Gandhi's Assassin by Dhirendra Jha

Author:Dhirendra Jha
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Verso Books

If the moment was turbulent for Manorama, it was doubly so for Godse, although for a different reason. The repeated failure of the ambitious plans through most of the later part of 1947—first to assassinate Jinnah, then to attack the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan and finally to blow up the train carrying arms to Pakistan—had shattered all his hopes of shaking the country. Though these plans had been conceived by Apte, who was also to supervise their execution, Godse had earnestly believed in them and had enthusiastically supported them. In a way, therefore, Godse was still adrift, but the direction in which he was now floating was getting increasingly defined. Added to the frustration was his failure, as the editor of Hindu Rashtra, to rouse the communal feelings of Poona’s Hindus against Muslims. The psychological impact of all this seems to have started mounting on him, reflected as it was in the rather frequent bouts of depression he now seemed to be experiencing.

One such occasion was recorded by Dixit, who was a regular contributor to Godse’s newspaper.38 In his memoir, Dixit recalls Godse asking him why the thirteenth-century Marathi saint Dnyaneshwar died prematurely. Dixit replied that he did not know.

‘I will tell you,’ Godse said. ‘With all the suffering, this saint kept preaching karmayoga’—a concept that calls for good works—‘but people remained inactive. This annoyed him and he took “Samadhi”—embracing death by entering into deep meditation. ‘This was in a way suicide. Do you agree?’

‘Is it an issue worth contemplation?’ Dixit asked him.

‘Then leave it.’39

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