is not to say that I am not again not to misconstrue what I'm trying to say I'm not saying that that means that you have unrestricted uh you know physical relationships no celibacy has its utility also it builds up certain power during that limited phase of time when you are following it so my recommendation to people who are actually in the path of any kind of spiritual practices that and I I deal more with people who are into the worship of deities so suppose you are into an anusthana of a deity so you take a you make a for 10 days or 15 days or 21 days so you follow limited period of celibacy during that time the only reason is that when you follow celibacy and you do that practice it helps building up power inside you however power is only useful if you have the capacity to digest it if you don't digest it one of the other things that happens for example you start doing a lot of Mantra sadhana for any deity certainly okay


Mantra sadhana for any deity certainly okay with no practice beforehand you start four or five hours of mantra japer today the first thing that you you are going to see after some days is the tremendous increase in lust tremendous increase in Anger these are the two leaks to which the power is going to get out of you because your system simply does not have the capacity to absorb it you can eat only that much food as much as your stomach can digest other things are going to get vomited out this is the spiritual vomiting that happens you will end up having all sorts of you know running around everybody physical relationships unrestricted and then anger unrestricted these two things the balancing how much of a spiritual power a particular individual can take through the practice and how much of a uh you know a physical relationship or any an anger by the way is equally dangerous it just in a second your power whatever you have accumulated is also going to go out this is where


accumulated is also going to go out this is where the role of a mentor a guru is so important because you will take a lot of time to figure out that what is it that works for you a good Mentor a good Guru who can handle you and I'm not saying and I don't mean that you know there are many organizations where you go and there are 1000 people getting an initiation and then after that for 10 years you have no clue where your Guru is and where you are sitting at home and doing practice no I mean somebody who actually hand holds and guides you step by step sort of at least and tells you that what to do and what not to do so there is no idea like this initially uh and it should not even be encouraged that right now from this age become completely celibate forget everything it is going to make you some spiritual Superstar nothing of that sort is going to happen what do you think of masturbation same same same principle that


you think of masturbation same same same principle that happens in celibacy same principle so if somebody is masturbating and he's uh practicing some spiritual same thing there's a leakage of energy that is going to happen so whatever I talked about right now in the course of a physical relationship Etc remove the word physical relationship add masturbation same thing there's no difference it is not going to make any other good or bad or anything and I'm not talking even for a moralistic perspective I don't care what anybody does in their privacy but um unrestricted yes definitely it is going to interfere with your process with your sadhana at a higher stage and one of the biggest disadvantages of unrestricted sexual encounters or masturbation for that matter is that um as I say in the peak point of concentration you should be like this when you are sitting for your Japan or yoga or meditation or whatever at that Peak moment you should be able to forget the whole world even if that is for


to forget the whole world even if that is for two seconds then it is working for you what happens with unrestricted uh either whether physical encounters unrestricted sexual encounters or excessive masturbation is that it is at that Peak moment that your chitta which is the you know kind of the the mind that has Impressions it is going to throw up all sorts of images and immediately it is going to break your concentration very minor thing but your practice is already gone you can pretend to the outside world that you are a great Yogi and you are doing a lot of practice but your inside your practice is not working so that is the problem on the other hand if you completely say that oh from today no no physical no sex no masturbation no nothing you have to become I don't know what uh two days you'll go crazy neither is Mantra is going to work neither the practice is going to work neither this is going to work so that balancing is important and we live in that kind of an


is important and we live in that kind of an age where to sell a toothpaste you have to put two skimpily clad women on the advertisement where is your celebrity going to come from yeah the society we live in stimulates us to shoot a load off that is where you have to maintain that Common Sense use common sense and balance and no point in the spiritual journey are you to give up your common sense you'll end up becoming a fool yeah yeah also I mean this is just a personal thought here not learned from a book probably learned from experiences my thought is that if a spiritual truth does not make sense to you and your subjective reality no one's asking you to accept it yeah so if this is against your thoughts don't accept it and I am not even judgmental of people who say by the way just because I'm sure that a lot of people will see that there may be traditional people who have uh celibacy they put into a very high pedestal and not being


put into a very high pedestal and not being judgmental and all that you do whatever you think is right for you but if you're asking me this is how you should approach in this age initially and the impulse celibacy comes naturally by the way yeah that I was just like literally a second before you said that I was thinking about the same thought that your libido if you're involved in a yogic life a spiritual life a tantric life yes uh Your Lust settles down without any effort yes after a certain point of time it will there are since we are on the topic there are two other factors by the way you have to remember here uh I think yesterday we were discussing about pitrus ancestors were stuck in a pit through loka who are not able to move forward very often in many cases uh an excessive amount of lust in an individual whereas they may be practicing everything well uh is basically a projection of the impulses of those pitrus and if it


of the impulses of those pitrus and if it is the case and that can be analyzed through you know various uh looking at the configuration of the planets at the time they're born and various other ways of finding out that is the case then the only way is to actually perform rituals in the right shetra in the right place so that the ancestors get Reborn and then it causes when you define it in whatever way you want but it then it has an effect that slowly that libido or that excessive amount of so normal lust is one thing normal lust everybody has but it goes beyond everything all rationality etcetera then it also comes down you know things calm down a bit that is one the other is with age also libido kind of can taper of um for a person who is genuinely spiritual yes that is what is happening for somebody who is not in the spiritual path it's up to them I mean no judgment on what they are doing or not doing


no judgment on what they are doing or not doing it's completely their life their choice but spiritually this um uh so pitrus are one of the things by the way that is there in quite a few cases I've seen people who face sudden bursts of whether it's excessive amount of lust or whether it's excessive anger or certain uh and they'd also manifest a certain blockages in life in various um stages etc those okay and if that is there if there's a normal amount of lust then uh to look at it as a manageable thing the other problem that happens it tapers off of it on its own it will in time okay don't don't make it as a big thing in your head that's the other problem that happens with a lot of spiritual people I am not able to get out of lust so you feel guilty about it that is far worse than actually you know indulging in a physical relationship sex or masturbation or anything after that the guilt trip that happens to some


after that the guilt trip that happens to some people that okay oh I I could not maintain celibacy that is not going to help you that is far worse um um intense I don't think the internet in general has a piece like this anyway definitely not on a written blog right I'm glad that we could do this on a podcast don't have any more questions with regard to this particular episode also while we're shooting this in real time this is the fifth episode we've recorded so yeah right before this we recorded a Hindi episode also fantastic and three epic English episodes yesterday and I still feel there's 15 more podcasts that we we have to cover so thank you yeah and just one point Sunday job go for it because we were discussing about go for it it's such a beautiful way in which certain concepts are represented in our in the Hindu culture for example there is the famous story of Lord Shiva who destroys kamdeva okay who's the god of last


destroys kamdeva okay who's the god of last and last and love so somebody tells him that you Shiva is meditating okay Shiva is uh in deep meditation is not even aware of anything so somebody tells him Shiva must have a son that son can destroy nasura Asura is one of those negative powerful negative entities only a son born out of Shiva but he is in meditation and in meditation in the deepest meditation is not even aware of the world he's not even aware of any physical existence nothing where is last going to come so they bring this and they tell him that please do something so the story says that he fires arrows okay and those arrows when they hit somebody uh that's when the last desire arises so he comes and he disturbs he does something there is Shiva is in deepest meditation suddenly there is this slight Awakening of stunning of Desire inside him and he opens his eyes and he's Furious who is it that destroy disturbs his meditation so


who is it that destroy disturbs his meditation so he opens his third eye Shiva Sada is the thing okay and he looks at kamdeva and he's born to ashes straight away okay burn to ashes now there's a huge problem if Karma if desire is gone to how will the world run world is finished without desire okay then the goddess Parvati she comes in and she requests him that uh that no you can't do that do something because otherwise everything is finished whole world runs on desire everything this there is nobody who doesn't have desire desires are there not only by the way by desire we always think that it is last but it could be your your body has a desire for food when you don't eat for a long time your you have a physical pain your body has a desire for going to a state where the pain is not there it's ingrained in you it's in your cells not just your mind desire is what runs it's the engine it's the glue that is making


it's the engine it's the glue that is making this world run continuously and there's nothing wrong in it just like there's nothing wrong in anything if it is correctly understood and applied so then Shiva says okay I will revive him but without a physical body so here comes Karma Deva he's born reborn again and he has no physical body and by the way this whole episode happens in kamakhya she is the goddess of all this and all these things now this is such a beautiful idea so he here we have a calm there with a lot of Desire who has no physical form what it means is that desire can come in any shape lust is born here from here it enters and then it spreads everywhere so because he doesn't have a physical form that means that he can manifest in any form anywhere and he cannot be destroyed something that doesn't have a physical form is also kind of omnipresent and omnipotent so this beautiful idea comes to us through this kind of a story


