THE SAD STORY OF A FREEDOM FIGHTER

When the tall, fair and handsome man in his white khadi kurta and dhoti walked around the main bazaar of Thrissur town, people made fun of him calling him ‘kanti pranthan’ ( Gandhi lunatic). Some others called him ‘Uyirppu Devassy’ ( Resurrected Sebastian).  These nicknames never bothered that great dedicated freedom fighter, P. W. Sebastian. He was known by his pet name Devassy among family and friends. He was one of the few leaders of the Freedom movement in the erstwhile Cochin State and was responsible for forming the Congress movement in Thrissur along with late Kuroor Neelakandan Namboodiripad.

                        At that time he was a rich businessman of Thrissur. He had a Jewellery and  textile shop known as Paris Hall in High Road, Thrissur. His enthusiasm for the freedom movement and love and respect for Mahatma Gandhi prompted him to jump into the ocean of freedom struggle even without considering the financial security of his family and the future of his business.

                        In those days the Catholic Church and its hierarchy were strong supporters of the British Raj and they opposed the struggle for independence lead by Mahatma Gandhi. They called Gandhiji as Anti-Christ. There is a belief among Catholics that an Anti-Christ will be born when the end of the Universe is near and the Catholic clergy thought Mahatma Gandhi was that Anti-Christ. Only when the church hierarchy became sure that the British would leave India and the Congress would come to power, they became enthusiastic supporters of the Congress.  Ignoring the opposition of the Catholic clergy against the Indian National Congress and Mahatma Gandhi, P. W. Sebastian, a true catholic, joined the freedom movement even at the risk of becoming an outcast from the Church and thus he became the first Catholic to join the Indian National Congress. The Church authorities were angry with him for joining ‘Kanti Bhagam’ (Gandhi’s side).

                        It was accidental that P. W. Sebastian, the then well-known businessman of Thrissur, came into the freedom movement. It happened during one of his routine business tours to Mumbai for procuring gold jewellery and textiles. During this trip he met Motilal Nehru, father of the first Indian Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru and they became friends. After returning to Thrissur their friendship became stronger through regular correspondence. It was under the influence of Motilal Nehru, P. W. Sebastian became a member of the Indian National Congress in the Madras Session of the Congress in 1914. He was one among the twelve persons who took Congress membership in the Madras Session. They included  K.P.Kesava Menon (Founder editor Mathrubhumi News Paper), E.V.Ramaswamy Naikkar (Founder of Dravida Kazhakam former incarnation or avathar of DMK and AIDMK), Mannath Padmanabhan (Founder of Nair Service Society), Barrister George Joseph, R. K. Shanmugham Chetty (Former Diwan of Cochin State), C. P. Ramaswamy Iyer (Former Diwan of Travancore State) and Mirza Ismail ( Former Diwan of Mysore).

                        Subsequently R. K. Shanmugham Chetty, C. P. Ramaswamy Iyer and Mirza Ismail deserted Congress and sided with the British. They were rewarded for this by the British Rulers conferring  the hounour of Knighthood and could add the title ‘Sir’ before their names. They were also doled out the lucrative jobs of Diwans of Cochin, Travancore and Mysore States respectively. But P. W. Sebastian was never a person to fall into the trap of British temptation. Otherwise he also could have managed to get such honours and lucrative jobs under the British.

                        P. W. Sebastian was the leader of the foreign clothes boycott agitation in Thrissur. In 1920 he publicly burnt a heap of foreign clothes along with other volunteers in Thekkinkadu Maidan of Thrissur. This made him the target of the British Government and the Government marked him as its enemy. He started a Malayalam News paper from Thrissur along with Sri Kuroor Neelakandan Namboodiripad to spread the message of freedom movement. The name of the paper was ‘Lokamanayan’ and P. W. Sebastian was the printer and publisher and Kuroor Namboodiripad, the editor. The British Government confiscated the newspaper within a year and Sebastian and Kuroor, publisher and editor of the newspaper, were arrested and imprisoned in Viyyur Jail for 6 months. While in jail he organized other prisoners and started a fast against serving of bad quality food. The imprisonment strengthened his will power and motivation to do more for the national freedom movement. During this period he had regular correspondence with Mahatma Gandhi, Motilal Nehru, Sarojini Naidu etc.

