The Role of South India in the Freedom Movement

Omkar Swami and the Assassination of Ashe

'From a terrorist revolutionary sentenced to a long prison to a spiritual ascetic and teacher would seem to many to be a far cry indeed. Yet this is exactly what happened in the case of Sri Sadguru Omkar who is today a revered octogenarian Saint who has his Ashram opposite the Nandi Hills in Kolar district', wrote Sri Dharma Vira, Governor of Karnataka in 1970.

Nilkantha Brahmachari - Sadguru Omkar's former name - was born on 4th December 1889 in Tanjore in an orthodox Brahmin family. From a very young age in high school, he was involved in national revolutionary activities. His group in South India was closely connected with the Jugantar group of Bengal. Because of his activities, Sadguru had to take asylum in the French territory of Pondicherry. He was one of the group along with the poet Subrahmaniam Bharati, which received Aurobindo Ghosh at Pondicherry on 4th April 1910. He was closely connected with the Mopla agrarian revolution in Kerala. His group published the Communist Manifesto in the South even before the Communist Revolution in Russia. He was the first accused in Kolkata by Teggart and was imprisoned for more than eleven years. In jail, the transformation from a revolutionary to a spiritual Sadhaka took place, as vividly described in his notes which he later collected as 'Confessions on the way towards Peace' (now being published). After coming out of the jail, he took the 'Confessions' to Sri Aurobindo, who wrote a small foreword. After going through a spiritual itinerary, Sadguru Omkar settled down at the lower Nandi Hills in 1930 and built a small ashram around a dilapidated Shiva Temple - which he called Omkareswara - by a rivulet, the source of the river Pennar or Penganga. Gradually his name spread and visitors from all over India and abroad began to pour in. His talks with the visitors, friends and disciples were published in two small volumes, 'Upadesh' and 'Selected Talks'. These are also included in the present volume to give a proper perspective of the thoughts of Swamiji Sadguru. About his ashram at Nandi Hills Swamiji said: 'My Ashram is a beautiful place with all the inconveniences necessary for spiritual life, but disappointing to a lover of case and comfort.' Sadguru Omkar passed away on 4th March in his Ashram at the Nandi Hills at the ripe old age of 89.

The Case of the Train Murder: Ashe Murder Case

Those were the days when the seeds of the struggle for freedom, sown during the Indian Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, had begun to sprout glowingly all over the sprawling British-ruled India. Many young men fired by the blaze of national spirit burst on the horizon spreading the message of freedom in secret, and also openly, committing acts of protest to tell the world what they sought. Some called them 'misguided youth', and some branded them as 'traitors', but they were neither. Indeed they were the heroes of the Indian Freedom Movement. They laid down their precious young lives at the altar of their motherland, Bharatha Mata. The stirring story of one such group of noble patriotic sons of Mother India, which spun round the murder of a British civilian officer, came to be known as 'Ashe Murder Case'. It occupies a place of honor in the history of the Indian Freedom Movement.

Robert W. D. E. Ashe, a member of the Indian Civil Service (ICS, also known as the 'Steel Frame' of the British Indian Government) and a tradition-bound Britisher was then the sub-collector at the small sea port town of Tuticorin (now Thoothukudi) on the Bay of Bengal in South India. Like most Britishers in India of the day Ashe felt that the British owned India lock, stock and barrel, and Indians were destined only to serve their white alien masters, and their duty was to do and die and not to reason why. He hated Indians

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who dared to ask him why and the man he hated most in the town famed for pearl fishing was the celebrated patriot V. O. Chidambaram Pillai.

On 17 June 1911, Ashe was travelling by train in a first-class compartment and when it stopped at Maniyachi, a railway junction, a young man made his way into the compartment. Suddenly he whipped out an automatic Browning revolver and shot Ashe dead at point blank range. As crowds, cops and all rushed, he escaped and ran down the unpaved gritty, gravelly platform. As cops chased him he ran into a lavatory on the platform and shot himself in the mouth using the same weapon. His name was Vanchinatha Iyer, a Brahmin from Shencottah, then situated in the princely native state of Travancore ruled by its Maharaja. The police found a letter on his body, which suggested a political conspiracy behind the murder. It read as follows: 'Every Indian is at the present time endeavoring to drive out the Englishman who is the enemy of [our] country and to establish "Dharma" and liberty... we 3000 Madrasis have taken a vow. To make it known, I, the least of them did this day commit this act.'