idea comes to us through this kind of a story how do you take care of the calm devathas everywhere then you follow a basic Common Sense discipline and you don't fight it too much it is on its own it will go and yes certain devathas since we are on the topic uh certain date is for example Lord Shiva and getting a blessings from Shiva is not so easy by the way he is he can't take the mind to a state where uh Kama is not needed Beyond lust but it is not something that is to be forced neither something that is you know artificially imposed on its own it happens until the time it happens one follows a basic Common Sense basic uh standard discipline so you follow a limited amount of uh you know Indulgence in last uh and then there are phases you deny do not go too much into it neither you run away completely from it that balance is important balance well Integrated Life along with the sadhana and the practices that you do


with the sadhana and the practices that you do eventually will lead the path for you and automatically whatever has to be left from your system will go away fighting is not useful thank you thank you so much great learning from you looking forward to meeting you in person again and you're in Mumbai the next time yeah thank you so much thanks namaste so that was the episode for today we've done an additional episode with rajashi sir in Hindi that's going to be out very soon I highly recommend that if you understand Hindi you should check out a Hindi podcast there's certain kinds of content pieces that can only come out better in Hindi please check it out it's over on our Hindi Channel make sure you also check out level super mind which is our meditation app it's for beginners intermediates and advanced meditators so if you're looking for a deep dive into your own mind a deep dive into your own spiritual journey level super mind is where it's at I've linked it down


mind is where it's at I've linked it down below and for more episodes like this make sure you follow TRS on Spotify every episode's available on Spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world one last request for you guys is to tell me what else you'd like to see so speak about so it's definitely going to return on the runway show I genuinely intend on visiting him in Bengal possibly doing a visit to the kamakhya Devi Temple in Assam but generally I'd like to know from you guys which are the topics you all would like to see covered on this podcast let me know in the comment section down below and keep supporting DRS [Music]


the Delhi University textbooks actually calls bhagat saying jatin does all these people as revolutionary terrorists the word terrorist is used for bhagat Singh and the descendants of bhagat Singh had protested saying this was a term that was coined by our Colonial Masters and today after you know we are still using terrorists for them then around 12th of January 1948 when Gandhi made his call that if the Indian government does not give 50 crores or so to Pakistan as promised he will go on a fast and to death at the same time when Pakistani forces were incur they were incursions into Kashmir that is when these people said this guy needs to be bumped off because you know he is a national security threat at a time when Pakistan is attacking us why do we need to be so virtue saying we promised you 50 crores we will give you and they are going to use that money to arm themselves against us Vikram sambad is primarily known for his work in


sambad is primarily known for his work in the field of History he's a PhD in history he's written books on the Indian Freedom Movement he's written books on Veer savarkarji he's spoken about Shaheed bhagat Singh and today we have all these topics covered and more we talked about the Indian Freedom Movement in our history textbooks in school but I do not feel that that's the way you should learn about Real History because a lot of history is hidden from us this podcast has always been about unveiling hidden history and if we're talking about the Indian Freedom Movement please understand these other aspects of it as well this one was a fiery inspiring conversation with Vikram somebody is going to be back on the runway show for now enjoy this one for more episodes like this make sure you follow the Run video on Spotify every episode's available on Spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world because we're a Spotify exclusive before I let you slip into this episode I just


before I let you slip into this episode I just want to remind you that my meditation and yoga app level supermind is now live on the playlist on the App Store we want to make this an India to the world Journey a world-class Indian product should make it big on the world stage so whether you're an Indian an NRI or a foreign National watching this particular podcast I highly recommend you check out level supermind and for now this is our India special episode with Vikram sampath foreign [Music] welcome to the ranveer show how are you thank you ranveer great pleasure to be with you I'm good how are you I'm great we were just talking about how history is taking over the Indian internet my theory is that a lot of young people kind of are a little bit pissed with the education system for teaching us um some wrong history some irrelevant history and focusing on topics that actually don't matter in the long term when there's a whole bunch of topics that didn't make it


a whole bunch of topics that didn't make it our history books yeah and people like yourself are putting it out there putting the truth out there whether it's the freedom struggle whether it's ancient Indian history so that is my assumption uh that's my theory that's why I believe history is kind of taking off on the Indian internet you're perfectly right because I think I I also see you know in my interactions across the country I just have a new book out bravehearts of Bharat and for that I'm on these promotional tours everywhere I'm interacting constantly with young people and this is the constant ground that they bring to the table that you know we've been fed the wrong facts we've not been told the truth our history has been so delhi-centric large parts of India don't get featured in it uh we've always been told we are a nation of losers we don't really know what are the stories of Valor courage if you're around as a civilization uh the only pre-bronzira


around as a civilization uh the only pre-bronzira civilization which is still around there must have been some uh courage also that we showed our ancestors showed so why are these uh you know kept away from us the Freedom Movement a very linear simplistic monochromatic view of that all this is something I think that the young youths today are talking about and social media is helping them amplify that there are people of course the pros and cons of that are there of a lot of misinformation coming up but uh I think it gives the youth a lot of platform to get information and also disseminate the information proudly which they have probably got through various sources yeah why do you think uh it's delhi-centric first and secondly the question is you said something about us being taught a linear version of the freedom struggle yeah I didn't even know that there's another version honestly like what do you mean well that famous Bollywood song which I think is dimmed into our Consciousness all the


I think is dimmed into our Consciousness all the time that it's only I mean like a Attenborough film you know frame to frame it goes that it's the non-violent movement the Mars movement that uh Gandhi and the Congress launched which was great in its own way uh it you know brought out that sense of nationalism and galvanized people towards freedom but you also had an armed uh you know resistance it was a violent armed resistance which was an unending chain from 1857 uh all the way till 1946 when you had the naval Mutiny In This Very city of Bombay Mumbai now so uh and again another topic that's not spoken about in tooni history books the naval Mutiny yeah and look at the use of the term ranveer I mean the the 1857 Uprising was called the sipoi Mutiny by the British as a very desperate charging thing you know is rebelled here and there and we crushed it it was Veer savarkar who called it the first war of Indian independence


who called it the first war of Indian independence uh ideally the naval Mutiny should have been called the last war of Indian independence but we still call it a mutiny Mutiny against whom the rulers where they are rulers no so then why do you want to call it a mutiny it should have been called the it was a last nail in the coffin of the British Raj but we still perpetuate that so from 1857 to 1946 this unending chain of revolutionaries who also LED another alternative story of our freedom struggle that is never told to us our you know uh young people today and I think people are asking questions on Delhi centricity uh I mean anybody could go to the ncrt book which is up uh you know freely downloadable on their website uh you have three chapters on the Mughal Dynasty you have lots of references to the uh you know obscure dynasties of Delhi the Lord these and kiljis and tuglax whose contribution to this nation I don't know


whose contribution to this nation I don't know is probably minimal barring a few structures here and there of architecture but the Chola is the mighty cholas who ruled for Thousand Years the vijayanagar Empire the satavahanas rashtrakutas pallavas kadambas gangas chalukyas the vodairs our homes our homes the Northeast is a complete black hole if you ask a young child today can you name three a home rulers the homes ruled for 600 years when even if you ask a big child today Child come on ranveer tell me another podcast on idiot name three cholas other than Raja Raja and rajendra yeah these are the only two I know honestly because the homes I know the Dynasty's names yeah you know this is the issue I've also grown up in the same India that you have and we've had the same history textbooks and if you want to truly learn about history it's all about doing the research yourself correct correct which is why I enjoy my job right now I just keep getting the


enjoy my job right now I just keep getting the unpacked like aspects of things I've not learned and that I wish to learn yeah yeah um but I've got a I think let's begin this conversation by talking about the 1946 Mutiny and the reason I ask you that is I was once in a room full of really well established CEOs and they were asking me Bollywood gossip because they know I interact with volume I was like that's cool but do you know that the history we're taught in books is not complete it's extremely fragmented and then those guys are like like what so you know they don't even believe that we've been taught for augmented history yeah and I brought up the 1946 Mutiny because it was brought up on the show and people were shocked they were like I can't even believe this happened this is the first time hearing about it and these are like established CEOs of multinationals wow wow so there you go let's start them prove my point let's


you go let's start them prove my point let's start there yeah well you know uh I think the best proof of this is uh Clement Atlee who is the prime minister of Britain when uh India got her independence in 1947 he comes to India after Independence around 1952 or 53 and he goes to uh various places he also goes to Bengal and there there is a uh you know the the governor of Bengal who is also the acting chief justice uh of the high court there uh funny bhushan chakraborty Justice chakraborty uh he's his host and chakraborty asks him uh you know why did you people leave us and got us uh Freedom so quickly because no one expected at that time that India would become free so soon and so he asked him what were the reasons for you to leave us and go away so quickly and uh chakraborty notes it in his Memoirs whatever athlete talks about and actually very clearly is supposed to have mentioned that it was


clearly is supposed to have mentioned that it was the heroics of the Indian national Army netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and ultimately all of it inspiring the Mutiny as they called it in the Navy in the Army uh you know units in different parts of India the British were petrified of a repeat of the 1857 uh you know episode that there will be a bhagavat uh an uprising or Insurrection in the British Indian army and so he said that was the reason we left the country and went and chakraborty is supposed to have egged him on a little more and said what about the uh you know quit India movement and the whole non-violent movement of uh Gandhi and how what was uh that impact on your final decision to leave this country and go and actually is supposed to have smirk then said minimal that those were his words are not mine so actually it's coming straight from the horse's mouth there was no need for him to be so condescending uh or you know disparaging


