Bhagat Singh, while on the other attempting to hide this creation of, or raising a historical figure to, an idol, far more than an icon.
But fact is, he hasn't accused jihadists even factually of the massacres, genocides and worse, perpetrated across West Asia and Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, Europe and more; he knows as all so self labelled secular do that such criticism is dangerous to their lives, while abusing Hindus is not only safe, it's profitable.
And even more of a fact, which he falsified in stating that communal forces are trying to appropriate Bhagat Singh, is that perhaps the only group that can be said to do so is any khalistani terrorist groups and politicians. No Hindu or Muslim or anyone of any other religion has ever claimed that Bhagat Singh was either born as to converted to being one of them.
If he's respected by Indian regardless of his background or his ultimate beliefs, why should Chaman Lal take objection, unless he's trying not only to create a new god and an an idol thereof, but claiming that nobody else can touch this idol without converting first? This is a level of fanaticism not seen in another faith, unless one compares it to all non muslims being directed to drive onto another route, not one to Mecca, at a certain distance on the highway. And to a lesser extent, the necessity of obtaining permission from Vatican before one may visit Lourdes, purely for health reasons. (While Hinduism might ban "others" from entering a temple, nobody is prevented from buying or making an idol or image of the same deity, and making a corner in ones home for worship; in fact most Hindus have such a little temple at home, whether they go to temples or not; and Hindus not only don't object, they literally coukdnt care less, what someone else - outside ones own family - "believes". For Hinduism, Divine is not a matter if belief, but a matter of fact, not of demanding belief but offering knowledge thereof, and paths to arrive be united with the Divine.
That India respects Bhagat Singh for his patriotic life isn't to be labelled as appropriation; he was Indian, and that he fought for India is without any doubt. He could have been safe abroad, or in India, with no politics, but chose his path, and has respect for that, as do all those who gave their lives for India. Chaman Lal can label others and does, extremely abusively, but he's incorrect, and wrong.
*****
Here's a surprise.
"From the proceedings of the trial of the Lahore Conspiracy Case, it seems that some of the letters may still be in the police files of the case, which are still in the custody of the Government of Pakistan. From the letters recovered at Bhagat Singh’s father Kishan Singh’s house in Lahore, there are references to a letter from Rio De Janeiro (Brazil) in 1928 signed ‘AS’, taken away by the police, which indicates that Bhagat Singh was in touch with his uncle in exile at that time. Ghadarite revolutionary and late President of Desh Bhagat Yadgar Committee, Jalandhar, Baba Bhagat Singh Bilga, who spent some time with Ajit Singh in Brazil during his exile period, where he himself was Ghadar Party activist said that Bhagat Singh wrote three letters to Ajit Singh, his uncle in exile."
Surprise, because elsewhere, in his introduction, in another English language work on Bhagat Singh, Chaman Lal expresses regret about how, though his work in Hindi on the subject has far more material, the slavish attitude of people nevertheless gives more importance to everything in English and ignore works in other languages, however superior they are.
(Perhaps he should rethink his own, as well as that of his fellow leftists', attitude in this context, where they are vitriolic against India and her majority, her treasure of knowledge of antiquity, and the fact that her culture is a tradition living and flourishing since antiquity; the said attitude being no better than say, favouring destruction of ancient trees with several,millennia of life behind them, in favour of brand new fashionable varieties potted plants from locations foreign enough to be preferred by those born in atmosphere of slave mindset.)
But then, in this work he gives far more material than in his own work in Hindi on the subject!
Surely, in this era, he couldn't have found it too much trouble to issue, simultaneously, an improved edition of the Hindi work, if only on kindle version?
Or does it pay better to not do so?
*****
Bhagat Singh wrote and published an article comparing, the then young, two of the major leaders, Subhash Chandra Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru.
The article states that Subhash Chandra Bose is emotional, in his love of India, with less theoretical and intellectual basis, and Jawaharlal Nehru had more to offer, an intellectual basis and more of a knowledge of the world, especially having visited Russia after revolution. In this the editors conclude Bhagat Singh correct, as faulty a conclusion as it could get. This conclusion is, again, based on a blind following of leftist powers by the said editors.
