The Life and Death of Mahatma Gandhi (The Robert Payne Library)

by Robert Payne

  There was a whispered consultation, and the battle plans were hurriedly revised. Apte’s plan revolved around the trellis-work, attacking Gandhi from the rear; in the new plan he would be attacked from the front Nathuram Godse agreed that this was the logical solution to their difficulties. According to the new plan Pahwa would explode the guncotton slab, and then when everyone was running away in panic Gandhi would be mowed down by revolver shots and hand grenades.

  At the trial Badge claimed that at this point he ordered Kistayya to give up his revolver, and he took the two revolvers, his own and Kistayya’s, wrapped up in a towel, and threw them into the back of the waiting taxi Since the taxi was standing near the gate, which was only a few yards from the prayer meeting, it was perfectly possible for him to do this. He never explained why he should choose this moment to entrust the two revolvers, the most effective weapons possessed by the conspirators, to the mercies of a taxi driver. He returned to the prayer ground, met Apte, and said he was new ready to continue the attempt on Gandhi’s life. The remaining weapons consisted of five hand grenades, one held by Karkare, one by Gopal Godse, one by Pahwa, and two by Kistayya. This was a formidable arsenal, and quite sufficient to kill many people.

  Badge and Kistayya arrived at Birla House at about 5:10 P.M., after the prayer meeting had already begun. There were talks with Nathuram Godse, Apte, and Karkare, but these talks were brief and hurried, lasting less than five minutes. Badge and Kistayya had time to take their places close to Gandhi when Pahwa exploded the guncotton slab. They had all expected there would be confusion, panic, a general stampede which would enable them to pick their own time for destroying Gandhi quickly and efficiently. But there was no panic, the prayer meeting continued as though nothing had happened, except for a small group of people who rushed in the direction of the guncotton explosion, surrounded Pahwa and surrendered him to the police. Nathuram Godse, Gopal Godse, Karkare and Apte jumped into the taxi and fled the scene. Badge and Kistayya remained until the prayer meeting was over.

  The first attempt to assassinate Gandhi was a fiasco. Pahwa was taken into the custody of the police, and long before midnight he had told them his own name and the names of all or most of the conspirators. The newspapers the next day announced the arrest of Madanlal Pahwa, aged twenty, of no fixed abode, accused of igniting a slab of guncotton some seventy feet away from where Gandhi was conducting his prayer meeting. The police were attempting to find his associates who had escaped in an automobile.

  When Dr. Jain read the news in Bombay the next morning, he realized immediately that he would have to get in touch with the authorities. He felt he had information which would enable him to help the police track down the remaining conspirators. His conversations with Pahwa had been weighing heavily on his mind. On January 13, when Pahwa was still in Bombay and none of the conspirators had yet left for Delhi, he made arrangements to meet Jayaprakash Narayan, the Socialist leader, but at the last moment there occurred one of those absurd accidents which nearly always take place at moments of great drama. Dr. Jain had to take a sick child to hospital, and when he returned it was too late to see the one man who might have been helpful.

  On the day after the explosion, Dr. Jain telephoned frantically from one government department to another. Patel was in Bombay, but he was unavailable. S. K. Patil, the president of the Bombay Provincial Congress, had left the city. There remained B. G. Kher, the president of the government of Bombay, and after what seemed to be endless delays, Dr. Jain was able to reach him on the telephone and to arrange an interview with him at four o’clock that afternoon. In the president’s office he recounted how he met Madanlal Pahwa the previous October, gave him odd jobs, and found him to be a simple, intelligent, hardworking person, apparently incapable of any evil acts. In January he met the boy again, now strangely transformed into a conspirator, nervous and ill-at-ease, talking darkly about strange conspiracies and a two-hour interview with Savarkar who had given his blessing to the conspirators. Pahwa was accompanied by a man called Vishnu Karkare, who was described as the person financing the conspiracy. As he told his story, Dr. Jain was well aware that he was inviting disbelief, for conspirators do not usually tell others about their intentions. He felt like a man who is struggling against the tide and in danger of being drowned by it.