be so condescending uh or you know disparaging of anybody uh because India had already got freedom it was a candid conversation that the two were having uh five six years after India's Freedom uh so I think right from the British horse's mouth we get to know that it was the heroics of the Ina the naval Mutiny where so many sailors uh you know decided to um you know go in an uprising In This Very city of Mumbai and that spread across to so many other units both in the British Indian army as well as the Navy now mind you when the second world war ended they were about two and a half million soldiers in the British Indian army out of which probably just 10 000 were British the rest of them were Indians Indian origin so the Revolutionary is their entire strategy and we're all through was to create this Insurrection even if our 10 of this huge number could be seduced to patriotism and they could switch over to the side of liberating your country then


over to the side of liberating your country then the edifice of the Raj would collapse because they were standing here only on the might of the army uh the British uh you know Army so I think these people understood that and created that Insurrection in the Army which is what as I said they did not want 1857 to repeat by in kanpur and all those other places you had Mass mathem massacres of Europeans men women and children why didn't this happen earlier why didn't this not happen earlier I think that constantly they were all these attempts right from 19 early 1900s the gadar movement uh which was a transcontinental movement between Canada San Francisco with the kumagata Maru episode there all of this was exactly attempts to do this very thing so the idea was very clear in all these people's minds that this is the only way to liberate the country because you know the weak point of the British government and how to get them uh going and if you actually see very dispassionately


uh going and if you actually see very dispassionately all the reforms or the uh you know anything that the British did to give in more to the Indian demands were preceded by Bloody revolutionary uh you know incidents whether it was the model inventory reforms the uh Montague chansford reforms the government of India act and eventually Freedom all of that was preceded by uh as I said violent uprisings so I think this was something that the revolutionaries understood they tried uh several times but for various reasons it didn't succeed I think netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and the country owes uh you know all its gratitude to him uh because he was the Catalyst who probably culminated the dreams of all these other revolutionaries who had slogged so hard for so many decades and failed unfortunately you want to highlight the actual incident a little bit which one uh the 1946 incident so the the 1946 Mutiny in uh which started in Bombay I'm saying Bombay because that's what it was called then


saying Bombay because that's what it was called then so there were lots of sailors who initially for you know uh the ratings that they had and so on they were denied that and so on so that is why they uh there was a protest on the deck uh you know in the ships here uh which did you know they went on Hunger Strike they started protesting and so on but then slowly that entire thing uh grew into a larger demand uh you know for Liberation and carrying placards of uh Long Live netaji and photographs of netaji both these people went all over uh you know the city uh on marches and common people started joining them in large numbers and as I said the the flame that was lit in Bombay spread to different places even South India Karachi jabal poor different parts of India and you know by then the Ina trials had begun in Delhi uh the Red Fort and that too had created a lot of sympathy uh for the soldiers who had fought


sympathy uh for the soldiers who had fought in the Ina so I think it was a it was like a bomb that was ticking at that time and that's what shocked the British and scared them Beyond doubt you know what sucks is that in our history books yeah the event preceding Indian independence that's written about is World War II so this is 1945 the British army was tired Britain itself was tired and that's why 1947 they decided to go they don't highlight immediate causes like this yes I question why why is this not there in most history textbooks that we read in school that's a long answer to that but uh you know I think after Independence uh the the people who came to power uh I think they wanted to ensure that a certain uh Viewpoint about the freedom struggle itself was highlighted and if anyone who is not part of that so-called mainstream of the non-violent movement they would not get its due uh and so nehru yes you can say it this


uh and so nehru yes you can say it this isn't uh television yes that's why people are gravitating away from television on to YouTube No I don't want to about him but I think some of these strategic you know and Machiavellian uh uh you know uh attempts that he made to to kind of suppress all uh opposing viewpoints he was called a great Democrat and a liberal and all that but then the stifling of voices the freedom of expression even the major sultanpuri uh you know languishing in jail for one and a half years because he wrote a poem in which he called nehru Hitler or something like that something has innocuous as that and we say he's a you know Paragon of freedom of speech I think that's a little far-fetched but be it as it may but uh you know the the narrative that was Set uh was that we need to highlight only the non-violent movement and the role of the Congress in it and anything that doesn't come within


the Congress in it and anything that doesn't come within this framework that should not get its due in the history it should be mentioned but it should be in passing uh so ranveer even now you know in 2016 if you remember they were uh people who were the descendants of bhagat Singh uh and you know who wrote to the hrd minister then smriti Irani that the Delhi University textbooks and also I think the upsc books or whatever written by this bipin Chandra Mukherjee and all these people actually calls bhagat saying that's all these people as revolutionary terrorists the word terrorist is used for bhagat Singh in the books and the descendants of bhagat Singh had protested saying this was a term that was coined by our Colonial Masters and today after you know we are still using terrorists for them so imagine a young child who's reading that and at the same time on television you are seeing uh what's happening in Kashmir or you know all the the


in Kashmir or you know all the the what terrorism and terrorist has a connotation today they'll equate that to bhagat Singh do you think this is because people like bipin Chandra and Uzi they grew up in a another version of India and they were probably kind of uh influenced a lot by the history yeah written in our books probably in the 60s 70s and 80s do you think that's the reason these were part of what I would call as establishmentarian historians who told the line that uh you know the dispensation the political dispensation of the time wanted them to you know around the same time there was a big project uh to write immediately after Freedom a lot of these people were still alive some of the Freedom Fighters so interviewing them capturing an entire history of the freedom struggle was something that historian the celebrated historian RC majumdar wanted to do and the government had initially commissioned him that project as well but he made it very clear that they go I'm not


he made it very clear that they go I'm not going to do some you know Gandhi eulogy in this I am going to be very critical of the man and the man had lot of failures uh in the manner in which he conducted we probably would have got uh Freedom several years or decades before but for his flip-flop policies that he did all the time and he was RC majumdar wanted to bring all this out so from a commissioned role as the official chronicler of the freedom struggle RC majumdar was summarily thrown out and a bureaucrat who had nothing to do with history or modern Indian history he was I think an expert of medieval Turkish uh history or whatever that guy was put in charge of writing the official history of the freedom struggle by the government of India um Mr nehru's government and so it became very clear to all the other historians that what line we need to tow if we don't toe the line you tell us we will lose our jobs


the line you tell us we will lose our jobs we lose uh all the patronage all the awards all the fellowships all these things that academics look for so you tend to tow a certain line there was no social media there was no ranveer then who could give them give the alternate voices a platform like this so I think that is why most of them followed this and that has been subliminally it's I think come down in our Consciousness after so many you know this is a problem all over the world when it comes to different histories yeah I think the older Generations have been taught one version of it and when it's challenged by alternative viewpoints uh it's often met with a lot of criticism like they call these kind of viewpoints really false conspiracy theories but I think you know you need to lay out all the information and see it extremely objectively uh kind of emotionlessly yeah and I'm asking asking you the next question from an objective perspective right I think we've had on


an objective perspective right I think we've had on the show uh very often like we may have done 20 30 episodes with them uh the one pitch that he keeps making on the show is that the world of geopolitics even historically has affected our viewpoint on Indian history as well which basically means that the world's power was centered in the western block during World War One during World War II after World War II it used to be big daddy Britain which became Big Daddy America yeah uh and he kind of pitched some very strong points which makes you kind of think that maybe America and Britain at that time have affected the kind of narratives we've gotten about our history as well yeah and probably even now yeah uh in terms of even how the world looks at jawaharlal nehru and gandhiji's branding yes which has been a big part of uh our minds and lots of people think of the Indian Freedom struggle they'll visualize uh Mahatma Gandhi yeah yeah as I said there are lots


Gandhi yeah yeah as I said there are lots of people who visualize Veer savarkar and bhagat Singh as well yeah but it's primarily Mahatma Gandhi and this is very intense branding which has been strengthened because of support from those geopolitical Powers right um my question is why is it is it because some kind of promises were made before India got independence uh you know did they promise jawaharlal nehru and Mahatma Gandhi that you guys will be given the uh you know opportunity to be the leaders of this free country is it is what do you think as a historian I uh because there isn't any documented evidence around it there are some secret files which a lot of people talk about which are out of bound just to think of it even all the mount baton papers are completely classified we don't even know the last Viceroy and the role of Edwina Mount baton what happened how did she negotiate or come into the entire conversation [Laughter] well


or come into the entire conversation [Laughter] well that's what as I said uh I'm unfortunately uh a historian who will sit and look at what is the evidence for this and I don't want to go with Bazar gossip or insinuations but yeah so there were a lot of things that were going on and I mean nehru is also in famously said supposed to have said once that he's the last Englishman the the brown sahib so I think a lot of people who also came to par uh you know not only not I'm not talking of the political power but the bureaucracy the people who uh who held uh the the power immediately after Freedom several of them were part of the larger collaborator gang when the British Raj was uh you know uh in par so there they themselves or their children or grandchildren and all of these people became historians became uh you know bureaucrats became intellectuals one example I can give is of This Man Called yashpal who very


give is of This Man Called yashpal who very clearly there was a there was a paper that came out somewhere an intelligence report when the British were leaving uh the country they very clearly said yashpal is our man so please take good care of him when we leave and yeshpal was the man who's supposed to betrayed the revolutionaries and also caused the uh you know leaked out the secret about Chandra shekhar Azad which got him to kill himself and the revolutionaries were so livid with him for being the mole amidst them that they wanted to have him killed and so the British jailed him and put him in jail to save him from the revolutionaries and he also got married in jail probably the few people who have a honeymoon in jail so the British were very good with people who uh you know who were on their side they would take very good care of them that's why when today people say savarkar was a British stooge and this and that that is the very


