Post type: Book review, Date: 23-March-2020, Language: English

Author: Bhagat Singh

It was purely by coincidence that I happened to read this essay yet again today, on the 89th death anniversary of Bhagat Singh.

My first introduction to the revolutionary trio of Sardar Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev Thapar and Shivram Hari Rajguru was obviously from the history textbook at school. However, I made a true connect with the man and his legendary story through the Bollywood movie “The legend of Bhagat Singh” starring Ajay Devgn.

Since then, I aspired to know him more through his writings and public discourses. That’s how I stumbled upon his Jail diary and this essay. What shocks me to disbelief about this man are two things: (1) the clarity and composure this 23-year young lad maintains in his discourses (2) his voraciousness to read and learn.

In this essay, he has tried to dissect the different aspects of the question of why he is an atheist, arriving at the answer by eliminating the wrong possibilities. He argues that he was an atheist even when he was an unknown person and so, vanity could not have resulted in his atheism. In fact, he proves that any such self-obsessed person could only be a theist since he considers himself in posession of godly qualities or even as god himself!

He then goes on to proudly declare that he chose to remain an atheist even when he was asked to offer his prayers in the jail, where he was told to expect a death sentence. It is an act of degradation and demoralization, says the firebrand revolutionary, to resort to prayer when his last days come!

Another thing that still throbs in my mind is the way he sums up his life, in comparison with what Hinduism and semitic religions profess. All the while, he knew that there was no reward here or in an (imaginary) afterlife.

“What hope should I entertain? I know that will be the end when the rope is tightened round my neck and the rafters move from under my feet. To use more precise religious terminology, that will be the moment of utter annihilation. My soul will come to nothing. If I take the courage to take the matter in the light of ‘Reward’, I see that a short life of struggle with no such magnificent end shall itself be my ‘Reward.’ That is all. Without any selfish motive of getting any reward here or in the hereafter, quite disinterestedly have I devoted my life to the cause of freedom. I could not act otherwise. The day shall usher in a new era of liberty when a large number of men and women, taking courage from the idea of serving humanity and liberating them from sufferings and distress, decide that there is no alternative before them except devoting their lives for this cause.”

I can’t emphasize it enough that this essay is a must read for every young person in India