Freedom Revisited

The tiny stars were straining their ears from the blanket of night-sky to eavesdrop on the discussion going on in the lone room of the Prati Sarkar. The Toofan Sena has assembled for last minute discussions on the next-day’s event. Since they have formed the parallel Government, the British Raj was finding it difficult to at least step into the area. However, there was much left to do. A struggle can never be claimed to have ended unless the opponent was grounded to next to nothing. Theirs was not any random struggle. It was the Struggle for Indian Independence and among the sea of freedom fighters across the huge nation the Toofan Sena or the Whirlwind Army formed a decent high tide capable of flooding an entire area of six hundred villages from the grab of the Raj.

The revolutionary was all set to go ahead with the well deliberated plan of action. He woke up from bed startled at the thought of getting delayed. He looked at the calendar which rightly read June 7. He struggled to his feet and hurriedly stepped outside the room when he felt a sharp pain in his ankles. He sat down in confusion and doubtfully looked at the calendar once again. The reason for his aching ankles returned flashing into his reeling mind. The date of the action was the same but the year was more than six decades earlier. Nursing his tensed nerves, he relaxed his heart and slowly started getting ready for the event ahead. After sixty four years of the most memorable day in his life, he was going to revisit the past with his Sena, this time armed not with weapons but the proud smile of a freedom fighter.

Few days back he received a call to attend a freedom fighters’ meet on June 7 to mark the historic Rail Loot of the Toofan Sena. Since then, the nonagenarian was beaming with life. His face showed mixed emotions and his words carried the confusion of pride, joy, disappointment and bewilderment. Proud of the brave act, joy at being remembered, disappointment at the present state of the nation and bewildered of future. That day however, he started off his journey from his home to the railway track simultaneously travelling from present to the past.

Exactly forty four years ago, he took the same path, armed with a lathi and a sickle. The troop has a couple of country bombs apart from lathis and sickles similar to his. The plan was to go about the track in two squads. One shall place boulders on the track to stop the train. As it halted, the other squad shall place boulders at its other end leaving it no chance to leave. The revolutionary belonged to the forward squad. Placing the boulders on the track, they awaited the arrival of the train. The vehicle was special as it carried the salaries of the British employees. The looted sweat and blood of the native Indians packed in the form of payrolls for the British servants, he thought within himself as he saw the first trail of smoke approaching from the other end.

As the train came to a halt before the boulders, the men moved out in disciplined precision at the targeted rail guard. The guard in the engine had a gun with him but the men overpowered him much before any damage could be done. They unloaded the payrolls and the next thing that flashed into the old man’s mind was the smiles that he witnessed that day. As the money was distributed among the peasants, their heartfelt blessings and warm smiles were a true treasure hit for the Sena. The Sena hadn’t taken at least one penny out of the loot which was hence unacceptable to be termed so.

The incident was so clearly lodged in his brain that the revolutionary could see it happen clearly in front of his eyes as he walked across the railway track. There were many people awaiting a ceremony at the spot where the train was stopped. There was a monument placed at the spot by the British Government to mourn the act. For the men who went to listen to the story, the monument meant a clear defeat of the British in the hands of the local rebels. However, for the revolutionary himself, it was a clear depiction of the importance given by the British authorities to their salaried personnel and the Independent Indian authorities to their freedom fighters. After about three decades of discussions on independence and freedom, the entire concept of freedom and freedom fighters had slowly started fading from the Indian context. Peasants were targeted a day earlier and many of his co-peasants were fighting against the injustice. If freedom meant suppression from natives, then what was the necessity for fighting for so many years? He wished Bapu was present at that occasion to help him understand his next course of action. Though their paths were different, it was Mahatma’s Quit India Movement that encouraged the Toofan Sena to take up the rebellion.

Debating thus within himself of the pros and cons of a free India, the nonagenarian accompanied the men at the track to a seminar. There he met the grandson of the Mahatma whom he hugged with affection and wept involuntarily at the touch of a man of the noble blood. He walked up the podium with the other members of the Sena and once seated on the dais, he realized that he had been proven wrong by the gathering. There was a huge crowd in the hall waiting to get a glimpse of the freedom fighters. If Bapu meant a surge of emotions for his contemporaries, then freedom fighters like him meant the same surge of emotions for the present generation. They always look up to the elderly men to show the course of action. Their statues might not be erected, their names might not be repeated but their stature as a whole lives rooted in the hearts of the Indians.

That day, the ninety year old revolutionary had heard a sound longer and louder than any he had ever heard in his life time and it emanated from the thousands of hands that joined together that day to clap for the living legacy on dais.  The standing ovation that the freedom fighters received on June 7, 2017 was a manifestation of the place that the revolutionaries had, have and shall have in the hearts of the Indians for centuries to come.

The Story is inspired from an event conducted by People's Archive of Rural India (PARI) to honour the Toofan Sena on June 7, 2017 to mark a historic act of looting the train carrying the British Payrolls.