British stooge and this and that that is the very fact that the British would take care of those who had sold themselves to them that is documented part of history and after Independence yashpal becomes one of the most loved intellectuals of the country he gets several Awards I hit the Academy Award his uh and he writes books in Hindi literature on his own you know blowing his own trumpet about how great uh uh you know revolutionary he was and so on and that is something that gets perpetuated uh you know uh in the people's minds too and he he has uh quite a few nasty things to say even about savarkar and all that so you know so that as I said a lot of collaborators who later became part of the new firmament ensured that a lot of Truth was suppressed and kept under the carpet and we're facing the consequences of that today but today I think the time has changed it's a Information Age light is the best disinfectant now anybody


Age light is the best disinfectant now anybody who throws light on uh the suppressed facts I think and the youth really want to lap up to you know what what is it that has been hidden from us and right from the time of Adam and Eve I think the forbidden fruit has been the tastiest thing right so everyone wants whatever is forbidden from you that always is very tasty welcome to the ranveer show I'm gonna ask you a little bit about yashpal uh what happened to him later on did he die peacefully yeah a very celebrated author uh celebrated literature as I said he was he won the sahitya Academy Award his books were prescribed as textbooks and uh you know learning material and all of that and I think he must have even got some Padma and all these different Awards so yeah many people like that who who wrote The Narrative of free India they decided uh you know what information comes to the Next Generation how do we frame that who is to


Next Generation how do we frame that who is to be excluded who is to be demonized who is to be eulogized everything was choreographed and the Western Powers also were you know you had to show the British in a nice way uh that uh they were I mean peacefully we kept asking quit India quit India one day they just got bored and said okay hello I will quit India and go it was not so simple as that you so I think somewhere you needed to show this uh as a very nice it's a great uh as I said Oscar winning movie uh attenborough's movie which gets all the global eyeballs it shows India in a nice uh image that we were very non-violent we didn't have very peacefully we got our freedom and also it shows our Colonial Masters in good light so it was a win-win situation for both and that's why in the process so many people who actually sacrificed their lives and everything by Leading the armed struggle their names till today will be


the armed struggle their names till today will be dubbed as revolutionary terrorists and not as Freedom Fighters um like Sardar udham saying yes have you seen the movie of course my God what a movie dude yeah yeah and how many of us knew about him I don't even think too many people watch the film it was a fantastic film it's Vicky kosher's best film um I met sujit sarkar the director of this woman I said that dude thank you for making that that's how history should be shown in its darkest tourist form and he said thank you he was grateful but there was a part of him which definitely at least that's what I sensed and that's what I heard I think somewhere he wanted more people to watch it you know and I highly recommend that dark kind of sad film to every viewer watching this you'll get a real emotional viewpoint on the Indian Freedom struggle from the people who actually used or had to use violence as a mean to um help


had to use violence as a mean to um help the Indian Freedom struggle right I had never heard of Sardar udham Singh till that movie came out yeah why sure you're not alone there are millions like you who didn't know about him and and how many people have he not heard of like thousands of them ranveer I think in the course of my own research on Veer savarkar the kind of names that came along uh right from vasudev balwan ke who was called the father of Indian revolutionaries and Maharashtra produced so many of them the chafekar brothers we saw his elder brother Baba Rouser Bengal had all I mean all of them around the same time and when savarkar goes to London the kind of people whom he Associates with their shamji Krishna Verma Madame bhikaji Kama in Mumbai or in Delhi you have a bhikaji Kama Road or a bikaji Kama place but those who are there also don't know who the hell this bhikaji


there also don't know who the hell this bhikaji Kama is is it a man woman most of often but she was someone who went and unfurled the first flag of Indian independence in 1907 in the international socialist conference in Stuttgart in Germany and the the flag itself was designed by savakar and him Chandra Das kanungo of the anushilan samiti so people like this whom we have zero clue of MPT acharya VVS Ayer sukh Sagar that you know lots of them like that umat road in Pune but then how many even in Pune know the details of who this man is of course Ram Prasad Bismillah Khan and them you know of the kakori case uh then bhagat Singh sukdev rajguru rash bihari Bose who formed the Indian national Army and later invited netaji Subhash Chandra Bose as I said the culmination of this long train the gadar movement itself in which started with Punjab and the Sikhs the there who joined then with this and


Sikhs the there who joined then with this and then it goes across continents to through Europe to Germany then from there to uh you know California San Francisco and then uh even Canada and you know the the long train where they were trying to Ally with Germany to ensure Germany invades British India and liberates uh India of course whether we would have become a German Colony that's another question but uh you know a lot of these uh Heroes uh who operated across countries and so on at a time when there was no communication channels of WhatsApp and all of that like we have today but still the jazbah of uh wanting to liberate your country just mind you I mean poorna swaraj was something that the Congress coined in 1930 right with the Declaration for purness but the revolutionaries including sabarkar when he did his first uh student bonfire of foreign clothes in 1905 gave the call for complete Liberation the revolution is one not asking for piecemeal negotiations like the Congress was that you


piecemeal negotiations like the Congress was that you know give us a little bit here and there Dominion status all they wanted complete freedom for the country as way back as 1905 which I think uh says a lot about what the objectives of the two groups were as they were working what did you think of the movie oh it was excellent movie I think it really left me deeply moved and I agree with you it's probably Wiki kosher's best and shujit's best as well I wish more of these movies get done on many of this so much drama there's so much all that Bollywood wants I think is there in the stories of all these people you know they've shown the jallian Malabar Massacre as it should be shown yes which is deeply violent deeply heartless yeah um we've read about it in our books but the way they visually shown it in that movie it moves everyone it'll stay with you forever correct they've shown people's hands being blown off yeah your kids dying yes it's


being blown off yeah your kids dying yes it's it really makes you think about the truth that sometimes words are not able to capture as well as visuals true very true very true which is why we probably need a lot more movies about people like Visa worker yeah bhagat Singh yeah you know everyone's seen the Ajay devgan bhagat Singh movie and that's my reference point as well uh I remember in 1996 or 97 there was a virus avakar movie also which my mom took me for it's one of my earliest memories in life um it's I think it's got Anu Kapoor if I'm not mistaken he plays with some Malayalam film that's dubbed in Hindi and I highly recommend people watch it because they've shown a very um raw image of him uh they've shown him in kalapani which was the jail in uh the animals yeah um these two make the prisoners do a uh oil extraction punishment yeah I mean I'd love for you to expand on it as well


I'd love for you to expand on it as well but it's basically like a sort of a torture technique where they make you extract oil from seeds uh and then when he doesn't comply he doesn't give them information about the uh Indian Revolution they actually tie him upside down on the uh extraction device and make sure his head rubs against the ground and he gets dragged along with the machine and his body is used to actually extract the oil from the seeds yeah and I saw this as a four-year-old man wow yeah I was just like whoa what has gone on in this country before I got here but it gave you a very dark image of the nymph Freedom struggle and I'm sure there's so many things that don't even make it to the world of films yeah which is why now I need to bring you into the actual meat of this episode you've written an entire book on view savarkar history books don't mention very casual random mentions you hear about him when you live in


random mentions you hear about him when you live in a city like Mumbai yeah but um not as much as you should there's a lot of gen Z's we have watching the show teenagers who watch this show what's the truth about Veer savarkar that Indians should know well here was a man who started India's first organized secret society which was called the abhinav Bharat initially Mitra Mela which later became abhinav Bharat he led the first ever student bonfire against foreign clothes when we talk of bonfire we only think of Gandhi in the you know bonfire of clothes but in 1905 as a student of Ferguson College in Pune this man had done that for which he even got rusticated from college uh and then five years that he was in London um as a law student he led literally the Revolutionary movement sitting there and got all these other people I mentioned earlier who were there with him shyam ji Krishna Verma and all of them into this entire movement and wrote


all of them into this entire movement and wrote this seminal book on the you know after researching British documents on the 1857 Uprising gave it a respectability by calling it the first war of Indian independence and that book ranveer became literally the the bhagavad-gita for all future evolutionaries whether it was you know bhagat Singh who got the second edition of it published or even Raj bihari Bose and netaji Subhash Chandra Bose who got it translated into Tamil and Japanese and all kinds of languages and how a revolution needs to be structured the entire prescription was there in that book so someone who had contributed so much and 12 long years in kalapani two years in Indian Mainland jail so 14 years of imprisonment and then 13 years after he comes out he's kept under captivity and house arrest in ratnagiri in Maharashtra where he could not even go out of the borders of ratnagiri so just imagine a young man who is prom you know so wanting to