                        The V.I.P. guests who visited Sebastian’s house in East Bazaar, Thrissur included Mahatma Gandhi, Deenabandhu C.F.Andrews and Sarojini Naidu. Kasturba Gandhi, Mahatma’s wife, stayed one night in his house.

                        He participated in Vaikom Sathyagraha and was arrested and jailed for 6 months in Trivandrum Jail. During his imprisonment in Trivandrum Jail discreet enquiries were made from the Viceroy’s Office in Delhi to Cochin and Travancore State Governments about Sebastian on  a British Secret Service information that he was a member of German Bolshevic Committee (German Communist Party). Travancore Government was warned that Sri Sebastian was a dangerous person.  After release from the jail he continued the struggle for freedom. His next arrest was in 1928 for participating in the agitation against and boycott of Simon Commission in Mumbai.

                        When Gandhiji visited Thrissur in 1927 P. W. Sebastian and Kuroor Namboodiripad were the leaders who arranged the reception of the Mahatma at the railway station. They entrusted a Harijan to garland Gandhiji when he got down from the train. A palm leaf umbrella was used to protect Gandhiji from the sun and he spoke to those assembled at the railway platform under this umbrella. During his visit to Thrissur Gandhiji visited Sebastian’s house on October 14^th 1927. The reception given to Gandhiji in his own residence provoked Catholic Church hierarchy and its cohorts and they branded Sebastian as ‘Kanti Pranthan’ (Gandhi  Lunatic).

                        He was a fearless leader and fighter.  Wherever in India there was a struggle, he was there. This kept him away from the family for months together. His letters to family were few and far between. Once a telegram was received by his wife with the message, ‘Sebastian expired’. There was no mention of where, when and how he died.  Under the initiative of Fr. Vadakkan, a progressive Catholic priest, a memorial service was conducted.  Three months his wife and four children spent in mourning. Then surprisingly one fine morning opening the front gate of his house the already ‘expired’ Sebastian returned home. Nobody could believe their eyes. They thought he resurrected from the dead and people started to call him “Uyirppu Devassy’ or Resurrected Sebastian. When he had gone underground during the Quit India Movement his wife Annam died. The relatives waited for him till next day midnight and only then her body was buried. He could come home only six days after his wife’s death.

                        By then his business and shops had become past history and nothing was left for a living. After Independence he supported Gandhiji‘s stand that Indian National Congress must be dissolved. This made him unpopular among, by then power-hungry Congressmen. P. W.  Sebastian, the great freedom fighter, really died on 27^th December 1969 unsung, unpraised and unremembered,  without the glare of publicity, without pension for freedom fighters or even without a Tamrapatra. No Congressman in Thrissur remembers him now. There are roads in Thrissur named after Christian Bishops who opposed freedom struggle, but there is no road named after this great freedom fighter. He has fully faded into the darkness of forgetfulness.

A Personal Note:  P. W. Sebastian is related to me. He married Annam, fondly known as Kunjannam in family circles, the younger sister of my own grandmother. As per our custom grandmother’s sister is  grandmother to me and her husband, grandfather. Thus P. W. Sebastian was my grandfather. His eldest son George after completing education left Thrissur and started an accounting firm in Calcutta.  When he visited our house in Thrissur again, even my mother had difficulty in recognizing her own cousin after so many years. It is years now since anything is heard from him. Sebastian’s third son Antony (Anties) died long ago. His daughter Baby was married to a noble family in Kothamangalam. His second son, Jose Poovathingal, lived for a long time in Thrissur in financial difficulties. I had the good fortune to extend occasional financial help to him.  I also could arrange an employment for his daughter in Elite Supermarket, Thrissur, thanks to its owner and my good friend Sri T. R. Vijayakumar. But, by then the family had shifted residence from Thrissur town to an interior place, the girl could not continue the job for long as it would be very late to reach home after work.  Soon Sri Jose Poovathingal died and unfortunately I lost contact with the family since then. I don’t even know where the family is now. This is the sad story of a freedom fighter who sacrificed his family, business and all good things in life for the freedom of the country.

            For the last fifteen years I used to deliver an Independence Day speech in my locality. (If you won’t consider me immodest, I have to reveal that my Independence Day speeches are popular among the people in the area. Hindus, Muslims and Christians flock to hear my speech even though other political leaders are there to speak. )  This year’s address was a memorial speech for P. W. Sebastian, the forgotten hero and freedom fighter of Thrissur. In my speech I hinted that he joined Indian National Congress disregarding the ban of the Catholic Church who supported the British Raj at that time. This provoked some faithful catholic sheep in the locality against me. Thrissur City Corporation is ruled by the Congress for a long time even from the days of being a municipal town and when I criticized the Congress Mayor and Councillors for not naming at least a road in memory of this great freedom fighter and one of the earliest  Congressmen who started the Congress movement in Thrissur, the Congress Councillors and Congressmen present in the meeting were a bit annoyed. 

