"He is a mad man", said *Gandhi*.
"His act was a senseless deed", said *Nehru*.
"We condemn his act of terror and apologize and hope we are not punished for it" -resolution passed by *Congress*.
He was *Shaheed Udham Singh* and the senseless deed he did was that he killed *Michael O’Dwyer*.
Michael was the *monster* who massacred 1,526 innocent, unarmed, peaceful Indians gathered in *Jalian wala Bagh in 1919*
Udham Singh was a 19 years old volunteer, who was serving water to the 20,000 people gathered in the garden on the festival of Baisakhi.
They were brutally massacred by Gen O’Dwyer and Udham Singh was live witness to it.
He wanted to avenge the brutality and get some sense of justice to these martyrs.
British Govt didn’t take any action (as anyone may expect.
*Congress couldn't get British to act on O’Dwyer*
So O’Dwyer happily retired to England and was leading a peaceful rich life.
Meanwhile, *Udham Singh joined Gadhar Party and fought for freedom*
He was jailed for 5 years and there he was inspired by death and martyrdom of *Bhagat Singh* who wanted to take action against O’Dwyer.
After release, he escaped from India through Kashmir. He went to Germany and then to London.
He joined as an engineer and pursued O’Dwyer for 6 years. He procured a gun, learnt shooting and then found that on 13, March, 1940 O’Dwyer was speaking in Caxton Hall, London.
Udham Singh hid the gun in a book by carving a place for the gun, sat in front row and shot two bullets into heart and lung of O’Dwyer.
O’Dwyer died instantly.
Udham Singh didn’t escape. He bravely courted arrest.
He told these words to the judge:
*"I did it because I had a grudge against him. He deserved it. He was the real culprit. He wanted to crush the spirit of my people, so I have crushed him. For full 21 years, I have been trying to seek vengeance. I am happy that I have done the job. I am not scared of death. I am dying for my country. I have seen my people starving in India under the British rule. I have protested against this, it was my duty. What greater honour could be bestowed on me than death for the sake of my motherland?”*
He was sentenced to death in the court.
He fasted for 42 days in the jail and was brutally tortured and hanged on July 31, 1940
Meanwhile in India *Congress condemned his act. Gandhi and Nehru abused him for making British angry and they forced Congress to pass a resolution against killing of O’Dwyer.*
They were very busy those days helping British recruit Indian soldiers for World War-II and they didn’t want Punjab to get upset wirh British.
This is our great freedom fighting party which condemned killing of monster O’Dwyer, who massacred 1,526 people in Punjab.
*Udham Singh was buried in London and like other freedom fighters, he is forgotten in India*
*No textbooks talk about him.*
Few people know about him.
*I am happy that they are making a movie on this patriot and coincidently it will be released on Gandhiji's birthday on Oct 2. His story is really great and inspiring one.*
Mayawati named a District in Uttarakhand after him in 1995, perhaps the only good deed she has done in her life and in 1974 his remains were exhumed and brought to Bharat and he was cremated here.
His ashes are in an urn in *Jalian Wala Bagh*.
Let this message be passed on to generations next…
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