Reality is, Subhash Chandra Bose risked his own life continuously from the moment he escaped, to when he brought an army consisting purely of Indian men and women into borders of India, fighting all the way from Singapore marching into Imphal. But more relevantly, according to a reply by Attlee when on a visit to independent India, it was due to Subhash Chandra Bose whose victories had changed Indian mindset that British were forced to flee precipitously, in such haste - specifically, due to strike on navy docks inspired by Subhash Chandra Bose's victories that made British fear a rebellion, and take flight.
Jawaharlal Nehru on the other hand wasn't elected PM of India, although he was the first PM; he was selected, and imposed, by Gandhi, who asked the elected PM, Sardar Patel, to step aside. This decision proved against interests of India. Gandhi advised independent India to not protest when pakis claimed an extra million square miles of territory in East, letting pakis have it; he went on a hunger strike, fasting unto death, if India did not give 55 millions of pounds to Pakistan, despite latter having attacked almost immediately after independence, and give this in midst of the said war, even despite certainty that the money was going towards arms and ammunition to kill more Indians. Jawaharlal Nehru and congress gave in.
Worst, Jawaharlal Nehru demanded army stop short of a decisive, complete victory in Kashmir, and took the matter to U.N. security council, and promised a U.N. inspected plebiscite, which fortunately did not play in favour of the jihadist Pakistan only because U.N. security council imposed a first condition about pakis withdrawal of forces, which Pakistan was never going to do - on the contrary, sending army trained terrorists, and army soldiers dressed in pyjamas, claiming they weren't pakis at all, but only locals.
And both editors, as well as Bhagat Singh, are simply incorrect in their assessment of Jawaharlal Nehru offering more intellectually than Subhash Chandra Bose, as evident ftom biography of the latter by a close relative and member of his family.
*****
Worth note - it is Bismil saying
"Now the question will arise that knowing everything beforehand, why did I send an apology, a mercy petition, and appeal after appeal? The only reason seems to me is that politics is a game of chess. ... "
And this is far from unknown to the opposition of the day, that is, since 2014; after all, it's a very thin pretence that Gandhi was a truthful holy man incapable of hurting anyone, to cover up the reality that he was a politician, just a tad more successful at most politicians do, but not as much as he's credited with by congress and co; that is, he was neither the only nor the major reason for independence, nor was he father of the nation as India exists now. Latter was far more responsibility of Sardar Patel, whom Gandhi swept aside despite being elected PM by elected representatives; as for independence, as Attlee told press when on a visit to independent India, Gandhi they could manage, but it was Subhash Chandra Bose affecting India that made them take flight in a hurry, after his arriving in borders of India with his army, resulting in the navy dock strike.
But chief point here in mentioning these words of Bismil is the continuous abuse meted out to Veer Savarkar by the current opposition, for his appeal. Even apart from the question of the imprisonment of Savarkar being not comparable in any way with that of Gandhi or Nehru who were kept more like state visitors while Savarkar was tortured in Andaman, these words of Bismil are a key.
*****
Amongst the freedom struggle warriors written about by Bhagat Singh and his comrades, there is an unexpected one - that of V. G. Pingle.
It's significant that, while names of his Bengal comrades are known, his has been wiped out - congress inherited the fear and hatred of Marathi bravehearts, whether from colonial rulers or due to Gandhi's politics of wiping out legacies of other, greater, leaders and being against his great predecessor Tilak who was of the same community as Pingle it was communal politics of congress that worked, is uncertain; probably both, and more. Crazy yo appease all enemies of Hindus, Gandhi is known to have spoken of not only such great personae as Shivaji and Maharana Pratap, but also of Hindi Gods Raam and Krishna, in language that woukd have been considered blasphemous and heretic, if Hinduism were ruled by an institution like church of Rome, with burning at stake as an immediate consequence for the abusive politician.
