Che Guevara
Ernesto (Che) Guevara was born in Rosario in Argentine in 1928. After studying medicine at the 
University of Buenos Aires he worked as a doctor. While in Guatemala in 1954 he witnessed the socialist government of President Jacobo Arbenz overthrown by an American backed military coup. Disgusted by what he saw, Guevara decided to join the Cuban revolutionary, Fidel Castro, in Mexico.
In 1956 Guevara, Castro and eighty other men and women arrived in Cuba in an attempt to overthrow the government of General Fulgencio Batista. This group became known as the July 26 Movement. The plan was to set up their base in the Sierra Maestra mountains. On the way to the mountains they were attacked by government troops. By the time they reached the Sierra Maestra there were only sixteen men left with twelve weapons between them. For the next few months Castro's guerrilla army raided isolated army garrisons and were gradually able to build-up their stock of weapons.
When the guerrillas took control of territory they redistributed the land amongst the peasants. In return, the peasants helped the guerrillas against Batista's soldiers. In some cases the peasants also joined Castro's army, as did students from the cities and occasionally Catholic priests.
In an effort to find out information about the rebels people were pulled in for questioning. Many innocent peoplewere tortured. Suspects, including children, were publicly executed and then left hanging in the streets for several days as a warning to others who were considering joining the revolutionaries. The behaviour of Batista's forces increased support for the guerrillas. In 1958 forty-five organizations signed an open letter supporting the July 26 Movement. National bodies representing lawyers, architects, dentists, accountants and social workers were amongst those who signed. Castro, who had originally relied on the support of the poor, was now gaining the backing of the influential middle classes.
General Fulgencio Batista responded to this by sending more troops to the Sierra Maestra. He now had 10,000 men hunting for Castro and his 300-strong army. Although outnumbered, Castro's guerrillas were able to inflict defeat after defeat on the government's troops. In the summer of 1958 over a thousand of Batista's soldiers were killed or wounded and many more were captured. Unlike Batista's soldiers, Castro's troops had developed a reputation for behaving well towards prisoners. This encouraged Batista's troops to surrender to Castro when things went badly in battle. Complete military units began to join the guerrillas.
The United States supplied Batista with planes, ships and tanks, but the advantage of using the latest technology such as napalm failed to win them victory against the guerrillas. In March 1958, President Dwight Eisenhower, disillusioned with Batista's performance, suggested he held elections. This he did, but the people showed their dissatisfaction with his government by refusing to vote. Over 75 per cent of the voters in the capital Havana boycotted the polls. In some areas, such as Santiago, it was as high as 98 per cent.
Fidel Castro was now confident he could beat Batista in a head-on battle. Leaving the Sierra Maestra mountains, Castro's troops began to march on the main towns. After consultations with the United States government, Batista decided to flee the country. Senior Generals left behind attempted to set up another military government. Castro's reaction was to call for a general strike. The workers came out on strike and the military were forced to accept the people's desire for change. Castro marched into Havana on January 9,1959, and became Cuba's new leader.
In its first hundred days in office Castro's government passed several new laws. Rents were cut by up to 50 per cent for low wage earners; property owned by Fulgencio Batista and his ministers was confiscated; the telephone company was nationalized and the rates were reduced by 50 per cent; land was redistributed amongst the peasants (including the land owned by the Castro family); separate facilities for blacks and whites (swimming pools, beaches, hotels, cemeteries etc.) were abolished.
In 1960 Guevara visited China and the Soviet Union. On his return he wrote two books Guerrilla Warfare and Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War. In these books he argued that it was possible to export Cuba's revolution to other South American countries. Guevara served as Minister for Industries (1961-65) but in April 1965 he resigned and become a guerrilla leader in Bolivia.