young man who is prom you know so wanting to become a barrister goes to London is caught by the British and unfairly tried and 27 years of his life are snuffed out his degrees are snatched away from him the law degree the graduation degree from Ferguson so on paper he was just a metric pass his entire family property confiscated and and so when he and his elder brother go away to kalapani the the women of the family they literally had to beg uh you know to eek out a livelihood they didn't even utensils were taken away in uh auctions literally brought to the streets uh so this is the sacrifice not only of him but also his entire family his wife his sister-in-law and all of them yeshuahini and all these people and so easily today sitting in air-conditioned rooms people passed judgment saying he was a traitor he was a you know stooge and all of that which I think is grossly unfair what is their argument I mean the


grossly unfair what is their argument I mean the fact that is mentioned that he wrote Mercy petitions too uh buy out his uh you know Liberty from jail and so on which I think is a is a flawed argument because these were petitions with that commonly a lot of political prisoners wrote those days it was not something that exclusively he wrote and in my book uh the first volume of the two volume by I have mentioned all the petitions in Toto there were six or seven that he wrote so just like you can have a lawyer today you can have a bail application a lot of people used to file up you know these petitions which were applications and in those petitions uh your viewers can actually read those and there's nowhere an apology uh in fact the British records themselves say that when they came one man called Reginald Cradock who comes all the way to interview him he in his official jotting says I interviewed Mr savarkar and he shows no regret


interviewed Mr savarkar and he shows no regret or repentance or remorse for what he has done so why would the British want to write that about him if he he could have prostrated and said so but he didn't do that so and then most of these petitions he was also filing on behalf of other younger people uh you know young revolutionaries who didn't know English who didn't know the law so this man was called Bada Babu uh you know who had studied uh you know law and who knew English and he could be their spokesperson so in fact in a 197 17 petition he says if my name constitutes an obstacle in the release of all the other prisoners then delete my name and release the others and that would give me as much pleasure as my own release would secure so that clearly shows he was talking on behalf of all the other people but this is constantly brought out uh you know to demonize him and you spoke about kalapani ranveer and


him and you spoke about kalapani ranveer and the the atrocities there not only to savarkar but all the other only the revolutionaries were housed in kalapani mind you no single Congressman was sent there hold on just hold this thought because I want to go back to this debate of uh where does Veer savarkar actually stand in the Indian history yes uh textbook basically when I was doing my research for this episode the word that repeatedly came up along with him was hindut yeah and I feel in the modern day Hindu doesn't mean what it actually meant back then like see now that I even use the word hindut there's a lot of listeners who probably switched off because they associate hindut with uh Hindus being against other religions like Islam Christianity Sikhism Buddhism Etc and you know honestly to some degree that is what hindut was become for a lot of Hindus out there today who are against other religions who want to have this whole Hindu nationalism thing


who want to have this whole Hindu nationalism thing going on in the country but back then I believe hindutua meant something very different and he was inspired by the ideals of chatapati shivaji Maharaj yeah uh and at that time Muslims Christians six Hindus were all fighting together so I'm sure that there was no uh religious sentiment behind what he did but I'd love to know this Hindu angle I mean the way it was invisaged by him he wrote this uh very slim booklet called Essentials of hinduta who is a Hindu while he was in jail and while all his other writings were in Marathi this was one he wrote in English for a pan-india audience because that was a time when it was very dangerous movement that was going on in the country called the khilafat movement uh which Gandhi had led with the idea of bringing Hindu Muslim Unity but it had very diff you know dangerous ramifications the seeds of partition were almost I think uh


the seeds of partition were almost I think uh crystallized around that time because of the the way it was led where on a communal issue of who will sit at in the uh as the sultan or the caliph of uh you know Turkey which the British had won in war you were bartering um you know Muslim support for the Freedom Movement so a lot of Muslims did not participate till then in the Freedom Movement the very little membership of the Congress too so that I think Gandhi's idea was if you show them this uh little carrot saying it's a cause that is very uh dear to some of you so we will support you for that in return you know you participate in the non-cooperation movement now and in return he had promised that within one year the country will become free and we will establish a caliphate a pan-islamist uh you know a very bahabi kind of a movement to establish a caliphate there why should we in India support something like that but that was done


in India support something like that but that was done and when both these things did not work his promises there were lots of you know Hindu genocides that happened in the 1920s including the mopla uh you know Carnage in Malabar in different parts of India and the Hindus were almost being led like a Pied Piper to their you know leading the rats to their uh destruction and that's when savarkar comes up with this document of what what hindutva is which right at the beginning he says this has nothing to do with the theological aspects of Hinduism as a religion or the you know matters of Soul Super Soul all of that this is more of a cultural and a national identity marker so to say you need to have your devotion your affiliation to this nation those who consider this land mass as their punya bhumi not by religion but by your affiliation you don't care whether turkey May consultant you're thinking of this country your punya bhumi and your


thinking of this country your punya bhumi and your pitrubhumi your ancestral where your ancestors come from that person is a Hindu he or she can be um Jain Muslim Parsi seek whatever else but culturally and nationally they would be termed as a Hindu according to savarkar because they're from Hindustan Hindustan and the world saw alhin right from how the Persians and others saws this was to this part of the world was called Hind and so people from there were Hindu for him of course you know that that the very fact that there's a religion by the same name complicates the matter but that was is Hinduism that resists uh you know all kinds of predatory moves on it and also anything that looks at Hindu unification because savarkar's role even you know in ratnagiri uh in the 13 years that I mentioned was on caste eradication very few people today hindutva is equated with you know manuwa then all of that while in reality


know manuwa then all of that while in reality here was a manhood for 13 years stood for a complete elimination of caste not just untouchability as Gandhi was advocating but removal of all kinds of and unifying the entire Hindu Society has one one strong unit so I think the the the misunderstandings that we have of this term as it grew is very unfortunate and we tag him with whatever as you said today's agenda and and today politics also enters that so much so that complicates things further um I have to bring you back to truth and history yes uh do you want to elaborate a little bit on kalapani kalapani to me ranveer I think is one of the most horrific it was the Indian Bastille so to say uh one of the most horrific aspects of our history which unfortunately we don't talk too much about I remember you know going there for my research uh in for savarkar and just the energy of that place and as someone


and just the energy of that place and as someone who's sensitive to energies you can literally feel the kind of suffering that your ancestors who fought for the freedom of this country faced when you know they were hold there they were more than uh you know 300 400 revolutionaries largely the people who are holed up in kalapani along with the hardcore criminals and rapists and murderers and all that were the revolutionaries Congress people never went to kalapani uh this was like the worst of the prisons and the inhuman tortures they are unspeakable you know the basic human rights of facilities of good food good drinking water water or toilet facilities that also is not given to these people uh there was punishments of standing handcuffs your legs tied up for weeks and months and most of the food that was given that would have pieces of reptiles and whatever in it so eating most of that most of the people would uh you know get diarrhea and but they were fixed timings to


get diarrhea and but they were fixed timings to go to the Loo uh and so at any other point of the day if you needed to ease yourself you couldn't go to the toilet and so most of the prisoners they would defecate and urinate in their own cells and you had to sit and you know sit down or sleep and even eat amidst your own squalor which would have been a you know soul-sapping experience and then this koluka Bell punishment as you mentioned earlier where the the Bell that was there the Bullock that would be yoked to the oil grinding machine instead of that you would have the the political prisoner who in the Blazing heat of Port Blair would have to go round and round that and extract about 30 pounds of oil and at the end of the day that would be measured and if it even one ounce less than that you would be whiplashed you would not be given food they were given the worst of you know clothes which would cause skin


worst of you know clothes which would cause skin rashes leeches uh you know biting into their skin but no medical treatment given to them many of these were young people who were in their teens late teens early 20s not more than 30 and the kind of torches many of them lots of them actually committed suicide because they thought death was better than the kind of tortures that were meated to them in fact the British had also started an entire asylum in this place called Hado Island in Port near Port Blair because many of them went mad because they could not bear the kind of tortures that you know they gave them they were not given newspapers to read initially they were not given papers or pen or anything uh even savarkar uh you know he was a prolific poet from his nails and with charcoal he would write on this uh cell walls his poetry in Marathi uh and to spite him the Jailer would come and whitewash uh the wall in front of him


and whitewash uh the wall in front of him but this man had such a precocious memory that uh you know he had memorized all not one or two but four thousand lines of poetry in Marathi called Kamala and saptarshi and all of that which he memorized and came out and those books got published so the kind of uh you know tortures that these people faced as I said earlier it's so easy today exposed factor to sit and pass judgments about all these people but uh do we even know uh you know in Port Blair in the cellular jail there's there are all these uh big walls on which the names of all the people and from which state each of these political prisoners came a lot of them from Bengal Maharashtra some and then you know the United provinces Tamil Nadu Bihar all these places uh when I just stood in front of uh that and just saw that and as I said I felt those energies of these whales and people who probably ended


