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'The ploy is to cover up for Gandhi's dishonesty'

In a match-box apartment in the densely-populated Sadashiv Peth, a saffron heartland area in Pune, a 78-year-old man answers his mobile phone.

"Mi Gopal Godse boltoy," he identifies himself.

Friday's performance of Mi Nathuram Godse Boltoy (I am Nathuram Godse speaking) has been banned, informs the caller, referring to the controversial play which, besides stirring up a hornet's nest in Bombay, has also created a storm in Parliament.

''I have already heard about it,'' says the man, revealing that he had learnt about it from a news bulletin.

''The ploy," he tells the caller, "is to spread superstition and cover up for (Mahatma) Gandhi's dishonesty.''

The man, as he identified himself, is Gopal Godse, brother of Gandhi's assassin Nathuram Godse.

Gopal Godse was a co-conspirator in the assassination, and has served a life sentence from 1949 to 1965.

The play, according to him, has 'traced history in the right perspective'. By banning it, a false picture of history is sought to be portrayed before the younger generation, he says.

The new generation, he continues, has been taught that Gandhi was killed by a 'mathefeeru (eccentric)', and they are curious to know about that 'eccentric.'

"The play had sought to provide the youth an insight into the ideology of Nathuram," he says, "You cannot understand Gandhi until you have understood Nathuram."

Those who cancelled the play have not seen it and, so, it is just a perpetration of superstition, adds Godse who, prior to being convicted, had served as a soldier in Iran and Iraq during the Second World War.

There were 12 accused in Gandhi's assassination. Only nine were, however, arrested, of whom one had turned approver, and another, Veer Savarkar, was acquitted. Seven were held guilty, and Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte hanged to death. The rest five, including Gopal Godse, were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Gopal Godse says he has never seen Gandhi. Yet, the Partition and the release of Rs 550 million to Pakistan were two overriding factors which undid all the contributions that Gandhi made to secure India's Independence, he says.

Gopal Godse still keeps the urn containing the ashes of his brother and Apte which has been pledged to be immersed in the Sindhu river as and when Pakistan merges with India. He acknowledges this would not be likely in the near future, and surely not during his own life-time, but asserts that the pledge would be definitely redeemed one day.

As of now, he refuses to acknowledge India as a nation. "She is a truncated nation," he says. "Our national anthem sings paeans of Sind, but where is Sind? As long as Sind remains with Pakistan, India will continue to be a truncated nation."

The resolution for Independence was passed at the Lahore session of the Indian National Congress in 1929. But, ironically, the venue of the resolution is now in Pakistan, Godse points out.

The old name of Lahore, he goes on as an aside, was Luvapur, named after Lord Rama's son Luv. Kush, the other son of Rama, has his name given to another city, Kasur, which is also in Pakistan. "So unless Pakistan merges into India, our nation cannot be described as a whole nation," he adds.

While Godse talks, his wife occasionally comes and sits besides him. There is an old man of about 85 hovering in the background. ''His name is Bandurang Bonde and he has spent his life-time distributing anti-Gandhi literature,'' Godse says by way of introduction.

As the evening progresses, there is a steady stream of visitors, all come to inform the man in the match-box apartment about the ban on Mi Nathuram Godse Boltoy. Godse receives them with the same graveness and, in a gist, answers the same:

They did it to spread superstition. And to cover up Gandhi's dishonesty.

EARLIER INTERVIEW:
Gandhi used to systematically fool people. So we killed him'

UNI

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