  Dr. Jain’s credentials were impeccable. He was the author of many scholarly works, including Life in Ancient India as Depicted in the Jain Canons, and he was well-liked by his colleagues and popular with his pupils. He was a kindly, generous, rather simple-minded man, and there was no doubt that he was telling the truth as he saw it. B. G. Kher believed him and decided to put him in touch with Moraiji Desai, the Home Minister of the Bombay government, and therefore ultimately responsible for the police and the investigation of crimes.

  Morarji Desai was a man of considerable administrative talent, lean and hawk-faced, with an intricate brain and a capacity for intrigue which he disguised under a mask of judicial calm. For eleven years he had been a magistrate under the British. The characters of the scholar and the administrator were at poles apart.

  The story, as Dr. Jain told it, was so wildly improbable that Morarji Desai found no reason to believe it. Why should Pahwa confide in a professor of languages met by chance on a busy Bombay street? Why was Dr. Jain so anxious to inform on him? Why should a busy administrator be expected to believe a cock-and-bull story? Dr. Jain answered the questions as best he could, only to be met by the cold and searching eyes of the Home Minister, who said brusquely: “Then you must be one of the conspirators!” For a moment Dr. Jain thought he was going out of his mind. Once more he attempted to impress on the Home Minister the fact that Pahwa might be induced to tell the full story, and he begged for the opportunity of being flown to Delhi to talk with the prisoner. He was sure the boy would speak to him openly, fully, holding nothing back. Morarji Desai brushed the suggestion aside. If Dr. Jain was one of the conspirators, then it would be the height of folly to send him to Delhi. Nevertheless he was sufficiently impressed by Dr. Jain’s testimony to summon to his office the deputy commissioner of the Bombay Special Branch, a man called J. D. Nagarwalla. Unhappily the commissioner was too busy to come, but he did arrange to meet Morarji Desai later in the evening at the railroad station. The Home Minister was taking the train to Ahmedabad, and he had a few minutes to spare for the commissioner. Morarji Desai spoke briefly about the attempted assassination of Gandhi and suggested that Nagarwalla should take some obvious precautions. Nagarwalla returned to his office, consulted his brother, who was a civilian, and decided that a watch should be kept on Savarkar’s house.

  During the following days Dr. Jain was haunted by the feeling that nothing was being done to arrest the conspirators. He had no confidence in the police, or in Morarji Desai, or in Patel, or in any of those who were ultimately responsible for Gandhi’s safety. Patel ordered some extra guards sent to Birla House; this was the extent of his intervention. Neither Patel, nor Morarji Desai, nor the police went to any pains to discover the conspirators, who had returned to Bombay. Twenty years later, when a commission of inquiry was established under Mr. Justice Kapur to inquire into some unexplained circumstances of the assassination, it was learned that the police had acted with astonishing laxity and had left no written records of their inquiries, if indeed they made any inquiries at all. There were many people in high places who acted as though they had no business interfering with a conspiracy which must be permitted to take its course. A permissive assassination—tolerated by the police and high government officials—was about to take place.

  After the fiasco on January 20, Badge and Kistayya took the night train for Poona, while Nathuram Godse and Apte took the train for Bombay. Gopal Godse and Karkare spent the night at the Frontier Hindu Hotel in Delhi, and then made their way to Bombay. With Pahwa under arrest, and Badge by this time completely disillusioned, refusing to take any further part in the conspiracy, there remained only Nathuram and Gopal Godse, Apte and Karkare. Failure ha
d not disheartened them, and they were more determined than ever to bring about the assassination of Gandhi.