In 1967 David Morales recruited Félix Rodríguez to train and head a team that would attempt to catch Che Guevara. Guevara was attempting to persuade the tin-miners living in poverty to join his revolutionary army. When Guevara was captured, it was Rodriguez who interrogated him before he ordered his execution in October, 1967. Rodriguez still possesses Guevara’s Rolex watch that he took as a trophy. In their book, Ultimate Sacrifice, published in 2006, Larmar Waldron and Thom Hartmann argued that in 1963 Guevara was involved in a plot with Juan Almeida Bosch to overthrow Fidel Castro.
Che Guevara, speech (21st August, 1960)
Almost everyone knows that I began my career as a doctor a few years ago. When I began to study medicine, most of the concepts that I now have as a revolutionary were absent from my store of ideals. I wanted to succeed just as everyone wants to succeed. I dreamed of becoming a famous researcher; I dreamed of working tirelessly to aid humanity, but this was conceived as personal achievement. I was - as we all are - a product of my environment.
After graduating, due to special circumstances and perhaps also to my personality, I began to travel throughout America. Except for Haiti and the Dominican Republic, I have visited all the countries of Latin America. Because of the circumstances in which I made my trips, first as a student and later as a doctor, I perceived closely misery, hunger, disease - a father's inability to have his child treated because he lacks the money, the brutalization that hunger andpermanent punishment provoke in man until a father sees the death of his child as something without importance, as happens very often to the mistreated classes of our American fatherland. I began to realize then that there were things as important as being a famous researcher or as important as making a substantial contribution to medicine: to aid those people.
But I continued to be, as we always remain, a product of my environment and I wanted to aid those people with my personal effort. Already I had traveled much - at the time I was in Guatemala, Arbenz's Guatemala - and I began to make some notes on the norms that a revolutionary doctor should follow. I began to study the means of becoming a revolutionary doctor.
Then aggression came to Guatemala. It was the aggression of the United Fruit Company, the State Department, and John Foster Dulles - in reality the same thing - and their puppet, called Castillo Armas. The aggression succeeded, for the Guatemala people had not achieved the degree of maturity that the Cuban people have today. One day I chose the road of exile, that is, the road of flight, for Guatemala was not my country.
I became aware, then, of a fundamental fact: To be a revolutionary doctor or to be a revolutionary at all, there must first be a revolution. The isolated effort of one man, regardless of its purity of ideals, is worthless. If one works alone in some isolated corner of Latin America because of a desire to sacrifice one's entire life to noble ideals, it makes no difference because one fights against adverse governments and social conditions that prevent progress. To be useful it is essential to make a revolution as we have done in Cuba, where the whole population mobilizes and learns to use arms and fight together. Cubans have learned how much value there is in a weapon and in the unity of the people. So today one has the right and the duty of being, above everything else, a revolutionary doctor, that is, a man who uses his professional knowledge to serve the Revolution and the people.
Now old questions reappear: How does one actually carry out a work of social welfare? How does one correlate individual effort with the needs of society? To answer, we have to review each of our lives, and this should be done with critical zeal in order to reach the conclusion that almost everything that we thought and felt before the Revolution should be filed and a new type of human being should be created.
Che Guevara, Tactics and Strategy of the Latin American Revolution (October, 1962)
There are no unalterable tactical and strategic objectives. Some- times tactical objectives attain strategic importance, and other times strategic objectives become merely tactical elements. The thorough study of the relative importance of each element permits the full utilization, by the revolutionary forces, of all of the facts and circumstances leading up to the great and final strategic objective: the taking of power.
Power is the sine qua non strategic objective of the revolutionary forces, and everything must be subordinated to this basic endeavor.
But the taking of power, in this world polarized by two forces of extreme disparity and absolutely incompatible in interests, cannot be limited to the boundaries of a single geographic or social unit. The seizure of power is a worldwide objective of the revolutionary forces. To conquer the future is the strategic element of revolution; freezing the present is the counterstrategy motivating the forces of world reaction today, for they are on the defensive.