energies of these whales and people who probably ended their lives in a miserable manner uh it was deeply deeply moved and I remember coming back to my hotel room and breaking down because it took me a lot of effort to get over what I had experienced by just going into that but I I always say I think the kala Pani should be a place of pilgrimage for all you know Indian students to go there and the least we can do as a nation is to pay our gratitude to them uh not forget their names can we list 10 people who suffered in kalapani I don't think our history books do justice to that in our growing up years saying what else do we do at least remember their names and pay them that tribute and gratitude we are celebrating 75 years of Independence today thanks to the Blood Sweat and Toil and life of several of these great men and uh several women and I think we would be very ungrateful as a nation uh if we did


very ungrateful as a nation uh if we did not do that and high time maybe through your show I hope many people who are watching this go to kalapani uh make it a regular part of the itinerary of some of their children or their students or whatever and that's so important intense um were women also part of it no not in kalapani very few uh most of them were men who were put there but women revolutionaries had other kind of I mean they were they they also someone like a Durga bhabi or a madame bhikaji Kama who sacrificed they left their families everything to do what they did uh you know so but what was the logic behind creating such a place it was to break people's spiritual Spirit yes yeah yeah probably the most intense place that the British had built yes and the British talking about human rights and all of that so while we ask them for an apology for jallianwala bagh uh which half-heartedly I think some of them gave including I think the


I think some of them gave including I think the queen when she came here but uh I think we they owe an apology even to to the tortures in calab they owe an apology for several things but kalapani too and for the Bengal famine and all these kind of the worst of tortures and this is not some ancient history or medieval history we're talking of this was about 100 years ago or less than that so I think uh you know just being aware just but imagine we've not been told about it in this kind of graphic detail uh and so we don't think it is a big deal uh you know so information is par so once that knowledge comes into uh our control then I think change naturally follows association with nathuram godse that was the other name that came up in my research yeah um I'd love to hear about say as well let's hear that side of so again this is not me supporting God say what he did I don't think that death is uh


what he did I don't think that death is uh the answer to anything honestly assassination assassination yeah I don't think someone else's life is in your hands to take yeah so I'm I'm kind of I'm almost against but I'd love to understand his motivations and how Veer sarkar is associated with him or with his side of the story yeah God say is a very uh interesting character that way I mean do we uh did we know like even the name it's nathuram so uh his his parents apparently had uh several uh all the male child uh who would be born in the family they would die and they thought it was because of some curse or something and so of some God and so they said uh they they tried to conceal the gender of this child and they used to put a nut to him you know uh the maharashtrian nose ring and so that's how he got his name nathuram uh which uh they thought because of if you make him a girl then he


because of if you make him a girl then he won't die and he lived on to do what he did he came under the spell of savarkar when he was in ratnagiri and became his secretary his confidante and when savarkar was with the hinduma Sabha as its president he was a very very Ardent uh follower there was a youth Wing within the Hindu masabha of which nathuram and also this other guy called apte narayana together were executed for Gandhi's murder they were um you know um uh they were part of this youth Wing they were very trusted confidence but in his uh testimony in court God say himself mentions uh that you know as we came closer to Independence savarkar became almost a pacifist uh you know he said we are now going to get freedom and uh so there's we should support the new government it's now a government off and for and by Indians and not uh Outsiders and so we need to stop uh you


Outsiders and so we need to stop uh you know being against Gandhi and nehru and all of these people which some of these Hot Blooded young men within the mahasabha Hindu Masa power against and he would say being one of them how old was he at the time it must be in his 30s yeah so uh that's one reason they decided to break away from him and in fact there's this anecdote that he mentions saying you know when Gandhi was uh and that was a peak of the partition and people were seeing the kind of uh you know refugees who are coming from their Trains full of copses and all of that women being raped and houses being plundered so and now Kali and the direct action what was happening in Bengal uh all of that was something that a lot of people including people like God say were seeing and they were blaming Gandhi for uh you know not taking enough action rightly or wrongly but then they were blaming him for uh


wrongly but then they were blaming him for uh letting things come to this pass where in front of you there is a massacre uh I wish the partition had been planned better but that's because a British left in haste uh just as what they uh you know the Americans did in Afghanistan and most colonizing powers are that they leave the country they colonized to their to the vultures and and uh and they go away and what happens is bloodbath after they leave so something similar happened in the subcontinent and all these young men who were uh you know aroused by that they want they were seeking revenge and so in fact uh in my research I came across that God said they were not a professional Killers or anything they had all kinds of plans to take revenge they wanted to cross over to Pakistan and bomb the Pakistan assembly when it was in session to kill Jinnah and all these people uh you know as a retribution that was obviously it failed because how do you manage to cross


obviously it failed because how do you manage to cross over and get ammunition and all that then they wanted to loot the nizam's treasury uh you know uh because nizam wanted to affiliate with Pakistan but for Sardar Patel we would not have had Hyderabad then around 12th of January 1948 when Gandhi made his call that if the Indian government does not give 50 crores or so to Pakistan as promised he will go on a fast and to death at the same time when Pakistani forces were incur they were incursions into Kashmir by the tribes and all those people that is when these people said this guy needs to be bumped off because uh you know he's a national security threat because uh at a time when Pakistan is attacking us why do we need to be so virtuous saying we promised you 50 crores we will give you and they are going to use that money to arm themselves against us so and for that this man is going on a hunger strike unto death and


man is going on a hunger strike unto death and so these people 12th uh January just about 18 days before Gandhi was finally murdered uh was when they hatched the plot and in my book I detailed the entire thing based on about 11 000 pages of court documents that I found in the National Archives of India saying how these people went about it was a sham of an uh you know Arrangement they made an attempt on Gandhi's life on 20th uh Jan almost 10 days before his murder that was an aborted attempt the police trees of Delhi of Bombay knew that Gandhi's life was under threat but he was not given enough security which was again a big mystery as to why that happened there was so much of information lapses and finally Gandhi was a Sitting Duck uh emotions of all these people yes it was largely a very very charged atmosphere was charged not only God say I mean when Gandhi went on this fast there were refugees who were coming in


this fast there were refugees who were coming in from Pakistan side who were in Delhi living on footpaths and all of that and they were shouting protests when Gandhi was in birla house saying let him die because we have lost our families our you know everything our property everything and come here and this man is supporting the same people and so that sort of charged atmosphere that was there even in Delhi in the heart of the national capital uh was something that probably inspired many of these people to pick up the gun and do what they did which I don't endorse at all as you rightly said um heinous crime like a murder is something that needs to be condemned but because he had this past affiliation with savarkar savarkar got dragged into the entire case uh and there was some police approvers called digambar badge who gave this uh you know sham of a story that God said went to savarkar's house in dadar in Mumbai where he's supposed to have told


in Mumbai where he's supposed to have told them in Marathi that yes you know be successful and come back and that was a bunkum story some uh you know gossip there's no way to corroborate that with any evidence and on the basis of all this uh you know fixed match that it was savarkar was implicated in the case by then he suffered two heart attacks he was almost you know half dead uh there was no way that he would have done all this when as I said he was pacifist he was wanting to cooperate with the new government but he got implicated in it and there was the Red Fort trials that went on for one long year and seeing all the evidence the judge exonerated him among all the people other than the approval most of them served 15 16 years of sentence God said were hanged but savarkar was honorably exonerated by the court and as recently as now ranveer in 2018 there was someone who filed a pil in the in the


someone who filed a pil in the in the Supreme Court saying savarkar's name was implicated in the Kapoor commission which was set up much later in the 60s to reinvestigate Gandhi's murder and this man called pankaj fardness who filed this he wanted the court to relocate it and exonerate savarkar now the Supreme Court appointed an amicus curate to go over all the documents and after one and a half years a bench headed by Justice bobday who was the cji later and Justice nageshwar Rao they gave a verdict in 2018 four years ago that the plaintiff's petition that savarkar's name is part of the conspiracy is null and void the high court the the trial court in Delhi what it exonerated him in 1948 that holds and this insinuation is wrong now something like when the Supreme Court of the country exonerates someone I think somewhere you should respect the court and the laws of the land and the matter should light to rest but then politics enters


matter should light to rest but then politics enters the whole thing and time and again you have have these kind of insinuations made against him is his image being cleaned up now as it rightfully should because of the current government to an extent I think they've brought the focus back on him you know when you have that very powerful image of the Prime Minister of India going to Cellular jail walking through those scary you know ramparts uh where you can literally if you are sensitive you can hear the howls and screams of all those people and to also sit in savarkarcel and pay his tribute just that one iconic symbol I think does a lot to make people curious at least saying who is this person who to whom you know the prime minister of India is going and paying Obi senses too and I think those who are opposed to him by time and again raking up his issue or uh calumizing him they are further you know arousing curiosity particularly about the in among