*****
CONTENTS
A Note on Compilation and Editing
Introduction
Section – 1
Letters/Telegrams
Letters from School
Letter from College
Letters from Revolutionary Life
Letters to the Colonial Administration/Judiciary from Jail
Political Letters from Jail
Personal Letters from Jail
Telegrams from Jail
Section – 2
Posters/Notices/Leaflets
Section – 3
Court Statements
Section – 4 Essays, Articles and Sketches
Essays, Articles and Sketches in Various Journals
Sketches of Indian Revolutionaries in Kirti, Maharathi, Pratap and Prabha
Thirty-five Sketches from Phansi Ank of Chand
Section – 5 The Jail Notebook A Short History of the Publication of the Jail Notebook A Martyr’s Notebook The Jail Notebook References Appendices Manifestos Drafted in Consultation with Bhagat Singh Manifesto of Naujawan Bharat Sabha Manifesto of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association Language-wise Details of Bhagat Singh’s Writings Life Events of Bhagat Singh Genealogy Ordinance by Viceroy Lahore Conspiracy Case Judgement Privy Council Judgement
Newly Found Material Notes
Bibliography
Acknowledgments and Sources of Documents
Photographic Inserts
About the Book
About the Author Copyright
*****
A Note on Compilation and Editing
*****
"... Manmath Nath Gupta, a convicted revolutionary in the Kakori Case, who later turned into a historian of the Indian revolutionary movement during the freedom struggle and wrote the Hindi book Bharat Ke Krantikari (Revolutionaries of India) (Reference 1). I translated the book into Punjabi in the early 70s, and from there my interest was further piqued – even though I was a student of Hindi literature and worked mainly in Hindi literature and translation, revolutionary movements and the lives of revolutionaries were always on my mind. ... "
"Bhagat Singh went beyond the tradition of the early revolutionaries and gave an ideological direction to the whole movement, which had been missing earlier. ...
"Before Bhagat Singh, the revolutionary movement was the study of the bravery, fearlessness, and patriotism of the revolutionaries. With Bhagat Singh, it took an entirely different turn and became a study of the ideas of the revolutionaries, and not just about their brave actions.
"To study ideas, one needs documents and physical records of their thoughts and actions. Bhagat Singh became the first such Indian revolutionary, who like the socialist revolutionaries from around the world, would write and record his thoughts. Bhagat Singh was just sixteen when he wrote his first essay available to us, apart from the few letters he had written earlier to family members. His first published essay, ‘The Problem of Language and Script in Punjab’, was published ten years later in a Hindi journal Hindi Sandesh in 1933. He wrote it for a competition and won the first prize of Rs 50, which in those days would be close to Rs 5000 of today. But from his very first essay to the last, none among those discovered till now are in Bhagat Singh’s own handwriting. Most essays or sketches, are found in print form and almost all are attributed to fictitious names; one hardly finds any printed essay remotely associated with his real name. For example in an essay in the Delhi-based Hindi journal Maharathi one finds the mention of a writer B.S. Sindhu. One can identify this as Bhagat Singh Sindhu, as his family clan title was Sindhu. ... Interestingly, when his niece, Veerendra, took to writing the family biography and edited his documents, she took the same title ‘Sindhu’- Veerendra Sindhu and not Sindhu, as is popular (Reference 3)! The only documents found in Bhagat Singh’s own handwriting are either letters or the Jail Notebook. Though not all letters are preserved well, quite a few letters are still conserved, including the oldest ones which he wrote to members of his family at the age of fourteen in 1921.
"Bhagat Singh’s writing life and active revolutionary life run simultaneously. He joined the revolutionary movement at the age of sixteen in 1923 and had less than seven years to achieve his goals of the revolution. During this time, he not only carried out political revolutionary acts – which are referred to in the introduction to the book – but also wrote prolifically. He travelled a lot all over India and spent a lot of time reading the best books from all over the world, be it history, politics, economics, or literature. Bhagat Singh wrote in four languages – Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, and English. He had a good command over Sanskrit, as he had studied it in school, all the more encouraged by his grandfather, Arjun Singh. He understood Bengali very well, and could recite verses by poets such as Nazrul Islam and Tagore fluently in Bengali. At one time, he was learning Persian as well. He wrote more than 130 documents in seven years, covering nearly 400 hundred pages! He wrote more than fifty letters, apart from numerous court statements, pamphlets, essays and sketches. Yet, it is believed by many, on the basis of the accounts of one of his comrades in jail, that Bhagat Singh wrote four more books in jail – these manuscripts were smuggled out but are yet to be found!