A search of the dead assailant's residence revealed more letters which threw further light on the conspiracy. The letters mentioned Arumugham Pillai, who had been in touch with Vanchi. He was traced and the British Indian Police were able to extract a lot of information from this weak-kneed man. Later he was taken as approver. Another man, Somasundaram was also traced and he too cracked at the seams and let out a good heap of sawdust inside. He too turned approver.

The cops did not leave a single stone unturned. Searches were made all over South India and the root of it all pointed to Pondicherry, the port town on the Bay of Bengal, then a part of French territory beyond the pale of British India. As the public prosecutor of Madras High Court, C. F. Napier commented later during the trial on '[t]he extraordinary way in which the town of Pondicherry seem[ed] to permeate this case'. This historic town of Dupleix and Anandarangam Pillai played a significant role in the fight for Indian Freedom.

Pondicherry, being alien French territory, proved a haven for Indian revolutionaries hounded and hunted by the British Indian Police. The friendly quiet beautiful small town gave political asylum to great freedom fighters like Aurobindo Ghosh; V. V. S. Iyer, a lawyer turned rebel who trained men in armed combat and guerrilla warfare; and Mahakavi Subramaniam Bharati, the great rebel poet of India whose works in Tamil were banned by the British Indian Government. Many publications in English and Tamil were produced here and circulated secretly in British Indian territory in spite of the ban on them. Indeed Pondicherry was a veritable factory of patriotic fervour.

Soon the police rounded up as many as fourteen men who were charged with various offences under the Indian Penal Code like murder, waging war against the King-Emperor of India, and criminal conspiracy. The accused were the following:

1) Neelakanta, alias Brahmachari, a Brahmin youth of twenty-one, a journalist, fiery patriot and person of considerable persuasive skills and charm, and the leader of a conspiracy to murder Ashe, according to the police

2) Sankarakrishna Iyer, a young farmer

3) Madathukadai Chidambaram Pillai (no relation of VOC), a green-grocer

4) Muthukumarasami Pillai, a pot vendor in his forties

5) Subbaiah Pillai, a lawyer's clerk

6) Jagannatha Ayyangar, a young cook

7) Harihara Iyer, a young merchant

8) Bapu Pillai, a farmer

9) V. Desikachari, a merchant

10) Vembu Iyer, a cook

11) Savadi Arunachalam Pillai, a farmer

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12) Alagappa Pillai, a teenaged farmer...

13) 'Vande Matharam' Subramania Iyer, a schoolmaster

14) Pichumani Iyer, a cook

Altogether, the list included a motley crowd of men mostly in their twenties from different professions and castes but all of them had something in common. They were all patriots burning with desire and thirst for freedom, their muscles all set to drive out the Imperialistic British from India.

In the ordinary course this case would have been tried by the District and Sessions Judge at Tinnevelly. But in view of its political importance and the murder victim being a Britisher and an ICS Officer at that, the case was sent up to the High Court at Madras. Here a Full Bench of three judges consisting of Sir Arnold White, then Chief Justice of Madras, Mr. Justice Ayling and Mr. Justice C. Sankaran Nair (later Sir C. Sankaran Nair) tried it as a special case. The case not surprisingly attracted attention all over India and even beyond achieving the status of a 'cause celebre'.

C. F. Napier, public prosecutor assisted by T. Richmond and A. Sundara Sastrigal appeared for the Crown, while a glittering array of eminent Madras lawyers defended the accused. Neelakanta was defended by British Barrister, J. C. Adam. Another Barrister, a brilliant and mercurial Indian, a great patriot and future leader who gave away his wealth and all for his native land, Tanguturi Prakasam appeared for Sankarakrishna and three other accused.