In this worldwide struggle, position is very important. At times it is decisive. Cuba, for example, is a vanguard outpost, an outpost which overlooks the extremely broad stretches of the economically distorted world of Latin America. Cuba's example is a beacon, a guiding light for all the peoples of America. The Cuban outpost is of great strategic value to the major contenders who at this moment dispute their hegemony of the world: imperialism and socialism.
Its value would be different if it had been located in another geographic or social setting. Its value was different when prior to the Revolution it merely constituted a tactical element of the imperialist world. Its value has increased, not only because it is an open door to America but because, added to the strength of its strategic, military and tactical position, is the power of its moral influence. "Moral missiles" are such a devastatingly effective weapon that they have become the most important element in determining Cuba's value. That is why, to analyze each element in the political struggle, one cannot extract it from its particular set of circumstances. All the antecedents serve to reaffirm a line or position consistent with its great strategic objectives.Relating this discussion to America, one must ask the necessary question: What are the tactical elements that must be used to achieve the major objective of taking power in this part of the world? Is it possible or not, given the present conditions in our continent, to achieve it (socialist power, that is) by peaceful means? We emphatically answer that, in the great majority of cases, this is not possible. The most that could be achieved would be the formal takeover of the bourgeois superstructure of power and the transition to socialism of that government which, under the established bourgeois legal system, having achieved formal power will still have to wage a very violent struggle against all who attempt, in one way or another, to check its progress toward new social structures.
Che Guevara, Guerrilla Warfare (1961)
We consider that the Cuban Revolution made three fundamental contributions to the laws of the revolutionary movement in the current situation in America. First, people's forces can win a war against the army. Second, one need not always wait for all conditions favorable to revolution to be present; the insurrection itself can create them. Third, in the underdeveloped parts of America, the battleground for armed struggle should in the main be the countryside.
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Che Guevara
Friday, December 14, 2007
Chandrashekhar Azad
Chandrasekhar Azad चंद्रशेखर आजाद (July 23, 1906 – February 27, 1931) was an Indian revolutionary and the mentor of Bhagat Singh. Chandrasekhar Azad is considered one of the most famous Indian revolutionaries, along with Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Rajguru, Ram Prasad Bismil, and Ashfaqullah Khan.
| Chandrashekhar Azad | |
|---|---|
| July 23, 1906–February 27, 1931 | |
 Chandrashekar Azad | |
| Place of birth: | Badarka, Unnao, Uttar Pradesh, India |
| Place of death: | Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh, India |
| Movement: | Indian Independence movement |
| Major organizations: | Naujawan Bharat Sabha, Kirti Kissan Party and Hindustan Socialist Republican Association |
History
Chandrashekhar Azad, often called, Pandit ji was the founder of Garam Dal. He was the first to start the revolutionary struggle with arms against the oppressive Britishers. Chandershekhar a devout brahmin believed that his dharma was to fight for others.
Chandrashekhar said a soldier never relinquishes his weapon. Hence Chandrashekhar died with his weapon in his hand fighting with British.
Involved in Kakori Train Robbery (1926), the attempt to blow up the Viceroy's train (1926), and the shooting of Saunders at Lahore (1928) to avenge the killing of Lala Lajpatrai He formed Hindustan Socialist Republican Association. He was the guru for revolutionaries such as Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Batukeshwar Bhatt, and Rajguru
Chandra Shekhar Azad was born on July 23, 1906 in village Bhavra in Jhabua district of Madhya Pradesh. His parents were Pandit Sitaram Tiwari and Jagarani Devi. He received his early schooling in Bhavra. For higher studies he went to the Sanskrit Pathashala at Varanasi. He was an ardent follower of Hanuman and once disguised himself as a priest in a hanuman temple to escape the dragnet of British police.
Chandrashekhar Azad was deeply troubled by the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre in Amritsar in 1919. In 1921, when Mahatma Gandhi launched Non-Cooperation movement, Chandrasekhar Azad actively participated in revolutionary activities. He received his first punishment at the age of fifteen. Chandra Shekhar was caught while indulging in revolutionary activities. When the magistrate asked him his name, he said "Azad" (meaning free). Chandrashekhar Azad was sentenced to fifteen lashes. With each stroke of the whip the young Chandrasekhar shouted "Bharat Mata Ki Jai"["Hail The Motherland!"] and "Gandhi ki Jai" ["Hail Gandhi!"] From then on Chandrashekhar assumed the title of Azad and came to known as Chandrashekhar Azad. Chandrashekhar Azad vowed that he would never be arrested by the British police and would die as free man.
After the suspension of non-cooperation movement Chandrashekhar Azad was attracted towards more aggressive and revolutionary ideals. He committed himself to complete independence by any means. Chandrashekhar Azad and his compatriots would target British officials known for their oppressive actions against ordinary people and freedom fighters. Chandrashekhar Azad was involved in Kakori Train Robbery (1926), the attempt to blow up the Viceroy's train (1926), and the shooting of Saunders at Lahore (1928) to avenge the killing of Lala Lajpatrai.
Along with Bhagat Singh and other compatriots like Sukhdev and Rajguru, Chandrashekhar Azad formed the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HRSA). HRSA was committed to complete Indian independence and socialist principles for India's future progress.
Chandrashekhar Azad was a terror for British police. He was on their hit list and the British police badly wanted to capture him dead or alive. On February 27, 1931 Chandrashekhar Azad met two of his comrades at the Alfred Park Allah bad. He was betrayed by an informer who had informed the British police. The police surrounded the park and ordered Chandrashekhar Azad to surrender. Chandrashekhar Azad fought alone valiantly and killed three policemen. But finding himself surrounded and seeing no route for escape, Chandrashekhar Azad shot himself. Thus he kept his pledge of not being caught alive.
Chandrasekhar Azad was born on July 23, 1906 in Badarka village (Unnao, Uttar Pradesh) to Pandit Sita Ram Tiwari and Jagrani Devi. Earlier going by the moniker Chandrasekhar Tiwari, after a court incident, he took the name Azad. He received his early schooling in Bhavra District Jhabua, Madhya Pradesh. For higher education he went to the Sanskrit Pathashala at Varanasi. He was an ardent follower of Hanuman and disguised himself as a priest in a Hanuman temple to escape the British dragnet in pre-independence India.
He vowed that he would never fall in the hands of British, preferring valiant death against vegetative life. He in fact lived a free-life, never ever being nabbed by the British.
Revolutionary
display by the British to serve as a warning message for other revolutionaries.Young Azad was one of the young generation of Indians when Mahatma Gandhi launched the Non-Cooperation Movement. But many were disillusioned with Gandhi's suspension of the struggle in 1922 due to the Chauri Chaura massacre of 22 policemen. Although Gandhi was appalled by the brutal violence, Azad did not feel that violence was unacceptable in the struggle, especially in view of the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre of 1919, when the British Army units killed hundreds of unarmed civilians and wounded thousands in Amritsar which deeply influenced the young Azad and his contemporaries.
At one point he was arrested while a teenager. When asked his name by the police, he replied Azad, which means "free" in Urdu. He once claimed that, while named "Azad," he would never be taken alive by police. Azad and others had committed themselves to absolute independence by any means. He was most famous for the Kakori train robbery in 1925 and the assassination of the assistant superintendent of police, John Poyantz Saunders, in 1928. Azad and his compatriots would target British officials known for their oppressive actions against ordinary people, or for beating and torturing arrested revolutionaries.
Azad was also a believer in socialism as the basis for India's future.
In Jhansi
In his very brief life of only 25 years, Chandrashekhar Azad had made Jhansi his organisation's hub for a considerable duration. He chose the forest of Orchha (15 kilometers from Jhansi) for practising shooting. He was a brilliant shooter and he used to train other members of his group here. Near the forests, on the banks of a small river called Saataar, near the temple of Lord hanuman, he established a small hut. He started living there in the disguise of Pandit Harishankar Brahmachari. He started teaching kids of the residents of nearby village Dhimarpura, and established good rapport with the local people. The village Dhimarpura is now named after him and is known as Azadpura. In Jhansi, he learnt how to drive a car at Bundelkhand Motor Garage in Sadar Bazaar, in cantonement area. In Jhansi, he met Sadashiv Rao Malkapurkar, Vishwanath Vaishampayan, Bhagwan Das Mahaur and they all became integral part of his revolutionary group. The then congress leaders from Jhansi Pandit Raghunath Vinayak Dhulekar and Pandit Sitaram Bhaskar Bhagwat were also close aides of Chandrashekhar Azad. Chandrashekhar Azad stayed in Master Rudranarayan Singh's house at Nai Basti and Pandit Sitaram Bhaskar Bhagwat's house in Nagra. Jhansi was a safe place in Chandrashekhar Azad's words and as soon as he left Jhansi, he became a victim of betrayal from one of his former group members.
With Bhagat Singh
The Hindustan Republican Association (HRA) was formed by Sachindranath Sanyal just after one year of the Non co-operation movement in 1923. In the aftermath of the Kakori train robbery in 1925, the British clamped down on revolutionary activities. Sentenced to death for their participation were Ramprasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah Khan, Roshan Singh and Rajendra Lahiri. Two escaped capture, Sunderlal Gupta as well as Azad. Azad reorganized the HRA with the help of secondary revolutionaries like Shiva Varma and Mahaveer Singh. He is also an associate of Rasabihariboss. Azad, along with Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, and Rajguru, transformed the HRA into the HSRA (Hindustan Socialist Republican Association) in 1927, whose goal was complete Indian independence based on socialist principles.
Chandrashekhar Azad was a terror for British police. He was on their hit list and the British police badly wanted to capture him dead or alive. On February 27, 1931, Chandrashekhar Azad met two comrades at Alfred Park in Allahabad. He was betrayed to the British police by an informer. The police surrounded the park and ordered Chandrashekhar Azad to surrender. Chandrashekhar Azad fought alone, killing three policemen. Being surrounded with no possible escape, Chandrashekhar Azad shot himself, thereby keeping his pledge to not be captured alive. However, he was such a firce fighter and so loyal and committed to his cause that the Indian soldiers who saw him die only had the courage to approach his dead body, after 20 minutes. This was because, Chandrasekhar Azad induced the guilt of Indian soldiers and policemen working for the British government, whereever he went, claiming that 'they were not of the true Indian Blood'.
Contemporary View
Azad is a hero to many Indians today. Alfred Park was renamed Chandrasekhar Azad Park, as have been scores of schools, colleges, roads and other public institutions across India. Ever since Manoj Kumar's film, Shaheed Bhagat Singh, in 1964, Azad's character has become central to any film or commemoration of the life of Bhagat Singh. He was played by Sunny Deol in 2002, in the movie 23rd March 1931: Shaheed. In the movie "The Legend of Bhagat Singh", starring Ajay Devgan, Azad (played by Akhilendra Mishra) had a prominent role and was shown to kill himself rather than dying by the hands of foreigners.
The patriotism of Azad, Sukhdev, Bismil and Ashfaqulla Khan was also depicted in Rang De Basanti, a contemporary Bollywood film starring Aamir Khan that released in February 2006. The movie, which draws parallels between the lives of young revolutionaries, such as Azad and Bhagat Singh, and today's youth, also dwells upon the lack of appreciation among Indian youth today for the sacrifices made by these men. Chandrashekhar Azad's role was played by Aamir Khan and it displayed the zeal in the man. The film also depicts the famous Kakori train robbery. In its climax, Azad is shown to shoot himself rather than dying in the hands of British.
Shaheed Bhagat Singh
Bhagat Singh
Born to a family which had earlier been involved in revolutionary activities against the British Raj in India, Bhagat Singh, as a teenager, had studied European revolutionary movements and was attracted to anarchism and communism. He became involved in numerous revolutionary organizations. He quickly rose in the ranks of the Hindustan Republican Association (HRA) and became one of its leaders, converting it to the HSRA. Singh gained support when he underwent a 63 day fast in jail, demanding equal rights for Indian and British political prisoners. He was hanged for shooting a police officer in response to the killing of veteran social activist Lala Lajpat Rai. His legacy prompted youth in
Bhagat Singh at the age of 17
As a child, he was deeply affected by the Jalianwala Bagh Massacre that took place in
In his teenage years, Bhagat Singh started studying at the
The British government created a commission under Sir John Simon to report on 
the current political situation in
On April 8, 1929, Singh and Dutt threw a bomb onto the corridors of the assembly and shouted "Inquilab Zindabad!" ("Long Live the Revolution!"). This was followed by a shower of leaflets stating that it takes a loud voice to make the deaf hear. The bomb neither killed nor injured anyone; Singh and Dutt claimed that this was deliberate on their part, a claim substantiated both by British forensics investigators who found that the bomb was not powerful enough to cause injury, and by the fact that the bomb was thrown away from people. Singh and Dutt gave themselves up for arrest after the bomb. He and Dutt were sentenced to 'Transportation for Life' for the bombing on June 12, 1929.
Shortly after his arrest and trial for the Assembly bombing, the British came to know of his involvement in the murder of J. P. Saunders. Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, and Sukhdev were charged with the murder. Bhagat Singh decided to use the court as a tool to publicize his cause for the independence of India.He admitted to the murder and made statements against the British rule during the trial. The case was ordered to be carried out without members of the HSRA present at the hearing. This created an uproar amongst Singh's supporters as he could no longer publicise his views.
While in jail, Bhagat Singh and other prisoners launched a hunger strike advocating for the rights of prisoners and those facing trial. The reason for the strike was that British murderers and thieves were treated better than Indian political prisoners, who, by law, were meant to be given better rights. The aims in their strike were to ensure a decent standard of food for political prisoners, the availability of books and a daily newspaper, as well as better clothing and the supply of toilet necessities and other hygienic necessities. He also demanded that political prisoners should not be forced to do any labour or undignified work. During this hunger strike that lasted 63 days and ended with the British succumbing to his wishes, he gained much popularity among the common Indians. Before the strike his popularity was limited mainly to the Punjab region.
Bhagat Singh also maintained the use of a diary, which he eventually made to fill 404 pages. In this diary he made numerous notes relating to the quotations and popular sayings of various people whose views he supported. Prominent in his diary were the views of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.The comments in his diary led to an understanding of the philosophical thinking of Bhagat Singh. Before dying he also wrote a pamphlet entitled "Why I am an atheist", as he was being accused of vanity by not accepting God in the face of death.
On March 23, 1931, Bhagat Singh was hanged in Lahore with his fellow comrades Rajguru and Sukhdev. His supporters, who had been protesting against the hanging, immediately declared him as a shaheed or martyr.According to the Superintendent of Police at the time, V.N. Smith, the hanging was advanced:
Normally execution took place at 8 am, but it was decided to act at once before the public could become aware of what had happened...At about 7 pm shouts of Inquilab Zindabad were heard from inside the jail. This was correctly, interpreted as a signal that the final curtain was about to drop.
Singh was cremated at Hussainiwala on banks of Sutlej river. Today, the Bhagat Singh Memorial commemorates freedom fighters of
Marxism
While in prison, Bhagat Singh and two others had written a letter to the Viceroy asking him to treat them as prisoners of war and hence to execute them by firing squad and not by hanging. Prannath Mehta, Bhagat Singh's friend, visited him in the jail on March 20, four days before his execution, with a draft letter for clemency, but he declined to sign it.