"The 59 letters available and presented in this book are in all four languages – Urdu, Punjabi, Hindi and English. Letters from his school period are in Urdu and Punjabi. Urdu was the primary medium of instruction in schools those days, and also commonly used in the socio-political life among all the three communities of Punjab – Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus. One can see from his three letters to his grandfather, Arjun Singh, which are all in Urdu, that Bhagat Singh had a good command over the language. However, in the two letters written in Punjabi to his aunt, Hukam Kaur, one can see many spelling and grammatical errors. This is perhaps, due to the fact that Bhagat Singh had learned Punjabi on his own in the year 1921, when the Nankana Sahib tragedy took place, in which innocent devotee Sikhs were killed at the hands of Mahant cohorts, supported by the British colonial government, and there was a massive movement against the Mahants and the British government. ....
September 30, 2020
This is book about The great revolutionary Bhagat singh. this book initially gives the idea about the early life of the bhagat singh and shows that how politician talks about the bhagat singh and earn votes on his name but no one wants to follow his principle and values. this books deals with the letter written by Bhagat singh from the early childhood to the last letter he wrote. it gives the insight of Bhagat singh mind how he use to think during certain situations. this book also gives insight of the letter written by the Bhagat singh from asking for better food, clothes, newspaper, pen and paper etc, and the letter shows that the bollywood made movies are nowhere close to reality. During that hunger strike bhagat singh used to write letter to british officials reminding them that how they have not fulfilled what they have promised to all the prisoners. All i can say is this is must read book if you are interested in the most loved revolutionary ever produced by India.
January 26, 2022
This is an amazing book to read. In a way this book helps us introduce to a great scholar named Bhagat Singh. The books also provides us his perspective into various aspects of life.
December 23, 2022
A must of everyone, atleast every Indian
June 14, 2023
A brilliantly researched work.
My favourite essays are Why I am an Atheist and New Leaders and Their Different Ideas.
My favourite essays are Why I am an Atheist and New Leaders and Their Different Ideas.
May 8, 2025
The Bhagat Singh Reader, edited by Chaman Lal, is an essential collection that brings together the political writings, personal letters, and prison notes of one of India’s most misunderstood revolutionaries. Far from the simplistic image of a martyr with a pistol and slogan, this volume reveals Bhagat Singh as a committed socialist, a sharp political thinker, and a fierce advocate for secularism and rationalism.
What makes this book particularly urgent today is how Singh’s views challenge the growing tide of communal politics and religious polarization in India. His critique of blind nationalism, his rejection of religious orthodoxy, and his call for a truly egalitarian society speak directly to the dangers of hate-fueled populism. Singh consistently argued for unity across religious and caste lines, believing that revolution meant more than just political independence - it meant social justice and human dignity.
Chaman Lal’s careful curation, supported by thoughtful commentary and accessible translations, ensures that Singh’s original voice comes through with clarity. The book becomes more than a historical document - it’s a tool for reflection and resistance in contemporary India.
Quotes:
"I am such a lunatic that I am free even in jail"
"Merciless criticism and independent thinking are two traits of revolutionary thinking."
"People get accustomed to the established order of things and tremble at the idea of change. It is this lethargic spirit that needs be replaced by the revolutionary spirit"
What makes this book particularly urgent today is how Singh’s views challenge the growing tide of communal politics and religious polarization in India. His critique of blind nationalism, his rejection of religious orthodoxy, and his call for a truly egalitarian society speak directly to the dangers of hate-fueled populism. Singh consistently argued for unity across religious and caste lines, believing that revolution meant more than just political independence - it meant social justice and human dignity.
Chaman Lal’s careful curation, supported by thoughtful commentary and accessible translations, ensures that Singh’s original voice comes through with clarity. The book becomes more than a historical document - it’s a tool for reflection and resistance in contemporary India.
Quotes:
"I am such a lunatic that I am free even in jail"
"Merciless criticism and independent thinking are two traits of revolutionary thinking."
"People get accustomed to the established order of things and tremble at the idea of change. It is this lethargic spirit that needs be replaced by the revolutionary spirit"
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews