Image Courtesy: Twitter/Narendra Modi
In a series of tweets, the Prime Minister said;
“I bow to two greats sons of Maa Bharti, Lokmanya Tilak and Chandra Shekhar Azad on their birth anniversary. These two stalwarts epitomise courage and patriotism. Sharing what I had spoken about them during #MannKiBaat a few years ago.”
“One of the everlasting legacies of Lokmanya Tilak is the large-scale Ganesh Utsavs, which ignited a spirit of cultural consciousness among the people. During one of my Mumbai visits, I visited the Lokmanya Seva Sangh, which has a close association with Lokmanya Tilak.”
I bow to two greats sons of Maa Bharti, Lokmanya Tilak and Chandra Shekhar Azad on their birth anniversary. These two stalwarts epitomise courage and patriotism. Sharing what I had spoken about them during #MannKiBaat a few years ago. pic.twitter.com/GuhXVxWZfa
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) July 23, 2022
Chandra Shekhar Tiwari, popularly known as Chandrashekhar Azad (23 July 1906 — 27 February 1931) was an Indian revolutionary who organized and led a band of youth during India’s independence movement.
Azad was born on 23 July 1906, as Chandra Shekhar Tiwari in Bhavra village of Madhya Pradesh in the family of Pandit Sitaram Tiwari and Jagrani Devi. Azad’s mother asked his father to send their son to Kashi Vidyapeeth in Varanasi. He was deeply affected by the massacre in Amritsar’s Jallianwala Bagh in 1919. He joined the freedom struggle in 1921 while he was just a school student. Azad lost his life in a face-off with the British police in Alfred Park in Allahabad on 27 February 1931. After single-handedly fighting the police for a while with just a pistol and a few cartridges, Azad shot himself in the head, fulfilling his vow of dying as a free man and not as a British captive. The Colt pistol of Chandra Shekhar Azad is displayed at the Allahabad Museum.
Bal Gangadhar Tilak (23 July 1856 – 1 August 1920) was a scholar, mathematician, philosopher, and radical nationalist who helped lay the foundation of India’s independence. He founded the ‘Indian Home Rule League’ in the year 1914 and was its president in 1916 signing the Lucknow Pact with Muhammad Ali Jinnah. He started the work of awakening the political consciousness of the people through two weekly newspapers, Kesari in Marathi and The Maratha in English.
Tilak’s views were a bit more extreme for the moderate party of the Indian National Congress. His prominent slogan was “Swaraj is our birthright and I will have it.” Taking a resolution to use his free time for some good work, he devoted it to the reading of his favourite books Bhagavad Gita and Rigveda.