Gandhi, during his lifetime, always maintained that he was a great admirer of Singh's patriotism, but that he simply disapproved of his violent methods. He also said that he was opposed to Singh's execution (and, for that matter, capital punishment in general) and proclaimed that he had no power to stop it. On Singh's execution, Gandhi said, "The government certainly had the right to hang these men. However, there are some rights which do credit to those who possess them only if they are enjoyed in name only." Gandhi also once said, on capital punishment, "I cannot in all conscience agree to anyone being sent to the gallows. God alone can take life because He alone gives it."
Gandhi had managed to have 90,000 political prisoners who were not members of his Satyagraha movement released under the pretext of "relieving political tension," in the Gandhi-Irwin Pact. According to a report in the Indian magazine Frontline, he did plead several times for the commutation of the death sentence of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev, including a personal visit on March 19, 1931, and in a letter to the Viceroy on the day of their execution, pleading fervently for commutation, not knowing that the letter would be too late.
Lord Irwin, the Viceroy, later said:
As I listened to Mr. Gandhi putting the case for commutation before me, I reflected first on what significance it surely was that the apostle of non-violence should so earnestly be pleading the cause of the devotees of a creed so fundamentally opposed to his own, but I should regard it as wholly wrong to allow my judgment to be influenced by purely political considerations. I could not imagine a case in which under the law, penalty had been more directly deserved.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) itself acknowledges Bhagat Singh's contribution to Indian society and, in particular, the future of socialism in
Several popular Bollywood films have been made capturing the life and times of Bhagat Singh. The oldest was Shaheed in 1965, starring Manoj Kumar as Singh. Two major films about Singh were released in 2002, The Legend of Bhagat Singh and 23rd March 1931: Shaheed. The Legend of Bhagat Singh is Rajkumar Santoshi's adaptation, in which Ajay Devgan played Singh and Amrita Rao was featured in a brief role. 23 March 1931: Shaheed was directed by Guddu Dhanoa and starred Bobby Deol as Singh, with Sunny Deol and Aishwarya Rai in supporting roles.
The 2006 film Rang De Basanti (starring Aamir Khan) is a film drawing parallels between revolutionaries of Bhagat Singh's era and modern Indian youth. It covers a lot of Bhagat Singh's role in the Indian freedom struggle. The movie revolves around a group of college students and how they each play the roles of Bhagat's friends and family.
The patriotic Urdu and Hindi songs, Sarfaroshi ki Tamanna (translated as "the desire to sacrifice") and Mera Rang De Basanti Chola ("my light-yellow-colored cloak"; Basanti referring to the light-yellow color of the Mustard flower grown in the Punjab and also one of the two main colors of the Sikh religion as per the Sikh rehat meryada(code of conduct of the Sikh Saint-Soldier) ), while created by Ram Prasad Bismil, are largely associated to Bhagat Singh's martyrdom and have been used in a number of Bhagat Singh-related films.
In September 2007 the governor of
Bhagat Singh was criticized both by his contemporaries and by people after his death because of his violent and revolutionary stance towards the British opposed to the pacifist stance taken by the Indian National Congress and particularly Mahatma Gandhi.[33] The methods he used to make his point—shooting Saunders and throwing non-lethal bombs—were quite different to the non-violent non-cooperation used by Gandhi. He was accused of having knowledge of the Kakori train robbery by the British.
