The Alipore Bomb Trial

NINETEENTH DAY'S PROCEEDINGS

Mr. Das continuing his address dealt with the case of the Sylhet brothers, Susil Chandra Sen and Birendra Chandra Sen. He would take up the case of Birendra Chandra Sen first. He was convicted under all the sections namely, sections 121, 121A and 122 of the Indian Penal Code. Counsel would submit, as the Sessions Judge had said, that neither in the correspondence nor in the oral evidence was there any connection between Birendra Chandra Sen and any of the centres of the alleged conspiracy. There were certain letters found not in the garden but at Sylhet which the Sessions Judge thought inflammatory. Those letters referred to physical exercises and self-defence and their Lordships would find the case for the defence was that they were written at or about the time of the Comilla and Jamalpur riots. It seemed, as far as could be judged from the correspondence, that they tried to start an organisation for self-defence as against the Mahomedans.

     So far as the watch witnesses were concerned, Counsel said, he need hardly trouble their Lordships because he had already pointed out that when the watch witnesses said they saw Birendra there, Birendra was, as a matter of fact in Sylhet and the Sessions Judge had rejected that evidence.

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     Counsel next referred to the various documents found in the garden which, the prosecution alleged, implicated Birendra Chandra Sen and said that in this case there was another B. C. Sen. It was for their Lordships to draw what inference they thought proper from the documents found in the garden. Then they came to the Sylhet articles and documents.

     Continuing Counsel said that as regards the articles and documents founds in Sylhet there was no reference in the documents to the garden at all. The first article found was a packet of explosive powder containing sulphite of lead, sulphur and red peppur. These were ingredients for making matches.

     Counsel continuing said the first point the prosecution made of this was that it was not found by itself but in a canvas bag where there were two note books containing copies of formulae. Major Black’s evidence was that the powder by itself was not an explosive but the addition of chlorate of potash and amorphous phosphorus would have made it so.

     Mr. Das submitted that an explosive was not necessarily a bomb and that that expression had been used very loosely. Amorphous phosphorous taken with chlorate of potash was an explosive, but it was not a bomb. One could make a bomb out of amorphous phosphorous. The note book contained a description of a number of different kinds of explosives with the proportion of these ingredients. One contained the ingredients, chlorate of potash, sulphate of antimony, sulphur, red pepper and amorphous phosphorous with nitro-glycerine or water proportionately. The Sessions Judge found those were the ingredients or a bomb but Counsel submitted those ingredients were used for the making of matches. After the Sawdeshi movement began in this country there was a good deal of enterprise in making matches, pencils and other things for sale.

     These articles were found in the south house. There was nothing to show that Birendra had anything to do with them. According to the case for the prosecution Birendra came out from the west house and not from the south house. Assuming that these were experiments towards making a bomb, how did that connect Birendra with the Calcutta conspiracy.

     The Chief Justice: I suppose you would put your case that even if this led to the conclusion that he was conspiring to wage war it would not justify his connection.

     Mr. Das :—That is my submission.

     Counsel submitted that there was absolutely no connection between Birendra and the alleged conspiracy. If anything was to be based on the ingredients that went to make a bomb there was no connection because they knew that was not how bombs were made in the garden. Then again it was Hem Chunder Sen who

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got these ingredients but he had been acquitted while Birendra had been convicted. As regards the two above letters they were before the period covered by the charge and did not establish Birendra's connection with the conspiracy.

     Mr. Das then dealt with the case of Susil Kumar Sen who had been convicted under section 121 and 122 and sentenced to transportation for seven years. Counsel would not trouble their Lordships ' with the evidence of the watch witnesses regarding Susil, because the Sessions Judge thought that they were unworthy of credit and when summing up the case against Susil, he did not refer to the watch witnesses at all.

     Mr. Das would next deal with Ex. 475. It was Biren’s diary in connection with Susil. It ran thus " Oh mother, we cannot, we cannot, we cannot hear this agony any longer. Mother's call has come. It does not behove one to stay at home. I give up going to school. I leave my home, friends and relations perhaps I leave them for ever. To Calcutta I shall again return. To my home I shall not return again. To God I shall look up for help and my work must he accomplished. Father, mother, Brother, sister, all shall weep, but I am going into the lap of one who is the mother of thirty crores of sons." The Sessions Judge referring to the last sentence said that the appellant was going to risk his life otherwise the " lap of the mother " did not mean anything else. The construction was based on a misunderstanding. .

     Referring to the Sessions Judge’s judgment, Mr. Das said : The Sessions Judge said that Snsil was the recipient of a lathi from the notorious Leakat Hossain, a lathi provided with a spearhead at one end and heavily weighted at the other, not the sort of weapon to use for ordinary physical exercise. What connection had Leakat Hossain with this case, I do not know. Leakat Hossain was convicted of seditious and therefore it was brought in. Unless your Lordship take it that this was a conspiracy and the conspiracy included all kinds of conspiracy after the partition of Bengal I submit that there is no connection between Leakat Hossain and this conspiracy. Mr. Das then submitted that no offence had been made out against Biren and Susil and both of them were acquitted by the Assessors.

     Mr. Das then said that he would next deal with the case of Nirapado Roy, who was arrested at No. 15. Gopi Mohan Dutt’s Lane. Both the Assessors found him not guilty. He was, however, convicted under sections 121A and 122 of the Penal Code and was sentenced to ten years‘ transportation.

     Continuing Mr. Das said that so far as the documents were concerned, they did not touch this appellant. Counsel then went on reading the evidence of the watch witnesses and had not concluded when the Court rose for the day.

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