  As always there was the problem of obtaining a revolver in good working order, for neither of the revolvers repaired by Gopal Godse could be depended upon. Once more, as though they were replaying an old film, they sought the help of Dixit Maharaj who possessed an excellent revolver but refused to part with it under any conditions. Nathuram Godse pleaded with him on at least two occasions, but Dixit Maharaj was deliberately evasive, saying that his health did not permit him to offer any assistance. On the night of January 26, Nathuram Godse, Apte and Karkare held a secret meeting in the freight yard of the Thana railroad station in the outskirts of Bombay. They talked in whispers. Godse said he was afraid Pahwa would talk to the police and there was only a little time left. In his view the original plan involving nine or ten conspirators was a mistake; it would be better if one man did the deed, and he had long ago come to the conclusion that he was the one who should do it. He spoke about Madanlal Dhingra and Vasudev Rao Gogate, both of whom were commanded by Savarkar to commit murder. Madanlal Dhingra had shot Sir Curzon Wyllie in London, Vasudev Rao Gogate had shot at the Governor of Bombay in 1931. The Governor had not been killed, because he was wearing a bulletproof vest, but Gogate’s name had been held in high honor by the Hindu Mahasabha ever since. Godse kept insisting that he would assassinate Gandhi single-handed, and all the time he was indicating that he needed help and could scarcely go through with his self-appointed task unless there were others beside him. He seemed to dread the thought of acting alone, and needed their companionship and moral support

  So, while the freight trains passed and the moonlight fell on the deserted railroad station, they discussed their plans, which were still fluid. Nathuram Godse had decided not to involve his brother in the assassination, and there were now only three members of the conspiracy. There was still no dependable revolver, but this was not regarded as an insuperable problem. Nathuram Godse and Apte had already reserved passage on a flight to Delhi early the next morning; Karkare was invited to come by train, and it was arranged that they would meet at the Birla Temple at Delhi at noon on the 29th. Inside the temple was an inscription reading: “He who is known as Vishnu the Preserver is verily Rudra the Destroyer, and He who is Rudra is Brahma the Creator.” The Birla Temple is a pleasantly ornate building of pink sandstone surrounded by pleasure gardens and usually crowded with visitors who come to worship the many gods enshrined in its marble halls. Because there were so many people about, coming from all parts of India, it was an ideal meeting place for the conspirators. Rudra the Destroyer would preside over their secret conferences.

  Assassins very often disdain to conceal themselves and sometimes openly profess their intentions. As usual, Godse was talking to far too many people about his plans, and if he did not declare openly what he intended to do, he made no secret of the fact that he was determined to kill a very important Indian leader. In his travels he lived under assumed names, sometimes using the name “Deshpande.” When he applied for his passage t6 New Delhi at the All-India Air Terminal office at Bombay, he gave his name as N. Vinayakrao. His full name was Nathuram Vinayak Godse. Similarly the seat for Apte was reserved in the name of D. Narayan, and Apte’s full name was Narayan Dattatraya Apte. An intelligent detective should by this time have been able to recognize them and pull them off the plane.

  Neither Godse nor Apte had the slightest trouble during their travels. They arrived in Delhi at 12:40 P.M. on January 27, drove to the railroad station, and took the train to Gwalior, two hundred miles to the south. The train was the Delhi-Madras Express. They arrived at 10:38 P.M., and drove immediately to the house of Dr. Dattatraya Parchure, an important figure in the Hindu Mahasabha. Here at last they confidently expected to find a revolver in good working order. The doctor had guessed, or knew, their intentions, and when they asked for his own revolver, he answered: “I am not such a fool.” But he had no objection to letting them inquire among his servants and friends, and with his help a revolver was finally obtained the following evening from Jagdish Prasad Goel, one of the members of his volunteer corps. Nathuram Godse attempted to bargain with Goel, offering one of his defective revolvers in part payment, but without success, and he paid five hundred rupees for the new revolver. Then, still accompanied by Apte, he took the night train to Delhi It had taken them a four-hundred-mile detour to find a revolver, but now at last with Goel’s revolver in his pocket Nathuram Godse felt sure there were no more obstacles.

  At noon Karkare was waiting for them outside the gates of the Birla Temple. The conversation, broken off in the freight yard of the Thana railroad station, was resumed. Godse was in a mood of calm elation, giving his final instructions. He expected Apte and Karkare to return to Poona and carry on their work for the Hindu Mahasabha.