In later years T. Prakasam known as 'Andhra Kesari' - the Lion of Andhra - occupied several high positions in South India as Chief Minister of Madras, and Andhra Pradesh, Central minister at Delhi and others. He began as pleader in Rajamundry now in Andhra Pradesh where he quickly scaled to the top. Realising that the District Headquarters town was too small an arena for a person of his brilliance and talents he went to England and qualified as Barrister. Back home he set up practice at Madras where he soon made a mark and moved to the forefront of the Bar. Sadly in recent years this great patriot and warm human soul has been sidelined.

M. D. Devadoss (later Mr. Justice Devadoss), J. L. Rozario, B. Narasimha Rao, T. M. Krishnaswami Iyer (a future leader of the Madras bar and later, Chief Justice of the Travancore High Court; he was also a great savant of Hindu religious lore), L. A. Govindaraghava Iyer, S. T. Srinivasagopalachari (a high-ranking Freemason, an eminent epigraphist and numismatist with a fabulous collection of ancient coins of solid gold) and V. Ryru Nambiar held the brief for the other accused.

Who was Nilakanta Bramhachari, as he came to be known? A person of some education born in Erukkoor in Thanjavur district he had been engaged from his late teens in journalism and was drawn to revolutionaries like Aurobindo Ghosh, then the idol of Indian youth. Soon he moved to Pondicherry where he published a Tamil magazine 'Suryodaya'. The British Indian government promptly proscribed it in March 1910. He ran other publications too which were also banned but he managed to circulate copies in British India with the help of friends some of whom were accused in this case. He also worked on other plans and methods to promote his cause, ideals and ideas. He toured the Tinnevelly district meeting people, and recruiting volunteers to drive out the alien British and attain freedom.

The Ashe Murder trial was a prolonged affair and the hearing at Madras went on long for a period of ninety-three days, between September 1911 and January 1912. Witnesses of over a hundred gave evidence on both sides and a mass of the documentary evidence like letters, diaries, publications, records and reports was filed in this case. It was a quite a task for the three judges who sat and heard the case without the benefit of a jury.It was a unique trial indeed, in many ways.

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The Prosecution case was that the conspiracy was initiated by Nilakanta as early as April 1910, when he toured places like Thenkasi and conducted meetings in secret. Here he exhorted people to take cudgels against the alien rulers and strain every nerve, sinew and cell to drive away the Englishman out of the land. During such meetings he met and made friends with Vanchi who felt drawn to Nilakanta at once.

The meetings, understandably in secret, had all the characteristics of an esoteric secret society with its own rituals and rites. One witness, Arumugham Pillai described it thus: 'There was a picture of Goddess Kali. There were red powder (kunkum), sacred ash (vibhuthi), and flowers. On the floor sat four or five people in a line. Nilakanta sat a little away and wrote on sheets of paper. We put that red powder into water and made a solution of it and each of us applied it on the paper. Now it was the white man's blood... on the top of the paper "Vande Matharam" was written... We should kill all white men.... We must sacrifice our lives, person, and property for this society. But whoever reveals the affairs of this society, he shall go to hell and he will be killed.... As we drink the red powder solution, now to us it is the white man's blood....'

When they corresponded among themselves Nilakanta, Vanchi and the lot used phony names to avoid detection. Such fake names were written down on a sheet against each name and the concern man pricked his finger with a knife and affixed his thumb impression in blood!

Vanchi was highly inspired by his guru and the revered members of the Pondicherry band who advocated and justified violence and sabotage as the rightful tools to achieve their goals. He was equally drawn to VOC who suffered immensely, a victim of the ICS despot Ashe. His drastic and Draconian measures and over-aggressive methods to put down VOC kindled bitterness, rage and hostility against him in the hearts of these spirited men. This spark soon grew into a blaze of anger. Nilakanta and his band had ideas and ambitions of murdering all Britishers in India on a particular day and Ashe, like a different kind of Abu Ben Adam topped the list.

