Delhi Court allows 26/11 attack plotter Tahawwur Rana 3 phone calls to family
Legal aid counsel Piyush Sachdeva was stated to have sought time from the court to scrutinise certain documents in the chargesheet and supplementary chargesheet.Rana is allegedly a close associate of 26/11 main conspirator David Coleman Headley, alias Daood Gilani, a US citizen.He was brought to India after the US Supreme Court on April 4 dismissed his review plea against his extradition to India.On November 26, 2008, a group of 10 Pakistani terrorists went on a rampage, carrying out attacks on a railway station, two luxury hotels, and a Jewish centre, sneaking into India's financial capital via the sea route.A total of 166 people were killed in the assault that lasted for nearly 60 hours.- EndsTune InMust Watch
IN THIS STORY#Mumbai#Delhi#26/11 Mumbai terror attack
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— Irfanullah Farooqi Sri Aurobindo's distinction as a political thinker and leader, an activist-journalist, and an informed scholar on Indian civilization and culture hardly needs any elaboration. He was a polymath (knew as many as 12 languages) who offered a nuanced reading of Swaraj and freedom at a time when many luminaries were walking down the beaten path. In his relatively short span of political engagement (1902-1910), Aurobindo wrote scathing pieces against British colonisers who were gradually settling in without much unease. He didn't spare the Indian National Congress either, which, in his opinion, was losing its political sheen because of its absurd and illogical pursuit of reforms within the imperial politico-legal structure. Despite the clarity and directness of his writings, and their potential as interventionist and disruptive prose, Aurobindo usually does not find a mention when we think of makers of modern India. On the occasion of his birth anniversary (August 15), it is appropriate to briefly look at Aurobindo's somewhat unusual biographical trajectory and a few of his crucial interventions that account for his distinction as a political thinker. Aurobindo Ghose was born in Calcutta on August 15, 1872 in a family significantly/deeply influenced by Brahmo Samaj. His father, Krishna Dhun Ghose, was an anglophile and wanted his three sons (Aurobindo being the youngest) to learn English language and culture. In 1879, Aurobindo's family moved to England so that the brothers could study and prepare for the prestigious Indian Civil Service (ICS). Raised in Manchester and educated in London and later at King's College, Cambridge, Aurobindo cleared the ICS examination but was disqualified for missing the riding test. After spending 14 years abroad, Aurobindo returned to India in 1893 and joined the Baroda Service, where he spent the next 13 years in various capacities alongside writing poetry. His stay at Baroda was also crucial in enabling him to distance himself from his English upbringing and education. He started learning Sanskrit and other Indian languages so as to have a more organic and intimate understanding of Indian culture. As Aurobindo delved deeper into understanding the core of Indian civilization and its foundational spirit, he became increasingly attentive to the question of Swaraj. This led to his involvement in political activities, which may be said to have begun in 1902. However, given the nature of his employment, his political activity had to remain covert. The Partition of Bengal in 1905 prompted him to take leave from the Baroda Service. In 1906, he left for Calcutta to serve as the Principal of Bengal National College (now Jadavpur University). Aurobindo joined a small faction of the Indian National Congress (INC) that identified itself as nationalist but was called by the majority faction of INC as 'extremist'. In 1907, he was prosecuted on charges of sedition. Though he was acquitted, his brief imprisonment turned him into the leader of the nationalist faction in Bengal. That same year, he presided over the historic Nationalist Conference in Surat, where the INC was officially split into two factions. Aurobindo was put behind bars again in 1908 for his alleged involvement in the Alipur Conspiracy Case. During his time in jail, he is said to have had spiritual experiences that led him to think beyond Swaraj. This was also the time he used for practicing yoga. When Aurobindo got out of prison in 1909, he found his party scattered and totally broken. He launched an English weekly, Karmayogin, and a Bengali weekly, Dharma, but despite his sincere efforts on multiple fronts, he was unable to revive the political unit he was once a part of. In April 1910, he left for Pondicherry, intending to return to Bengal when conditions became more favourable, but that never happened. His spiritual quest kept him in Pondicherry, effectively away from active politics until his death in December 1950. Before his withdrawal from public life, however, Aurobindo remained steadfast in his advocacy of passive resistance. Aurobindo remained committed to the idea of passive resistance throughout his stint as a perceptive political thinker. Much of his thinking, expressed in his articles for the weekly newspaper Bande Mataram, rested on his principled criticism of the INC's moderates, whose politics he viewed as convenient politics. For a comprehensive understanding of Aurobindo's conceptualisation of the philosophy, or, more appropriately, its praxis, one can turn to his article titled 'New Thought', published in Bande Mataram in April 1907. In this long reflection, he underlines the absolute necessity of self-development through self-help, even if it demands