THE TYRANNY OF RELIGION

                          While humans were barbarian hunters God wasn’t known to them and there was no religion as such in existence. Only when they settled in a place and opted agriculture as their main means of livelihood, religions came into existence. Jericho in Israel is one such place where early humans settled for agriculture and this place is one of the early centres of civilization. This place may be called as the cradle of one of the earliest religions, Judaism.  Another team of hunters from Middle East Asia travelled to the Southern Asia and settled on the banks of Sindhu River. They were known as Aryans and their religion was subsequently came to be known as Hinduism. Other religions like Jainism, Budhism etc. were the offshoots of Hinduism just like Semitic monotheistic religions like Christianity and Islam are the products of Judaism.

                         During the evolution of homosapiens,  religion had its own utility in the conversion of humans from barbarism to civilization. But after passage of many centuries religion became a liability rather than an asset to the human race. Religion became a force that retarded the progress and scientific quest of humanity. Any impartial observer can convince himself of this fact if he goes through the history of the Dark Ages in Europe.  Christian religion, especially its Catholic sect, was the most reactionary force that blocked all scientific discoveries of early scientists. Semitic religions like Judaism, Christianity and Islam are the most intolerant religions in the world where as the Hindu religion and its daughter religions are more tolerant than the former.  As far as Semitic religions are concerned they believe their God is the only true God and their religion is the only path for salvation or the passport for entry into heaven. They also believe that their holy books are the words of God that cannot be questioned or challenged.  A Hindu is free not to believe in any God and still he will be considered a Hindu. He may observe or not observe Hindu rites and still he will be considered a Hindu. There is no question of ex-communication as in Semitic religions. Hindu religion is broad enough to accommodate other beliefs also. But the story of Semitic religions is just the opposite and they brand other religionists as non-believers or khafirs.

                         I am a person who believes all religions have outlived their utility. If we study the past history of the world, you will be convinced that more millions of people had been killed in religious  wars  than in political wars like 1^st and 2^nd  World Wars.  Everybody is born into a religion if we like it or not. There is no option.  I am born of Christian parents and I became a Christian at least in name. Nobody asked me whether I wanted to be a Christian, Muslim or Hindu. All the prejudices and false beliefs of the respective religion are injected into a human being from early childhood. Even though I am not a believer or admirer of any religion, if I have an iota of respect towards any religion, it is the Hindu religion. But I feel sorry to see that the new face of the most tolerant religion in the world now is the Sangh Parivar, Viswa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal and not philosophers like Sri Narayana Guru.

                         The ignorance of the faithful is being exploited by religions and their clergy. So far in India religious organizations were satisfied with protection of their vested interests by their proximity to the political parties and their leaders. But the situation has changed drastically and now the political authorities are being determined and controlled by the religious leaders, brandishing the true or assumed strength of their vote bank.  As long as various political parties and their leaders do not come together and show the religious leaders their respective place in public life, India’s future is doomed to be bleak.

                         I have to openly tell you this. Like Martin Luther King Jr. I too have a dream, a dream of a society where there is no tyranny of religion, where there is no exploitation of the common people by their clergy, where there is no distinction between man and man on the basis of religion and where there is no slavery of the mind perpetrated by the so-called religious leaders.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, the New Hero of Indian Fascists.

 A speech of Russian President Vladimir Putin in Duma (Russian Parliament) on 4^th February 2013 against the minorities in Russia is being circulated by Modi supporters through internet. They present Putin as a role model for India and by implication say that Modi will be the only person in India who will dare to speak like Putin.  We all know that Putin is not a widely respected World Statesman. There are too many allegations against him and in the last Presidential election in Russia he somehow scraped through by hook or by crook. There was even allegations against the genuineness and impartiality of that presidential election and it was alleged that Putin manipulated the election process to ensure his victory. He first became President of Russia in 2000. Soon on becoming President he took out his true fascist colour. First victim was N.T.V. owner Vladimir Aleksandrovich Gusinski. The reason: President Putin was provoked by a programme telecasted on N.T.V. showing him as a joker. In June 2000 a case for cheating and forgery was charged against Gusinski and he had to flee Russia.