The Crown let in heavy doses of evidence, oral and documentary to prove Nilakanta, Vanchi and others were conspirators whose sole aim was to kill Ashe who by now had become the boss at the district, as the Collector. As the actual killer Vanchi had shot himself to avoid capture and being forced to let out secrets, the Crown had to work hard to make the charges stick on Nilakanta and his band. Much of its evidence came from the approvers who were in other words accomplices.

According to the Indian Evidence Act, the position of the reliability of approver's evidence is not clear-cut and precise. Section 133 of the Indian Evidence Act states that, 'a conviction is not illegal merely because it proceeds upon the uncorroborated testimony of an accomplice'. Whereas Section 114 states by a way of an illustration that 'the court may presume that an accomplice is unworthy of credit unless he is corroborated in material particulars'. And this has exceptions too! There is a mass of case law on this point in India and indeed it figures in almost every other case of murder and other crimes.

J. C. Adam, T. Prakasam and the other defence lawyers raised this point and argued it hotly and also subjected the approvers to severe cross-examinations lasting several days. Many witnesses were also attacked on the ground that they were testifying against the accused because of the pressure of the British Indian police who created the evidence for this case. On behalf of Nilakanta a plea of 'alibi' was set up and witnesses were summoned to state on oath that he was not present at places like Shencottah where he met Vanchi and others as charged by the Prosecution.

The Defence lawyers fought with all their ability for their clients. Prakasam rose to rare heights of forensic eloquence, displaying his abundant talents and skills. With this trial

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his name became synonymous with the Ashe Murder Case. His reputation as criminal lawyer rose further to place him among the front rankers of the Madras High Court Bar.

Interestingly the decision of the Full Bench was not unanimous. Sir Arnold White and Ayling delivered a joint judgement while Sankaran Nair delivered his own. He wrote a brilliant judgement, which serves as an excellent resource material for the history of the Indian Freedom Movement of the period. Justice Nair even translated into excellent English the famous patriotic song written by Subramaniam Bharati, 'Endru thaniyum intha suthanthira dhaagam. ' ('when will this thirst for liberty and freedom be quenched...'). So wrote the Judge whom in later years he would fight for the country's freedom. The song was banned by the British but musicians and such continued to sing it in public with the fear of arrest lurking in their bosoms.

Justice Nair came to the conclusion that the charge of murder had not been legally proved against the accused while he held the charges of waging war against the King proved against Nilakanta and another but not the rest.

Finally the Court by a majority decision awarded Nilakanta seven years rigorous imprisonment and Sankarakrishnan was given four years. The remaining accused were sentenced to varying terms of lesser imprisonment.

Appeals were filed against the judgement and a Bench of five judges comprising Sir Ralph Benson, John Wallace, Miller, Abdul Rahim and P. R. Sundara Iyer heard them. C. J. Napier, now as the Advocate-General appeared for the Crown assisted by T. Richmond while the accused were defended by T. Prakasam and others.

The appeals were argued on legal grounds, which were the only issues allowed to be raised in such an appeal. They focused on the value and reliability of the approver's evidence and legal admissibility of some of the Prosecution witnesses.

Three judges, Benson, Wallis and Miller held that the appeals could not be sustained while Rahim differed and opined that the appellants should be acquitted in toto. Sundara Iyer expressed doubts about the conviction and left it at that. The Full Bench finally dismissed the appeals and confirmed the sentences. The final decision of the Ashe Murder Case was as expected because of its political nature of the murder of a British civilian officer and Nilakanta and the rest spent their terms in prison under painful and pitiful conditions.

Vanchi came to be hailed as a martyr and found a place in the Roll Call of Honor of the Indian Freedom Movement. Many years after India became free an agitation was put up successfully by locals to name the Maniyachi railway junction after Vanchi as homage and tribute to his revered memory.

Sadly, Nilakanta Brahmachari is barely remembered today except by some enthusiastic historians of the Indian Freedom Movement. The average literary Indian of today has hardly heard his name. In his later years this great soul gave up politics, perhaps disillusioned and took to spiritualism. He called himself Omkarnath Swami and sought solace in the world of religion and philosophy.

One cannot but wonder how Nilakanta would have thought and reacted had he been alive in the India of today.

From RAndour Guy's blog

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