Cellular Jail

Press Information Bureau
Government of India



CELLULAR JAIL – AN EMBODIMENT OF SACRIFICE
S. Balakrishnan

“Oh! My dear Motherland, why are you crying?
The rule of foreigners is about to end!
They are packing up!
The national shame and misfortune will not last long!
The wind of freedom has begun to blow.
Old and young are yearning for freedom!
When India becomes free,
‘Hari’ will also enjoy his freedom! “

Thus wrote Shri Babu Ram Hari of Gurdaspur District, Editor of ‘Swarajya’, sentenced to transportation at Cellular Jail in Andamans for 21 years, for writing three ‘seditious’ editorials.

The country’s flowers were thus untimely plucked and offered for upholding the cause of liberty. Cellular Jail was one such sacrificial altar. This jail, where freedom fighters were sent for solitary confinement by the British rulers of India, is indelibly linked with India’s fight for freedom.

Indian Bastille

Rightly then did Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose describe it as the “Indian Bastille”. In a statement issued in November 1943, after the Andamans were won and occupied by the Japanese during the course of World War II, Netaji remarked, “Like the Bastille in Paris which was liberated first in the French Revolution setting free political prisoners, the Andamans, where our patriots suffered much, is the first to be liberated in India’s fight for independence.” [Later, however, the Allies recaptured the Andamans.]

Sepoy Mutiny

The British established penal settlements at Benkoelen, Malacca, Singapore, Arakan and Tenasserim for prisoners convicted of severe crimes in colonial India and Burma. The Andamans was the last in the series but the first to be established on Indian soil. The penal settlement was first stared in the Andamans in 1789 but was abandoned after seven years.

The idea of a penal settlement in Andamans was revived in the wake of the First War of Indian Independence (1857) which the British dubbed the ‘Sepoy Mutiny’.

To deport and imprison the so-called mutineers, deserters and rebels, the Andamans was chosen. In March 1858, the first batch of 200 sepoy mutineers was sent to Andamans. Within the next three months, the figure rose to 773. It is believed that between 1858 and 1860, about 2,000 to 4,000 freedom fighters (Sepoy mutineers) were deported to Andamans from different parts of the country. Nearly all of them perished under the most agonizing conditions of the penal settlement. And neither those who tried to flee from the settlement into the jungles could escape from the jaws of death.

Nearly a century later, on August 15, 1957, a Martyrs’ Column was erected in the Marina Park of Port Blair in Andamans to commemorate the sacrifice of the first freedom fighters who perished in the Settlement. The penal settlement was finally given up in 1946.

Solitary Cells

The British rulers feared that if the political prisoners came into contact with other prisoners in Indian jails, they would spread their revolutionary ideas among them also. Moreover, they would also be able to chalk out plans amongst themselves if confined in dormitory system. Therefore, they decided to lodge the political prisoners in solitary cells in a far off place. The Cellular Jail - conceived with 690 solitary cells (hence the name Cellular Jail) - was the natural choice.

A small beginning was made in 1889 by deporting about 80 revolutionaries from the Poona area. Later, during the first phase of our freedom struggle from 1909 to 1921, a total of 132 political prisoners were sent to Andamans. During the second phase of 1932 to 1938, another 379 political prisoners were interned in the Jail, making a total of 511 from the year 1909 to 1938. This was despite the British ruler’s averred decision of abolition of penal settlements altogether.

Hunger strike

When Congress Ministries were formed in seven Provinces of India in July 1937, the demand of political prisoners that they be repatriated to the mainland prisons gained momentum. As their repeated appeals and agitations did not yield any result, 183 of them went on a hunger strike for 37 days from July 24 1937. This had its echo in the Indian mainland and their counterparts in the mainland jails also went on a hunger strike, sympathizing with their cause. Demonstrations in support of their demand were also held all over India. Unable to bear the sensational wave the emotional issue had created throughout the country, the then British government at last bowed to the demand and the first batch of political prisoners left the shores of Andamans on September 22, 1937. The last batch left on 18th January 1938. Criminal convicts were, however, continued to be deported to the Andamans till the penal settlement was abolished once for all in 1946.

The political prisoners involved in the Alipur Bomb Case (also known as Maniktola Conspiracy Case), Nasik Conspiracy Case, revolutionaries of the Ghaddar Party of the Lahore Conspiracy Case, Banaras Conspiracy Case, Chittagong Armoury Case, Dalhousie Square Bomb Case, Dacca Conspiracy Case, Rajendrapur Train Dacoity Case and Burma Conspiracy Case were deported to Andamans by the British government.

The Wahabi rebels, the Mopllah agitators of Malabar Coast, Rampa revolutionaries of Andhra, Manipur revolters and the peasant revolters of Tharwardy Revolt in Burma were also sent to the Cellular Jail.

Inhuman condition

Life at the jail was of the most inhuman and barbaric nature. With little food and clothing, the prisoners were compelled to do gruelling manual work. Unused to such hard manual labour, they found it very difficult to complete their daily work quota. This resulted in further severe punishments being inflicted upon them. The intention was to humiliate the political prisoners and shatter their will power. They were asked to manually operate the oil pressing mills, de-husk coconuts, pound coir and make rope and were also involved in hill cutting, laying roads, filling up the swamps, clearing the forests, etc. The most dreaded was ‘picking oakum’ or rope making out of Rambans, a kind of grass with high acid content, leading to continuous itching and scratching, ultimately resulting in bleeding. A real ‘acid test’ devised by the British!

National Memorial

To honour and remember the sacrifice of our freedom fighters, Cellular Jail was declared open a National Memorial on 11th February 1979 by the then Prime Minister, Shri Morarji Desai. A small museum has also been set up to remind the visitors of the sacrifices made by the freedom fighters. A sound & light show is also staged.

Once a dreaded place, Cellular Jail has now become a national monument; an embodiment of sacrifice, a place to remind us that freedom does not come easily and that we have to be ever vigilant to safeguard it.