non-peaceful means, a qualifier that distinguishes his framework from Gandhi's. Outlining the core aim of passive resistance, Aurobindo highlights the significance of moving beyond articulating narrow concerns to opposing the fundamental and pernicious markers of the colonial system – a defining feature of independent political thinking. He argued that passive resistance is vital in demonstrating India's strong determination to be a free nation, thereby strengthening its claim for self-government and liberty. For Aurobindo, the case of passive resistance is linked to the necessity of liberty for the thriving of a nation. If a nation is to thrive, not merely survive, it must be willing to take any action necessary for its self-preservation. When the very life of a nation is attacked, Aurobindo believes every possible response towards reclaiming that life, non-violent or otherwise, is right, lawful, and justifiable. Aurobindo also draws a well-informed distinction between active and passive resistance by looking into their methods. He explains that while active resistance involves acts or interventions aimed at 'bringing about positive harm to the Government', passive resistance refrains from doing anything that might help the government in any possible way. Aurobindo affirms that while the object of both active and passive resistance remains the same –putting pressure on the government– their methods differ. For him, passive resistance is particularly potent in a country like India because the colonial administration could not function without the native population's voluntary help. Passive resistance was an 'organised refusal' to make it impossible for the colonial government to administer. It is evident that Aurobindo differed significantly from Gandhi on the idea of passive resistance. For Gandhi, it was about personal suffering as a means of securing morally justified rights and claims (what he identified as Satyagraha). In his work Hind Swaraj, published as more of a manifesto, Gandhi dedicates an entire chapter to passive resistance. He warns his readers against viewing it as a 'weapon of the weak'. He insisted instead that it is an expression of 'soul-force' or 'truth-force', premised on the courage of a higher order, and informed by absolute fearlessness. However, for Aurobindo, there was no alternative to 'the sword of the warrior' when it came to upholding justice, defending righteousness, and stopping oppression and exploitation. Moreover, as we get to know through his several letters and other reflections, Aurobindo regarded Gandhi as operating with a rigid mind, firmly fixed in his ways of seeing things and unlikely to change. For Aurobindo, nationalism – from his early writings on the subject to his final political interventions (from 1890 to 1910) – was not to be reduced to a political programme. It demanded much more from its adherents. In January 1908, not so long after the moderate-extremist split in the INC, Aurobindo delivered a speech in Bombay wherein he outlined nationalism's religious significance by terming it as nothing less than a 'work of god' and true nationalists as 'instruments of god'. Nationalism for him was a deeper question of faith and conviction, not some selfish political aspiration. His words – 'If you are going to be a nationalist, if you are going to assent to this religion of Nationalism, you must do it in the religious spirit' – left little doubt about nationalism's religious significance. He argued that there were attempts at crushing nationalism because it was a 'new religion', and historically, 'when a new religion is preached, when God is going to be born in the people, that such forces rise with all their weapons in their hands to crush the religion'. In his famous Uttarpara speech delivered in May 1909, right after he was released from prison, Aurobindo shares with his audience his spiritual and mystical realisations during his time in prison. He declares that 'through her national revival, India was to spread the universal truth of Hinduism throughout the world'. A significant section of the speech dwelt on Hindu religion as the only religion that is universal and eternal, two features that he saw as deeply interconnected. Having established the superiority of the Hindu religion, he goes beyond the idea that 'nationalism is a religion, a creed, a faith'. Let Aurobindo's birth anniversary be an occasion to engage with his works diligently and gain a deeper and informed understanding of his views on Swaraj, dharma, nationalism, and passive resistance. Such an exercise would be beneficial, enabling both praise of and questions about Aurobindo to rest on registers that are markedly objective. How did Aurobindo's conception of nationalism differ from being merely a political programme, and in what ways did he infuse it with religious and spiritual dimensions? Compare and contrast Aurobindo's and Gandhi's interpretations of passive resistance, focusing on their respective moral foundations, strategic methods, and implications for political action. To what extent did Aurobindo's framing of nationalism as 'Sanatan Dharma' blur the boundary between religion and politics in colonial India? How did Aurobindo's views on self-development through self-help reflect on prevailing nationalist strategies of his time? (Irfanullah Farooqi is an Assistant Professor at the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode.) Share your thoughts and ideas on UPSC Special articles with Subscribe to our UPSC newsletter and stay updated with the news cues from the past week. 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