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.