you know arousing curiosity particularly about the in among the young people because as I said earlier I think the forbidden fruit is always the tastiest so the more you berate someone the more the Curiosities among people to know what is the truth is it really what is made out to be so I think there is a renewed interest in the man his legacy what he stood for he had failings a lot of them and in my books have been quite brutal even about his failings but an understanding of the person the last first biography ranveer of his in English at least was written when he was alive in the 1960s by dhananjay kir from then till now so many biographies of Gandhi nehru all these people and rightly so you must reevaluate historical characters but savarkar would never open for re-evaluation and assessment he was literally a Persona non-grata any talk about him you would even lose your job so someone of the Eminence of Pandit mangeshkar in the 1960s uh


of Pandit mangeshkar in the 1960s uh you know since savarkar was a prolific poet in Marathi and the mangeshkar family was very close to him so some of savarkar's poems which are iconic in Marathi you know and there's this other very moving poem so all these poems uh you know had tuned and Sagara was particularly it was sung by lataji and Asha ji and all the sister sisters and can you believe it for that crime of actually picking up his poem and this was Independent India in the 60s he got a show cause notice from all India radio where he was working uh saying can you explain why you chose this so we had this conversation of someone being a person or non-greata so just an illustration saying what is the level of demonization of a human being so ritenaji gets this show cause notice and in return very nonchalantly he says good poem great poet and that should be reason enough to pick the poem tune it


be reason enough to pick the poem tune it and sing what was the General emotion in the poem well that was uh you know savarkar had written it while he was in London uh you know and uh he was on the sea seashore in Brighton uh and he was so overwhelmed with emotion and he shines the uh ocean the Sagara saying you cheated me and brought me here uh saying I'll get better education and I can be of some use to my matrubhumi but I am here stuck here and not being able to do what I do the Revolutionary movement had unraveled by then so there was a lot of frustration that was built up so uh his friend niranjan pal bipin Chandra Pal's son who was with him uh he says that almost uh extemporaneously he broke into tears and he composed this poem uh extempor and started singing it uh in his own way and that poem tuned in a different way now for that crime of doing that and for


way now for that crime of doing that and for the show cause notice answer that he gave he lost his job in less than a week he was sacked from all India you and that is the freedom of expression Liberty all of that that we talk of that you know in a democracy as I said earlier even for these historians and others you can have differences of opinion you can have a differing viewpoint but even a discussion around that is not possible uh today at least we we're having a mainstream conversation on this a publisher like penguin has the you know uh gumption to publish a two volume biography on him in the 60s you know I might have been put in jail or the book would have been banned or anything like this would have happened so obviously when the people who are you know in the creative space they know the mind of the ruler that you do anything you are going to you know face it uh the consequences with loss of livelihood loss of job and all that


with loss of livelihood loss of job and all that who would want to venture into that and that is why many of them including savarkar became you know unsung heroes and you know several things that came out in the course of the research of this book how do we even know particularly in Maharashtra after just as we had the 1984 anti-seek riots the horrific riots in Delhi in 1948 just flipped the digits you had an anti-maharashtrian Brahmin Carnage across Maharashtra really spearheaded by several goons of the Congress and this was as a retaliation against Gandhi's murder the same people who were singing songs of non-violence and nahimsa when their leader is assassinated and that is a horrible crime no uh condoning of that the crime is perpetrated against members of the caste to which God say belong which was a maharashtrian Brahmin and so several uh you know Maharashtra and brahmins were killed in different parts of Maharashtra they lost their


killed in different parts of Maharashtra they lost their property there was ethnic cleansing of several Villages no cases filed none of it and so I put out on Twitter in fact you know saying I'm doing something on this and if you have family stories uh can you give to me and I was deluged with information that came from everyone saying this happened to my grandmother my grandfather my uncle my this and that and I also interviewed a couple of people who were in their 90s who were eyewitnesses to what happened and uh horrific tales as to how in those three two weeks or so of Mayhem following Gandhi's murder so many of them lost everything that they had for no crime of theirs just because they belong to the same community and the police didn't register Firs there was no justice to all these people and just think of it history they say repeats itself if you are not listening for the first time if I think we as a nation or as a


if I think we as a nation or as a government if we had taken a strong stand against this that if someone is a political leader is assassinated uh members of the community of the Assassin should not face uh you know this kind of music maybe the anti-secretes would not have happened and many people would have been saved after what happened to Indira Gandhi so by but then we've let all this under the table but interestingly ranveer I mean I asked the people whom I interviewed if I could put out their identity out in public 90 of them said we'd prefer to be anonymous uh because the perpetrators of uh you know the crime their descendants and their whatever you know Associates are still in positions of a lot of power in Maharashtra and outside these were obviously maharashtrians themselves yes yes but then their successors are still very politically uh you know powerful so we've moved on we've rebuilt Our Lives which were shattered uh in the aftermath of this we


were shattered uh in the aftermath of this we don't want to we want to give you the information but please let us remain anonymous and let us be happy in our lives which we have rebuilt uh so I think you know history also offers you that space to heal uh the wounds of the past and we need to do that with our history it's not just recent history all the other atrocities right from the ancient times whatever when we fabricate when we do subterfuge when we whitewash crimes uh particularly of genocide AIDS of murders of all of that I think that somewhere that unhealed energy keeps coming out and affecting future Generations we need a Truth and Reconciliation with our history it's not revenge stories it's not retribution it's not uh you know demonizing somebody or a community or group just make peace with your past get done with it and I think move on to build a better future and history should give us that very important lesson as to how these mistakes of the


very important lesson as to how these mistakes of the past should never occur again how long did the British rule over India roughly 200 plus 250 yeah but yes we weren't independent for the last thousand years yeah true true so our generation is basically the First Independent Indian generation true which is what a lot of young people fail to understand yeah maybe because we've not sensed not perceiving Freedom so what that feels like true you take freedom for granted uh and I've learned about Freedom through the Special Forces soldiers that I've seen on the show who served in places like Sudan where Freedom isn't a thing for those people in everyday life so you kind of start valuing what you have as an Indian uh and that's made me think about what lessons we should learn from the past this divide and Rule situation has been used against us for a thousand years true not just by the British but everyone who ever invaded they turned one brother against the other yeah uh and we're kind of seeing a


the other yeah uh and we're kind of seeing a repeat of that even now on places like Twitter with left wing versus writing true that uh India's biggest problem right now is probably happening from inside the country yeah where two sides are fighting each other yeah rather than understanding that where the fastest growing economy in the world yeah and we should be looking outward and figuring out how to sell Indian products and services and make money yeah and become a richer country uh which is actually what China has done yeah they've become rich first then become powerful yeah but China has managed to do that ranveer because they've set the Grand China narrative as to and they've made peace with their past they have told the stories of their past in the way it needs to be told uh we did not do that I think you know even for an individual if you have had a troubled past growing up years you have your inner child healing all of that that needs to happen right so it's


of that that needs to happen right so it's same with a nation and a civilization anything that is wounded needs healing it needs to only then you can move ahead uh with confidence with closure uh if that doesn't happen then the ghosts of the past will keep hurting you will keep coming uh you know by your backside and there's no way you can escape you can push it away for some time but it will come again so I think we have not done that and as I said when you cover up something and you think you put all the muck under the carpet and you put some deodorant on it and the the smell stench won't raise that is a wrong way of going about things it will once the deodorants power you know comes down the stench is going to show up and we need to have as I said an honest assessment of our past make complete peace with it tell the truth as it is don't look at history as a tool for uh you know for contemporary political


as a tool for uh you know for contemporary political correctness or think that you know this edifice of national Unity as you see it or social cohesion it cannot rest on the faulty foundations of fabricated history so don't think if you say say the truth some Community today will get uh you know affected or they will feel bad and so we need to cover up we need to make stories up that never helps so say things as they are and move ahead wow you have a lot to share man I'd love to actually unpack a little more in our next conversation I think you have stuff to share even beyond the British uh and Beyond the Indian Freedom struggle you're a fan of History just like the Watchers and listeners of this show so any final message to the people who've listened to this point I thought I gave my fable speech already about how maybe you can just tell people how to support you more I'm probably assuming that you're active on Twitter that's your yes yes social plan for Instagram a little bit


your yes yes social plan for Instagram a little bit no not so much of an insta person but more on Twitter yeah and I think uh reading uh helps as you know my alma matter bits pilani had that is the uh tagline and I I truly believe in it uh knowledge is power Supreme so the more you read read every shade of opinion uh keep the windows of your mind open uh particularly when it comes to a subject like history and those of the viewers who are interested in history they should read Left Right Center whatever uh you know ideology the writer is and imbibe differing viewpoints and make up your own mind so I mean I'm not evangelizing my book and say all of you should read my savarkar book you read them at the same time you read also someone who's written an inimical by biography of his or a book of his and you make up your mind after reading all of that what you make of the person or of the other you know these bravehearts of