  “Apte has responsibilities,” he said. “He has a wife and child, while I have no family. Moreover, I am an orator and a writer, and I shall be able to justify my act and impress the Government and the court of my good faith in killing Gandhi. Now Apte, on the other hand, is a man of the world. He can contact people and carry on the Hindu Rashtra. You, Karkare, must help in the conduct of the newspaper and carry on the work of the Hindu Mahasabha.”

  During the afternoon they decided not to stay in a hotel, but to take a retiring room at the main railroad station, which was cheaper than a hotel room. They had some difficulty obtaining a retiring room, but finally one was provided for them and reserved in the name of N. Vinayakrao. Although Gandhi held a prayer meeting that day, Godse had decided that the assassination must wait for the following day. He was tired from the long train journey, he had not yet tested the new revolver, and he was in a mood to savor his approaching triumph.

  Toward evening Karkare suggested that they were all in need of some diversion to take their minds off the business of the following day, and they should therefore go to a cinema. Godse seemed to feel that such a diversion was unworthy of a man shouldering a heavy responsibility, and he bluntly refused. While Karkare and Apte went off to the cinema, Godse remained in his room at the railroad station reading a book.

  On the morning of January 30 he awoke early and was already bathed and dressed when Karkare and Apte awakened. They had a light breakfast, and then took a tonga in search of a place where Godse could test his new revolver. Godse was unusually calm and self-possessed, saying little, engrossed in his own thoughts. All over New Delhi there are wild and abandoned places, thickly wooded, where a man can practice shooting and no one would hear the shots. Godse dismissed the tonga, and they walked into the woods, where Godse fired three or four shots at a tree and was well satisfied with the accuracy of his new revolver. He had been curiously withdrawn in the morning, and as the afternoon wore on, he became increasingly silent, speaking in a monotone, making short cryptic statements. “You will miss me the next time,” he told Karkare, who could not understand what was meant by “the next time” and did not inquire. He wanted Apte and Karkare to be present with him on the prayer ground, offering moral support by their presence but otherwise taking no part in the assassination.

  At 4:30 P.M. he hired a tonga, drove to Birla House alone, and then mingled with the crowd of about a hundred people waiting on the prayer ground. A few minutes later Apte and Karkare drove up in a tonga, and they too mingled with the crowd. It was a clear day, and the cold wind was rustling the trees.

  At 5:13 P.M. Gandhi emerged from Birla House with his hands resting on the shoulders of his grandnieces. Usually Gurbachan Singh, one of his attendants, would walk in front of him to clear the way, but on this afternoon the attendant was detained, catching up with him only when he reached the steps leading to the prayer ground. Gandhi smiled, and walked a few paces beyond the steps, and then Nathuram Godse darted out of the crowd, brushing past Manubehn so quickly that he almost hurled her to the ground, and fired three shots in rapid succession at point-blank range. There were seven bullets in his revolver, and he would have go
ne on firing if Sergeant Devraj Singh of the Royal Indian Air Force had not pounced upon him, gripping him by the wrist, swinging his arm up with one hand while raining blows on his face with the other. A moment later Raghu Mali, a gardener at Birla House, was grappling with him, and then there were about ten people attacking him. People standing a short distance away could see a still smoking revolver waving jerkily above the crowd. For a few moments there was a hush, and then when the full realization of what had happened came to the people on the prayer ground, there arose a strange animal-like roar of grief mingled with screams, loud sobbing, hysterical weeping, and cries of “Kill him! Kill him!” In the confusion scarcely anyone saw Nathuram Godse being led away, bruised and bleeding, all the left side of his face covered with blood.

  For nearly ten minutes the crowd in the garden was caught up in a paroxysm of despair; people assumed the classic gestures of grief, swaying a little and sometimes running about distractedly, only to return at last to gaze down at Gandhi lying where he had fallen, his head cradled on the laps of the two girls, the red stain on his chaddar growing larger. Then at last they carried him into Birla House.

  People came and scooped up the blood-soaked earth where he had fallen, until there was a small pit about a foot deep. Later, candles were lit and set down near the small pit, and policemen were sent to watch over the place. Two empty cartridge cases and two spent bullets were found in the grass.