Next on the victims’ list is Boris Berezovski, a self-made billionaire with investments in oil, aluminium, car and airplane industries and T.V. channels. He played a substantial role in Vladimir Putin’s rise to power in 2000. Subsequently their relationship became soured and finally he fled to England. Very soon on 23^rd March 2000 he was found dead in his bathroom under mysterious circumstances and it is suspected that the long arm of Putin was behind the mysterious death of Berezovski. (One former Russian Federal Security Officer had given evidence for this.) The super-rich Russian Oil baron Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky became Putin’s enemy on his public allegation that Putin is corrupt. He was arrested on 25^th October 2003 on false charges of fraud and sentenced to 9 years imprisonment. He is still in the prison cell.

A Russian accountant and auditor Sergei Leonidovich Magnitski brought to light a scam of 230 crore dollars against Putin Government in 2008. He was subsequentl y arrested on charge of tax evasion and thrown into prison. In 2009 he was killed in custody at the young age of 37 years as a result of cruel persecution. Former Russian Federal Security Service Officer Alexander Valterovich  Litvinenko was murdered in London in 2006 by poisoning with polonium. The reason is that he accused Putin and Co. for ordering the assassination of Russian industrial tycoon Boris Berezovski.   A vehement Putin critic and human rights activist Anna Politkovskaya, a journalist and reporter of opposition news paper Novaya Gazeta  was  shot dead in the lift of her apartment block. It is still an unsolved murder attracting international attention. After Putin became President four other reporters of the same news paper were killed under mysterious circumstances. Two anti Putin lady singers of an orchestra group are still in jail. Anti Putin left opposition leader Sergei Stanislavovich Udalsov is under house arrest. Elder Opposition Leader and former Deputy Prime Minister Boris Effimovich Nemtsov  is living in and out of jail. Former World chess champion Gari Kasperov was victimized for his anti Putin views. Opposition Leader and hero of the Russian people Alexei Navalny was arrested  on the flimsy ground of stealing some wood and put into jail. Only after strong international protest he was set free. In a land where those in power wreak havoc with the law and settle personal scores with opponents, no one is safe.                                                        
Modi supporters in India now make such a person who has low esteem in the eyes of the world (the only good thing he did is to give political asylum to Snoden) as a role model for India. I fully agree with them that these are what going to happen in India once Narendra Modi is in Prime Minister’s throne.

In Putin’s speech he says,“ Russia does not need minorities. Any minority, if it wants to live in Russia, to work and eat in Russia, should speak Russian. Russia doesn’t need minorities and minorities need Russia.  We will not grant them special privileges, or try to change our laws to fit their desires, no matter how loud they yell ‘discrimination’. The Russian customs and traditions are not compatible with the lack of culture or the primitive ways of most minorities. When this honorable legislative body (Duma or Russian Parliament) thinks of creating new laws, it should have in mind national interest first, observing that the minorities are not Russians.”

No wonder that this speech finds sympathetic resonance with the Indian fascists. They wonder if there is any leader in India other than Modi to give a similar statement in Parliament.  As far as they are concerned minorities are not Indian citizens. In their view minorities mean Muslims and Christians. But there are other religious minorities like Sikhs, Jains, Budhists, Parsees and ethnic minorities like Gorkhas, North Eastern People, South Indian People etc. Linguistic minorities like Konkanies, thulus etc. are there. In Putin’s view only people speaking Russian language can be considered Russians and those who speak other languages are minorities. If we stretch this argument to the Indian situation only those people who speak dominant Hindi language can be considered as Indians. People speaking Tamil, Telugu, Kannada or Malayalam will be considered as minorities and not to be fit to be Indians.  That may be the reason this Hindutva fascists never uttered a word of protest when genocide took place in Sri Lanka and the Tamil Minority was butchered.  In their view minorities are not fit to live as equal citizens and they must live as second class citizens. Yesterday Sikhs in Modi’s heavenly Gujarat took out a protest march against discrimination of Modi Government.

It seems fitting and proper that Putin is the new hero and role model of the Indian fascistsi. I have to forewarn that the same Russian fate is waiting the Indian people and the opposition parties and leaders who doesn’t toe the fascist line once Modi is in the Prime Minister’s  throne.