Bhagat Singh has also been accused of being too eager to die, as opposed to staying alive and continuing his movement. It has been alleged that he could have escaped from prison if he so wished, but he preferred that he die and become a legacy for other youths in
"The aim of life is no more to control the mind, but to develop it harmoniously; not to achieve salvation here after, but to make the best use of it here below; and not to realise truth, beauty and good only in contemplation, but also in the actual experience of daily life; social progress depends not upon the ennoblement of the few but on the enrichment of democracy; universal brotherhood can be achieved only when there is an equality of opportunity - of opportunity in the social, political and individual life." — from Bhagat Singh's prison diary, p. 124
"Kureh Khak hai Gardash main Tapash sai Meri ,
Main Voh majnu huan Jo Jindan main Bhee Azad Raha"
-Bhagat Singh
Source:www.wikipedia.com
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro was born on August 13, 1926 in Mayari, Cuba. His parents were relatively wealthy and owned a sugarcane plantation. During his childhood, he attended private Catholic Schools and graduated to attend the University of Havana in 1945. His teachers immediately noticed Fidel's amazing
memory, which he used to memorize entire books.
At the university, he majored in law studies and became a member of several groups that opposed the Cuban regime, aiding exiles from the Dominican Republic in their political movement. The Cuban government dissolved the group in 1947 and Fidel joined in protests in Bogota that were intended to stop the Ninth International Conference of American States.
He graduated with his degree in law in 1950 and had seen the power of political movements. He became a full member of the Ortodoxo Party and campaigned for a seat in the Cuban Congress. However, his plans were disrupted when Fulgencio Batista seized control of the Cuban government in order to prevent the rise of the Orthodoxos. Under Batista, thousands of political opponents were murdered and the people were held under massive oppression.
Fidel began plotting militant action against the Batista regime, becoming the leader of nearly 200 revolutionaries from all over Cuba. On July 26, 1953, he led them in a guerrilla attack on the Moncada army barracks in Santiage de Cuba. The militia seized weapons and other supplies and their success caused the citizens there to rally to his flag. Unfortunately, the government sent in reinforcements, which managed to kill nearly all of the revolutionaries and send Fidel to prison for fifteen years.
After a year, Batista granted amnesty to all political prisoners, including Fidel, and they were released. He had not lost his revolutionary attitude and moved to Mexico and form a new army of guerrillas to overthrow the Cuban government. There he met Che Guevara, who was serving as a medical intern in Mexico City. They quickly joined forces and assembled a group of eighty-two guerrillas, training them in the art of war. The group was called the 26th of July, in memory of the attack on the barracks in 1953. 
On December 2, 1956, the group returned to Cuba using a boat. When a man fell overboard, Fidel refused to continue until he was found. They landed, but the group was quickly destroyed by the Cuban army. The few survivors, including Fidel and Che, went into the mountains to hide. There they were able to conduct small hit-and-run operations as well as initiate a propaganda campaign that helped them to gain public support. Over two years, his group gained enough strength to force Batista to leave Cuba on January 1, 1959.
In 1959, Fidel toured many countries, including the United States, to encourage unity among nations. Although President Eisenhower refused to meet him, Vice President Nixon met with Fidel, later calling him a communist dictator that should be overthrown. He traveled again to the United States to speak before the United Nations general council. When they threatened to refuse him an audience, he stayed in a hotel nearby. During his stay, many leaders of the time, including Malcolm X and Khrushchev.
When Fidel returned to Cuba, he formed a socialist economy, putting the country at odds with the United States in the middle of the cold war. Previously, up to 70% of the Cuban land and farms had been owned by foreigners. He ordered all American-owned businesses and interests confiscated, eventually causing the United States to cut off diplomatic relations with Cuba and impose a trade embargo on January 31, 1961. As a result of the seizure of foreign assets, over one billion dollars was lost by private companies in the United States.
Fidel united Cuba with fellow Marxist leaders in the Soviet Union and China, gaining military aid and economic assistance. When the United States sent in forces to remove him from power in 1961, he managed to defeat them and retain power. In 1962, the United States forced the Soviet Union to remove its nuclear missiles from the island, ending the Cuban Missile Crisis and embarrassing Fidel.
He continued supporting revolutionaries in other countries, including Che, who had left Cuba to lead a revolutionary effort in Bolivia. Despite Che's death in 1967, Fidel continued sending Cuban soldiers to unstable countries in Central and South America to encourage Communist revolution.