or of the other you know these bravehearts of Bharat you read other people who have written about maybe the same person and make up your own mind you can love to love somebody or love to hate someone but let your love or hatred be informed let it not be based on rhetoric on assumptions on misnomers political propaganda and what your relatives have told you what your relatives and your peers have told you or what social media informs you use this important tool which God has given us to make up your own mind on the basis of information informed opinion is always powerful and that is my only message to everyone who's tuned in all right thank you so much thank you thank you so much that was the episode for today amongst a bunch of these history related topics so also spoke to me about his life in the modern day how he's criticized for a lot of his work how he's trolled how he is subjected to a lot of online hate because he's trying


to a lot of online hate because he's trying to really uncover aspects of history that aren't out there yet I feel history all over the world is being Rewritten the Indian Freedom Movement should also be Rewritten in some aspects that's the one thing I've got to learn through this podcast not just this episode but this podcast in general talking to people like Abhijit chavra talking to people like Vikram sampath it's been a re-education process for me and through my re-education I hope that even you The Listener the viewer gets re-educated because we're in charge of this beautiful country now we owe it to the people who helped us gain freedom once again let's relearn history and let's put forward the new proof-backed history that we're learning through these great historians for more episodes like this make sure you follow us on Spotify every episode's available on Spotify 48 hours before it's available anywhere else in the world make sure you download level super mind as well it's my way of helping my country


as well it's my way of helping my country and my country's culture and helping push it on a world stage make sure you check it out it will benefit you in forming habits in learning about meditation learning about yoga and lots more until next time guys I'm ranveer the ranveer show will be back [Music] thank you


I had a Maserati I had a Mini Cooper John John Cooper Works gcw Cabrio 211 horsepower red beautiful my favorite actually it was a mango bought a Ferrari I am a monk who sold his Maserati when you grow too fast you know to Grow Rich too fast you don't know how to handle your wealth then I think you kind of get lost and you become too materialistic and you lose your good friends and like we said in the beginning life is more about love and relationships and God so I think I started losing those good things when an innocent girl or a guy and she's possessed and then she says I'm from this place I'm from that place and you have never heard of such place until you verify and you realize that there was such a place that somebody had fallen down a Gorge and drowned or killed or whatever and just very unhappy and just wandering around looking for Liberation welcome to rgo presents the ranveer our spirit virtual podcast because truly after


ranveer our spirit virtual podcast because truly after doing so many episodes I believe that it boils down to your spiritual sensibilities when it comes to long-term happiness and peace so when we're speaking about achieving it in style of course there's a material side to things there's a money-oriented family-oriented side of things but true peace happiness and curiosity are fueled because of spiritual conversations just like this had countless conversations about Hinduism on the show this is our first buddhism-centric conversation with palga rinpoche went to some dark places as well he's got an incredible life story he's a monk who adopted the monk life very early on in his own life left it in his young adulthood went to Europe need a lot of money and then figured that money is not the answer came back and continued his monkey Journey right from the place he left this conversation also goes to some mystical places so whether you're trying to learn about Buddhism whether you're trying to get a dark


Buddhism whether you're trying to get a dark energy Rush from this episode or whether you're trying to answer your own spiritual questions you will enjoy this particular episode if I let you slip into it remember this look has been styled by agio so if you want to be fashionable just like fashion bhaiya make sure you check out the options available at rgo and of course as with any TRS episode our episodes are available on Spotify 48 hours before they're available anywhere else in the world because whereas Spotify exclusive our meditation app level is now live on the apps on the Play store and now I'll let you slip into another epic spiritual conversation of azure presents TRS baby [Music] thank you our first shoot in our new studio and I could not have wished for a more meaningful guest welcome sir welcome home thank you it was such an important moment in my life meeting you for the first time because I was fully torn apart I was very broken and uh I think we were in


was very broken and uh I think we were in a room with my level team and often the burden of leadership is that you can't show all your emotions in front of your whole team it's just what captains is about and I knew that when I was talking to you you knew exactly what was on in my head I feel like my life has gone just upward after meeting you so I don't know what you did and I'm also kind of a little bit broken in life right now as we speak and I know you can tell uh that I'm not okay even now uh I think you're doing very well no thank you sir uh again here I talk about emotions and I think that's what the world doesn't understand you know Johnny Depp says that I hope that everyone becomes rich and famous to understand that that's not the answer I feel like I've reached that place in life where you realize love means so much more and God means so much more than all these material things true


means so much more than all these material things true now I'll ask you how are you sir I'm good uh thank you so much I just came to Bombay briefly uh for some commitments and on top of that list my wish list on top of that was to try to meet you and I'm really happy to be meeting you and I'm really fortunate to have this opportunity today to speak with you on your wonderful show in this beautiful office so congratulations thank you so thank you uh really I feel you know the people who visit a particular space leave a bit of themselves here and since our space got renovated I feel like all the old energies have also kind of gotten renovated that's why I'm so happy to have you first here I just wanted to start with a kind of shubh Murat but let's get straight into it also uh you've had like a very interesting life to say the least uh if you had to speak about the story of your life in four sentences what


about the story of your life in four sentences what do those four sentences be um four sentences difficult let me try Okay uh to be recognized as a Reincarnation of the previous um to have slept on the sidewalk when I was extremely poor uh to have experienced extreme wealth at a very early age I was 26 something I was already a multi-millionaire and having driven all the big cars slept in big hotels worn the big clothes and then the fourth one would be to realize that like you said love God um you know inner happiness those things are more important than materialistic things so yeah yeah that was the introduction to palgar and poche and his story no actually let's get into the story sure what's your earliest memory in Life or do you just remember things from your previous birth did you come with those memories um frankly and honestly speaking um when I was young I used to remember a lot about my previous life I used to remember being murdered being killed


life I used to remember being murdered being killed um the previous Bulgarian was killed by the Chinese Invasion invading forces when China invaded Tibet in 1959 so he stayed back and um to protect his Monastery in eastern Tibet and um he got tortured and killed so um like I remember those uh brief moments of torture and some pain and to being killed that was I think one of my earliest memories of my life to remember the torture and the trauma of previous life what has Tibet historically been because there's a lot of Indians and probably even International listeners who don't know enough about Tibet but Tibet has its own very mystical very spiritual history uh draw out a picture if you can a little bit based on I want to say what you remember from your past life but I'm a little embarrassed to say that yeah but what is Tibet um in a nutshell Tibet is a protected uh Heaven um where Buddhism thrived and


protected uh Heaven um where Buddhism thrived and survived not only survived but thrived uh they were protected by the mountains of the Himalayas and Buddhism which was founded in India by Gautam Buddha and then it was transported to Tibet uh all the Sanskrit teachings and Pali teachings were translated very uh rigorously very truthfully word by word into boti which is Tibetan language and uh Tibetan language we call it boti boating because it's a Himalayan language actually so we don't call it the Tibetan language anymore um so that's a place where the teachings of the Buddha were studied contemplated practiced and taught for centuries so Tibet is mainly known for the teachings of the Buddha yeah what is the born religion the bond religion from what I know and I do have some friends who belong to Born religion born religion was the actual religion of Tibet before Buddhism was introduced to Tibet and


before Buddhism was introduced to Tibet and born religion it's very similar has many similarities to uh Buddhism I think they put a lot of emphasis also on shamanism besides the core philosophy which is similar to Buddhism they put a lot of emphasis on Shamanism also okay okay uh because from what I understand when Buddhism expanded outside of India it Incorporated many of the local traits in order to expand itself so I am assuming that the Buddhism that's mainly followed in Tibet is sort of a fusion of born as well as Buddhist yes understanding yes you're very right uh we did borrow a lot of elements from uh the bond religion for example I think uh I think I'm right to say uh the drum there's a hand drum a small hand drum that I think was mainly used um by Shaman practitioners and also I think in India damru was prevalent so even though it was not a Tibetan thing or a Himalayan thing it


a Tibetan thing or a Himalayan thing it I think it was borrowed from other cultures uh also I think there is this uh small trumpet which is made from the femur the leg I think I think it's the femur I'm not really sure of a human yeah of the human leg if somebody's somebody dies um so they would just go and you know they will check out the leg it's a good looking leg especially if it's uh I think a footballer's leg would be very very healthy one the bone density would be crazy but then they would just check the leg and you know ask for the family because people I think in Tibet many parts of Tibet they don't actually burn the body they call it sky burial so they chop up the body and they offer it to the vultures as an offering wow okay okay uh while I began asking you about your life and previous life I want to actually talk a little bit more about Tibet and what significance does it


bit more about Tibet and what significance does it have with respect to both China and India okay so roughly in about 1959 the Chinese uh invaded Tibet in order to expand their own country because the Chinese Communist party has an expansionist policy they're always trying to get more land it's just how their idea yes uh they basically went to Tibet and said now you're a part of our country it's kind of like what the British did in India yes that forced a lot of Tibetans especially people following Buddhism to come down to India and they settled in Himachal Pradesh mainly if I'm not mistaken if I said anything wrong yes no no this is what happened yes um and they were accepted and protected by the Indian government which is why the Dalai Lama sits in um why did you join your hands when I said just his name we respect him so much introduce us to this uh I don't know whether you can introduce someone who who is enlightened you know no